Juicy Secrets Forbidden Tales of Lesbian Love

A brief summary (well, it USED to be brief…) of what has transpired thus far. (To get a additional breakdown of the earlier chapters, please see Pages From a Diary Chapter Links )

Eleven-year-old Mallory is a bright but lonely girl with strict fundamentalist Christian parents whose marriage is going through a rough patch. One day, Mal gets acquainted with a girl named Julie, who lives with her father Jason and his girlfriend Lisa. Soon, the girls become fast friends, and before very long, more than friends. Mallory has a difficult time reconciling her emerging sexuality with her faith, but soon finds her desire for Julie and her interest in sex getting the upper hand, especially once she learns to masturbate.

Meanwhile, her parents’ relationship is really starting to founder. By then, Mallory and Julie are beginning to experiment sexually, but don’t really know what they’re doing. Julie’s dad’s girlfriend Lisa finds out about their curiosity and offers advice, then the girls persuade her to undress and join them in bed. Mal and Julie have full-on sex for the first time, then Lisa gets involved. 

Soon thereafter, Mallory and Julie are confronted by a fifteen-year-old girl from their school named Megan, who tells them she recognizes their feelings for each other, admits to being gay herself, and invites them to drop by her place a few days later. Megan only wants to hang out and chat, but Mallory casually takes charge of the situation, and soon the three of them are naked and having sex. In the weeks to come, they will get together again every now and then for more of the same.

Mallory’s mother Sharon is spending more and more nights away from the home, supposedly staying with her own mother. So she isn’t there when Mal’s father Dan collapses and nearly dies from alcohol poisoning. Only Mallory’s quick thinking and immediate response saves his life. Once Dan is taken to the hospital, Mal learns that her mom isn’t really at Grandma’s house, but out with another man.

Not long after her father is released from the hospital, Mallory is taken out on a shopping trip by her mother. During the lengthy drive, Sharon explains her side of the story, treating her daughter more like an adult than she ever has before. Mal finds herself feeling sympathetic… but then she’s startled to catch herself having sexual thoughts about her mother, which leave her feeling flustered and confused. Those thoughts won’t go away, either.

Sharon soon gets a job at a senior center, and is making plans to go back to school. Needless to say, Mal’s father is most unhappy with this development. On the other hand, Mallory is quite pleased for her mom, and takes the opportunity to get in her lap and give her playful, but subtly flirtatious kisses. More then ever, she suspects that her mother is secretly gay.

Mal is gradually becoming more popular at school. One result is that she and Julie are invited to a sleepover with Emma and Cindy, a couple of Julie’s friends. Once the parents are asleep, the girls get into a discussion concerning masturbation, which leads to everyone getting naked and engaging in mutual touching. Emma and Cindy love it, and the four of them get together for more fun a couple of weeks later.

Mallory finds a new student project: playing keyboards in a rock band of high school students supervised by Jason, who has also been teaching his daughter Julie how to do mixing work. Mal is much younger than the other members, but her skills soon win the others over. One of the band members is a sweet hippie girl named Jamie, and Mal is immediately attracted to her.

An ugly scene occurs at the home of Mal’s grandmother, where her mother Sharon is staying until she finds her own place. When Sharon makes a disparaging comment about lesbians, Mal loses her temper in a big way. In her anger, she comes out there and then, venting until her mother breaks down and cries. Mal quickly becomes remorseful, but the damage is done.

A couple of unhappy developments occur. First, Mallory’s parents make it official: they are to divorce. Mal is utterly disgusted with them both. Second, two of Julie’s cousins have vanished without explanation, eleven-year-old twin girls named Anna and Nettie. A search is underway, but without success thus far. Mallory has never met these girls, but she prays as best she can for their safe return.

