Shock and Aw, Cute

Now don't get me wrong, we weren't broke or struggling to find food to eat -- but another mouth to feed was not a great idea as far as I was concerned. Especially a canine one.

"But he's like totally cute, mum!"

"You're eighteen," I sighed, already knowing deep down that I had lost the argument, "You should be out hunting down a girlfriend, not at home with an over-sized puppy."

Jamie shrugged, "It's not my fault we'll be in lockdown again next week. He'll be company for us."

"And the second the lockdown is over, or we're all vaccinated you really will be off trying to sniff out a female companion and your poor single mum here will be left with a puppy to look after, right?"

I received another shrug, "I'll be around for a while yet. There's like no way they'll get the universities sorted out for ages and he really will be great company anyway..."

"He's already huge! What breed is he?" The bundle -- the enormous bundle -- of black fur pointed his snout my way and I swear he grinned at me.

"He's a Newfie cross, mum, they're great--"

"They're vast, more like. Have you any idea how big they get? And anyway, what's he a Newfoundland crossed with? A horse?" The shrugs were coming thick and fast, "His owner wasn't sure. Their only other dog is a pug and there's no way--"

"Yes, I get the picture," I interrupted, "There's no need to go into detail. So, how did this thing's mother actually get pregnant? Let me guess -- a stray from the local stable escaped and ended up in their garden." I snorted, "Then ended up in this thing's mother!"

"Mum! It was nothing like that."

"An unnecessary comment but carry on."

"She escaped from their garden and that's all they really know."

I sighed as the big, black ball of fur licked my hand tentatively, "So it really could be fathered by anything, horses included."

"That's just silly," my son grinned, "But it must be something taller than a pug."

"Like a horse," I nodded, finally giving in and petting the now dribbling puppy. Its fur was luxurious -- so soft and dense...

"Mum! It was more likely to be the Alsatian that lives near them."

"Or one of the giraffes from the zoo. It's only two miles away." The furball licked me with its already enormous tongue. It liked me.

"Dogs don't mate with other animals, mum. You know that!"

I sighed again. I knew the furball was staying. "You evidently haven't seen some of the websites I have. Not that you should," I added quickly.

Jamie joined in with my petting of the great big fuzzy lump, sending it into slobbery raptures of delight, "So, we're keeping him, right?"

"We really shouldn't," I persisted, despite knowing the argument was already lost -- you have to show the right cards, regardless.

My son, though, could read my hand better than most professional poker players, "I knew you'd agree!"

"I did not agree!"

"Your mouth didn't but your face did," he laughed, "And let's face it, you're single and we've got loads of space and when I finally go to uni you'll be all alone here and--"

"And staying alone if I'm playing mother to this furry thing. Mind you, as a son replacement he'll probably be tidier and more talkative."

"Funny -- not," Jamie grinned, "But that's a 'yes', then, right?"

And of course, he was right. If the truth had been told, I really had been wondering whether some sort of pet might be a good idea after Jamie had departed. But a huge dog had not been on the list of possibles. Cats, yes. Chinchillas, yes. A parrot, maybe... "Well," I sighed as the hairy bundle licked my hand harder, "Perhaps we can give it a trial. No promises!"

And thus, it started.

*****

I'm Debbie (note to others - never Deborah, thanks), and a single mum, by choice, of thirty-three. Given that Jamie is eighteen you can read into that a story of teenage stupidity but that's an altogether different story -- just do the maths (or math if you're American) -- and not for telling here. I inherited a smallholding that earns enough to keep us in food, and life is good. It's a simple existence and it suits me perfectly.

Perfect or not though, it's not exactly a thrilling existence but I like the peace and the honest toil that is all my life demands. I think -- like most mums -- that I've raised a fundamentally decent son, and he's a smart kid -- even if he is a typical moody teen who treats every horizontal surface as somewhere to store his junk. To be fair to him, I will miss his grunts and mess when he finally heads off into the wild world on his own, but that's life for all decent mums, and I wish him every success. And at least he isn't a parent yet unlike his own mother eighteen years ago...

As far as I can make out, we're a normal mother and son. We have a large, rambling place here and we keep to our own areas, doing our own things with a large degree of privacy and decorum. The older he's become the more those areas of privacy have expanded and in all honesty I will barely miss someone I seldom see here regardless of our shared life. Such is life.

