The Photographer's Mother

As they alighted from the wooden steps, Daniel caught himself watching his mother walk, specifically from her well-kept waistline and pear-shaped bottom on down, as he followed behind. She always made denim look good, even with her usual choice of a conservative-looking summer dress top to accompany it.

'Stressed then,' she gathered, undeniable of his slightly restrained tone.

'I'm fine now that I'm with you,' Daniel said heartily and twirled her around for another hug. Barely able to accommodate his stature, Linda brushed her thigh up against her son's outer leg in a vain attempt to cling and to climb. Daniel bent down to kiss her cheek and breathed in the scent of her flesh at her neck for a moment.

'Mmm, I've missed you so much, and I'm so proud of you,' she cooed. 'And I cannot begin to say how much I love this book, but I'd love to talk your ears off about it.'

'I'm glad you like it,' Daniel began to say. Corrected; 'Love it!'

'We can have a cup of tea and talk about it, if you haven't had your ears chattered off with it already,' she said, directing her son to his old chair at the breakfast bar before sweeping over to the empty kettle and taking it to the kitchen sink.

'No, really,' Daniel gesticulated his agreeableness. 'Actually I'm surprised you love it as much as you do. I want to hear your critique.'

There was no mistaking her eagerness, her genuine pride in the way she spoke, he knew. There was something else in her energy that late morning as she bounded about the kitchen, light on her toes; ready to get down to business. 'Still smoking?' she asked. Daniel nodded.

Taking the small crystal ashtray from out of her slight, delicate fingers, Daniel wasted no time in setting up an open deck on the counter and lighting himself one. Meanwhile Linda wasted no time herself, as the kettle rumbled quietly on its stand, hurrying to retrieve the large glossy book.

"THE CHRONOLOGY OF MOTHERHOOD by Daniel D. Jackson"

There it now sat before him, in its red, black and white veneer, his mother absently stroking the book's spine from top to bottom, and he wondered if she realised just how ambiguous but suggestive that action seemed, and how sensual it appeared.

On the cover a young man cradled his naked mother in the nook of his shoulder. She appeared to be sleeping. Critics presumed the image to be somewhat post-coital. It was an image of death in fact - from cradle to grave, the roles of carer and protector reversed in all finality. Of course, every artist in evaluation had to remain open to interpretation, once the material was out of their hands.

'Remind me to autograph this for you, by the way,' Daniel said as Linda returned to the kettle and proceeded to dole out teabags to each cup.

5

The book's layout was divided into thematic segments featuring each mother-son couple's portrayal of Daniel's chronological themes. From the outset the imagery, larger than life even on the page, set out to capture and to provoke the viewer.

Daniel felt a warm wave of embarrassment overcome him the moment his mother turned the page to the first segment - Birth - in which simulated acts of oral sex portrayed the sons' introduction to the world through his mother's sexuality.

In one photograph, Daniel and his mother were faced with a mother's perspective of her own naked, enraptured body, thighs wide, knees elevated, while her son clawed his way up her body, his face below his eyes submerged at her sex.

Another portrayed a similar pose from a different direction, one son's face appearing to be buried in his mother's vagina as her contorted face portrayed the sweet agony of birth - or was it the agony of something else?

'It's very racy, isn't it?' Linda's voice filled the growing silence. Apprehension gripped him at first, which surprised Daniel. His mother absently smiled as she went on to express what the pictures meant to her, putting aside the sexual overtones for a moment.

'Does it not, err, bother you that they're all mothers with their sons?' Daniel tested in quite a clinical manner.

'Oh no, that's part of the appeal. It'll definitely challenge the prudes and the part-time parents, but I think it's wonderfully - what's the word? - without prejudice?'

'It definitely challenges the perceived "acceptable", yes,' Daniel added happily. 'The outrage has been a bit much at first, but it's all free publicity. It makes having done it seem more worthwhile.'

'Well, I can understand the moral outrage,' she added, 'from those who see the taboo and not the actual point of your art.' That warmed Daniel to loosening up a little, that and her tea. 'But you'd have to be soulless not to feel something deep inside.'

'Which was?'

'Hmm?'

'What do the pictures make you feel?' Daniel was more curious than ever now. Still on edge, though he hid it well enough, it was the moment he'd been waiting for. If anything his own mother's evaluation was the only real evaluation.

