Family Reunion

"That's not the point—"

"Please, Mom, just answer the question," Terri insisted.

Sara stared at her daughter, then shifted her gaze to Tom. She blushed. "Forgive me Tom... son. I didn't know you were my son. I just knew you as a very attractive, very sexy young man who was a very good lover, so, yes, I did enjoy our lovemaking a lot."

"No need to be sorry Sara, uh, Mom," Tom said with a smile. "I enjoyed every second of it. It was great. With you, too, Terri."

"Thanks, Tom," Terri said. "Okay, now listen all of you and don't interrupt me. This may take a while. I believe I have all the facts I need and can apply logic to this situation.

"Mom, you started me down the road to being a sexually healthy women, mentally and physically, with those long talks you gave me as well as the books on human sexuality. Of course, I didn't stop there. I bought other books on the topic and I went on the Internet.

"There is a theory as to why nearly almost all cultures forbid inbreeding, in other words, incest. But still, incest has been around as long as humans. Did you know that in ancient Egypt the Pharaoh always married one of his sisters? But, due to the nature of genetics, this led to almost no viable baby boys being born, so the Pharaohs had to start choosing heirs from other wives or concubines.

"Did you know that, as far as father-daughter incest goes, the God of the Old Testament didn't forbid it? There is no law in the book of Leviticus, where the laws are set out, that forbids father-daughter incest. It forbids mother-son, brother-sister, and so on but, really, that's more of a property thing. Women were the property of their fathers until they got married, then they were the property of their husbands. For a son to have sex with his mother, or sister, would be misusing his father's property.

"Abraham and his wife, Sarah, were supposedly half-brother and half-sister; same father, different mothers. There is some controversy about this, but many scholars believe it to be true. And yet God did not condemn Abraham or Sarah. There is no controversy about Lot and his daughters. God told Lot to take his family and flee because God was going to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. The story goes like this. After Lot's wife was killed by God for merely turning around to see the destruction of her hometown, Lot and his daughters were living in the desert. The daughters said they had to save their father's seed. Really? Like he didn't have slaves and there weren't other people, nomads, or towns they could have gone to? So they got their father drunk, supposedly so he wouldn't realize who he was having sex with, and the oldest daughter fucked him the first night, then the next night they got him drunk again and the youngest daughter fucked him.

"If anyone believes that, they are seriously brain damaged. I would think that a man so drunk he couldn't recognize his own daughter bouncing up and down on his cock would be a man passed out and his cock would be useless."

Dan and Tom grinned and nodded.

"But God did not condemn this double father-daughter incest," Terri continued. "Kills Lot's wife for having feelings about the place she was born and raised being destroyed, supposedly for the very thing that Lot and his daughters do, but they aren't condemned, therefore, incest is okay with God, at least father-daughter incest.

"But, of course, none of us are religious. We don't believe in the concept of God. We don't go to that church. Incest between consenting adults is not the business of the government. It's peaceful, honest, private behavior. That should be protected behavior, not criminalized behavior." Terri paused, collecting her thoughts. "Richard Posner, a U.S. Courts of Appeals Judge wrote a book entitled Sex and Reason. In it he brings up the subject of incest. I can't quote him exactly but he said something like this: Incest is universally condemned but it would seem that it is universally practiced." Of course, he was talking about the child molesting kind of incest for the most part. What we're talking about here is consenting adult incest, which is our right if we actually own the property of our bodies and minds.

"I've come up with my own theory of why incest is, at least, openly reviled. Our pre-human ancestors comprised, basically, two groups: in-breeders and out-breeders. The in-breeders became genetically pure, so to speak. Everyone in the family, clan, or tribe would have the same genetic material. You see, when you inbreed, the bad recessives will show up more and more frequently. But, the nature of a bad recessive gene is to be non-viable, the mentally or physically damaged babies would have died, been killed outright, left exposed to die—as the Greeks and Romans did, I might add, with sickly or firstborn girls—or for the wild animals to take, or wouldn't have been successful breeders if they lived to breeding age.

