Put a Leash on Her

"Oh jeez, honey. No... Hell no," he looks embarrassed and horrified. "We've just been so... and... well it hasn't-"

"Shh." I pat his thigh. "It's just a silly feeling. Make it up to me later."

It seemed to become his raison d'etre for the next two days. He commenced that evening in the showers and continued lazily licking me through my whole confused and still slightly disjointed confession about my fantasy back in the van later. The one with the dogs in the parking lot and the line of dogs fucking, all mixed up with our recent activities that I haven't quite sorted out in my head.

The one that strictly doesn't contain any 'actual' dogs, just people, and me feeling totally lost to my own lust and completely out of control and used and using them. And... He made up soundly for any neglect I had felt in that regard. A few more times in fact, before he fucked me so hard that Amy grumbled and stirred in her sleep at the other end of the van and we giggled like naughty teenagers caught in the act, then finished really quietly and fell asleep wrapped in each other.

Mum woke us with a phone call, early on Tuesday morning to ask if we could pick her up on our way to save her the drive up to Larry and Tracey's. We'd okayed it with the lovely older couple so that if the girls got bored fishing there was an available sitter on hand.

Everything was already packed and organised, I just had to shunt two sleepy girls through the showers and stop them bickering long enough to eat some breakfast. Rod was up and about long before that phone call as he was on 'holiday time' and had been getting up for a dawn fish. He had brewed fresh coffee for me and another silly thought struck me.

I hadn't blown him to completion since he'd come in that woman's mouth. What if he felt neglected like I did?

"What?" He asked my frowning morning face.

"Coffee please, babe. You know how I am till I get coffee." I'm not admitting that stupid morning thought to him, but I do commit an action plan to do just that at some point in the near future.

Mum was waiting out the front of her motel tapping her foot looking like a middle-aged hooker running away from home. She had her hair in a lazy ponytail and was made up to the nines as usual. She wore a short red skirt and a tight white singlet top and runners. The phrase, 'mutton dressed as lamb' would come to mind if by some weird twist of genetics her petite frame and seemingly ageless face hadn't seemed to pull the whole ensemble off.

She had two bags. An overnight bag and her big beach bag with her and Rod dutifully stowed them in the back of the wagon.

"How long are you going for?" I ask her cheekily. Clearly my coffee has kicked in.

"Always travel prepared." She frowns at me. "Just a change of clothes and some things in case you abandon me along the way."

The girls engage her in excited banter the rest of the way. They've never been in a boat and appear to be looking forward to it.

Larry and Tracey's house is a simple old two story cane farm house that is right on the highway just out of Tumbulgum. The tweed river is just across the busy highway that we turn off into their driveway. Larry is up and about. I can see him stowing things in his boat as we pull up. It's a much larger boat than I expected when he described it as a 'tinny'.

The girls explode out of the car in a gaggle of noise and hug Larry's legs. I follow Rod around to where he shakes Larry's hand and gestures at Mum who is straightening her travel crumpled skirt.

"Oh Larry, this is-"

"Bill!"

"Annie! Fucking hell. It's been..." he rushes over and picks mum up in a bear hug to spin her around.

"Put me down, you fuckwit." Mum laughs.

"Wait till Tracey..." Larry shakes his head turns Mum around in front of him to look her over. "You haven't changed a bit, lady. Gorgeous as ever."

"Who is Tracey? What happened to Enid?" Mum asks him, holding his jaw in her palm like a long lost... what exactly? "Oh, and it's Jane. Pleased to meet you Larry."

"Tracey is Enid. Incredibly pleased to meet you, Jane."

And then Rod, Amy, Laura and I watch with our mouths wide open and our eyes bugging out as Mum pulls Larry in for a very unmotherly kiss. It involves tongue and passion and lasts far longer than the girls can bear. They giggle and whisper and Rod and I share a very confused eyebrow raised look.

"Good lord woman." Larry huffs when they part. "It must be twenty years."

"Fifteen or so... Maybe. You still kiss alright for an old bloke. Oh shit..." They both finally remember their company and start laughing loudly.

"Annie? Get fucked!" Tracey has found us and runs over to smother mum in a far too familiar hug. A hug that involves kisses on the lips and a lot of squeezing.

"Well that explains a hell of a lot." Larry laughs. "I spent all last week wondering how you looked so familiar, Jill."

