Breaking And Entering With Steele Pt. 05

AJ felt like he was in some sort of half-in / half-out, dream-like state. He awoke shivering and soaked with sweat. He reached around, searching for something, anything, to find out where he was.

"You're okay," a voice said from somewhere nearby. "I'm here. What do you need?"

"Where am I?" AJ asked, not understanding why it was so dark, or why his bed was so lumpy.

"You're on the couch," the voice said, and he felt someone's fingers slide through his hair softly. He moaned at how good it felt and smiled. "Do you want water? Mommy's got you."

"Mommy?" AJ questioned then. His mother? It took him a minute. His brain felt raw and sluggish.

"I'm here sweetie," she said, and then he smelled her, the familiar scent of her perfume, and the lingering scent of epoxy floor coating. AJ closed his eyes. It was Melody, not his real mother. He shook his head. There was no way it could be his real mother. He hadn't seen her in...ages.

"Don't worry. We cleaned up the mess. We got you cleaned up, and you're on the couch now."

"I want to go to bed," AJ said in a whiny voice.

"Well, you can't," Melody said. "Your bed is buried and...your father and I think that the basement needs time to set. At least twenty-four hours. So until that happens, the basement is off limits."

"What about my clothes?" AJ asked, his arm coming out from underneath the covers and flopping to the side. His muscles felt heavy, sore, and weak. His left hand grabbed his privates underneath the covers and he was glad his penis hadn't fallen off. That would have been bad.

"Your clothes are on the table," Melody said. "It's okay. You can put them back on in the morning. Either that or, your dad says he might have a few things that will fit you."

AJ tried to raise his arm, but he only accomplished a kind of rotation which brought his hand up above his head where it flopped against Melody's chest and then lay there, above his head, resting on her chest.

"Sorry," AJ said, and he tried to pull his arm back, but it refused to move.

"It's okay. Stop fidgeting. I've got you," Melody said, and he felt her arm lift his shoulders up just a bit as if readjusting herself.

"Thank you," AJ moaned, and then he found the energy to move, and he flopped his body to one side, rolling toward Melody's voice. He felt his face pressed against something soft and warm and he closed his eyes and fell asleep, his face resting snugly on the pillows.

When AJ woke up, he did so with a start, and then, he slowly sat up and looked around. He was on the couch. That much he knew. Melody was gone. A single sheet was draped over his naked body and he pulled it securely into place, noting that his cock was hard as a rock. Nothing new there.

As he readjusted the sheet, he looked around and then found his shorts and underwear, as well as his shirt, folded up and sitting neatly on the table in front of him. He grabbed his underwear and pulled them under the sheet, and then hurried to slip his ankles through the holes, gradually pulling them up until they were snug in place. Once his underwear was on, he stood up and then fell back down to the couch feeling dizzy.

"One step at a time," AJ said to himself. "One step at a time." He grabbed the rest of his clothes and put them on. He picked up the sheet and was going to fold it up, until he saw cum stains on it, and thought better of it. Slowly, he got to his feet, testing the waters, and then he walked to the bathroom and put the sheet into the laundry hamper.

"Candice?" AJ asked, going to her door which was right there. "Candice. You in there?" He slipped around the corner, looking in through the open doorway, and saw the room was empty. No, not just devoid of Candice, but empty. Completely empty, like Candice had moved out, empty.

"What the fuck?" AJ asked himself, and he went to his father's bedroom and knocked on the door. When nobody answered, he grabbed the handle and turned it. The handle moved a fraction of an inch, but no more. AJ sighed. It was locked. AJ hurried to check the other rooms in the house, just in case something weird was going on, and then he went to the kitchen. He reached under the sink, grabbed the spare key to his father's room, and went to the secondary door at the top of the stairs. He pushed the key into the handle, turned it, and then turned the handle. The door came open.

"Dad?" AJ asked, pushing the door open just enough to fit his head through the opening. He looked around, saw nobody within, and was about to close the door when he saw a familiar item sitting on his father's dresser. "What the hell?" AJ asked, and he pushed the door open even more. He flipped the light on, and then wished he hadn't. The bedroom was a wreck. The bed was covered with blankets and foreign objects. It was the nicest way he could put the cacophony of items that were there.

Handcuffs were cuffed to specific spots on the headboard. A riding crop lay on one side of the bed, and a double dildo lay half-tucked underneath a pillow. There were leather wrist cuffs, a leather harness of some sort, multiple leather masks, and additional dildos of all shapes and sizes scattered about the room.