"In any case, with enough inbreeding you get a genetically pure line, like we do with horses and cattle and dogs. However the problem with that is that, in the wild, whenever there is an environmental stress—drought, floods, ice age, whatever—the limited genetic material means that many more of the inbreeding group will not be able to cope and will die, if not all of them.

"With out-breeders, you get a strong mix of genetic material. When some unusual environmental stress comes along, many more of them survive. Then it's just a matter of time before the out-breeders out number the in-breeders and are more robust. And, by the time we became fully human, out-breeding was the cultural standard and in-breeding, or incest, was taboo. And, of course, being humans we had to have a reason, even a logically faulty one to back up our belief system, so God condemned incest... except, of course, as I pointed out, for father-daughter incest. And that's pretty much what the present day laws on incest are based on.

Terri was surprised that no one, especially her mother, was trying to interrupt her. "Now, I want to make this perfectly clear, I don't belong to the school of thought that forbids incest in all cases. It's based on religion and I don't accept those religious beliefs. But neither am I suggesting that anyone else should find out that we've had incestuous relationships. Due to the nature of our society and the laws regarding sexual behavior, it has to remain our secret.

"Here's something that Mom taught me and something that I agree with wholeheartedly." Terri paused. "Mom calls them the three objectively bad things about sex. One, nonconsensual sex. Obviously that would include rape and child molesting. But that would also include any kind of sex that an otherwise consenting adult objects to. Two, unwanted pregnancies. Three, sexually transmissible diseases. Take care of those three things and anything goes... including incest."

"Look, Terri," Sara said. "I told you about those things but I never in my wildest imagination thought about incest and if..."

"I know, Mom, Terri said, "but those three objectively bad things about sex do apply here and apply directly. We're all adults and can consent to have sex with each other. You can't get pregnant and I'm as protected as I can be, so no unwanted pregnancies. And I don't think any of us have any sexually transmissible diseases." Tom and Dan nodded their agreement.

Sara didn't nod or say anything for a while but the other three were looking at her. "Oh, of course I don't," she said with exasperation.

"So where does that leave us?" Terri continued. "Unfortunately, my friends Cynthia and Darlene know that I am having sex with both Tom and Dan. What about the rest of you?"

Tom spoke up first. "A couple of my buddies know that we're dating and believe we're having sex, since I didn't deny it. I also told them about you, Sara, but not by name."

"I suppose that's to be expected," Sara said. "Debby, the receptionist at work and I share secrets and she knows about you and me, Tom."

"Dan?" Terri asked.

"I haven't told anyone about you, my circle of friends being other professors and administrative people of the university. Had I told even my best friend that I was having an affair with an undergraduate, the president of the university would have had me on the carpet by now."

"Okay," Terri began again, "so now we can't tell people that we are family. That would cause a shockwave that would reach clear across the nation, ruin Mom and Dad's careers, stop mine and Tom's before we got them started, and might even bring criminal charges against us.

The others nodded in agreement.

"But," said Terri, with a mischievous grin, dimples and all, "there is an upside to all this; if you guys can handle it."

"What is the upside?" Sara asked guardedly.

"We continue our affairs. In fact, I think we should all get into bed together and have our own mini-orgies whenever we can."

Sara, who had remained standing after fixing her second drink, dropped her glass onto the carpet. It was mostly just melting ice cubes by then. She stared openmouthed at her daughter.

Tom grinned openly, lifted his glass to salute his sister. "Tell us more, Terri, dear."

Dan was pretty sure he knew what was coming. He took a big gulp of his drink and settled himself back in his chair.

"You've got to be kidding!" Sara argued, her hands on her hips.

"Stop, Mom. Just hear me out. Okay?" Terri insisted.

Sara closed her mouth and waited but she obviously wasn't happy. She bent down to scoop the ice back into her glass then set it on the sideboard. She got another glass and made herself another drink and then drank off nearly half of it in one gulp before sitting down.

"Okay, here's my logic," Terri said. "Mom and Dad both got 'fixed.' Mom can't get pregnant and Dad can't make anyone pregnant. "I'm using an IUD so Tom can't make me pregnant.

"That's not one hundred percent sure," Sara interjected.

"Close enough," Terri responded. "Anyway, I can get the 'morning after' pills. Besides, when Tom and I get married..."