A few days later, the twins are found and their kidnapper arrested, but not before he murdered Anna. Nettie is still alive, but devastated, and the girls’ parents go completely to pieces, turning on each other in their grief. Obviously, they are unable to take care of Nettie, so after a family discussion in which Mal is asked to participate, Jason, Lisa and Julie decide to bring Nettie into their home for the time being. Mal vows to do everything she can to help Jason’s niece to recover from her emotional trauma.

Mal and Julie pay Jamie a visit. The girls admit to being lovers, then tempt Jamie into masturbating with them. This quickly leads to much more.

Mallory gets to meet Nettie soon after that, when Jason brings her home. Sure enough, she is in bad shape: unable or unwilling to do or say much, often screaming herself awake from nightmares.

Mal’s band is making serious progress, which gets her and Julie a sleepover at Jamie’s place. Needless to say, music isn’t the only item on the agenda that night.

The next day, while practicing her keyboard part on a Black Sabbath cover, Mal puts the album on, only to get a positive response from Nettie, who asks to hear more. It’s the first time she’s shown interest in anything since her twin’s sister’s death. Mal, Julie, Lisa and Jason are is thrilled. Could their tormented guest be on the mend?

In the days that follow, Nettie seems to be emerging from her torpor. In addition to her burgeoning interest in heavy metal, she becomes absorbed by Jason’s medical textbooks.

At band rehearsal, Mal’s and her fellow group members toy with a concept: focus on Eighties pop. At the same rehearsal, they also make plans to perform live, and even manage to work up a cool original song. The entire band is thrilled.

Mallory has a frank discussion with her mother Sharon about sexuality and desire. She admits to listening to her masturbate herself through the wall, then gets Sharon to confess that she has overheard Mallory touching herself as well… and it arouses her. Somehow, Mal persuades Sharon to stay in her room instead, then mother and daughter masturbate together.

The next morning, Sharon is feeling guilty and uneasy, even though she admits to wanting what she and Mallory did the night before. Mal manages to ease her mother’s conscience a bit before they both leave for school.

Mal and her friends run into trouble at school when a lout named Floyd teases Nettie about her sister’s death until she cries. An enraged Julie attacks him, then Mal, Cindy and Emma join in the brawl to keep the much larger Floyd from hurting their friend. Luckily, the principal breaks up the fight, then goes on to suspend Floyd for bullying.

Later at home, Mallory joins Sharon on the couch. They snuggle, then end up grinding their bodies together until they both climax, still in their clothes. This time, mother and daughter share their first passionate kiss.

And now we rejoin our story, which is currently in progress. Do enjoy!

by Rachael Yukey

March 4th, 2007

God, I’m tired. It’s late, I have school in the morning, and my body craves sleep. But if I don’t keep my diary current, what’s the point? You’ll notice that I’ve stepped up the pace a little bit… this is my third entry this week! I don’t promise to keep it up at that rate.

Tackling Floyd Peterson bought my circle a whole new level of respect. It’s all around school: don’t mess with Julie Hanson, her cousin, or her friends! We’ve privately taken to calling ourselves the Pussy Posse, which you might recall from the last entry was my idea.

Floyd’s reputation, on the other hand, isn’t doing so hot. Nobody wants to be the guy who got taken down by girls! I was half-expecting he’d pick a few fights to regain some respect, but that hasn’t happened either. He’s been sullen and quiet… my guess is that he got in a lot of trouble at home.

Oh, and Floyd’s friend Tom isn’t his friend anymore. In fact, Tom apologized to Nettie for not stepping up when Floyd made fun of her. “I kinda already knew he was a jerk,” Tom said, “but the way he treated you really sucked. I want better friends than that.” Nettie actually gave him a hug! He really is a good guy, deep down.

We had an unexpected series of snow flurries Friday afternoon, bad enough that school let out an hour early. It ALSO meant that Mom got stuck in Wadena. She didn’t know we were being let out early, and barely phoned the school office in time to catch me. She’d already spoken to Lisa, making arrangements for me to go to Julie’s house for the night. Ms. Jordan from the district office literally caught up with me as I was boarding the bus.