AJ tried to avert his eyes and only looked at the item that had caused him to enter the room, but when he saw the magazine, his magazine, open to a specific section, he froze. He stepped in front of the magazine and flipped a page back, and found magic marker writing on some of the pictures. He furrowed his brow and flipped back another page. "Sexy ideas to spice up the night," the article read and the first entry was "extended edging". There was a checkmark next to it. "Mutual oral pleasure," was next. AJ flipped the page forward, realizing that the checkmarks meant they'd done it. He backed out of the room and pulled the key out of the door handle, rotated it until he was sure it was locked, and went to put the key back.

He was just making his way back to the couch, when the door opened and Melody ran across the room, almost tackling him. "Are you okay? Why are you up? How do you feel?"

"I...I'm okay," AJ said, shaking his head a bit.

"You really gave us a scare," his father said, clapping him on the shoulder.

"What happened?" AJ asked.

"What didn't happen," Jaxson said, and then he waved off Melody's sharp glare and said, "Let Mom explain it to you."

AJ turned to Melody and waited.

"Well, you remember we were doing the floor in the basement, right?"

"Yeah," AJ said, his brain still a bit foggy on the whole thing.

"Well, apparently, the fumes got to you. You were saying strange things, acting funny."

"Mmmm," AJ said, putting a hand to his forehead. He remembered doing something he wished he could take back, and he realized now, that this might be the perfect opportunity to act as if it never happened. "I remember...starting," AJ said softly as if struggling to recall the events of the previous evening.

"Well, you threw up," Melody said.

"Oh, it was so gross," Jaxson said, shaking his head.

"Jax. Please," Melody said and Jaxson nodded and then stepped into the kitchen. "Well, you passed out. We got you cleaned up, and then brought you out here on the couch."

"I figured that much," AJ said flatly.

"Well, you slept the entire next day," Melody said.

AJ blinked. "I did what?"

"You slept," Melody said. "The second day, you started coming around, but all you did was ask if...." Melody leaned close and gave him a wry smile. "You kept asking if we'd found your penis."

"How many days was I out of it?" AJ asked.

"Three days," Melody said, reaching out and patting his knee. "But you're awake now, and that's what counts."

"I...you didn't take me to the hospital?" AJ asked, thinking if his father or Melody or Candice had suddenly fallen asleep for an entire day, he would probably insist on taking them to the hospital.

"Of course not," Melody said. "I called my physician friend. He recommended a few things and viola! You're awake."

"After three days," AJ said.

"What's wrong?" Melody asked then, confused. "I thought you'd be happy to be awake."

"I am happy to be awake," AJ answered.

"Well that's good," Melody said. "You inhaled a lot of fumes. And how fast you were going, you probably weren't holding your breath at all, were you?"

"No," AJ said, and he chuckled self-consciously. "I didn't know I had to hold my breath."

"You didn't read the instructions," His father called out from the kitchen.

"No Dad," AJ said quickly. "No, I had someone reading me the directions."

"Oh, don't even try that," Melody said sharply. "You had every opportunity to read them, just like I did. I read you most of the instructions."

"Was there a warning label?" AJ asked.

"Well...obviously," Melody said.

"Why didn't you read that to me?" AJ asked incredulously.

"Because you were...you were busy...trying to be...macho."

AJ scrunched up his face, confused. When had he tried to be macho? Before, or after he'd started getting high off the fumes?

"I wasn't trying to be macho," AJ said in a semi-obstinate way. "I...I was..."

"It doesn't matter," Jaxson said loudly. "The point is, you're okay. You're fine, the floor is finished."

"It's finished?" AJ asked.

"Yeah. Your mother and I finished it while you were napping," his father said. AJ sucked in a deep breath, trying to let his father's comment wash over and away. But the way he said it... "napping", made it sound like AJ was milking it. Like he'd been playacting, and making a big deal out of nothing, for attention. If his father had inhaled half the fumes AJ had, he'd be dead, AJ thought.

"You want to go see it?" Melody asked him then.

"Yeah," AJ said, and then he added, "Yes, mommy," as a sign of respect.

Melody smiled at that and stood up, and then she offered her hand to AJ and he took it, standing up on shakily.

"When I got up earlier, I felt so dizzy," AJ said, taking a few slow steps to check whether he was ready to walk like normal.

"Well, just hold on if you feel dizzy," Melody said reassuringly.

