The Touch Ch. 07

WARNING TO READERS - This is a long, rambling, multi-part story and VERY British. The individual chapters will make more sense if read in sequence.

Pt.7 A Family Christmas

Christmas Eve was quiet at the garden centre. Jack had the day off to be with his family; Mrs. Cardew had left on Friday and Maggie was spending the day with the twins, Lucinda and Lauren and had invited Emma to go into town with them shopping that morning. So it was just me and the lads. By lunch time we had cleared away the remnants of the holly sprigs, taken down and packed most of the Christmas gifts and decorations in the shop, and I had bagged up the roots of the three small trees that were left. I intended planting them out in the grounds once the building work was completed. I closed up and we all went down to the pub for a ploughman's lunch and a drink, then wished each other a Merry Christmas and went our own ways.

Maggie and I had discussed what to do about the Christmas holiday period that year. With the builders starting work immediately after New Year it seemed pointless opening to the public for a few days. In the end we decided to give everybody the week off as a paid holiday; a special thank you present for all the hard work they had put in, and re-open for business on the 2nd of January. Obviously, there would be jobs to do at the centre, the greenhouses needed to have the heating and water systems monitored daily, plants like animals cannot be left totally unattended for days at a time, but Jack had volunteered to come in a couple of mornings and I was happy to do the rest. So everybody had a long holiday to look forward to.

I got home and pushed my moped into the garage, I would not need it again that evening as we were all going to Maggie's for drinks and would take Mum's car. I was surprised to see her VW in the drive as I had not expected her home from work until later. I let myself in by the kitchen door leaving my boots and coat in the lobby, and then quickly peered into each of the downstairs rooms. Mum was obviously upstairs somewhere and I silently dived into the stairs cupboard and pulled out the bag of presents I had hidden there and placed them under the tree with the others. I noticed that there were no presents from Dad, again this year; we had not even received a Christmas card. I really didn't mind, I had, long ago, got over him leaving, but I was afraid that Emma would be hurt and disappointed.

I needed to shower and change before going out tonight and so started up the stairs, my thick wool socks making absolutely no sound. The staircase doglegs at the top and as my eyes came level with the upstairs landing I glanced across. Mum's bedroom door was standing wide open and I caught sight of a movement and for some reason paused and stood on the stairs peering through the banisters, my eyes at floor level.

Mum had obviously just come out of the en suite bathroom and was standing in the centre of the room totally naked, hers arms up holding a towel and drying her hair. Her back was to me and her buttocks looked tight and round and glistened slightly with the residue of the hot bath water and I could clearly see a single droplet of moisture running slowly down the curvature of her back. As I watched, entranced, she turned around, half facing the door, I quickly ducked down and then peered through the banisters again, she had not moved and showed no signs of having seen me. I now had a full frontal view of her petite body; her pert breasts had large dark aureolas and neat button nipples and despite her age showed no signs of sagging. Her belly was a small, firm, neat mound and a triangle of honey blonde hair half concealed her pussy, just the merest shadow of darkness indicating where the lips began. She lowered her arms and her damp hair cascaded down around her face and shoulders. She was beautiful.

Suddenly I was having difficulty breathing and a massive erection was crowding the inside of my jeans. I slowly and silently backed down the stairs and then tip toed along the hall and back through the kitchen. I stood outside the back door and lit a cigarette and stood smoking and breathing deeply until my hard-on subsided. I had not intended to play peeping Tom, but the experience had been totally erotic.

I went back inside the house and banged the door hard behind me and then clumped up the hall to the bottom of the stairs, "Hello...Mum...are you there?" I shouted, and then started up the staircase carefully stamping my foot on each tread making as much noise as possible in socks. As I got to the top she came out of her room wearing a white towelling dressing gown. "You are home early!" I added in pretended surprise.

"Yes, I thought I would give myself time to change and then make some mince pies and sausage rolls for tomorrow, before we go out." She replied. Then reached up and kissed me on the cheek and gave me a small hug. Her body still felt warm from the bath even through the bathrobe and she was obviously naked beneath the fabric, I could see the tops of her breasts at the neck opening.