Lisa met us at the door, and handed me a scrap of paper with a phone number on it. “Your mom wants you to call her at this number,” she said.

I placed the call. “Hello?” said a female voice I didn’t recognize. That voice had a firm, no-nonsense edge to it.

“Uh… hi,” I said. “My name’s Mallory. Um, I’m trying to reach Sharon Kalvornek?”

“Oh, hi there, Mallory,” the voice boomed, suddenly jovial. “I’m Katerina! Your mom has told me SO much about you. Hang on a second.”

My heart was instantly racing. Mom was at Katerina’s house! There was a thunk as the phone was set down, then another as it was picked up again.

“Hi, sweetie.” Mom’s voice.

“Hi, Mom. I guess you’re not going to be home tonight?”

“I’m afraid not. I tried the highway, and didn’t make it half a mile before I had to turn around. I’m sorry. You’ll be staying at the Hansons tonight.”

I had to smile at that. She didn’t need to apologize for sending me to Julie’s house! “That’s okay, Mom. I’ll be fine. Are you staying with Katerina, then?”

“Mmm-hmm. Katerina and her partner were kind enough to offer me their couch.”

All kinds of crazy thoughts were running through my mind. Would Mom hear them having sex? Would she maybe be invited to join in? Sure, I knew neither of those things was likely, but the images  in my head were immediate, graphic, and powerful. There were also mixed emotions. Part of me was hoping something would happen with Mom and her friends, but there was a little jealousy there as well… I wanted Mom’s first real, bare naked lesbian sex to be with me.

I’m pretty much certain by now that it’s going to happen, Mom and me going all the way. I’m very close to reaching the goal… but let’s not get ahead of ourselves! Mixed emotions aside, knowing where Mom was and imagining what might happen rocketed me instantly to a  state of intense arousal… I felt like the tiniest bit of pressure applied to my clit would be enough  to make me come.

“That’s great, Mom,” I managed, carefully keeping my voice steady. “Have a good time with your friends tonight. That’s what I’m going to do.”

“All right, sweetheart. If you need anything, call.”

I assured her that I would, and got off the phone before she could hear that my breathing was becoming a bit unsteady. I haven’t met Katerina, but I have a fairly fixed image of her in my imagination, and the mental picture of her, my mom and her lover in bed together was getting me just about as hot as I’ve ever been without anyone touching me.

Then again, I’ve been having episodes where I get intensely aroused for what seems like no reason at all, and I feel like there’s some kind of cycle to it. I wonder if I’m close to getting my period.

I replaced the phone in its cradle and turned to face the room. Lisa was reading a magazine, and Julie was on her dad’s computer looking at something or other. Nettie was nowhere to be seen, probably in her bedroom. Jason was out on an ambulance call.

Julie glanced up at me, and her eyebrows lifted. “You okay, Mal? You’re like… all flushed.”

“Mom’s staying with her gay friend and her partner tonight.” I got out.

Julie snickered. “And you’ve got all kinds of naughty thoughts racing around in your noggin.”

I nodded helplessly.

“Have you made any more progress with her?” Lisa asked. “You know… what we were talking about the other day.”

“Yeah,” I breathed. “We kinda… got off by rubbing against each other. We had our clothes on, but we both came.”

I was squeezing my thighs together, which left me totally lightheaded. My panties were so wet that I could feel them squish whenever I moved.

Julie knew exactly what was needed. “Oh, you poor thing,” she said, laughing. “Come on.” Seizing my hand, she guided me through the kitchen to the back bathroom, which was on the opposite end of the house from Nettie’s room. She yanked my pants and panties off, then I spread my legs wide apart. Knees on the throw rug, Julie buried her mouth in my pussy, her tongue attacking my clit with gusto. Closing my eyes, I felt two fingers enter me, fucking me hard and fast. It took less than a minute to come.

