Chapter 3
In the morning, Jackie had to go into New York. It was late in the afternoon when she got home, and in the driveway was a red Volkswagen, its roof rack piled so high with duffel that the thought of going around a sharp turn in the car made Jackie shudder.
Peter met her as she came in the door, and for a fleeting second she thought he was going to kiss her. There was something proprietary about his manner. But he didn't. She heard the sound of young male voices in the living room.
"They arrived about twenty minutes ago," Peter said, jerking his thumb toward the archway to the front room. "And Bob called from Maine a while ago and said he wouldn't be home till tomorrow afternoon. Can we-can you-put these guys up overnight?"
"Sure," Jackie said. "There are two other rooms up there with twin beds. And on the third floor there's the big room the housekeeper lives in when she's home, and another room with a double bed."
"I didn't mean is there room for them." He was looking directly at her, and Jackie saw a faint flush rising at his cheekbones.
"Well," she said, smiling, and saw his flush deepen. He was blushing, actually blushing; and Jackie had thought that blushing had gone out with Louisa May Alcott and the parasol. "But aren't you a little tired today?"
"No," Peter said. "Never."
"You're wonderful," Jackie said lightly. "But I think it would look better if you introduced me to your friends. Or are they just Bob's friends?"
"Mine too," Peter said, and moved at her side through the archway into the living room.
The talking stopped and the four boys stood up as she entered the room. They looked at her in an awkward silence. They all wore blue jeans or faded khaki pants, and nondescript sport shirts, and every one of them needed a haircut. They exuded an air of youth and good health and a kind of smoldering animal vitality that Jackie sensed immediately. There was something almost frightening, she thought, about all that restlessly subdued young energy. They were all at least as tall as Peter, and the tallest one must have stood around six three. He was the only one who looked old enough, Jackie thought, to even have a senior driver's license. He had wavy chestnut hair, the tall one. He might have been all of nineteen.
Peter gave him some sort of seniority by introducing him first.
"This is Andy Ballinger," he said, and the tall boy nodded. "And..."
"First names will be enough," Jackie said, laughing. "Please. I'll have trouble enough keeping first names straight."
"And Hank and Steve and Walter." They all nodded, not taking their eyes off her. The one called Hank had his mouth hanging open, but she had no way of knowing whether or not that condition was permanent. He was a redhead. The other two were blond, blonder than usual probably because of the sun, but not as blond as Peter.
"And this is Mrs. Rankin," Peter said. "But even you guys had that figured out." She smiled at them and went over to the recliner and sat down, swinging her legs up, careful to keep her knees together under her short skirt.
"Sit down, please," she said. They sat, without taking their eyes off her.
"You're really Bob's mother?' the tall one asked. There was honest incredulity in his voice.
"Nobody else," she said, pleased despite herself.
"You look more like his sister," Andy said.
"Some sister," the redhead said. She was pleased to see that his mouth did not always hang open.
"Bob won't be back until tomorrow," Jackie said. "But I want you all to stay. There's plenty of room."
"We wouldn't think of putting you out," Andy said. The words did not come easily, and Jackie had the feeling that he was not used to using polite, middle-class clich‚s. She felt a sudden strong rapport with him. It wasn't easy for her either.
"I wouldn't think of letting you leave," Jackie said. "It'll be a party for me. I'm a sort of frustrated Pearl Mesta." Frustrated, Jackie thought Some word. "Besides, I want to get to know Bob's friends. I don't meet many of you."
"This bunch ought to be enough, for a while," Peter said. She looked at him sharply, but saw that he hadn't meant anything. He was just jealous of sharing her socially.
Jackie stood up.
"Ii you're anything like my son," she said, "you're probably all starving. I'll go out and get a couple of steaks, but you'll have to move the Volks, so I can get out of the driveway."
Andy started toward the door, digging for his car keys.
"You can bring whatever you need and take showers while I'm shopping," she said. "Take the two front rooms. There's one bathroom between them, and you can use the other one too while I'm gone." It gave her a tingling sensation inside, thinking of all that healthy tanned young muscle running around naked upstairs.
"Thanks very much, Mrs. Rankin," the sandy-haired one named Steve said. "You're much too good to us."
"It's my pleasure," she said. "And call me Jackie."
She nodded slightly with her head toward Peter, and he followed her out to the porch.
"I trust you haven't breathed a word to the boys about yesterday?"
"Don't worry about me," Peter said. Tm the original Sphinx."
She reached out and squeezed his resting cock, fondly.
When she got back from her marketing they were all back in the living room, fresh-showered, in clean shirts, looking younger in their neatness than they had seemed travel-wrinkled. They all smelled faintly of soap, or at least she imagined they did, from the look of them. And Andy, the tall one, had shaved; a tiny patch of toilet tissue adhered to a cut on one side of his chin.
"There's two cases of cold beer on the back seat of my car," she said, and Steve and Walter sprang up and headed for the door. "I hope you all drink beer."
"They sure do," Andy said. He's like a den mother with this group, Jackie thought And if she really wanted to show them how much she belonged on their scene, she should have brought them some pot, probably; but where would you look for it, in a supermarket?
"Peter, there's charcoal under the back porch. Maybe you and Andy could get a fire started in the grill, while Hank helps them put the beer in the refrigerator. I'm going up to take a shower and change." She sounded like a den mother herself, she realized. She turned for a second at the foot of the stairs and saw Hank looking at her with his mouth open again. He looked as if he wanted very much to come up and help her.
After she'd taken a shower and dried herself she stood in front of the mirror, completely nude, and looked at herself. She felt strangely exhilarated, having all those healthy young animals in her house. She saw her nipples start to tighten, in the mirror, and turned away quickly. Enough of that, she thought
In the bedroom, she started thinking about what to wear. Something appropriate for a den mother. A Mother Hubbard, she thought taking a wisp of a black net bra from a drawer and putting it on. Blue jeans and moccasins. Culottes and sensible shoes.
She drew on Bikini-size white nylon panties, and started rummaging through her sweater drawer until she found a thin, soft, bright-red sweater, and put it on. It fitted tightly over her breasts, snugged in sharply under them, and molded her waist and hips. They might as well have a den mother they can look at least, she thought defiantly.
In another drawer, she found bright red stretch pants to match the sweater. They fitted precisely as firmly as her skin, and the tiny ridges at the hips caused by the panties bothered her. She peeled off the stretch pants, stepped out of the panties, and pulled the stretch pants back on. That was better. There wasn't a wrinkle or a bulge anywhere, from hips to ankles. The hair on her pubic mound made a hint of a bulge at the crotch, before the pants dimpled at her cunt, then clung faithfully to every swell and contour from the waist down.
She turned sideways and looked at the mirror over her dressing table. Those bright red pants did something sensational for her ass, she noticed, making it stand out, round, tempting, provocative, a being all in itself.
Satisfied, she ran a comb through her tumbled mass of shining black hair, stepped into her ballet slippers, and ran for the head of the stairs.
She felt as young and innocent, for that moment, as her guests downstairs.
Almost.