Down at the Twist and Shout Ch. 01

"Surely do, Big John!" quavered the skinny, rat-like cabbie, his throat bobbing and clicking as he swallowed noisily, nervously, and John nodded in satisfaction at Jerome and Kelly.

"Yawl go straight back to yo' hotel, ain't no one gonna trouble you. And Miss?"

Kelly snapped her head around to stare fearfully at him.

"You mind me now, you hear me?" he murmured, and smiled, his smile broadening as a small smile appeared on her pretty face.

"Yes oficer, I will, I promise!" she whispered back, smiled shyly, and climbed into the cab. Jerome once more shook his hand, looking at him pleadingly, but John grinned and shook his head, so he climbed into the cab too. John leaned down and once more beckoned Sissany closer.

"Y'all remember, I don't hear from them, then you gon' be hearin' from me, you got that?"

Sissany swallowed noisily once more and nodded, then pulled away from the curb. John watched the cab disappear into the traffic, then, shaking his head at the frailty of his fellow man, retraced his steps to Papa Louie's to finish his interrupted lunch.

*

Two months later, John received the news; Antonio, his stepfather, was dead; he'd collapsed and died at work ; there had been no signs, no warning, he'd been at a meeting, delivering his forecast for the following year, when he'd suddenly slumped back in his chair, killed instantly when the undetected aneurysm in his brain ruptured.

John knew he had to go; much as he loved his job, Mama-Jane and Justine needed him; Justine was only thirteen, she needed a mature male presence and influence in her life, and now that had to be him, young as he was, only twenty-one and only half-way through his Criminology Degree at Loyola; he was her big brother, and like it or not, he was the man of the family now.

His boss understood; he knew John's family came first, always, and so he reluctantly processed him out, fast-tracking his resignation and cashing-out his benefits so he could go take care of his family. For John, the only bright spark was he still had Barker's number; he'd be calling him as soon as he could, and taking him up on that offer, if it was still open.

*

As John walked the streets aimlessly, trying to rid his mind of the images that refused to go, of his beautiful sister taking him into her mouth, of her nakedness, and thoughts of what his thoughts were doing to him, he passed an adult bookstore, and, a devil of perversity prompting him, he stepped inside, pushing through the beaded curtain and looked around in confusion.

Shelf after shelf of the rankest, most graphically explicit pornography blared at him, women with gigantic breasts and large round asses thrusting lewdly everywhere he looked. He could feel his face burning, and then a single shelf caught his eye; 'Sister Parade' was the title that leaped out at him, and when he looked closer, magazine after magazine of sister-slanted incest pornography revealed itself.

John was stunned, but also, to his shame, deeply aroused; something about those magazines called to him, and as he slowly sorted through them, his erection bulged and ached in the confines of his pants. Almost before he knew what he was doing, he'd plumped down a handful of the magazines, all the while writhing in embarrassment at what he'd just done, paid the indifferent clerk anonymously in cash, and slipped the brown-bagged magazines inside his jacket.

Back at his loft, he wasted no time in leafing through the magazines, reading the stories, absorbing them and the reader's letters, taken by the hot rush of arousal as the forbidden subject worked on him; he couldn't decide if they were real or fake, because who confesses to that kind of stuff in a magazine just anyone could buy? But while he doubted their veracity, something else, deep inside him, wanted them to be true; the stories jibed so closely with his own thoughts and feelings that he actually began to identify, then sympathize, with the people relating their stories, real or not.

The fact is, whatever else he felt, and in spite of the guilt at contemplating such a wrong thing, he found them intensely arousing and the photographs of the girls fucking their supposed brothers took on a new meaning for him when he began imagining they were Justine, and the guy they were so nakedly entwined with was him.

As the weeks passed, the magazines began to pall; he needed something else, something more, to feed the growing urges and needs he was feeling. The first time he bought an incest video and watched it, he masturbated like a teenager, to enormous climax, as the images and fantasies took on a new life for him; it was no coincidence that the DVD's he bought featured girls who looked like Justine; slim, small-breasted, with long, dark, curly hair, clear, pale skin, rosebud lips, and delicate, heart-shaped faces.