***

Nettie seems to be coming out of her shell again. She didn’t talk much that evening, but she did sit in the living room with us, reading one of Jason’s paramedic texts. She’s on Volume 2, which is impressive. Like Julie, I made one brief attempt to read the first volume, and my head was spinning halfway through the first chapter. I wonder how much of it she understands.

***

The bad weather continued through yesterday morning, which meant Mom wasn’t able to drive home till pretty late. But that was okay; I had plans for the afternoon anyway. The whole band and our Official Front of House Engineer Julie got together at Roger’s house to watch Back to the Future. Roger wasn’t kidding… his folks have a REALLY cool home theater with surround sound and a giant flatscreen TV. We made popcorn, turned the lights off, and got comfy.

It was a pretty fun movie. This teenage kid who plays guitar has a nutty old scientist friend who invents a time machine using a sports car called a Delorean. You can go backwards or forwards through time by turning on a device called the flux capacitor and getting the car up to eighty-eight miles an hour. Of course, things go wrong, and the kid goes back in time and almost stops his parents from getting together.

The happy ending… honestly, it bugged me a little. The kid in the movie starts a chain of events that change his father’s personality, and when he returns it turns out that his family has a way better life as a result. But what does that really mean for the main character? His family has a couple decades of shared history that he doesn’t remember. How’s that going to go?

I mentioned that to Julie later on. She just giggled, elbowed me in the ribs and told me I think too much. I suppose she isn’t wrong.

After the movie was over and the lights on, Ralph addressed us all. “So here’s what I was thinking,” he said. “We make a tape that we play at the beginning of the show. We have the lights down, except for one pointing at a backdrop with our logo. In the tape, we’re having a conversation as we’re driving along in our Delorean. We’re arguing about what radio station to listen to. We decide that every station sucks, so we’re gonna go back in time to when the music on the radio was good.

“Fire up the flux capacitor! Find a long flat stretch of highway so we can get her up to eighty-eight miles an hour! Then we land in whatever year our first song was recorded in, and we make the whole rest of the set an 80s radio show. Roger does a really great radio DJ impersonation. Show ‘em, Rog.”

“Aaaaand coming up next on WKX92,” Roger said in a booming, exaggerated voice, “the latest single from Def Leppard, ‘Photograph,’ right after this important message from our sponsors…”

We all cracked up. “That’s actually pretty good,” said Jamie.

“I like what’s on the radio today,” said Katie, “but I still dig the concept. It’ll give us a really strong theme.”

“I didn’t just pull it out of the air,” Ralph admitted. “The Who did an album back in the sixties called “The Who Sell Out,” where they stuck a bunch of cool fake radio ads and stuff in between the real songs. That’s where I got the idea.”

“Oooh… I’m pretty sure I have a vinyl copy of that one,” said Jamie. “I have all my Dad and Grandpa’s old rock records. That’s one of the ones I never got around to checking out, though.”

“You should,” said Roger. “It’s a cool record. But I think we should do this. I’m gonna talk to Jason and see if he knows what we need to record that intro tape and make it sound good, because I’d actually like to unveil it at the student concert. It’s wacky, it’s cheesy… but hey, so were the eighties. So why the hell not?”

Jamie, Julie and I went to Jamie’s house after the movie. Jamie has even more records than I knew about… there’s a whole closet full of them!  Most of it is stuff she got from her dad and her grandpa. We found an old copy of “The Who Sell Out.” We listened to the record, and even though the radio ad bits were completely bonkers, I could see the appeal of the unifying theme. The songs on the album were mostly pretty cool, too.

Jamie’s mom insisted on feeding us supper, after which we once again adjourned to Jamie’s room. We stripped naked and got into a tight circle, listening to Led Zeppelin with our mouths buried between each other’s legs.

***

I thought I might end up sleeping at Julie’s house again last night, but Mom showed up around eight. The highways hadn’t been great, she said, but they’re okay to drive on if you’re careful. We returned to the apartment, and Mom went straight to bed.