"Married?" Sara screamed and jumped up out of her chair, nearly spilling her drink again.

Terri was looking at Tom, ignoring her mother. Tom gave her a smile. "You want to get married?" he asked.

"Well, Tom, despite the fact that you're my brother, which I really don't feel like you are, I love you. I'm in love with you and I thought that eventually getting married might be a good idea.

"I'm in love with you, too, Terri," Tom said. "And before all this, before I knew you were my sister, I thought that, eventually, getting married to you would be a great idea."

Terri swallowed. "So what do you think, now?" She asked fearfully.

"I still think it's a great idea," Tom said as he stood up and held out his arms to his sister.

Terri was up and in Tom's arms in a flash. They embraced and kissed.

Sara was standing there speechless, not knowing what to say to convince her daughter and her son, that this was absolutely crazy. She looked over at Dan. "Are you just going to sit there and let this insanity go on?"

Dan looked at his ex-wife coolly. It was time for him to add to Terri's logical argument. "Sara, if you didn't know that Tom was your son you would have continued to have sex with him. You were physically attracted to him, liked him, maybe even loved him and you admitted to really enjoying having sex with him. So now you know he's your son, but that doesn't change the physical pleasure you can give each other. You are letting the beliefs of society and the beliefs of religious, whether you agree with them or not, to affect your emotions.

"What Terri is trying to tell you, well, all of us, is that as consenting adults it's our right to have sex with whoever we want. It's not the business of government, or society, to tell us who we can and who we cannot have sex with. As she pointed out, if we actually do own the property of our bodies and minds, then we have an absolute right to have sex with whoever we want, regardless of the law, because the laws prohibiting..." He paused. "Hmm, how to say this? The laws prohibiting consensual adult incest, that would include the four of us, are religious in nature and violate the rights of otherwise honest, peaceful people who are not violating the rights of anyone else. That is, as honest, peaceful people who are not violating the rights of others, Sara, we have an inalienable right to have sex together if we want, if the principle of inalienable rights means anything at all in America. Does that about sum it up, Terri?"

Terri grinned and nodded. "Perfectly, Dan."

"The only other thing to consider then is this," Dan went on. "Do we feel sexually attracted to each other? Do we want to have sex with each other based on that sexual attraction? Obviously, we all did, including you, Sara, and Tom. Furthermore, Sara, I can see that Tom and Terri still find each other sexually attractive and I know, notwithstanding the fact that she is my daughter, that I'm still quite attracted to Terri, also. I hope she is still attracted to me." Dan turned to where his son and daughter were standing. "But Terri, you were saying something about pregnancy and when you and Tom got married?"

"Thanks, Dan. And, yes, I'm still quite attracted to you." She gave Tom a questioning look.

"That's cool," Tom said, "because I'm still quite attracted to Sara. And we agreed, early on that we could all still be lovers. Of course, Sara may not want to now, but..."

"Mother, Tom, I'm your mother," Sara reminded him.

Tom gave her a gentle smile. "Yes mother, but I still want to be your lover."

"Wait," Sara said. "You and Terri say you love each other and want to get married, eventually. Then how do Dan and I figure into this? How...?"

"Sara... Mother," Tom interrupted gently. "Didn't you and dad love each other when you were married and yet you were swingers, having sex with other men and women? I don't see why Terri and I can't do that, too. We would just be swinging with you and dad... who happen to be our parents, but who we've already had enjoyable sex with.

"Anyway," Terri said, when Sara didn't immediately respond to Tom's statement, "when Tom and I do get married, there are tests, genetic tests we can take to see if we're both carrying the same bad recessive genes. If so, then there's the sperm bank, artificial insemination, or adoption."

"But... but... Terri! It's just not right. You're talking about continuing to have sex with your brother and father," Sara finally spoke up.

"That's not logic, Mom. That's emotion." Terri countered. "You have no logical argument and you fall back on society's religious argument: It's immoral, according to their religious beliefs, therefore it should be illegal. Mom, you're not religious and you should know that religion is based on emotions, not logic. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of emotional reasons why to not have sex with a certain person, or at a certain time, or in a certain way. Hell, Mom, you're an admitted bi-sexual. You like making love to women. That's a big religious no-no.