I felt a new erection starting and hurriedly stepped away, "That's great, Mum!" I said trying to make my voice sound normal, "I'm going to take a shower and change, and then I'll come down and see if you need a hand."

She did not seem to notice anything unusual and simply answered, "Fine, sweetheart. I will make some tea and coffee." She went back into her room and pushed the door half closed. Through the gap I saw the dressing gown drop to the floor. I fled to my own room and dived onto the bed and lay face down, my erection pressed into the quilt, thinking about Mum's pale, beautiful body.

A few minutes later I heard the front door bang and Emma's footsteps on the stairs and heard her call out "Hi, Mum," as she passed her bedroom door. Then she was tapping on my door. "Jay... are you in there, Jay?" I heard the door opening and quickly grabbed a book from my bedside locker and pretended to be reading. I glanced over my shoulder, I could not stand up because of my all too visible hard on. She came into my room a large department store carrier bag in each hand. She put them down and came over to the bed and held out her pay envelope, again it contained more than half her pay.

"Thanks," I said, "I'm really proud of you, Sis."

"Good," she laughed, "In that case you won't mind waiting for the bathroom...will you!" She stuck her tongue out like a little girl, grabbed her bags and fled down the hall to her room. Less than a minute later I heard the bathroom door close and water start to run in the bath. I now had no choice; it was either wait until Emma had finished or use the en suite in the master bedroom and I was not at all certain that I wanted to stand in the en suite shower looking at the tub thinking about Mum taking her bath earlier. I waited until Emma had finished and then took a long nearly cold shower.

We were all dressed and ready to leave on time. Mum looked stunning in a plain black cocktail dress which hugged her figure and was cut straight at the neck, exposing just the right amount of cleavage and held up with very narrow shoulder strings. Her outfit was finished off with black tights and shoes; tiny silver earrings and a small silver pendant. Neither Mum, nor Maggie ever wore a lot of jewellery. Emma looked the best I had ever seen her look. Her shopping trip with Lucinda, Lauren and Maggie that morning had obviously gone well. I may have never really got on with my cousins but they had always had good taste when it came to buying clothes. She had dressed in a black satin mini skirt with a white strapless top and a lacy black sparkly, bolero jacket which made her look very grown up and sophisticated. I had put on my blue suit over a plain white, open necked shirt.

Drinks at Maggie's on Christmas Eve had become a bit of a tradition. It was always a low key affair for family and a few select friends. There were probably about thirty people there, including several young guys and girls who were either friends of the twins or the children of other guests, I knew most of them either from school or from mixing socially in town. Lucinda and Lauren had requisitioned the dining room and were holding court with most of the young men dancing attendance. Emma and a girl called Kristen, the daughter of Maggie's solicitor, Carl Olsen, were the only other girls in our age group and the four of them became the centre of attention for all the boys. The twins had totally changed in the last year; they had grown into very attractive young women, with a decided flair for flirting. I would guess that they took their late father's looks, as both were quite tall, probably about 5' 7" with slim figures and long, wavy light brown hair which flowed around their faces and over their shoulders, but there was something about their eyes and mouths that reminded you of Maggie. They were both dressed in fashionable designer blue jeans but Lucinda was wearing a bright fuchsia coloured waist shirt, with an embroidered denim jacket, and Lauren had on an impossibly tight pale grey polo neck sweater, which emphasised her tiny waist and made her pointed tits look larger than they actually were. They were identical twins and most people had trouble telling them apart even now, but I had never found it a problem, I just instinctively knew which was which. They had always been closer to Emma than to me but this year we all seemed to have put aside past differences and were getting on quite well.

I had joined the other youngsters in the dining room but was standing in the doorway, sipping a large, single malt scotch and watching Mum and Maggie across the hall in the drawing room. Maggie had on a deep claret coloured velvet evening skirt and matching top and her hair was pulled back in her favourite pony tail style and tied with a small matching velvet bow. I could not help thinking that they were the two most attractive women in the house that night. I felt a small tug at my sleeve and looked round. It was Kristen Olsen, "We are all taking our drinks and going out into the garden for a while," she said, "Are you coming?" I must have missed something whilst I was day dreaming about Maggie and Mum.