I have -- lockdowns permitting -- the occasional male 'friend' who visits and we're always left alone by Jamie (who entertains girlfriends from time to time). Our life -- and love-lives -- is/are normal, in other words. But then 'he' arrived, and I saw much more of my son for a few days -- at first trying to choose a name.

"You can't call him Dog, mum!"

"Why not? That's what he is."

Jamie gave one of his trademark shrugs, "He's more than just a dog, though, isn't he?"

"True," I relented, "How about Horsey?"

"Mum!"

"Or Sit. That'd be fun when I walk him. Stay, Sit. Roll over, Sit. Come to mummy, Sit-"

My son threw his arms up in despair, "You're not taking this seriously!"

"You noticed," I grinned, "May I remind you that I wasn't the one who forced the mutt into the ranch."

"You didn't have to say he could stay..."

I cuddled the slobbering pup, "And you knew I would. But," I added quickly, "you are going to help feed and groom him while you're still here, okay?"

My son shrugged again, but in a way that I had come to know as a definite yes.

"And his name is Yeti."

Jamie raised an eyebrow, weighing up my choice of moniker, "That's like... okay."

High praise indeed from my taciturn offspring. I pressed home my slim advantage, "Tomorrow morning you're going to help feed him, and you're going to clean up any mess Yeti has made in the kitchen where he's going to be living for now, okay?"

Flushed with his apparent success, my son agreed readily.

Little did we know that the newly named Yeti wasn't keen on sleeping alone.

In my nightie with a hastily donned robe over it, I met my bleary-eyed son in his t-shirt and boxers as we hurried through to the howling Yeti at stupid-o'clock the following morning.

"I think someone's lonely," he said as we staggered into the kitchen.

"No shit, deerstalker boy," I yawned. "Oh..."

We stood and looked around as Yeti, relieved in many more senses than one, came over to us wagging the rear half of his furry body. I patted his head.

There was shredded paper everywhere, some of it rather damp. Worse still there was rather a lot of evidence that Yeti's digestive system was fully -- and very stinkily -- operational. I patted his head again, resisting the urge to add a strangle.

I sighed and opened a kitchen drawer, extracting two large black bags and two packets of floor wipes. The sacks were about to be filled with shredded newspaper, but I figured no one would appreciate recycling the contents by the time we were finished. Handing one to Jamie along with some wipes, I nodded to the furthest corner of the room, "You start over there and I'll meet you in the middle. And don't skimp on the wipes."

My son sighed, "I hope this is sorta first night nerves." He took his share of the cleaning materials and headed for his designated starting position.

I hid a smile and dropped to my knees, trying to ignore the now-happy puppy, and started into the clean-up.

Fifteen minutes, and two surprisingly full sacks later, Jamie and I were nose-to-nose with the last scraps in sight. I was about to offer my boy the privilege of the final remnants when I realised that he'd stopped anyway. A glance up at his face was all it took for me to understand why -- my nightie was, I was suddenly aware, not exactly tight-fitting, and being on hand and knees meant it gaped rather low. My teenage son was being gifted a rather too intimate view of his own mothers unfettered breasts!

And son or not, he was a heterosexual teenage male with all the usual fascinations. I sat back fast, "Oops, sorry," I managed a laugh as I pulled the robe across my hitherto rather visible areas, "I hope that didn't offend!"

Now, while I knew that offence was the last thing on his mind, I was still surprised -- almost shocked -- by his automated shake of the head and his next words.

"Shit no, mum, they're... I mean, it's just fine!"

"Hey, buster, I'm your mum, remember!" I couldn't place the sudden feelings that were skittering around the edges if my brain. Jamie sat up fast, "What? I mean... oh, right, er, sorry? Bit of a surprise, that's all."

I believed him at once. I mean, it wasn't as if he'd engineered the view after all, "I'll let you off," I managed another laugh, "But as a penance, you can put some more paper down -- I'm going back to bed."

He answered, I'm sure, but to this day I can't remember what he said -- I was in much too much of a hurry all of a sudden. Once in the sanctuary of my room I gave myself space and time to think. What on Earth had come buzzing through me down in the kitchen? I hadn't been any sort of exhibitionist since a silly phase in my teens -- and anyway, this was my freaking son! That sort of situation had never arisen before because we were discreet -- not prudes -- and gave each other space and privacy... but all I could keep seeing were his wide eyes as he started down my gaping nightie...

