Truth and Reconciliation Ch. 06

"Good point," Jason said. "Though, the two combined, apartment and girlfriend, may provide for a double whammy."

"Yeah," replied Evie enthusiastically, "hell yeah. Sounds like a plan."

"Jason, my love," she continued after pondering the situation for a moment, "I'm calling it! In one week's time, our bitch of a mother is going to be on her knees servicing your cock like it's the most important thing in the world."

"Yeah?" Jason replied, raising an eyebrow and wondering if the past few days of Evelin's programming have made an impact. "How does that thought make you feel?"

"Truthfully...," Evelin replied, glancing up as she took an honest assessment of her emotions, "it makes me happy. Hmm, it does. It makes me genuinely happy. You deserve to get your revenge on that bitch. And I'm proud to have helped."

"Well...," Evie amended her previous answer. "I'm happy, I'm proud, and right now, I'm horny as fuck. We've got less than thirty minutes before Mom gets home..." she started undressing, "...and I know exactly how we're going to fill that time!"

----

The next day things were a little tricky. Jason was still trying to avoid his mother, but being a Saturday, she was home.

Even so, his weekend chores were a little lighter than his weekday chores. And, he usually would do the grocery shopping on Saturdays.

All in all, he mostly managed to avoid contact with his mother. They did pass each other a couple times in the morning, but Jason hurriedly went from chore to chore, not giving them time to truly interact.

The afternoon also required a bit of finessing. Jason and Evelin were due to tour the apartment at around one o'clock. Evie had scheduled that time precisely because she knew that about the time Jason was usually doing the shopping.

The plan was simple. Usually, Jason enjoyed the opportunity to get out of the house and would take his time at the grocery store. Today, however, he took advantage of the new phenomenon of online ordering for the first time ever.

Evie would leave the house, as she often did on the weekends, so it wouldn't draw any suspicion. Jason would then, using his mother's car, pick her up a few blocks from home.

They would tour the apartment, pick up the groceries, and, time permitting, drop Evie off at Britney's house.

The plan worked... mostly.

As it turned out, Evie knew the apartment manager, Becca. Well, in truth, she was Jessica's sister. So they knew each other in passing, and Jessica had put in a good word.

Becca, being a modern woman, was fully aware of the little online business her sister had. And she approved wholeheartedly. In fact, Becca was toying with the idea of doing a little online "modeling" herself.

As a favor to her sister's friend, Becca was willing to forgo some of the usual documentation required to lease an apartment. However, she was willing to do that for Evie, not for Jason.

Jason really couldn't blame her either. His income had been intermittent, and even with his recent "windfall," he couldn't guarantee it would continue.

Evelin, on the other hand, had a steady income going back nearly two years.

The final agreement they reached--before Becca would even show them the apartment--was a six-month lease with three months' rent in advance, a security deposit, and it would have to be in Evelin's name.

Jason was just shy of what he needed (plus, he wanted a buffer in his bank account), so Evie offered to spot him the rest. He really didn't want to borrow money from his little sister, but they were both sure he'd be good for it in just a couple weeks.

All that settled, they finally got to tour the apartment. It was nice. Nothing fancy, but it should be comfortable with plenty of room for both Evie and Jason (if it came to that).

Jason had nothing to compare it to, other than his own room. And anything seemed better than being trapped there under his mother's thumb.

After the tour, they told Becca that they were interested but needed another week to think about it.

That turned out to be okay because Evie would need to fill out an application, and Becca would need to run some checks. Becca told them not to worry about the checks because she could override the system if it rejected them.

They thanked her profusely for taking a risk on them, but she brushed it off. It was a six-month lease, and they were basically paying four months in advance. If anything, they were getting a bad deal, but it was the best she could do.

They were just about to leave when Evelin spoke up, "Becca, you've been a big help. Would you mind doing me one small additional favor? We'd really appreciate it."

"What do you need?" Becca responded.

"Well, could you fill out an application in Jason's name and print it out? Don't submit it, just print it."

"Umm, I guess... but why?"

"We just need to prove to our mother that Jason is trying to find a place of his own. He's twenty-three, and she wants him out of the house. It'd be terribly embarrassing if he had to admit that the apartment was in my name."

"Oh, yeah, I guess I can do that. Here, Jason," she said, holding out her hand, "give me your ID."

Five minutes later, Evie grabbed a folder off Becca's desk, which was full of promotional material for the apartment building. She slid Jason's fake application into it, and they said their final goodbyes to Becca.