"Besides, so what if we are family, blood kin? If sex isn't about having babies, which in our case, at least for right now, it isn't, then it's only about pleasure. What is wrong with giving pleasure to someone you love, a family member, sexual pleasure, if they want it, if they are adults?"

"Hear! Hear!" Tom interjected, raising his glass, then quickly finishing his drink. "Terri is absolutely right, Sara, or do you really prefer me to call you Mom?"

Dan spoke up. "Perhaps, under the circumstances, it would be best for us to keep each other on a first name basis. Whether or not we decide to continue our sexual affairs we can't tell anyone, now, about our family relationship. Calling your mother Mom, rather than Sara," Dan glanced over at his son, "means you risk calling her that, inadvertently, in front of someone else."

"Right," Tom said. "Sara it is. Listen, Sara I am in full agreement with Terri. I agree with her theory on sex and inalienable rights and on her, or rather, your three objectively bad things about sex, and on the fact that if sex is for pleasure, what's wrong with me giving you, my mother, some sexual pleasure, if you want it, and vice versa, of course. I mean, Sara, you were sexually attracted to me and I was sexually attracted to you. We had some really great sex. None of that has changed just because we found out our true genetic relationship."

"Well, you haven't convinced me that it would be okay for us to continue our incestuous affairs," Sara said. "What about you, Daniel? You said that you're still attracted to Terri, does that mean that you do want to continue being her lover?"

"Hmm? Yes what about me? This is a very strange situation. I can't fault Terri's logic, but of course the world doesn't run on logic, now does it? And she's right that we can't tell others about our true relationship. Too many now know that we have all been lovers." Dan paused. "Can I be perfectly honest here?"

"Oh yes, Daniel, do be perfectly honest," Sara said sarcastically.

"Go ahead, Dan," Terri said. "Don't mind Mom. She's still in shock. She'll get over it."

"Oh, will I now? Sara responded icily.

"Okay," continued Dan. "To be perfectly honest, all things taken into consideration in this situation, I, uh, well..." he glanced over at Sara, then at Terri, "I'm very much turned-on to the fact that this beautiful young women I've been having sex with is my daughter. I never had a father-daughter incest fantasy because, well, I didn't know I had a daughter and if I did I don't know that I would. I have watched a few pretend incest porn and I've read a couple of incest stories online and I thought they were pretty hot, but never applied it to myself. It was just all fantasy. But now, since this is a real incest situation and I've been having sex with my daughter, well, I'm even more turned-on to the idea of continuing our sexual relationship. So, yeah, I think we should all be lovers."

"Oh Jesus Christ!" Sara shouted. "You're all a bunch of perverts!"

"No, Mom!" Terri said emphatically. "No, we are not. We're realists. We're applying logic to guide our emotions. I admit, when you first told me that Tom was my brother, that Dan was my father, I was shocked. But then I asked myself, did I love Tom? The answer to that was that I did. And I love Dan, too. I like sex for the pure carnal pleasure of sex. You taught me that, Mom, and I'm sure you do too, considering your sexual history. All four of us like sex for the sake of sex itself. There is nothing intrinsically dirty or nasty or wrong with sex, except for the three objectively bad things that I pointed out earlier. But, not only do we like sex, pure eros, we also like each other for who we are, pure philos. And it's no one else's business what we do together with our bodies.

"The only possible problem here, in a secular sense, is if I allow myself to get impregnated by Tom, which I would, eventually, dearly loved to happen. But first I want to find out what the risks factors are. And even if we have a baby together and it has problems, I will still love it as I'm sure Tom will. Tom and Dan and I are consenting adults. We are consenting to continue our incestuous affairs knowing that they are incestuous. All you have to do, Mom, is to consent, too. There is no logical reason why all four of us should not be lovers, should not continue to give and receive sexual pleasure from each other." Terri paused to give her mother a wicked grin. "And Mommy dearest, that would include you and me being lovers also, since you are admittedly bisexual and I am terribly bi-curious."

Sara gave her daughter a shocked look. Dan and Tom grinned at each other, with images of what Terri had just suggested cavorting through their horny male monkey brains.