But Linda made him wait for it - turned page after page, and seemed to do it so deliberately slowly. In her son's mind she could have been testing his nerve, biding her time before she asked a question he wasn't prepared for, such as "what else made you think about motherhood this way?" Linda however was genuinely lost in each picture as she went.

'I got pretty flustered the first time I looked at them, I'll be perfectly honest,' Linda said with some embarrassment and overrode it with a brief dose of defensive laughter. 'And I don't think I was too biased, being as proud as I am. But honestly?'

'Honestly,' Daniel encouraged her.

'A mother could feel worshipped if she wasn't so prejudiced.'

'Do you?' he asked, waiting...

'Yes I do,' Linda beamed, and reached up to kiss his cheek.

Throughout the book, each theme portrayed a part of the mother-son dynamic in a sexual light. The segment "Nursing" had the sons celebrating their mothers' breasts, some caressing their mothers' breasts from behind, others sleeping and using breasts for pillows.

One particularly ample mother looked very happy to have her son's lips and tongue latched onto one slippery wet nipple. Her dark Mediterranean facial features showed it with a tense fascination rather than a smile, which suggested plenty more as to where these stories were going.

All through the book things would only get racier, though rarely less poignant, with themes such as "Puberty", "Fantasy", "Safe", "Manhood", "Empty Nest", and "Reunion". But before those came the theme titled "Fever", and there was no denying the sudden tension as Daniel studied his mother's expression of concentration as her eyes transfixed on mother Mary and her son Adam engaged in a very heated kiss.

'How times have changed,' Linda said almost to herself.

'How did this one make you feel?' Daniel suddenly asked. It came so unexpected to him that he didn't expect his mother's equally sudden answer.

'Oh wow,' was the best he was getting out of her at that point, but it didn't stop Linda from sharing her thoughts. 'It's gorgeous! Really,' she assured, 'so natural and intimate. They look beautiful together, but really I couldn't help but think that really it was all down to your beautiful mind,' she added consciously.

'None of it bothered you?'

Linda smiled wanly and shrugged. 'It's like I said, love - how times have changed!'

Daniel paused. 'I want you to come to the installation tonight, if you have no plans,' he offered. 'That's Mary and Adam. You couldn't meet anyone more lovely than those two. They'll be there and I get the feeling you'd like to meet them?'

Linda blushed, welling up at the same time, and for the first time since she'd made the tea and settled down to open the book, she was restless on her feet again. 'Really, oh I'd love to, Daniel, thank you. Oh but I'll end up pestering them...'

'Not at all, mum. They love the attention. I think you'll get along.'

After all, how times had changed, and how minds were still changing. Maybe he just wanted to test her, or maybe he truly believed that introducing both mothers was always on the cards, whatever it could mean.

6

The exhibition opened from 7pm to 9pm that evening. After an early dinner that day, Daniel had to go help to set it up, and to ready the considerable pile of autographed books for sale purposes. He was gone by quarter to six, psyched up and ready for just about anything. That left Linda to her own thoughts for a while, and to make herself presentable for the show.

And she thought again of how brave he was, considering his own words later that morning. Despite it being an art exhibition like any other, and all art set out to provoke reaction these days, if not to leave you feeling conned. His wasn't the latter, but therefore his enemy was that same morally outraged few.

You couldn't argue with ignorant, and you couldn't push boundaries and not give them the ammunition they needed. So what could you do, if someone decided to take offence to what they just couldn't understand?

There were no words for just how proud of her son Linda was, but she'd never tire of telling him that she was proud. She would go to the exhibition to watch him knock them all dead, and so maybe she should dress to give him a helping hand. It had been a while since she dressed up for anything.

So she arrived at the small gallery at half past seven, because she wanted to be fashionably late, to let Daniel work the room, dressed in a crimson figure-hugging cocktail dress, sporting black stockings. Bee-lining for the bar, Linda ordered a gin and cranberry juice and was happy enough to casually survey the growing collective of couples of all ages.

In the main gallery, which she could view through a glass partition wall between rooms, she proudly watched her son lead groups of his audience around the giant canvasses where "The Chronology of Motherhood" now hung suspended and immensely larger than life. Even from the bar, the allure of some of those stark images, in all their detail and definition, captivated.