"Why is Pops and Tracey so weird, Mum?" Laura sneers. She really isn't a big one for public displays of affection. She enjoys a snuggle on her own terms, but this is insulting to her. "Why are they kissing Nan so much?"

"Why indeed," I smirk. "Ahem... Seems like explanations are in order and you have clearly forgotten your manners, Tracey. I am in desperate need of at least one more coffee this morning. What on earth is going on?"

"Oh shit, bub." Mum tells me. "Do you remember the other day I said, Dad and I had some 'very' close friends in Noosa years ago?"

"Ohhhhh," I nod as it makes sense. "Oh god." I mutter as I realise Mum and I have something more than she imagines in common.

Rod finds the whole occasion tremendously hilarious but manages to settle himself long enough to gather our confused daughters into a huddle and explain that Grandad Eric, Nan, Pop's and Tracey knew each other a long time ago and were BFF's. That seemed to placate the girls who then turned their attention into inspecting the boat. Well, clambering all over it and pushing buttons and trying on life-jackets.

Larry extracts himself from the reunion to entertain the girls and Rod and show them about the boat. I follow Mum and Tracey into the house feeling very much like the forgotten spare wheel. So much so, that I snoop in the kitchen and locate Tracey's kettle and make instant coffee for everyone.

I take Rod and Larry's out first because Mum and Tracey are making noises like high school girls and I'm a bit left out. Rod and Larry thank me and I'm a bit left out there too. They talk horsepower and fuel and man things and the girls ignore me and play with fishing rods.

Back inside I sit across from Mum and Tracey who hold hands and sip their coffees between stories of glory days and a thoroughly different picture of my Mum is painted for me. I listen as she tells Tracey about Dad's cancer and the treatment, his pain and ultimately his death. They both cry. Their connection must have been deep but somehow, they kept it hidden from Paul and me. My younger brother and I had no memories of these people that somehow meant so much to Mum and Dad.

"Are you seeing anyone?" Tracey asks Mum as they wipe their eyes.

"No. It always feels to soon still and it's been five years now. And how would I ever find someone who understood?"

"We've slowed down a hell of a lot, but I feel the same about Larry. I don't think I could ever find someone so... And your Terry, I mean Eric. Oh god, I loved that man. No-one got me quite so... and he was so good back there. Oh shit. Too much, Jill? This must all be some kind of crazy to you."

"Oh, Jillian sweetheart," Mum puts her hands on her heart, "Tracey tells me she watched you take your first stray." There are tears in her eyes and this moment is so ridiculous that I simply burst out laughing.

"You didn't even come to my graduation, Mum. When I told you that I gave my virginity to Tim, I think your exact words were, 'oh that's lovely dear, are you on the pill?'. When I came home with a driver's licence, you asked me to go to the shop and buy some tampons for you. But I fuck some random in the sand dunes and you're tearing up? Can this day get any weirder?" I'm a bit angrier sounding than I actually feel.

They both laugh until Mum has to put her coffee down and Tracey grabs at her crotch and excuses herself, "I'm gonna piss myself, I'll be right- ooh... too late."

When she returns Mum is actually asking, "So how did you and Rod like you know, get into it. It's hardly passed on genetically..."

I hang my head into my palms and wonder if this is the same woman who couldn't have the birds and bees talk and asked Dad to tell me about periods and bras. Yet here we are. How did you and your husband start fucking in front of people and... fuck my life.

"Corrupted them the same way we corrupted you and Terry." Smiled Tracey with her hand on Mum's shoulder.

"Oh no. My little girl took... All... Jilly? You..."

I am not having this conversation with my mother. I am going fishing. And fish I did.

It was a thoroughly normal and wonderful day. The joy on the girls faces when they reeled in their first small bream each gladdened my heart and almost made me forget Tracey telling me that Larry gave mum the name 'Annie' because he took her 'Annie which way but loose'. This was a reference to the old Clint Eastwood film that he liked and the fact that my mother was the only woman he knew who could deepthroat him, let him take her vaginally as roughly as he liked and entertain him anally as well. All the while, being the tightest woman he'd ever fucked.

"You and Paul were caesareans." Mum patted my arm smiling and explained.

I almost forgot this while I reeled in a monster sized flathead that was too large and had to be thrown back. My world's axis had taken a sudden tilt to the left. My mum and dad who had previously in my mind been relatively asexual beings who somehow conceived Paul and I were suddenly perverts like Rod and me.