But it couldn't last; it was his deepest secret, but he wasn't very good at hiding the evidence, and it was only a matter of time before the one other person with access to his home and his life found his stash.

*

It was a purely accidental chain of events that finally revealed John's inner self to his sister. He was working, and Justine had a light night, so even though he wasn't expecting her early that morning, she thought she'd give him a nice surprise, clean up a little, and maybe make him a hot breakfast. So she picked up, straightened up, dusted and polished, and, last of all, began on his partitioned-off sleeping area.

On the floor beside his bed she found a handful of magazines; she could see they were porn mags, so gingerly picked them up, blushing furiously as she did so. Her first instinct was to throw them down in disgust; sweet Johnny B read this kind of stuff?

As she pondered his ownership of such things she realized he'd never once mentioned a girl, any girl; his life was about work, and her. Maybe her Johnny B was lonely, so he read these things? She was no-one to judge, so she put them in a tidy pile and left to prepare a hot meal for him.

As she cooked, a germ of curiosity gnawed at here; what did Johnny find so attractive in porn? Was it the pictures of the girls, with their exaggerated chests and hairless vulvas, or the sight of two people having sex? What exactly was it about those things that turned him on?

At last, unable to contain her curiosity any longer, she switched off the stove and made her way back into Johnny's bedroom, sat on his bed, and picked up the first magazine in the pile; when she realized what the subject was, she nearly threw it down again in disgusted horror; her sweet Johnny B was reading...this? What was wrong with him, the very idea was unnatural, and wrong, and just...wrong.

Justine put her face in her hands. How could the man she loved and depended on be so enamored of...filth like that? Brothers and sisters doing...that, it was just wrong. But a worm of guilt burrowed inside her even as her horrified rejection of what was in front of her washed over her; she'd had thoughts along those lines, momentary, fleeting, and never once admitted to before now, but she knew she was capable of thinking like that too; maybe she and Johnny B were more alike than she cared to admit, even to herself?

She made to put the magazine back on the pile, but then curiosity got the better of her, and so she flicked through it properly, looking at the photo-stories, and finally reading the letters and 'true-life' experiences.

As she read, Justine began to react to what she was seeing, what she was reading. Almost against her will, her mind rewrote those stories, re-cast the pictures, and now it was her story being told, and it was her and John in those pictures, doing those things to each other, feeling the heat of each other's bodies, the texture of their skin against skin, the sounds and sensations as they made love.

Involuntarily, her hand slipped down her belly, sliding along the smooth skin and into the waistband of her leggings, to slide inside her panties, caressing the smooth skin of her labia, and the slick, desperate flesh pulsing between her thighs. Justine gasped as she slipped a finger inside herself, gently flicking the little bud that pulsed there, tense and taut, waiting to release her from the tension building inside her.

As she lay back on the bed, her earlier horror and revulsion forgotten, she felt something under the covers, and reached under, to find an empty DVD case, an incest video, with a girl on the front cover who could be her! Justine stared for long seconds, conflicting emotions warring in her as the need to see this, to know what John wanted, fought against the urge to leave, to forget this had happened, to wipe those wrong, dirty, hotly beguiling images from her mind, to stop seeing her sweet, handsome, lonely brother as anything except her big brother.

Need and arousal won; she was too turned on to leave, her arousal fed by the certainty that Johnny B, her darling, sweet, caring Country-Boy, had watched this while thinking of her, seeing her, wanting it to be her. Almost without thinking, her hand sought-out the remote control, clicking the DVD player on and lying back with a sigh as the movie began.

Justine had seen a few porn movies in her time, mostly because Carl wanted to watch something 'to get him in the mood', as he put it (which had invariably pissed her off; why wasn't she enough, why did he need those hard-faced, plastic sluts moaning in fake arousal on screen to turn him on; was that what he really wanted?) and at first she was puzzled by how slowly the movie was paced, lots of dialog and scene-setting, but then she realized it was much more than just a porno; it was a romance, too, slowly drawing her in, unfolding a story of forbidden love, smouldering passion, and hot, illicit, taboo sex.