I knelt up on my bed and faced the mirror on the wardrobe door, letting my nightie hang as it must have done down in the kitchen. That way I could see through Jamie's eyes, in a way, and the view was anything but discreet. My nipples, very visible, hardened in an instant, and my eyes widened much as my son's had downstairs.

Not because of the view, though, in my case. Oh, no. In my case it was because I couldn't deny the thrill that coursed through me.

I sat up quickly and shook my head. After all these years, was I suddenly seeing my own son through completely new eyes?

I'm a rational person and I couldn't deny what I was feeling any longer. Had he just been surprised, though, was that the only reason he had gaped at the view down my loose nightie?

My mind gave me a memory of part of a view that I realised I'd been actively supressing. When I'd mockingly scolded my boy for staring, he had eventually sat up. Sat up and failed to disguise the distinct bulge that had appeared in his boxers.

And it wasn't my imagination, hopeful or otherwise. All young men get hard from time to time -- all boys as well, whatever their age. It's something you get used to as a mother, something that can be triggered by a pretty girl in a TV advert, or a saucy sentence they overhear, or a strong breeze on a sunny day -- anything, in fact. But Jamie's clear excitement down in the kitchen had nothing to do with anything but the unexpected and unintentional view he'd received. And, oh, it was a surprise -- a shock, even -- to me, but it had caused an undeniable thrill.

As my hand travelled down my body searching out the source of a heat that was now pouring through me, I wondered how guilty I would feel when I was finished. But as my fingers found their goal, I decided it didn't matter and, even better, that it just wouldn't feel bad anyway...   And I didn't feel guilty, either. Even after the remainder of the disturbed night and a whole heap of soul-searching, I failed to find a single thread of reason that I couldn't logically dismiss. I don't know how I managed to wriggle my mental way out of the feelings, but there you go -- I did. When all was said and done, I suppose, it had all been triggered in a genuinely accidental way, and if my body responded in the wet way that it had, it wasn't in any way pre-conceived. I was, I successfully assured myself, one of the two innocent parties. Or one of the three if you included Yeti.

I even managed to relate my sudden exhibition arousal with the earlier episodes in my life, some years before Ben was even conceived. Quite what had happened to them in the intervening years was another matter -- but not one that held any import for me. Perhaps they'd been put into storage until such time that Jamie had been successfully raised, perhaps it was a cyclical thing with very long cycles, or perhaps it was some sort of second coming... Yes... probably that one.

The net result in the end, though, was pretty much 'where's the harm?' -- quickly followed by 'can I somehow arrange for another 'accident'?'.

Oddly the thoughts that it might not feel as good the next time, and my son might not like it so much, didn't even cross my mind.

And so, Yeti's first full day with us passed in a very normal way. Jamie and I were perfectly normal with one another and I gave no hints or clues that another accident might very well be approaching fast. A scheme had formed even before breakfast, and I was happily taking things normally and calmly, content in the knowledge that my mind was clear in every sense. It had even occurred to me early in the day that this was just how I had been way back when I'd dared to bare (a little) way back in the day, a memory that gave me a nice, comfortable sense of well-being.

Yeti, you see, was part of my plan, and I didn't think for a moment that he would suddenly become house-trained in a single day. And nor would he be content alone in the kitchen all night long -- but I insisted to Jamie that he needed to get used to it as soon as possible if he was to become a member of the family... When Jamie, of course, said that he didn't want to get up alone to sort out any mess that would no doubt appear I just gave him one of his own shrugs back, and muttered something about that being okay and I didn't mind helping.

As you can probably guess, my choice of nightie that night was no less loose than the one I had worn the previous night. The only thing that gave me pause for thought was whether to leave panties off -- eventually deciding that would be a little too far. Yet.

Sleep came remarkably quickly and easily, probably because I'd slept so little the previous night and because I was confident that the new furball would act as a very effective alarm when the time came.

And he most certainly did.