"I think I'm feeling a bit dizzy," Jaxson said, walking over and flipping on the light above the stairs before they made it through the kitchen.

AJ ignored his father and kept walking, slowly feeling stronger and more sure on his feet, and as he turned to step down onto the upper landing, he heard his father slip and slide the last five or six steps to the basement floor below.

"God damn it!" his father swore, and AJ couldn't help but smile. That was instant karma for him. "I swear to god, I'm going to rip these god damned stairs out and put in a fireman's pole!"

AJ took the first step, and then the next, and then the next. By the time he got to the basement floor, he felt just fine, and he stepped down off the steps onto a dark blue sea of glossy epoxy resin. He turned right and saw his bedroom was set up, almost exactly how it had been before. His gaming table and furniture weren't exactly in place, but he could move them as needed.

"WOW," AJ said, peering down at the floor, and seeing how the LED light strips reflected brightly, even though the floor was dark. "This is awesome!"

"We finished up and completed the laundry room too," Melody said, pulling AJ in the opposite direction. AJ turned and saw the deep blue floor coat was all-encompassing, spread from wall to wall, all the way to each of the basement's four corners.

"When...when did you guys do this?" AJ asked, confused.

"Night before last," his father said.

"It's completely dry," Melody said, stepping onto the floor in the laundry room area. "It set up nicely. Now, you're going to want to make sure you mop every day. Mopping will keep the dust down and keep it smelling nice."

"That means vacation time is over," Jaxson said.

"I wasn't on vacation," AJ said, feeling completely out of it.

"Well, you laid around all day, slept for hours on end... You only got up to eat, drink, shit and piss. Sounds like a vacation to me."

"Jaxson," Melody said as if chiding him.

"Oh right. I guess it wasn't a vacation, cause men fuck like rabbits on vacation."

"Daddy!" Melody yelped.

"Big Daddy," Jaxson said, grabbing her up in a hug and squeezing her in a somewhat vulgar manner.

"Stop it," Melody said playfully, trying to extricate herself from Jaxson's grip.

"What? I thought you liked it when I did this?" Jaxson said, grabbing underneath her skirt and squeezing her ass, hard.

"I do," Melody said in a lowered tone of voice, "but this isn't the place for that baby."

Jaxson gave Melody one last lustful grab, and then let go of her, swatting her ass one time for good measure. "Ahhhh, you were always such a tease," he said, and then added, "thank god I figured out what you were really after."

Melody didn't say much to that and AJ wondered what exactly they were talking about.

"Anyway. Keep it clean, otherwise, you'll be moving to one of the rooms upstairs," Jaxson said.

"I will," AJ replied, still marveling at the way everything looked.

"And get a job." Jaxson waved his hands about for a moment and then said, "When you're feeling up to it, I guess."

"There's no need to rush out the door," Melody said then. "Once you're feeling better, you can go get a job. Alright?"

AJ nodded. He continued walking around, feeling like he was re-discovering his room for the first time in centuries. He grabbed one of the chairs by his gaming table and pushed it back to where he thought was the correct spot and then sighed. It all looked so awesome, yet, something felt out of place. Something was...missing.

AJ's brows knit together, and he turned to Melody. "Where...is...Candice?"

"She'll be back," Melody said, folding her arms across her chest.

"If she knows what's good for her," Jaxson said, swatting Melody on the ass again, which caused her to unfold her arms in a hurry. "Then again, if she keeps it up...."

"Keeps what up?" AJ asked. "Where did she go?"

"She left," Melody said then.

"Left?" AJ inquired.

"She's leaving... On a jet train! No telling when she'll ever be back again!" Jaxson said loudly, singing the words into the rafters above.

"She's been sequestered," Melody said quickly. "Saint Margaret's Women's Shelter for the Mentally Unstable and Helplessly Deranged."

"Mentally unstable? AJ asked, confused. "Since when was she-"

"She's coo-coo for coco pops," Jaxson said.

"Do not call her that!" Melody said sharply, rounding on Jaxson. "I told you to stop it! Are you trying to get me pissed off?"

"Well, she is," Jaxson said, and he grabbed the hand railing of the stairs and pulled himself up the first step. "It's not my fault she's... got issues," Jaxson said, choosing a different set of words to describe Candice's affliction.

AJ sat down on the arm of the love-seat, suddenly feeling weak in the knees.