Unfortunately for Jason, by the time he had picked up the groceries and dropped off his sister, he was well over an hour late getting home.

As Jason pulled into the garage and began unloading the shopping, he was sick to his stomach.

Sure, he'd been trying to hypnotically reprogram his mother over the past week. Still, there was no guarantee that it had worked. Further, to prevent messing things up, he had avoided his mother all this week.

There was no indication as to whether or not the hypnosis had worked.

His plan was to gauge her reaction when he paid his rent. Inadvertently, however, by being so late, he had created a different test scenario.

And, even if the hypnosis had been working, Jason feared that this particular scenario--his being so late--might just be too much.

Jason's first indication that things may be working was when he entered the house.

Janice wasn't there. Well, he knew that she was home, but she wasn't waiting to scream at him.

With all the bags transferred into the kitchen, Jason began putting everything away.

He decided to be intentionally noisy, just in case his mother was unaware that he had returned.

It worked, as when he was about halfway through putting the groceries away, his mother appeared.

"You were gone a long time," Janice said. Her voice wasn't accusatory. If anything, she sounded inquisitive.

Jason thought about how to respond. In the past, he would make some excuse, and depending on his mother's mood, she may let it slide.

An hour was a pretty long delay for grocery shopping, though, and any excuse he concocted would sound weak.

'This is supposed to be a test,' he thought. 'Might as well go all out.'

"Yeah, the weather is great! I decided to swing by the park and...um...," Jason hesitated, trying to think of a plausible reason to stop at the park.

Seeing her son's hesitancy, Janice assumed she knew the reason and finished Jason's sentence for him.

"You went to the park and did some girl watching?" she prompted, raising an eyebrow and giving her son a knowing grin.

'Huh,' Jason thought. 'She is acting very strange right now.'

"Yeah, girl watching," he replied, studying his mother's reaction.

"Well, at your age, I'd expect nothing else," she again smiled at him warmly and started to walk out of the room. "After all, men do have needs."

Calling back over her shoulder, Janice added, "Just, ah, don't be creepy about it, Jason. Girls don't mind when guys look... As long as they're not creepy about it."

Back in his room, Jason analyzed this most recent interaction with his mom. While incredibly bizarre for this household, it was, by most standards, entirely normal.

Unfortunately, it was also too short. There just wasn't enough data to draw any firm conclusions from. Jason dissected it piece by piece.

'First,' Jason thought, 'she wasn't angry even though I was an hour late.' Out of character, certainly, but not 100% outside of the realm of plausibility.

'Second, when she asked about me being late, she almost seemed concerned.' There was no doubt, such behavior was new for Janice.

'Finally, she joked with me about...girls?'

'Yeah,' Jason concluded, 'something is seriously different. The programming must be working.'

Having thought through the situation, Jason decided to review his mother's current programming and try to plan what he might do when paying her the rent.

----

That evening Jason found himself watching TV in the living room. It was incredibly rare for him to do that when anyone else was home, but he hoped to engineer some interaction with Janice. (Evie would be spending the next two nights at her friend's working on creating more content.)

Eventually, she showed up and sat down in her favorite chair.

On instinct, Jason made to give her the remote control, but she waved him off. "What are you watching?" she asked.

"Nothing really," he answered honestly. "I'm mostly just flipping channels. Though I've been watching this crazy obstacle course show for a few minutes. Please, the TV's yours." He again tried to pass his mother the remote.

"No, no, this I'm fine," she said, turning to look at the glowing screen. "Oh, my!" Janice exclaimed, flinching back.

Jason quickly turned to see what he had missed. Sure enough, a contestant had just been knocked into the muddy water by a giant swinging hammer.

Engrossed in the show, Jason's attention wandered away from his mother for a minute or two before she started him by calling out.

"Look out... move! Move!" she was shouting at the TV.

For the first time in years, Jason and his mother just sat and watched TV together, laughing and cringing at the on-screen antics.

It was both joyous and heartbreaking for Jason. It was nice, genuinely nice to share this meaningless moment with his mother. No stress, no fear. Just fun and laughter.

Still, for as lovely as it was, the moment also served to remind Jason just what he had been deprived of over the past decade.

This woman was his mother. A deep, instinctual part of his mind, something developed over eons of evolution, desperately needed to please this woman, to gain her approval.

Simultaneously, Jason's higher brain hated her. Absolutely HATED her and called out for retribution.

The battle of emotions played out on Jason's face and consumed his conscious awareness. So much so that he didn't realize he had been staring at his mother and that she had been regarding him back.

"Jason?" she said tentatively. "Are you okay?"