"Oh, yes...OK!" I mumbled and looked around, all the others were gone and so I quickly topped up my scotch and followed her out through the French windows. We stood on the terrace for several minutes talking, she was one of those dizzy blondes who giggled a lot and was extremely tactile, touching my arm constantly to emphasise each remark. After a while she said that she needed to pee and went back inside. It was a really mild evening for December and the pundits were predicting a shirt sleeve Christmas Day. I was quite glad to be in the fresh air, it was hot in the house and I am used to being outside most of the day in all weathers.

Maggie had designed the gardens at the rear of the house herself but the work was only partially completed, she just pottered about with it at odd times and Jack brought the big ride on lawn mower up once a week to do the grass. The design blue prints were pinned up on the wall of the office and I had been itching to ask her if I could help work on getting the next phase cleared, laid out and planted. I often sneaked up here in my lunch hour and fantasised about which shrubs, trees and flowers I would plant out if I was given the chance. The others had gone off down to the end of the lawn and were sitting around the lily pool, somebody had found and brought candles, and one of the boys had a guitar and was plucking out the melody of a folk song. I lit a cigarette and strolled slowly towards the flickering candle light when I felt a small soft hand slip into mine. I thought that it was Kristen but on looking around found it to be Lauren.

"Wotcha, Lulu!" I laughed and then paused for a re-action to see if we really were friends again now.

"Wotcha, Jimbo!" she replied with a big smile. Each of us had a pet name we had used as small kids when we all played together and were a friendly family group, before the twins went away to boarding school. Emma was Emms, Lauren was Lulu and Lucinda was Luci and I was Jimbo although Emma always called me Jay. She tugged at my hand and pulled me towards an arbour seat to one side of the lawn and out of sight of the house and the lily pond. We sat down and she crooked her finger at my cigarette, I passed it to her and she took a long drag. I had never seen either of the twins smoke before.

"When are you going to France?" I asked. Maggie was allowing the girls to spend several months in France, staying with an aunt, their late father's sister, skiing and sight seeing before going to university.

"Oh, about the end of January," she replied. "But, I hope the weather is bloody colder than this over there, we need some serious snow if we are going to get some skiing in before the season ends." I could tell that there was something she wanted to talk to me about out of earshot of the others. "You were here when Mummy gave that bloody bastard Ben the push, weren't you? She asked eventually.

I nodded, I was not sure how much to say, they were Maggie's daughters with her first husband Robert De Vere, but 'Ben the Bastard' had been their step father for five years or so and I was not sure about the relationship there.

"Emms told us that you kicked the shit out of him!" she went on, "Well done you.....I wish we had been here to help!" I breathed a sigh of relief, "We both hated the creep," she added," he was really nice to us to start with but that did not last long, but we only had to put up with him during the holidays, poor Mummy had to put up with him all the time." Then added, "They had separate bedrooms after the first year, you know!" I hadn't known that but the thought was oddly comforting, at least he hadn't been shagging Maggie when he was having his affairs.

"It was a pleasure," I said cockily, and meant it, "I couldn't have him pissing Maggie about," then added quickly "she is family after all!"

She put her hand on my bicep and squeezed lightly, "We girls need our own private Rambo to protect us, the three of us all alone up here in this house," she giggled flirtingly, "and it looks as though our big cousin has already volunteered......" Lulu squeezed my muscle again, a bit harder this time, "We can be VERY grateful," she purred, "just wait until Luci gets her hands on this, she will be creaming in her knickers!"

I was totally floored. I hadn't really talked to the twins for two years and they were fifteen year old school girls then, full of giggles and schoolgirl shit, total little twits. Now, I wasn't certain but I think that Lauren was coming on to me, her vocabulary was certainly all grown up. I took a large swig of scotch from my glass and choked, I bent double coughing and spluttering and Lulu was thumping me furiously on the back, and then I was sat upright again and we were both laughing and she had grabbed my cigarettes and was trying to light one with my lighter. The ancient Zippo was a pig and so I took it from her and flicked up a flame, then lit one for myself.