“We stayed up way too late,” she informed me with a rueful smile. “Katerina’s partner, Tracy, is really nice. We played cards until after midnight.” Part of me wondered for a moment if more than that had happened, but I know Mom. It would be written all over her face.

This morning, of course, we went to church. During the sermon I amused myself by fantasizing about a three-way between Mom, Katerina, and Tracy, but forced my mind to other matters once I realized that I was soaking my panties. The last thing I needed was a dark wet spot on the back of my dress!

I spent a lot of the afternoon catching up on homework; the price I paid for having spent most of the weekend goofing off. Mom was working on her laptop, also doing school stuff. I made supper that night.  Julie’s lessons in the kitchen have turned me into a better cook than Mom.

After we ate, Mom led me over to the couch. She sat on the opposite end, but I wasn’t having any of that. I slid over and snuggled up. Mom put an arm around me, though she seemed a bit awkward doing it.

“Mallory, I… I need to ask you something,” she said hesitantly.

“Sure. What is it?”

“Well… I spent a lot of time talking to Katerina and Tracy this weekend,” she said. “They told me about their journeys… you know, when they found out they were gay, and when they first acted on it. They were both, well… incredibly young. Tracy says she was twelve the first time she had sex with a girl, and Katerina was ten. Ten! Can you believe it?”

Now I knew what Mom was about to ask, and my stomach tightened a little. But I realized something else, too… she already knew the answer. There was no point in trying to hide the truth. All the same, I picked my words carefully.

“Sure,” I said. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. I think if someone feels ready, that’s when they’re ready. It’s not for anyone else to decide.”

“Mallory… have you… done anything with anybody yet?”

“You know I have,” I said. “I’ve done things with you.”

I felt her tense. “That’s not what I meant… but… oh God.” Her voice broke.

I gripped her hand, squeezed, and turned my face up to hers. She wasn’t crying, not yet, but tears were forming around the corners of her eyes.

“Don’t be upset, Mom,” I said. “I know what I am and what I want. I’m not ashamed. You shouldn’t be, either. It’s not like you get to choose. Can I ask you something now?” She nodded. “When Katerina and Tracy were telling you those things… how did it make you feel? Did you get excited?”

A single tear tracked down her cheek. She nodded again. “Yeah… I… yes, I did. Very excited. I was wishing I’d had experiences like theirs. Can you imagine? Me, having sex with another girl when I was ten.” She paused. “I even knew which girl I would want to, to be with. My best friend Mona… Mona Schmidt. I loved her. Maybe more than I thought at the time…”

“Mom… do you think maybe you’re a lesbian, too?” It felt like the right time to ask.

She squeezed my hand tightly. When she spoke, her voice was steadier. “I think it’s possible that yes, I’m attracted to women. Oh, Mallory, after Katerina and Tracy went into their bedroom Friday night, if you could just imagine the thoughts that were running through my head…”

I giggled. “Remember who you’re talking to, Mom! I can imagine, all right. When you told me you were staying over, I got all horny thinking about you getting into a threesome with them.”

Mom stared at me for a moment, a stern expression on her face. Just as I was starting to worry about what was coming next, she burst out laughing.

“Oh… oh, Mallory!” she exclaimed. The arm around my shoulders squeezed. Then her face went serious again. “What scares me the most isn’t that,” she said. “It’s the fact that I got so excited picturing Katerina and Tracy having their first lesbian experiences as children.”

“Or the stuff with me?” I asked. “Does that scare you?”

“Yes, that too. Even more, because I’m your mother.”

I shrugged. “So what? It’s not like we can get each other pregnant!”

We both got to laughing at that, and it felt good. But it wasn’t long before Mom was looking at me again with that sober expression. “You never did answer my question, sweetheart.”

I sighed. “Yes, Mom. I’ve been having lesbian sex for six months.”