Come eight o'clock, and after putting down another two gins, Linda felt composed enough to enter the gallery, to join the flocks and to view Daniel's images in all their glory. As if by magic, his eyes caught hers, and then the rest of her in that dark red dress. There was no hesitation in his immediate stride towards her.

'Oh mum, you look fantastic,' Daniel gushed, bending to kiss her at the corner of her mouth, and then people really began to talk.

'Things look to be going extremely well,' Linda beamed. 'I've been watching.'

'Well, they're here. Would you like to meet Mary and Adam?' Daniel pointed over to the farthest corner of the gallery where the unmistakeable couple stood side by side. Linda was surprised to feel her heart flutter, especially at the sight of Mary, who really could have been her sister, maybe in another life. She noted how they held hands, even when others stopped by to compliment them for their work.

'Please,' Linda replied politely, and was smiling over to Mary as she approached. It was as though their gazes were magnetised towards each other from the start.

'Mary, Adam, I'd like you to meet the woman I owe everything to. This is Linda, my mother.'

Linda was blushing now, although the contrast of her dress hid the radiating pink of her neck and chest well. Adam wasted no time greeting her with a kiss on the cheek, but then it was Linda who reached to kiss Mary. To Daniel, seeing the two face to face looked almost like the same person meeting from two different dimensions.

'I'm so happy to meet you. We were finally talking over the book this morning. I think it's amazing, really, how you were so comfortable and expressive with each other,' Linda gushed. So did Mary.

'Thank you, Linda, and may I say, Daniel, how beautiful your mother is,' Mary said generously, with those kind and piercing eyes. 'If anything you belong up there.'

'Oh, I don't know about that,' Linda laughed defensively. But Mary's gaze didn't falter, nor did the modest smile curving the corners of her red lips.

'Don't you think so, Daniel?'

'My mother deserves an exhibition all of her own, really,' Daniel was quick to compliment, never contemplating in which light Mary and Adam might view his remark.

'I'd want to read that,' Mary grinned disarmingly.

Come half eight and the herds started to thin out. Daniel had left his mother to talk to Mary and her son, with little to no idea of what they might talk about. Amazingly, all but five of the books were now gone. He was dog tired by that point. Handling large groups of people was always draining under pressure. Doing so after two weeks of touring and long-distance driving left him hoping for an early exit. Instead what he got was a brand new breed of idiot.

'This isn't art, are you all fucking kidding me?' somebody called out. Daniel didn't understand how he couldn't have seen it coming earlier. There was a small group of college students led by a hefty girl with her head shaved. 'This is pornography! What is society if pornography passes for art? What are you if you can pay to view sexual abuse and inbreeding?'

'Pornography, really?' Daniel challenged with a smile, though aware that he was too slow to keep up with the list this girl was suddenly checking off on her stubby fingers.

'Shut up you fucking nonce,' one acne-riddled boy shrieked. 'What have you got to say for yourself?'

'Which way do you want it? Do you want me to shut up or do you want me to answer your-

'You have nothing to say for yourself promoting sexual abuse,' the boy shrieked incessantly. 'This is not culture. This is the death of culture. The only culture...'

'Oh fuck off,' came a protest from the crowd.

'This is rape culture!' he shrieked regardless, and; 'You fuck off,' to his objector.

'Okay, define pornography and define sexual abuse, or else leave before you're removed,' Daniel said calmly and gave them a meaningful pause, although they didn't wait.

'You're promoting rape culture!'

'So I've heard,' Daniel deflected. It didn't stop his worried mother's heart from reaching up into her throat as she watched from afar with Mary now fuming at her side.

'Social justice fucking warriors,' she grimaced. 'I wish they'd make their minds up what side they're on.'

'There isn't a side, mum,' Adam groaned.

'Do you rape your mother or do you pay other men to rape theirs?' an older girl yelled. She could have been in her mid-twenties. She herself could have been a teacher. She might even have been theirs. It didn't matter when the question fell out of her mouth like glorified sewage.

'I have no problem debating,' Daniel tried to say but was cut off by their shrieking.

'Are you a paedophile, Daniel Jackson?' one hooded youth asked, more an insult than an insinuation, whilst recording the incident on his phone for his YouTube channel. Daniel was now verging on helpless, unable to speak for himself - cut off every moment he tried.