"She was having some issues adjusting," Melody said and Jaxson started up the stairs without another word. "She wasn't cooperating. She was arguing all the time. Swearing. Eating too much. Lashing out."

"Lashing out?" AJ asked. "How was she lashing out?"

"By talking back," Melody said as if it should have been obvious. "She refused to put her clothes away, and If I told her once, I told her a hundred times. She kept eating things she wasn't supposed to."

"Like what?" AJ asked.

"Like pizza, and chips, and soda, and those cans of ravioli you and your dad eat all the time."

"What's wrong with ravioli?" AJ asked.

"Nothing," Melody replied, shaking her head. "Men can eat that stuff all day long and never gain a pound. But if you're a model, and you have to keep your figure, and, most importantly, if you're lazy, and you refuse to exercise, then you can't just eat whatever you want."

"She..." AJ tried to come up with something, some sort of defense for her. "She was really trying," he said, his hands and his words falling flatly. He looked up and saw Melody eyed him suspiciously, and he didn't like it. He waited until he thought an appropriate amount of time had gone by, and then said, "Well...I guess she brought it on herself."

"She did," Melody said, agreeing with him. AJ watched her, judging her mannerisms, trying to guess what would be appropriate and what wouldn't.

"She's not gone forever, right?" He asked, instead of asking when she would be back. He didn't want to sound desperate, and he also didn't want to add fuel to the fire.

"No. Not forever. Saint Margaret's is where women go when they need structure. They have some very simple rules, and if she plays by the rules, she'll be perfectly fine."

"And...what happens if she doesn't play by the rules?" AJ asked.

"Then, she'll...learn to play by the rules. Not many people stay there for long periods of time. It's more on a place to collect your thoughts, reflect on life, and appreciate just how good you had it, on the outside."

"Like prison?" AJ asked.

"No!" Melody scoffed. AJ smirked. It sounded exactly like prison. Simple rules. Play by the rules, or, learn to play by the rules. There was no such thing as not playing by the rules. You either did, or eventually you did. And if you didn't...maybe you never got out.

"You said she went crazy?" AJ asked.

"NO! I did not say that," Melody retorted sharply.

"But dad-"

"He was kidding," Melody said quickly. "He didn't mean she...he didn't mean anything. She didn't go crazy. She just needed some time away, and we gave her that."

"By sending her away?" AJ asked.

"We didn't send her away," Melody said, refolding her arms across her chest.

"Then, how did she get to Saint Brutus's-"

"Saint Margaret's!" Melody corrected him sharply.

"Saint Margaret's," AJ repeated. "How did she get there?"

"They came and picked her up," Melody said.

"It's the same thing!" AJ said, rejecting Melody's line of thinking.

"It's not the same thing," Melody said.

"It is!" AJ said. "What happens if I can't get a job? Or, if I eat too much? Or what if I can't get a hold of my girlfriend again? Cause you know that's such a huge requirement in life, having a girlfriend. Are you and Dad going to kick me out?"

"No," Melody said after a moment.

"Wha...why didn't you answer?"

"I did," Melody said.

"Yeah, but...you paused. Why the pause?"

"Because I was thinking," Melody said sharply. "You know. People do that every now and again. They think before they speak!" AJ's mouth fell open, but Melody was just getting warmed up. "Maybe you should try it!" Melody unfolded her arms and pointed a hand and a finger at him. "We worked all night long on this floor, making it perfect, so that when you woke up, it would be finished."

AJ looked around quickly and then back at Melody. "I'm surprised you had the time, sending Candice away to some mental institution!"

"It is not a mental institution!" Melody shouted at him then.

Before she even got the last words out of her mouth, AJ could hear his father's heavy footsteps running across the floor upstairs. He came through the kitchen, hooked a left, and yelled down the stairs, "Everything alright down there?"

"Yes," AJ said loudly.

"I don't know," Melody said and AJ heard his father take the first two steps on his way down.

AJ froze. His dad was not the cute and cuddly type, and he had no reservations about pounding some sense into AJ when he thought he needed it.

Melody smiled an evil-looking smile at AJ as his father came down the steps. She looked like she was enjoying the apprehension in his eyes. The fear maybe? Regret? She even took a step back, making room for his father, or, in case he fell the rest of the way, AJ thought. That would serve him right. He deserved to fall down the stairs, and maybe another thirty or thirty-five flights as well.

"Nah, I think I've got it," Melody said suddenly when Jaxson was almost down the stairs.