Justine was enthralled. The story, such as it was, was simple: loving big brother comes home from college, dumped and deserted younger sister clings to him as he comforts and cares for her, love for his sister turns to real love between them, leading to mutual seduction and hot, explicit sex, with every act the human mind is capable of devising; it was played so well it felt real to her, and while the male star only vaguely resembled Johnny, the female lead was her in almost every detail.

As the story slowly built to its crescendo, Justine, completely caught-up in the burning eroticism, feeling it take her and make her its own, pushed her leggings and panties down so she could touch and stroke her stiff, pulsing clitoris and hot, swollen, labia more completely. At the same time, her free hand found its way inside her blouse, to rub and squeeze and pull nipples that suddenly seemed huge, and almost too sensitive to touch. That didn't stop her though; every brush of her nipples sent a bright spark of pure pleasure deep into the core of her, making her gasp and moan with the sheer delight of it.

As the movie played out, Justine's fingers strummed and petted her smoothly waxed pudenda, her fingers slipping easily through the dewy flesh of her swollen labia, imagining she was the girl in the movie, that it was her Country-Boy making her feel so good, giving her pleasure she hadn't felt in all the five years of her marriage.

Her fingers pistoned into herself, drawing out the pleasure, pulling her to that peak of pleasure she could feel herself approaching, and when the girl on-screen dissolved in gasping orgasm, Justine came too, her teeth clenching as she fought not to scream in release, fought and lost, as a fine spray of her secret essences bathed and coated her frenzied, restless hands and fingers.

"Oh God yesss, oh Johnny, oh yes baby, love me, oh Johnny, yesss...!" she chanted as her climax echoed and reverberated through her, the face of her wonderful, caring brother before her as he took her to that peak again and again.

Justine slumped back gasping, her heart beating a frenzied tattoo in her chest and small lights sparkled in her peripheral vision as the aftermath of her colossal orgasm surged, ebbed and eventually calmed. Justine wondered at how it had been Johnny she'd seen as she gave herself such pleasure, how the thought of him had spurred her on and on, but for now, now she would lie back and remember the hot rush of love and arousal she'd felt when she thought of her Country-Boy without examining it too deeply, not while the memory of such pleasure still lingered.

*

John let himself in wearily, his night cut short by having to deal with the latest shit-storm stroke calamity stroke PR disaster his current assignment had managed to engineer. As it was, he'd had to hustle his charge back to her hotel suite and shove her fully-dressed into an icy shower until the combination of high-tension booze and whatever it was she'd popped had worn off a little, before calling the doctor the agency retained to come and check her over and assure him she wasn't going to die on him anytime soon.

Her entourage, allegedly close friends all, had stood by and cheered her on while she tried her damnedest to self-destruct in public, so he'd had no compunction about throwing the whole bunch of them none too gently into the limo and collecting their smartphones. He deleted their pictures and selfies, and warned each and every one of them what would happen to them if any word of this latest debacle leaked out to the press-vultures, or if any pictures appeared on social media, or even one word hit the streets.

He'd been coldly enraged at their callous disregard for their supposed friend and terrifyingly graphic in his threats to their lives and limbs if anything, anything at all, ever leaked out; somehow, none of them believed for one second he was bluffing. Johnny was pretty sure he'd finally gotten through to that gang of numbskulls and airheads, and that the night's events would be going no further, ever.

Cleanup and damage-control had taken half the night, and now that his charge was in a discreet private clinic a long way from anywhere, registered under a false name, and all of her so-called friends had once again had the facts of life, and how short and full of painful incident it could be, explained to them in short, simple words, John had decided that, early as it was, the night was over, and he was going home.

As he came in the door, his head still full of the steps he'd taken to keep the gutter press and paparazzi away, he noticed the place had been picked-up, and he was smiling at Justy taking the time out of her night's workload to stop by and dust him off a mite when he heard her call his name.

Her voice had come from his sleeping alcove, so he ambled over, moving silently, as was his wont, to stop dead and stare in stunned, slack-jawed amazement at the sight of his beautiful baby sister writhing on his bed, her sweats pushed down on her smooth, round thighs, her eyes tight-closed even as her hand blurred with the speed she was rubbing herself, with her other hand shoved up the front of her blouse, while his favorite incest porn DVD played on the big-screen TV.