And wasn't that the beauty of public protest; the right to censor with one voice whilst slandering with the other. Almost a small mercy, more people were beginning to stand up for Daniel from their own corners, taking some of the pressure off him, but it wasn't likely to end, or so it seemed until one voice spoke up loudest.

'Excuse me, darlings,' came Mary's steady and polite dulcet tone. 'For a start, if you'd looked up the definition of pornography before you decided to make fools of yourselves, you'd note that there isn't a cock or cunt in sight, other than yourselves...'

Before she had finished speaking, the room was roaring with hysterical laughter, amplified by the bare brick walls. And every cock and cunt was now furiously blushing and wordless.

'Second of all,' Linda chimed in, courageously full of gin, 'there's a slight difference between applying for a perfectly legally acceptable job, as a "consenting adult", and being sexually abused...'

Linda turned and smiled stealthily toward Daniel, who simply stood in awe. Not on her fucking watch!

'So?' the fat one said, losing her own mad power trip.

'So kindly get fucked, would you?' Linda volleyed, dealing the final blow. 'This is a function for cultured, intelligent grownups.'

'Mother,' Daniel turned and responded, eyes and mouth agape, before turning the crowd's hysterics into a standing ovation. With that, the hooded adolescents left in a hurry with the gallery staff close behind.

7

'Mary and Adam really are a beautiful pair,' she reflected over a late glass of chilled white. They were sat out on the patio overlooking the back garden, tea lights burning on the glass table where the family used to eat their food every sunny day. 'Did you know they're an actual couple?' she asked, turning to dote on her son.

'Actually yes I did, mum,' he admitted freely as the buzz ran through him like static over a TV screen. 'All of them are!'

'I should have seen it, shouldn't I?'

'Not necessarily, but it changes the way you see things...'

'I must say, Mary does have a strange allure, doesn't she,' Linda said quickly, though not specifically as a direct response.

'She is... different!' Daniel agreed.

'She's lovely,' Linda reflected. Daniel agreed also.

'Incest,' she said to herself, trying to come to terms with it.

'And you're okay with it,' Daniel noted. She nodded with a smile that suggested that she still surprised herself sometimes. Then her eyes met his again.

'I suppose I am.'

'Just recently?'

'I'd never had an opinion on it other than that it was a horrible word. When it's abuse, there's no denying it's abuse. But after talking to Mary and Adam tonight - oh love - they do love each other and they're so happy and expressive and there's a lack of that, other than you...'

'Me?' Daniel pondered.

'They remind me of you,' Linda observed. 'But then Mary reminds me of me.'

'I saw the same thing earlier,' Daniel admitted once more, now frowning. 'Looking at the two of you was like you looking into a mirror image from the future. It was surreal.'

Linda picked up at that and then before she could say what was on her mind, she ducked in her seat, took a long sip from her chilled wine, and then leaned over to whisper to Daniel, 'yes but me from the future, having a sexual relationship with my son!'

The thoughts were boundless, Daniel knew. He didn't know so much about his mother, but she did all of a sudden seem comfortable enough talking about it.

'And what do you think about the images you saw, when you think about what you three talked about?' Daniel perused. 'In fact what did you talk about?'

Linda wasn't sure she should say, but there seemed no backing out. She was in his corner after all, and she had stated that she was okay with incest. She certainly was spellbound by Mary and Adam and their relationship dynamic.

'I invited them to dinner in the near future. I'd like you to join us. Will you?'

'Gladly, for you, mother,' Daniel complimented. 'They are lovely people with a lot to share.'

'Mary was like a thirty year old in an older body.'

'I see it when they're together especially,' he agreed.

'She, uh, she said something that really caught my attention,' Linda struggled for the words. 'She said very quietly that they'd made love for the camera.' Daniel swallowed dryly, his abdomen fluttering with a sudden storm of butterflies. 'She was amazed you let them get so carried away. Can you keep a secret?'

'Don't I already?' Daniel asked with one eyebrow manically cocked. Linda blushed.

'Certainly you do,' she replied. 'When I heard that, and when they told me how it all began, I was kind of zoned out as they say, just taking it all in. I really couldn't tear my eyes away from those pictures...'

'What is it?'

Linda held her breath until she couldn't anymore. When the words finally came in a flurry of confused emotions, she confessed; 'For a while I wished that I could be her, just to know...'