She closed her eyes. “I figured. I was thinking about the things you did when we… you know…”

“Are you angry?”

“No. How can I be, after what I’ve already let happen between us? And…” she hesitated. “I talked to Katerina and Tracy about it. I didn’t tell them what we did, just that you identify as a lesbian, or maybe bisexual, and that you were probably doing things with other girls. They were just like… good for her! Hope she’s having fun. They were so relaxed about it, I guess it made me rethink things even more than I already have.”

“I’d love to meet Katerina and Tracy, Mom. I think they’d be great people for me to talk to.”

“I think I can arrange that,” said Mom. “Mallory, if you’re honest with me, I promise I won’t be mad. You and Julie Hanson…?”

“She’s my girlfriend,” I said. “We have a deal where we can do things with other people, too, as long as we’re both there. But we’re a couple.”

Mom frowned. “But you’ve been doing things with me,” she said, “and she wasn’t here.”

I smiled. Time to go all in. “I’ll tell you the whole truth, Mom. I realized you were into women months ago… maybe girls, too. I don’t even think you even knew it yourself. And you’re SO beautiful… well, it kind of made me think about doing stuff with you. I told Julie about it, because we tell each other everything. She  knows she can’t be here for anything you and I do, but if it happens, you get to be the one exception.” I paused, wondering if I should tell Mom everything, then decided to go for it. “Julie’s attracted to you, too, by the way.”

Mom was holding her breath. She let it all out in an explosion of air. “So… you’ve planned all this?”

I nodded, grinning. “I didn’t really expect anything to happen between you and me… but I’ve sure been trying for it,” I said.

Mom laughed. “A seductress at age twelve. God help us.”

“Well… it’s kind of been working, right?”

Mom nodded slowly. “I guess it has.” Then she frowned. “How much does Julie know about, um, what you and I have done?”

“Relax, Mom,” I said. “Julie and I have a lot of secrets. There’s things we’ve done with other people that you don’t know about, stuff I’m not gonna tell. Julie knows everything, but she’s not going to blab. Everyone involved has too much to lose.” I ran my fingertips up her thigh. Mom closed her eyes and sighed.

“Mom?”

“Mmm-hmm?”

“Does talking about this stuff get you… excited? I’m really turned on right now.”

Mom let out a shuddery sigh. “Y… yeah… yes, it does. I’m turned on, too.”

I got up on my knees, which put my face at about the same level as hers. Cupping her chin, I turned her head to face me, then moved in until our lips met.

She responded almost instinctively. Our open mouths teased and toyed. Finally I slipped my tongue forward, lightly tracing the insides of her lips. She seemed to freeze for a second, then her tongue met mine.

We shared a long, tender kiss, then she pulled away. “M… Mallory… I don’t…”

Her ragged breathing told me everything I needed to know. “I’ve already walked this road, Mom,” I whispered, lightly caressing the back and sides of her neck. “I can teach you everything. Let me teach you…”

“Not… n-not tonight,” she gasped. “Have to… I have to think about this a little more.”

I was disappointed, but knew better than to push any further. “Can I at least sleep with you tonight?” I asked.

“Um… okay,” Mom whispered, then got up. She took my hand, tugging me gently from the couch. “Let’s get ready for bed.” It was still early, but I wasn’t about to argue!

Fifteen minutes later we were snuggled up in Mom’s bed, she in a nightgown, me in a fuzzy two-piece. Mom was still slightly dazed, and I could feel the arousal coming off of her like a glow. “Mom?” I said after a few minutes.

“Yeah?”

“Are you still excited?”

A dry chuckle. “Oh, yes.”

“Me, too. I have to do something about it. Should I go back to my own bed, or can I…?”

There was a long silence. “I think here would be fine,” she whispered.

“Are you going to do it, too?”

“Yeah… probably.”

