Fortune Favours the Brave

Mary Harper stood in the lamplight on the pier, looking out into the black ocean. An overwhelming sense of loneliness swept over her like the waves on the shore below. Her fiftieth birthday. Her husband of thirty two years leaving her a week before. A son she loved but rarely saw and a part time job that no longer held any satisfaction. The laughter of drunken couples surrounded her and never had she felt so disconnected to society, to happiness.

"God I think I've drunk too much!" She stated as her two workmates barrelled into her against the railing. "I'm beginning to feel melancholy."

"Haven't we all Darling!" Clarissa shouted.

"It's your birthday," Steffie expounded. "Don't be melancholy, be merry. No that's Christmas!"

"Oh I went through merry about an hour ago," Mary admitted. "I'm moving quickly on to depression."

Clarissa took her by the arm and dragged her off the guard rail. "Then we'll find another bar and drink some more. We'll get you back to merry Darling."

"No that's Christmas!" Steffie repeated, stumbling on her heels as she followed the two other women back towards the strip.

* * * * *

Morgan let himself into his parent's house and ascended the stairs. No, not his parent's house, he told himself. His mother's house. He'd have to get used to calling it that. The dick. He thought. How could his father file for divorce a week before his mother's birthday? He was aware their relationship hadn't been perfect, but the timing. "Asshole," Morgan stated as he passed a photo of his father in the hallway.

A tool box under one arm and the packaging of the new shower head in his hand he made his way past his old bedroom towards his parent's, no, his mother's room. It felt wrong somehow. To be in her house without her knowledge. It was his childhood home of course. He could come and go whenever he chose but it still felt an intrusion. More so as he entered her bedroom.

The bed was of course impeccably made. Her dressing table orderly. The only real disorder to the room were the few dresses laid out on the bed. Evidence of her indecision as to what to wear he reasoned. He was pleased she'd chosen to go out with her friends. Not only as it allowed him time to install her present but he'd noticed her mood had soured since his father's decision. Not unsurprisingly of course. But it wasn't like her to be so sad. He always pictured her smiling and like the loving son he was, he wanted her to be happy. Turning on the light in the bathroom, Morgan stopped in his tracks and reassessed his very presence in the house.

* * * * *

The three women stumbled out of another nightclub. Steffie had abandoned her heels altogether and carried them hanging from her handbag. The shops they walked past on their way to the next bar were mostly closed, take-out and all night convenience stores the exception.

"Oh look," Clarissa unnecessarily shouted in Mary's ear. "A fortune teller! And they're open."

The shop front was half the size of those surrounding and the glass painted in swirling mist and stars.

"So," Mary stated.

"So, you should get a reading."

"Why?" Mary threw back. Both women looked at Steffie who had squatted in the adjacent doorway and was in the process of hitching up her dress.

"Don't mind me," Steffie slurred as she released a stream of pee onto the concrete, oblivious to passers by.

Shaking her head but smiling at the action of her companion, Clarissa looked back at Mary. "Because you need to know what's ahead." Clarissa took Mary's hand. "Look you may not believe in these things but it'd be a bit of fun wouldn't it? Honey, with all that's happened. You could use it!"

Why not? Mary thought to herself.

"Ugh, that's better," Steffie declared as she rose from her impromptu toilet break. "So what's happening?"

"Mary's having her fortune read!" Clarissa declared, taking both women by the arm and marching them through the door beads hanging from the frame.

* * * * *

Morgan sat on the closed lid of the toilet looking into the shower stall.

"What do I do?" He asked himself. "What do I do?"

The new shower head was the only present he'd organized for his mother. A wide rainfall head with attached hand shower that didn't need to work independently, meaning both flows ran at once. The ultimate decadence and the shower head especially, something he knew his mother had dreamed of for some time.

The problem was what protruded from the far wall of the shower. It had been obvious the moment he'd entered. Just below waist height. Flesh colored and he guessed, roughly nine inches in length.

It wasn't like he'd never seen one before, but to see the suction cup dildo in his own mother's house, in her shower where there was no doubt as to its reason for being; well it wasn't something a son regularly contemplated.