Almost against his will, his eyes were riveted to the juncture of her thighs, to the smooth skin innocent of any hair, and the sight of her fingers rubbing the pink, exposed flesh as she pleasured herself.

Justine slumped back, her face red and beaded with perspiration, her black hair pasted to her forehead, and a serene, almost exalted expression on her face. Even as she caught her breath, something made her turn her head, to lock eyes with him, his gray eyes wide with shock...and something else, something she recognized even in her shock and confusion.

Justine squealed in mortified shock, yanking the comforter over her partial nudity, and hiding her face in her hands.

"No, Justy, no...I didn't mean...I didn't know...Justy, please I wasn't..." he stammered, while Justine hurriedly yanked her leggings back up and slid out from under the covers, to run past him. To try to run past him; John fielded her, circling her in his arms even as she struggled to escape, to run and hide, anything to hide her shame and ringing embarrassment at being caught so squarely 'in flagrante'.

John hugged her close, smothering her attempts to escape, to wriggle free, murmuring soothingly to her the whole time in the exaggerated accent she loved him to use.

"Shush, Shush now, it's okay, you okay, Justy, s'only me, this your home too baby-girl, yawl do what you want here, honey-chile, you ain't done nuthin' be 'shamed for, 'twas me, baby, and I'm sorry, I di'n't mean to walk-in on yawl, baby, honest..."

Justine sagged in his arms; she was caught, there was no way out of this, no explanation she could think of giving, and her face burned with shame at being seen...that way, doing that, especially by her sweet Johnny B; what must he think of her?

John felt the girl slump, and tightened his grip on her, before hoisting her into his arms and carrying her back to the bed, to sit with her still cradled in his arms. Justine's fingers were digging into his arms, while she kept her face resolutely hidden, firmly pressed into his shoulder, her body stiff and unyielding. John began swaying, rocking her as you would a small child, and almost without thinking, began softly crooning the 'Mardi Gras' song to her, the first Cajun song he'd learned to sing and play properly on the fine old Bon-Tee accordion Jean-Noèl gave him when he was twelve:

"Les Mardi Gras s'en vient de tout partout, Tout alentour le tour du moyeu, Ça passe une fois par an, demandé la charité, Quand-même ça c'est une patate, une patate ou des gratons

Les Mardi Gras sont dessus un grand voyage, Tout alentour le tour du moyeu..."

As he sang he slowly beat time on her flank with the arm across her waist, exactly as one would when lulling a baby, holding her to him as he soothed her, singing the way she'd loved him to sing to her when she was still just a young teen and he was newly arrived in New York. As he sang and rocked, he thought back to those first days in New York, dealing with his mother's grief and the thirteen year-old Justine's shock and loss.

*

Mama and Justine had met him at La Guardia; his mom had been stony-faced, obviously masking her emotions, but not Justy; nope, she'd taken one look at him coming through the arrivals gate and she'd flung herself on him, babbling about how big he was, how much he'd changed, how glad she was he was home at last. Mama-Jane had reached out to stroke his cheek, and then suddenly she was hugging him like to break his ribs, crying and talking and stroking his hair.

John somehow managed to get his luggage stowed in the cab and sat with the women in his life gathered to him the whole journey back to Mineola, to their large apartment on Roselle Street. Jane had cooked a large and sumptuous meal, which John ate with a will; it had been a long time, and it was entirely his fault, since he'd eaten with his mama, and he regretted not coming here sooner, maybe being a part of this family too, the way mama-Jane had always wanted. Now he was here because of her loss, and he felt sad and guilty that he'd waited this long; Tony had been a good man, a devoted husband and father, and he found himself wishing he'd taken the time to get to know him better.

They'd sat up late into the night, talking about him, them, how much Justy'd grown since her last picture, how tall he was, life in the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Department, and how things were going to work going forward. He had a plan for how he was going to live now that he had his family to care for; underneath it all was the one thing that was troubling him; he never spoke of it at all, but inside he was scared stiff at the prospect of somehow getting mama-Jane and Justine through the imminent funeral and the days after.

But first things first; in the morning he had a call to make.