A Family Reunion

1

The clouds parted beneath us, and I could see the sparkling ocean from my window. The crowds on the beach made it look like a freshly disturbed ant hill. I had seen a city from a bird's eye view in movies plenty of times, but seeing it in person was breathtaking.

While I was staring in awe at the scene outside my window, Mom was typing away on her work laptop. The lack of internet didn't stop her at all. She was surely composing some important work-related document, or going over the company's upcoming financial statements again.

It was Friday, a bit past noon. We would be going home Sunday around the same time. I was shocked that it was such a short trip, especially with the price of plane tickets. Alas, money was no object to Mom. Taking a day off work, however, was all but unthinkable. Vacations like this only came when holidays landed in just the right spots. I hoped that being around her easygoing sister might help her relax a little bit.

"We're about to land soon," I said, "Don't you want to at least look out the window?"

She looked up from her laptop for a moment, and gazed out of my window. "It's nice dear," she said, "very pretty." Then she looked back, and typed furiously on her keyboard for a few more moments, before snapping it shut and stowing it away.

"How was your first time on a plane?" she asked.

"It was fun. I feel much better now that I've had time to get used to it."

Normally I took a train to get between home and my university dorm, and we used to be able to reach Aunt Sally's place that way too. A few years ago she decided to move to the coast, and we hadn't met with her, or her daughter, in person since. Mom was always too busy to visit, even though they were the only family either of us had. If I was a bit older, I might have visited on my own, but right now I was pretty busy as well. Even if I wasn't, it seemed a bit awkward to plan that kind of thing by myself.

The landing was a bit nerve-wracking for me, but Mom seemed totally calm. Flying was something totally normal for a woman like her.

Everyone stood up and began fishing around in the luggage compartments. I tried my best to reach my suitcase, which was at the back of the compartment, but I couldn't stretch my arm far enough to reach it. Mom, already carrying her luggage, effortlessly reached it and pulled it down for me.

It was a bit embarrassing that my mother still towered over me at my age. Nonetheless, I thanked her, and she patted me on the back, smiling gently.

Once we were in the terminal, she groaned, and rubbed her shoulder.

"That seat was murder on my back. Would you carry my luggage as well sweetie?"

They were both on wheels, so it was by no means a feat of strength. She was surely just asking in order to massage my pride a bit, after I was forced to rely on her earlier. My pride was not so easily injured, but I happily agreed to carry her suitcase anyway.

She bought us each a coffee at a store in the airport, and then we made our way to the spot where Aunt Sally was waiting. She was the total opposite of Mom. She was slightly shorter than me, with curly blonde hair down to her shoulder, and dressed like she just came from the beach, which she likely had. She had on a bikini top and a long, water-safe skirt. She had put on a light jacket as well, for some semblance of modesty.

She was grinning from ear to ear, and ran up to us as soon as she saw us. She wrapped Mom in a tight hug, during which her face was about level with Mom's chest. Mom looked a bit flustered. She wasn't usually this affectionate with people. We never really hugged unless one of us was upset. Sally hung onto her for quite a long time. Then she hugged me as well, a bit less forcefully.

We exchanged simple pleasantries as we returned to her car. She tossed our bags into the trunk, and we climbed in. Mom sat up front with her, and I rode in the back seat.

"Mark," Sally said, "I can't believe how cute you still look! And you're so slender!"

Sally herself was beyond what most would call a young age, but she seemed to value youth quite a bit. I definitely wouldn't have said she looked old, and she had the sort of energetic personality that one might call "being young at heart." At her assessment of my figure, I just laughed a bit and rubbed my wrist.

"I guess I'm not eating enough these days." I said.

"Don't worry about things like that baby, you look fine just the way you are! I bet you've been getting a lot of attention from the women at school haven't you?"

"Um, not really no."

"Oops, sorry. Men are fine too, dear!"

"Oh, it's not that. I haven't been meeting many people at all. I've been focused on studying and stuff."

That was partially true, as I had been holed up in my dorm room studying, but I also spent my free time playing games by myself or with online friends. If I had tried, I probably could have spent plenty of time socializing.