Pastor Eric Bramston and his Sunday school teacher wife, Jane. Perverts... My moral compass thrown to the ground and stomped on. But the girls were enjoying fishing. And Rod was enjoying the boat. Larry let him drive it and god help me, I had been enjoying everything and had a total handle on it up till now too.

The couple of cold beers didn't help. Of course, I smiled and played wife and mum for Rod and the girls but oh my god. I seethed with the hypocrisy. All my developmental and adult life I felt like I fell so far short of their expectations.

We ate fish and chatted like normal people as the sun dipped into the hills and the river turned dark. Little Laura claimed 'Pops' lap and Amy, her Dad's. They picked at chips with too much sauce and seriously, I thought the girls would bore far more quickly with the 'wait' side of fishing but once they each had one on board, they too, were hooked.

"Um, Jill?" Mum looked up to me as we washed dishes in the kitchen and prepared to drive back to the van before it got too late.

"Hmm." It was hard to keep the betrayal out of my voice.

"Look, I'm going to stay up here tonight. You really aren't coping so well with this... er development. I wish I'd known... Larry is going to drop me home tomorrow."

I mike dropped the fucking tea-towel and stood there looking at my hands.

Then something, a single brick in the dam wall. A straw on the camel's back. Something snapped.

"Fuck me Mum! All my fucking life, I've measured myself against this perfect fucking thing you and Dad held me up against. All my fucking life. Fuck, do you know how bad I felt when I finally let Tim fuck me? Well, fucking do you? I thought I was going to hell. I thought you were going to kick me the fuck out when I told you. And here you both are fucking... fucking 'fucking'. Fucking strangers and preaching to your children about love and chastity and fidelity and just... fuck you. Fuck you very much."

Suddenly I'm a little embarrassed. I'm reminded I'm in a stranger's house. But that fuse was well lit, and I burn still.

"Do you know how many times, how many boys I wanted to sneak off with when I was with Tim? Normal growing up exploration I suppose, but no... Goody two shoes playing the perfect girlfriend just like you were the perfect fucking wife and Dad the perfect fucking husband. When Tim cheated, I felt like such a fucking failure. It was the same with Alex. He treated me like shit but I tried to be this thing I thought you were."

I was crying and screaming and felt arms around my shoulders and shrugged them violently off only to turn and find my Rod and fall back inside them again. Sobbing hard against his chest, I heard Mum explaining she was going to give us some space for me to internalise things.

"Bull fucking shit. I know what you're going to fucking internalise, 'Annie which way but loose!' You fucking hypocrite." I sobbed. "You fucking hypocrite."

I was asleep in minutes. The emotion and the lullaby of the tyres whining on our way back down the highway took me far, far away from the upside down my preacher's daughter's life had become. Rods warm, heavy hand resting on the back of my neck as I slumped down in my seat was my lifeline. The girls were horrified at my outburst and sympathetically cried themselves to sleep in the backseat making me feel even worse.

"Drive safe." Larry told us as Rod bundled me in the car. "She'll be okay. Call us."

By the following afternoon I was a little sick of myself. I'd been moping and a terrible drudge for the girls who couldn't understand why I had been so angry at Nan. Rod gave up on trying to cheer me up and took his fishing rod for a walk. Around two in the afternoon I was watching Amy and Laura paddle in the little gutter that low tide had left behind. They splashed each other and marvelled at things they found like shells and little rocks. Their innocence explained it all to me.

What the ever-living fuck would I tell them about my evolving sexuality? What the ever-living fuck did I expect my parents to tell an innocent me? There's no handbook for parenting. Especially none when it comes to explaining sexuality to your children as they encounter their own.

I guess the best a parent can do is to be reliable. I mean, what did I think Mum was going to tell me when she discovered her enjoyment of exhibitionism, group sex and this 'dogging' thing as Larry calls it. I'm sure as shit not telling the girls about it. Certainly not until they're much older and even then, maybe not.

But I am, I promise myself, going to be a lot more open, honest and sex positive with them as they grow and ask questions. I will continue to mould their moral development too, but within a more realistic and healthy way than my religious upbringing allowed.

"I'm really sorry." Are the first words out of my mouth when I find Mum sitting in the van. In answer, she just stood and hugged me.