Once more I met my son on the stairs as we headed down towards the howling mutt, the only difference in our attire from the previous evening being that my 'hastily donned' robe was a tad shorter and already a tad looser. To his credit, Jamie tried not to let his eyes settle on the bits of me that were usually well-covered and were then rather more visible.

"I told you he wouldn't like it, mum."

"Stop complaining," I said, heading into the kitchen, and almost catching the suddenly delighted dog, "The sooner he gets used to it, the better."

"I guess it's not a bad idea really," he said close behind me.

I could well imagine that's what he was now thinking, and I smiled happily as I pulled another couple of bags from the drawer. With a final tweak of the robe's tie, I turned and handed my slightly flustered son one of them and pointed to the counter where the wipes had been spending a busy day. "Same as last night?"

"Er, um, yeah... I'll, er, start over there and, er, see... meet you in the middle."

"Good boy," I laughed, "A comment which can be applied to both of you!" Without further ado I knelt down and began harvesting the scraps of paper, studiously ignoring Jamie's hurried progress across the room.

My nefarious scheme had two immediate benefits -- my soaring excitement and the speed at which everything was cleared off of the mucky floor. That night, though, the final moments before the inevitable nose-to-nose meeting had my heart racing, and a few moments of doubt began to settle in. Had Jamie really enjoyed the view the night before? Would he call me bad names when he saw such a similar view? Would he...

"I, er, think that's, er, done, mum."

"What? Oh yes... I think so..." I let my eyes glance up at my son for a fraction of a second as I wiped the last mucky mark off a tile -- and all of my uncertainties flew away. His eyes were fixed on the front of my gaping nightie and I didn't even need him to sit up to see that his boxers were bulging in a rather obvious way. No matter, I kept wiping away at the tile for a few seconds longer, feeling my unfettered breasts jiggling with each stroke. "There," I said, finishing eventually, "that's better." I sat up slowly. "How does it look?"

"They look awesome... the tiles, I mean the tiles, they look great!"

I nodded, looking all around, trying to ignore Jamie's boxers as he sat up, hastily hiding his front with the now-full rubbish sack, "Yeah," I laughed, "Perhaps Yeti getting them mucky every night won't be a bad thing in some ways for a few nights." I glanced back at my son, "As long as you don't leave me to do all the cleaning after a couple of nights."

"Oh, I won't, I promise!"

It was at that moment that I knew I could take things further if I dared. I didn't know what or how I could, but I knew I could. What I didn't know was whether I dared, whether I truly wanted to -- or even if Jamie would want me to. Sure, he was pretty obviously rigid there in front of me, but couldn't that just be a natural male reaction to the view he'd been getting? Nothing intrinsically anything to do with me as a person, maybe? I dithered, unable to make a decision -- and fairly naturally, my considered and careful son did nothing to sway my mind in either direction. And, okay, I chickened out.

I wasn't sure whether another night dressing the way I was, seeking another similar reaction from Jamie, would prove anything either way, but that was what I decided I needed to do before I chose a potential path.

Standing quickly, I muttered something about seeing him there tomorrow night -- a poor joke, a poorer flirt -- and patted Yeti another goodnight before tying up my waste sack and leaving it for my son to throw out. A fast return to my bed left me feeling confused and vaguely annoyed with myself, but sleep came mercifully quickly, and the next thing I knew was that the sun had risen and to judge from the near-painful glare across my face, I had not pulled my curtains fully closed the night before.

It wasn't late by my standards and nor did I feel lacking in rest, despite the Yeti (and son) induced disturbed night, but my movements were slow as I visited the bathroom to freshen up and relieve myself. It was in there, though, that my brain seemed to kick into gear. A low gear, granted, but transmission, nevertheless.

After flushing then quickly showering, I went back into my bedroom to dry my hair and choose some clothing for the day ahead. I hadn't closed my en suite bathroom door, though, and as I tousled my dripping locks, my eyes lit upon the nightie and robe I had discarded in there. My gearshift notched up one step, and I smiled to myself.

Ten minutes later I left my room, hair dryer but un-brushed, once more wearing the little nightie and the very loose robe. I still wasn't sure what I might do or how Jamie might react -- but I had come to the conclusion that the very real 'true light of day' could maybe direct me more readily than another night-time act. None of which stopped the internal shivers and shakes that the thought of Jamie walking in and finding me like it in the kitchen brought on.