He couldn't take his eyes from it. It drew so many images in his mind. The floor of the shower was wet. She'd only been in there hours before. Had she used it then? The time passed and he realized he had to make a decision. Leave now and pretend he'd never seen it. Or install the shower head and ignore its presence. Be an adult, he told himself. What's the big deal? So my mother masturbates in the shower, so what? But even as he thought of it, the picture of her naked, fucking herself under the flow of water filled his mind and ashamedly, it looked pretty hot.

* * * * *

The woman was a caricature straight out of a movie. In her late sixties or seventies, she wore a shawl over her head and shoulders and spoke with an Eastern European accent.

"You will cross my palm with twenty shekels and your fortune to be read," she explained and Clarissa was quick to find the money from her purse.

"I'll pay you back," Mary promised as she sat before the woman, a crystal ball between them.

Clarissa dismissed her comment with a wave of the hand and sat beside Steffie who was soundly sleeping, snoring lightly on the bench provided.

The woman ran her hands over the glass ball and murmured something in her own dialect before glancing at Mary. "You have had celebration, yes?"

It wasn't totally unpredictable. Middle aged women out on the town, drunk. There must have been some motive for them to not be at home on a week night.

"It's my birthday," Mary provided.

"Yes, yes. I see."

"Never mind about the past," Clarissa interrupted over Mary's shoulder. "Get to the good stuff. What does her future look like?"

"Please I need relax mood," the fortune teller fired back and Clarissa resumed her position. Steffie had slumped further, a contented trickle of drool running from her mouth.

"You have great sadness," the seer proclaimed and Mary felt her stomach turn. "Yet I see light my child." The woman moved a hand from the crystal ball to touch Mary's and she felt genuine warmth conveyed in the contact.

"A man is coming into your life," she continued and both Clarissa and Mary straightened to hear more. "He rides horses!"

Mary racked her brain to think of a man she knew that rode or would have anything to do with a horse and came up blank.

"He is how you say, outdoorsman," she elaborated. "His hands," she held her own out before her. "They work iron; wood. Yet he is gentle. He will learn your most intimate secret and he will never say a word."

The description was becoming less plausible the more detail it conveyed but Mary listened on.

"He will shower you with gifts. He will see you at your worst and love you all the more."

"Oh goodness," Clarissa remarked from behind. "If you don't want him Mary, I will."

The oracle ignored the intrusion and ran her hands again over the glass.

"In the strangest place you will wish to make love but at the ballet, after a feast it will happen....." The woman stopped in her telling and leaned back cocking her head. "It is strange....I see....no it can't be....never mind." She concluded.

"So that's it?" Clarissa stood up, knocking Stephie in the process and drawing her from her slumber. "Do we even know what he looks like?" She added.

The fortune teller shook her head. "I only see what the glass allows."

"Hmm," Clarissa frowned. "At least give us a tall, dark and handsome!"

To this the fortune teller almost broke character and half smiled. "As you wish," looking back at the still seated Mary. "He has eyes like the darkest forest."

* * * * *

Morgan tightened the nut around the shower arm and turned the head to face the correct direction. He stood back to survey his handiwork and was proud of the job he'd done. The counterfeit cock caught in the corner of his eye and he looked directly at its veiny length, hairless latex balls hanging beneath.

"What do you think buddy? Did I do a good job?"

He tapped the bulbous head with the end of his spanner and watched it comically bob up and down.

"Exactly," Morgan laughed before being silenced by it slipping from the wall. Bouncing to the floor of the shower, it landed between his feet.

"Oh shit!" He gasped. The whole situation had uncomfortable written all over it. Squatting down, Morgan took hold of the cold dildo and lifted it back to where a smudge on the tiled wall signalled its origin.

Pressing the suction hard, an image of his mother taking the cock in her mouth came to him. Jesus, he thought. Does she suck it? How much can she take before she chokes? The idea of his mother sucking a dildo, the very dildo he had in his hand dominated his mind. Coating it with saliva before taking it inside her body, her ass slapping the wall as she penetrated herself. It was only upon standing did he realize he had an erection.

* * * * *

It was after one a.m. and Mary had been waiting for the Uber more than twenty minutes past it's arrival time. In a well lit area with constant pedestrian traffic she didn't feel unsafe but she'd drunk way too much, her feet were killing her and she really needed to pee. She looked at her phone and tried the Uber app again but her eyes wouldn't focus on the small text and it just made her nauseous. Taxis drove past but she hated the thought of sitting in the rear of a dirty cab. Did she even have money to pay the fare, she pondered?