"Huh? Yeah?" Jason replied, just a hint of anger escaping into his voice before he managed to catch himself.

"You look... Well, you look...upset."

"Yeah... no... sorry," Jason said, getting ahold of himself. "Just lost in thought."

"Oh, yeah," he quickly added, changing the subject, "I've got rent money for you."

"Rent money...," Janice started. "You know, I've been thinking about that and..."

Jason cut her off, "I'll be honest with you, Mom. When I paid you for last month, I had no idea how I would make rent this month."

"Jason, perhaps, maybe...," Janice tried.

Jason just kept talking right over her, "I was terrified that I'd be out on the street."

"What! No, you're my son; I'd nev...,"

Jason ignored her, "But, Mom, I'm not worried anymore. I did it!" He just looked at his mother, waiting for her inevitable questions.

"Did what?"

"My business, Mom. I finally managed to get it off the ground in a major way," he was grinning ear to ear. Even as he said it, Jason recognized some sort of angry mania beginning to rise up inside of himself. He struggled to refocus himself before his emotions got out of control.

"Your...business...?" Janice was clearly confused, and it infuriated Jason. Of course, he had talked to her about his business. How else had he been earning money? How had he been paying rent?

Jason realized, at that moment, his mother had never taken him seriously. She probably figured he'd made a few bucks doing odd jobs or something.

Of course, that's what she thought. To her, Jason was a boy, not a man. A boy can't have a job or start a business. A boy get's money from Grandma and from cutting the neighbor's lawn.

"Yes, Mom," Jason said with more anger than he intended. "My business. The business I started writing software? The business I've been running for over a year now?"

"You... Writing software? You know how to do that?"

Suddenly it hit Jason, and his anger was defused. The hypothesizing that he and Evie had done was correct. When his father died, his mother went through some kind of mental break. For the past ten years, she had indeed thought of him as her perpetually thirteen-year-old son.

But that couldn't be right. He didn't go to school. Hell, he drove the car. She would have to be so disconnected from reality...

As these realizations flashed into Jason's consciousness, he felt sympathy for his mother. It was the first time in many years.

'Holy, shit,' thought Jason. 'She's fucked. Like she's seriously fucked in the head.'

He almost reached out to touch her, a sympathetic gesture, but something stopped him.

'Yeah, she's fucked. But is that an excuse for how she treated you? Is the drunk innocent when he runs over a kid just because he was intoxicated? Sure, maybe we show her a little sympathy, but first, she's got to make amends for what she did. Atonement can come only after punishment.'

Jason's heart hardened toward his mother.

"Mom," Jason started calmly, "I'm a grown man. A grown man with talents, and skills, and passions, and... needs." He added that last bit to hook into the hypnotic programming.

"I own and operate a small software company. Recently one of my projects started selling very well. Not 'tech millionaire' well, but I'm now making a solid living.

"My point is, Mother, I have enough money to pay the rent. Just like we agreed. Dad said, 'A man always sticks to his word.' Well, I told you'd I'd pay you rent. I'm a man, and I'm sticking to my word.

"I will keep paying you rent until we change our agreement or until I leave," he finished.

Janice was starring at him in shock. Jason guessed that the hypnotic programming had been gently easing her worldview to more accurately align with reality.

Tonight's conversation had been much less gentle, however, and Janice was struggling for her brain to catch up.

Either, Jason mused, Janice would be able to adapt, or she'd end up in a psych hospital. He hoped it was the former (after all, he still wanted to get all up in that MILF ass of hers), but he didn't particularly care if it was the latter.

"Leave...?" Janice asked, her voice barely above a whisper, her eyes locked into a thousand-yard stare.

"Not today," Jason said. "There's still time. I'm a man, Mom. I have needs; my needs must be satisfied. Only unsatisfied men leave."

Janice nodded as Jason took her by the shoulders and started walking her to her bedroom.

"It's late, Mom. Why don't you get some sleep."

"Yeah..."

"Don't worry, I'm not leaving yet. As long as my needs are met, as long as I'm satisfied."

"Of course," he continued after a pause, "I don't know how to do that. I wonder if anyone knows. Knows how to satisfy a man's needs. Knows how to keep him from leaving..."

Helping her get into bed, Jason left her dressed but pulled the blankets on anyway. He suspected she'd awaken in a couple hours, confused and a bit warm.

"Goodnight, Mom," Jason finally said, turning out the light.

Just barely audible, Jason could hear his mom repeating something to herself in the dark, "Jason is a man... Men have needs..."