"God, it's starting to get chilly out here!" Lauren said dramatically, and shuffled closer to me on the seat, grabbed my wrist and hooked my arm around her shoulders. I could feel her firm breast pushing against my chest and her thigh tight alongside mine. I glanced down at her and found to my surprise that close up her profile was very much like her mother's. She looked up at me, "Come on then, Rambo," she whispered huskily, "It's your job to protect me now...even from the cold!" She brought her face up closer to mine, "Come on.... kiss me!" She pushed her lips softly against mine and I felt the tip of her tongue exploring the line of my lips and then pressing through into my mouth and met it with my own tongue the tips flicking together. I couldn't stop myself, I brought my hand up and pressed her breast, my thumb seeking and finding the nipple which was already erect. She did not push my hand away or stop kissing me and we sat like that until we heard one of the boys shouting, her name.

"Enough gratefulness for one night," she said. Then kissed the tip of her finger and pressed it against my lips "You've been book marked," she laughed, "I'll pick up where I left off some other time....just remember when Luci comes sniffing around, who got here first!" She jumped up and trotted down the garden. I remained sitting for a bit and then wandered back into the house and poured myself another drink and sat on the doorstep and finished my cigarette. What was that expression the Yanks used, I wondered, 'Kissing Cousins'?

The party broke up about eleven, and everybody pushed off except for the family. I found Mum, Maggie and the twins in the kitchen, the coffee maker was making slurping noises and the delicious smell of hot salt beef was wafting from a heap of foil covering a board on the table close to a basket of hot rolls. It was time for the traditional family Christmas supper, we had done this for as long as I could remember, Dad had even come a couple of years, but normally he was out drinking somewhere on Christmas Eve.

"Where's Emma?" Mum looked around the table.

After a pause, Lucinda said, "I think she may still be trying say good bye to Phil Newman; he has been trying to get his hand up her skirt all night and has probably dragged her into his car to ravish her!"

"Shut up Luci, you are just jealous everybody else is getting some and you are not!" Lauren put in, and then looked at me and winked, then said quietly, "Do your job, Rambo.....go and rescue your sister!"

I don't think anybody else heard but I stood up and had started towards the hall when Emma came in. She looked a bit flushed and annoyed but otherwise unharmed. "Bloody Phil!" she spat," got hands like a bloody octopus and all the charm of a barrow load of shit!" We all laughed but Mum tried to look disapproving and hid her smile behind her hand.

"Philip the Groper strikes again!" Lucinda hooted and we all laughed. I sliced the joint of salt beef and then stood back and watched Emma for a while, just to be sure that she was really OK.

We had coffee and hot salt beef rolls, followed by mince pies and clotted cream, then we all gathered round the tree in the hall and sang Silent Night, another little family tradition. We said our goodbyes hugged and kissed and then Mum and Emma and I went to the car. In the drive I laughed and asked Mum, "Which of us is sober enough to drive?"

She came very close and pretended to sniff my breath then said, trying to keep her voice serious, but failing," As you seem to have been drinking...and I haven't, it had better be me." She kissed me on the tip of my nose and made for the driver door, I playfully slapped her rump as she went. I knew she had stuck to a couple of glasses of wine all night. It was just after mid-night when we got home, we were all tired and I was still feeling a bit pissed so said that I would make hot chocolate. Mum refused and said she would go straight to bed so we hugged and wished each other a Merry Christmas and she went upstairs leaving Emma and me in the kitchen. We exchanged bits of gossip from the party and I asked her about 'Philip the Groper'.

"God!" she said in disgust, "I said he could kiss me goodnight and he tried to ram his filthy fat tongue right down my throat...then started to grab anything he could get his hands on!" She looked and me and saw that I was scowling, "It's OK," she went on, "I just slammed the car door on his finger and walked away.....I think that he was crying as he drove off!"

We both laughed, and I said in fun "Well you do look a million dollars tonight, Sis! I can't say that I blame 'Philip the Groper' for trying, in that outfit I'm having a hard job keeping my hands off of you myself."