She hated doing it. Even in her inebriated state, she could see how annoying being woken in the middle of the night to come and get your drunken mother would be but what other choice did she have? To her surprise he answered on the first ring and without a word of complaint he took down her whereabouts.

* * * * *

"I'm glad really," Morgan stated. "There's something at your house I want to show you!"

The movement of her son's Mustang had been soothing at first and as he drove her home she'd begun to do doze off. Now however, the amount of alcohol she'd consumed was coming back to haunt and again nausea overwhelmed her.

Morgan looked across as her head pressed to the glass of the passenger window. "We can stop if you want."

Mary waved her hand dismissively. "No I'm alright. Just keep going. What were you saying?"

"Oh nothing, you'll see." He again glanced at her and thought he'd never seen her so drunk. Dad, he said to himself. Asshole!

* * * * *

"I can carry you?" Morgan offered as she struggled to walk beside him from the car to her front door.

He was already carrying her handbag and with an arm around her waist was essentially supporting most of her weight already.

"Oh no Honey, hic," Mary hiccuped, placing an arm up over his shoulder. "I can, hic, make it!"

Mounting the steps was an experience and a shoe came off half way. This caused her to begin laughing and Morgan took it upon himself to carry her the rest of the way anyway.

"Ooh, hic. You're so strong Honey. Stronger than your loser, hic, father that's for, hic, sure!" She opined, looking into her son's face, her arms hugging his neck.

Morgan tried to get his keys without putting her down but it was futile and to Mary's regret he lowered her back to her feet and unlocked the door.

"Ooh my shoe!" She declared.

"Don't worry, I'll go back and get it," Morgan stated. "Actually." He dropped to his knees before her and undoing the sling on her remaining high heel, lifted her foot out of the shoe.

Mary had one hand on the door frame, the other she reached down and stroked Morgan's hair off his forehead. "What, hic, would I do without you?"

Being at her waist it was only then he noticed how high her dress had ridden up her thighs, her bare legs on display from just below her crotch to her toes. They looked pretty good for her age, he thought and all of a sudden the image of her in the shower with the dildo flooded back.

"Oh I'm sure you'd manage," he offered and rose to direct her into the house.

They reached the kitchen and before even contemplating getting her up the stairs to her bedroom, Morgan suggested a large glass of water.

"You're so good, always looking after me...Oh I forgot!" Mary stated, pushing her son against the fridge. "I saw a psycho!"

"What?" Morgan replied, wondering what she was talking about but glad her hiccups had stopped.

"Oh not a psycho, a psychic." She slapped her forehead. "We went to a fortune teller," she admitted. "She said I'm going to meet someone Morgan." She scrunched the front of his t-shirt and her glassy eyes looked intently into his. "But I don't need him," she added. "I have you!"

It looked to Morgan like she was about to cry and ever so slowly she leaned in towards his face.

"Oh shit!" Mary cried out and stumbled towards the sink.

She just made it before a stream of vomit flowed from her mouth. All liquid, Morgan was there beside her quickly and held her hair back from the sink. An action that even in her state, didn't go unnoticed by his mother.

* * * * *

The purge went a long way to sobering her up. The large drink of cold water even more so.

"I must look awful!" Mary remarked. "You must hate me."

Morgan chuckled. "You look fine, maybe a little green! And I love you. What good am I if not to hold back your hair from a little vomit!?"

"So what was it?" Mary asked him.

Morgan raised his eyebrows before realizing she was asking what it was he'd wanted to show her.

"Oh it's in your bathroom." He felt his face redden and wondered whether she remembered she'd left her toy on the wall.

"In my bathroom?" Her frown showed she had no idea what it could be but the blood draining from her face told him she had remembered the dildo.

If she wasn't sobering up a minute before, she was now. Oh my God, my playmate! She screamed at herself. Did I put it away? It wasn't an everyday thing that she'd use it. Her husband didn't even know she owned it. It was just that afternoon, before going out, she'd felt so horny and needed relief. She hadn't even cum, just toyed with it in the shower. Please tell me I put it away, she pleaded.