For a while, Sally and Mom talked back and forth about work and other similar topics, while I read a book on my phone. I vaguely registered that they actually had pretty similar careers, and were talking shop and complaining about coworkers. My ears perked up when Sally mentioned the one member of the family who was currently absent.

"Gina started working at one of those restaurants on the boardwalk a few months ago," Sally said.

"So she still isn't planning on going to college?" Mom asked.

"She's considered it of course. She's a smart girl. She doesn't have any sort of ambitions though. She just wants to read and play games."

"A good job is hard to come by these days without college. She won't be able to rely on you forever."

Gina was a year younger than me. I was 15 the last time we had seen each other. Before she and her mother moved away, we had spent a lot of time playing together. We were both quiet kids who didn't have many friends. While the sisters talked or went out, we would often end up hanging out. Sometimes we just sat silently in the same room and did our own thing, but eventually we started playing together more. We hadn't talked at all since she moved away. I wondered what she would be like now, after all this time.

The towering hotels and condominiums thinned out, and suddenly the road was long and straight, following the coastline. Along that coast were colorful beach houses, evenly spaced and representing the full spectrum of basic candy colors. I imagined most of them must be rentals, but apparently Aunt Sally actually owned one of them.

Sally pulled the car into the driveway of a house painted in various shades of green. I could faintly hear the sound of the waves, and I could see the many people crowding the beach. Though it was basically in the backyard of the houses that lined the shore, it was still a public beach.

We entered into a cozy living room, from which the kitchen was scarcely separated, and were guided around the house. There was a staircase in the living room that led up to the second floor. The house was short, so the second floor was really more of an attic or a loft. It only contained Aunt Sally's bedroom, where she and Mom would apparently be sleeping for these two nights.

Across from that staircase was a hallway which connected all the other rooms.

First there was a 'guest bedroom'--usually a storage room--where I would be sleeping. Piles of junk were shoved into the corner and stacked on a shelf, making just about enough room for an old convertible sofa to be folded out into a bed.

A charming ocean-themed restroom was across the hall. A shower curtain depicted an idyllic underwater scene with a coral reef, and the soap dispensers, among other things, were shaped like fish.

Further down the hall was a broom closet, and finally Gina's bedroom, which had a cute wooden sign on the outside. As Aunt Sally was showing me how to pull out my bed, I heard Gina's door open, and she and Mom apparently met in the hallway outside.

"Gina!" I heard Mom say, "Look how much you've grown. I thought Sally was exaggerating!"

I walked out into the hall to greet her. Gina was always a tall girl, but when I saw her now, I was a bit startled. She was a full head taller than Mom. She looked a bit embarrassed to have her size commented on.

When she saw me, we locked eyes, silently staring at each other. She was dressed in a long sweater and a black skirt. She was wearing big round glasses and her long black hair was in a bun. I felt my heart racing.

After a second or two, she smiled brilliantly, and practically lifted me up off the ground.

"Mark!" she said, pressing my head against the lower part of her ribcage, "You really came!"

"Gina! Of course I came!"

She kept me in that embrace for a while longer, and the sisters began moving back toward the living room.

"We're going to go catch up a bit," said Sally, "Later on let's all go to the beach!"

We both nodded. Just like old times.

"Come on, let's go to my room." Gina said, grabbing my hand.

I hadn't expected her to be so happy to see me. It was making me a bit flustered. Come to think of it, my own social skills had improved a lot since we last met, so it makes sense that she would be a bit more forward than she used to be. There was a strange feeling that I couldn't shake when I looked at her though. I should have felt at ease, but I felt unusually alert, like I couldn't stop looking at her. Regardless, I followed her into her room.

2

Gina's bedroom was covered in colorful posters and toys. She had about a dozen plastic figurines of characters from games sitting on top of her dresser and among the books on her bookshelf. Across from the bed there was a large television and beneath it a table, which held multiple game consoles. Some of them were quite old, and made me a bit nostalgic.

She sat down on her bed, causing the springs to creak. Her skirt bunched up around her legs and waist, and I glanced at the inside of her thighs for a moment, before she quickly adjusted it. She shot me a look, as if to see whether I had seen anything. I instinctively averted my eyes.