"Shh. Not like anyone saw it coming. I'm sure it was a lot to take in."

She's swallowed by excited girls who have a million things to tell her. I spend the rest of the afternoon laughing at her expense as she carries a cushion with her everywhere the girls drag her. She's sitting on it now in the park as we watch them swing.

"So, we met Larry and Tracey in the early eighties. We were on holidays in Noosa, do you remember the van park there?"

"Sort of."

"From what they tell me, your beach is very similar to how Woods Bay was back then. Your father and I were walking along one of the tracks one afternoon with you kids in tow when we spotted some people going at it in the scrub. I shielded you two from it and we rushed back to the van. That night your Dad and I had the best sex ever."

"I'm not sure how much of this I want or need to hear, Mum."

"It's just sex Jillian. And we felt so much shame about it back then. I like that I can talk to you about it now. We felt like such deviants back then. I just want you to understand why, I mean how could we..."

"I do understand Mum. Look over there." I pointed at the girls, "I protect them from everything I can and prepare them for everything I can't protect them from. But this adventure, this sex thing... This is for me and Rod to share."

"That's how it was for us. Look," she scrabbled in her bag, "Larry gave me these to show you."

She handed me three old polaroids. Apart from the fact that the people in them were completely naked, they looked just like friendly holiday snaps. Mum and Dad, fucking hell this was my Dad naked..."

"They were happy times, but you started asking a few too many questions and we knew it was time to move on. I can remember the exact moment. You were laughing at your father who was in a bit of discomfort one day and told him, 'maybe if you put sunscreen on it when you are on the beach with your friends it wouldn't have got burned. At least it will be quiet in the van tonight.' I think you were around thirteen or so and just starting to become aware of such things. We didn't want you sexualised by our behaviour. We tried to be good parents."

"Oh, you were, Mum. I was just a total drama queen yesterday. It was 'all about me' as usual. I'm really glad you caught up with some old friends. It looks like you caught up pretty damn well with Larry." I snickered.

After dinner she went back to her motel with a promise that she could take the girls to Palm Valley for a paddle the following afternoon. They loved riding the gentle waves there on their boogie boards.

Rod woke me early the next morning. I was dreaming about something vaguely erotic when I realised the sensations were actually Rod being naughty and waking me up like he does sometimes. He was hard and already inside me. I was well wet and he was moving gently back and forth behind me.

"Good morning, honey." He said, brushing my hair out of my face so I could turn and kiss him.

In answer I just moaned quietly. He must have been at me for a while because I was already very close to cumming. Now he knew I was awake, he picked up his pace and fucked me more strongly. In no time at all I shook like a rag doll as he held me gently around the waist. Taking my cue, he emptied a short time later inside me and lay there cradling me.

"God, that beats an alarm clock." I told him. "What bloody time is it anyway? It's dark still."

"Just on five. I have some things to organise today. Have to get going early."

"You mean fishing, don't you?" I tease, as he softens and plops out of me. "Well bring me back coffee, I'm going to snooze till the girls get up."

He kisses the back of my head and tucks me back in after he leaves the bed. I hear him rattling with his rods and gear at the front of the van and hope he doesn't wake the little crotch goblins up yet. I could use another couple of hours sleep still.

He's still not back by lunch time when Mum arrives to collect the girls. They've been waiting excitedly for ages and are in the car and gone in just moments. It was nearing two in the afternoon when he finally returned.

"Hello stranger." I said a little sharply.

"Yeah sorry, hon. I took a bit longer than... Well a lot longer than I wanted. Girls gone?"

"Yeah, since lunch. I was kinda hoping to get some beach time in. We only have three more days. I can't believe it's Thursday already. We have-"

"To pack up and leave Saturday. I know." He's stowing his fishing gear and putting some fresh fillets in the little freezer that's almost full.

"You trust me, right?" He asks a little enigmatically.

"Yeah. Of course. Why?"

"Oh... Well look, I've been thinking on that fantasy idea you half told me about. I've... I've done a little planning. I hope you enjoy yourself, but you'll have to trust me a bit."

"Ooh." An excited girly squeak surprises me, "Can you give me some hints?"

His broad smile and accompanying wink tell me that I'm just going to have to wait and find out.

"So, how about some nudey time? Make the most of girls being gone for the arvo?"