Rising, but her eyes trained suspiciously on her son, Mary moved towards the stairs. Morgan followed, remaining close behind her to steady her if she stumbled on her wobbly legs; he wasn't disappointed with the view of her ass as she ascended. The hint of panty when she reached the top caused admittedly impure thoughts to enter his head and he tried to remove them as he wondered how the dildo situation would play out.

"Um," Mary stopped at her bedroom door. "I just have to pee!"

"Oh, yeah of course," Morgan stepped back. "I'll wait."

"Ok," she drummed her fingers on the doorframe. "So it's in the bathroom? My bathroom?"

"Yep," Morgan grinned and cursed himself for his actions. You're an idiot Morgan. She thinks your talking about the dildo. Why did you ever go through with it? Idiot.

Oh Jesus, Mary thought. He's seen my playmate. He's talking about my playmate. He's making fun of me. Why would he do this? What else could he be talking about?

She left him at her door and went to the bathroom. There was a moment before the light came on that she thought it would all be ok. That she was mistaken and had secreted it away before she'd left. But no. There it was. As obvious as the nose on her face, in every direction she looked, there was its unmistakable color in her peripheral vision. She looked around for sign of anything else. Had he bought her new towels? Bath products? Nothing. She really did need to pee and before she did so, quickly ripped the cock from the wall and threw it in a vanity drawer, completely missing her new shower unit.

The cistern refilling, she looked in the mirror at her white face before exiting and as she turned she saw it. "Oh my God!" She screamed in genuine delight as she re-opened the door to her shower.

Morgan hearing her shout, tentatively opened the door to the bathroom and his eyes went directly to where the dildo had been, entering fully when he saw it gone.

"I love it!" Mary ecstatically clapped.

Thankfully with the new shower head to focus his attention on, the elephant now hiding somewhere in the room needn't be mentioned and Morgan joined his mother outside the shower.

"Honey, it's wonderful," she beamed. The dildo was still in her mind but the embarrassment of her son knowing her most intimate secret was put aside with the joy of his gift. "When did you, how did you? Oh my God, I love it."

With abandon she threw her arms around Morgan and kissed his cheek. There was a strange moment with her body pressed to his that she felt like kissing his mouth, settling instead with another kiss on the cheek.

"It has the hand attachment as well," Morgan stated. "And check this out." He turned on the faucet and the rainfall shower head showed its power and then flicking a lever, the hand shower came on as well.

"They work at the same time!" Mary gushed.

Morgan nodded.

"Your father never even offered to get this for me Honey," she stated and as she'd been on the verge of in the kitchen, her eyes filled with tears.

"Happy birthday Mom," Morgan said and looking down at his watch added. "For yesterday! I love you." Turning off the shower, Morgan kissed her on the forehead and couldn't recall ever doing that before then.

Wiping her dripping mascara, Mary sniffed and didn't need to wonder how she must have looked, the mirror right there. He loves me even in this state, she thought to herself.

"Listen, I'm gonna get going and you should get some sleep," Morgan ventured as she walked him out of the bathroom.

"I will, later," she stated. "You know I have to try out my new shower!"

Morgan smiled and rubbed her arm as he left. And with her shouting again her thanks and how much she loved him, he descended the stairs. The sound of the shower starting made him smile and then he wondered if she again had the dildo?

* * * * *

Morgan walked through the retirement village and navigated his way to his grandmother's unit.

"Knock, knock," he called as he passed through her unlocked screen door and found her in the living room.

"What's this?" Patty remarked. "Two visitors in the one day!"

Morgan kissed his grandmother and went to take up his regular seat beside her, his eyes drifting to the television where women paraded shapewear.

"Let me guess, Mom?" Morgan asked.

"Uh huh," Patty confirmed examining her grandson. "Where are my chocolates?"

Morgan managed to tear his eyes from the alluring display on the screen. "Oh poop, I forgot. Sorry Nan."

"Hah,"she exclaimed. "You and your mother. Memories like sieves."

"Why, what's she done?"

"Well while you're here, you can get it," she explained. "She forgot to take her box."

"Box of what?"

"Oh go get it would you Dear, in my closet, bottom shelf, just a cardboard box."

Morgan rose but was reluctant to leave the room. The camera zooming in on the crotch of the middle aged model.

"Do you watch this all day Nana?"

"Hmm?"

"The Home Shopping channel?"

"Oh, I don't want to miss the bargains."