I sat down beside her, looking around the contents of her room. My dorm room was undecorated; I didn't even keep any clothes there when I wasn't around. My room at home was a bit more lived in, but still I didn't have any posters or anything of the sort. I didn't openly display even my more tame interests, and here she was with posters of half-naked anime girls all over her walls.

"Do you wanna smash?" Gina asked, seeing me lost in thought.

"Huh?"

"Like we used to when we were kids."

She ran over to the table across from her bed and knelt down on all fours. As she rummaged around in a box, I could see the outline of her butt under her skirt. I stared for a few seconds before I reprimanded myself and looked away.

She pulled out a colorful plastic case and two retro controllers. She pulled the disk out of the case and inserted it into the second-oldest machine sitting atop the table. Then she plugged in the two controllers.

She returned to the bed and handed me mine. It was the exact same one I had always used before, as was hers. I heard the familiar music swell up as we started the game, and it sent shivers up my spine.

She was good. Much better than me. We had just been kids before, messing around and not really knowing what we were doing, but now I could tell she was doing a lot more than just mashing the buttons.

"I've been going to local tournaments lately," She explained after her third win. I hadn't picked up the game since the last time we met. Even once we introduced a handicap, she continued to trounce me. If we had a different dynamic, she might have teased me about it, but neither of us had ever really acted like that.

She just looked like she was having fun playing the game. She gave me advice and taught me some tricks, and we laughed together when I finally managed to win a match due to a silly mistake on her part. We took a break after that, and I found myself staring at one of her posters.

It depicted a very buxom woman dressed in a short skirt and a tight button-up shirt, swinging a giant sword toward the viewer. I recognized her as a character that was popular on the internet, but I had no idea where she was from. I had seen many artists posting drawings of her, often making her even more absurdly curvaceous than this official poster was. I was startled when I heard Gina's voice right beside me.

"Are you into this kind of stuff?"

"Oh! Um... not really."

"I totally whaled for her when she first came out. Those were the days," she sounded genuinely wistful.

"Of course," she continued, "I had to swear off microtransactions pretty soon after that, once I started having actual expenses to pay. Now I just drool over the fanart people post online."

Her expression led me to believe that I was meant to find this relatable, so I nodded along. "You work at a restaurant or something right?" I asked.

"Technically a café! It's in a prime location for tourists too. It pays pretty well, but I save most of it."

"That's good! I actually haven't had time for a job yet. Mom says I need to focus on school, and I'm sure she's right."

She nodded silently, and looked down at the floor. We stood quietly for a bit, not making eye contact, before she spoke.

"Hey, I'll be right back," she said, "I'm gonna get something to drink. Do you want anything?"

"Oh, yeah. Maybe just some water?"

She nodded and vanished into the hallway, closing the door behind her. I was left alone in her room. I moved over toward her bed and sat down on the floor beside it, staring at the looping menu screen we left on the TV.

As I got comfortable, my hand touched something underneath the bed. I flinched, and looked to see what it was. It was a translucent plastic container that appeared to be full of miscellaneous junk. Thinking it harmless, I popped it open.

Inside were several unexpected things. An open box of condoms, which kind of left a pit in my stomach.

"Stop it! It's none of your business. She's your cousin," I reprimanded myself.

There was also a pornographic comic with a cover which depicted an extremely pregnant woman, literally soaked with semen, such a comical volume that she was practically submerged in it. I didn't consider myself a prude, but my nose kind of wrinkled at the sight of it.

There was a bottle of lubricant, half used. And most perplexingly, a miniature sex doll. It was just a nude woman's torso made from silicone, stopping at the neck and the thighs. Between those thighs were two functional holes.

I quickly closed the box and returned it to its place. I contemplated very briefly about what use she might have for such a thing, before she burst into the room and tossed me a bottle of water.

"Mom says they're ready to hit the beach. Let's get changed!"

***

Neither of us had ever been very drawn to the outdoors. We grew up in a city, and we never had more than a tiny backyard to explore. Even if we had, we probably would have preferred to stay inside and play games.

Despite this, Gina seemed pretty enthusiastic about the beach. I hadn't noticed it, but she had a bit of a tan. She looked dazzling when she walked out into the hall in her swimsuit.

It was an orange bikini with a metal ring fastening the two cups together. The bottom was covered by a frilly skirt that reached the middle of her thigh.

My mother and aunt appeared soon after. Sally was still wearing the same bikini top and skirt as before, but my mom had changed into a black one-piece swimsuit.

She seemed a bit uncomfortable, even flustered. I hardly ever saw her in anything less than business casual, so it wasn't surprising. Her embarrassment was exacerbated by her sister showering her with compliments.

"You look beautiful Sam!" She said, putting her hand on the small of Mom's back, "Just gorgeous! It fits your figure perfectly!" She stroked mom's hip, where the suit was riding quite high.

Gina joined in as well. "Yeah Aunt Sam, you look incredible!" Unlike her mother, she kept her hands to herself.

Mom just fidgeted and laughed awkwardly. It was pretty strange to see her so bashful. I knew her as a no-nonsense sort of woman most of the time.

As it happens, I was wearing blue swim trunks. I wasn't entirely lacking in confidence, but I wore a t-shirt with them anyhow. I never felt comfortable showing my upper body to people at the beach or a pool.

I was looking at myself in the mirror, when Gina came up behind me, towering over me such that her chest appeared above my own face.

"Are you gonna wear a t-shirt?" she said, sounding a bit surprised.

"Yeah, I usually do."

"Do you burn easily?"

"Well, no, I just... don't exactly have a beach body."

"What do you mean? I think you would look great!"

She pushed a little bit more, and eventually I took it off. She smiled and cheered like I was a stripper. She rubbed my belly and caressed my shoulders.

"See? You look great!" she said.

We set out for the beach, with her arm around my shoulder. I did feel quite a bit more confident with a beautiful girl like her hanging off of me, although having that thought about my cousin made me feel like a bit of a sicko.

The path to the beach began by just walking over some sandy soil, which gave way to a boardwalk. The boardwalk had some elevated pavilions where families might meet for a meal or a party, as well as a public bathroom with showers. There were several outdoor showers as well, for rinsing off the saltwater. Eventually it led down to the beach proper, where hundreds of visitors had set up camp. As far as the eye could see in both directions, there were colorful parasols and towels.

Seagulls circled overhead, and occasionally swooped down toward someone holding food. Children chased after the ones that walked across the shore, and sent them flying back up into the sky. Occasionally you could hear their cries, completing the ocean atmosphere.

Sally found us a good spot, and enlisted my help to drive her parasol into the sand. We laid out some towels in the shade and placed our belongings on top. The sisters laid down on the towels, and Sally opened up the cooler. She took a beer for herself and handed one to Mom.

After some stretching and basking in the atmosphere, Gina took my hand and pulled me out into the water. We waded through the shallows, battered by agitated waves. The water was beautiful. It wasn't crystal clear, but it was far from murky. It had a beautiful emerald color to it.

We reached a sand bar some distance from shore, where we stood and soaked peacefully. Gina was still holding onto my hand, but I didn't draw attention to it. We just enjoyed the water, letting ourselves float and be rocked by the waves.

"So," Gina began, "how have you been?"

"I've been okay. I've gotten used to college, and I'm still in a lot of easy classes."

"Have you been going to any wild parties?"

I laughed theatrically. "No, definitely not. I've just been holed up in my room doing the usual."

"So not even a girlfriend or anything?"

"Well, no... What about you?"

She shrugged. "Nope. I'm the same as you. I mostly stay in my room when I'm off work. Even though Mom tries to drag me along to beach parties sometimes."

Part of me was relieved to hear that she hadn't been dating, and another part of me was ashamed of that relief.

"That sounds kind of nice. All my mom seems to do is work, and it concerns me sometimes."

"No way! My mom literally hangs out with college kids during spring break. She says she gets hit on a lot too. It's weird!"

I laughed. It was easy to picture how Sally would react to something like that. I looked back to where our mothers were sitting, or I tried to. They weren't there. It seemed we had drifted off a bit while we were in the water.