“I’m going to get naked to do it,” I said. “If that’s okay. And I’d love it if you got naked, too. Even if I can’t touch you yet, I want to see all of you.”

“I… I guess that would be all right.”

I reached across her to switch on the bedside table lamp. It’s not super-bright, but it cast just the right amount of light across the bed. I tugged my PJ top over my head, tossed it to the floor, then stripped off the bottoms. I wasn’t wearing anything underneath.

Moving slowly, as if in a trance, Mom got to her feet, pulled the nightgown over her head and off, then lay back down. She was still for a long moment, then raised her knees up and shimmied out of her panties.

I spent a minute or two looking her up and down. I can’t recall ever seeing Mom naked, and she was flat-out stunning. Her small, perfectly formed tits with dark brown areolas, her smooth, taut skin, the sparse tuft of hair between her legs, framing the rosy slit that I was just aching to caress.

Finally, I lay down next to her. “I want to hold your hand while I touch myself, Mom. Is that okay?” She nodded.

Taking her hand with my left, I trailed the right downward to lightly cup my pussy. The whole slit was dripping with wetness, and I took some on my fingers, rubbing it all around my pussy lips and the upper part of my thighs. The smell of sex hung delicately in the air. I heard a gasp from beside me, and felt Mom’s body shudder. Looking to my right, I could see that her free hand was busy between her legs.

I slipped a finger inside, curling my hand so It was grinding against my clit. “Ohhhhh!” I groaned. Then I got brave. “Oh, Mom, I’m fucking myself…”

I wasn’t sure how she’d respond to that kind of talk, so I felt a delicious shiver when Mom raised her head and looked down at my hand, watching me finger my cunt. God, what a thrill that was! I guess Mom felt that way too, because she moaned out loud, and moved her own hand even faster. I could actually hear her pussy squish!

Mom dropped her head to the pillow, her face turned towards mine. Our eyes met, and it was only a matter of inches for my mouth to reach hers. She met me full-on, her lips parted, and just like that, my mother and I were kissing like lovers. We kissed frantically, hungrily, our tongues darting and dancing. I felt my orgasm bearing down on me with the force of a runaway locomotive, and I backed off the pace of my fingering for a moment, wanting to come at the same time as Mom.

I didn’t quite make it. She suddenly tore her lips from mine, her wild cry filling the room. I began to work my fingers furiously, grinding with my palm, but Mom’s orgasm had already taken hold. Her body tensed, her back arched, and she spent herself with another loud wail.

She went limp, and I crushed my mouth to hers again. She accepted and returned my passion, and I came a moment later, shaking and moaning in Mom’s arms.

We snuggled together, catching our breath. It felt so good to be holding my mother like this, both of us naked. Like I’d been waiting my whole life to be that close to her, but didn’t know it until right then.

“I love you, Mallory,” she whispered.

“I love you too, Mom.”

I was kind of afraid that Mom would want to talk about what we’d just done, but she just smiled, closed her eyes and settled in, her body touching mine.

Mom fell asleep right away, but I found myself surprisingly restless. So I got up, and poured all of this onto paper. It is now entirely too late, and I’m going to be worn out as an old pair of pants tomorrow. Hey, it is what it is.

March 11th, 2007

I wrote last time about how I wasn’t sure I could keep up two or three entries a week. Now look! It’s Sunday, I’m just finishing up my week at Home One, and I haven’t done a new entry in what feels like ages. Let’s see… what happened this week that’s worth writing about?

Well, for one thing, me and Julie are in the heavy planning stages for Nettie’s birthday party. Her birthday is next Saturday, which is convenient… school’s out, so we can have the party on the actual day. Her parents won’t be coming; they’re both still in institutions. Her mom, you’ll remember, had a full-on psychotic break, and every time her dad gets cut loose from rehab, he ODs on booze, drugs or both at once.

Jason and Lisa have been doing what they can to take Nettie to visit her parents on weekends, but it’s hard. Her mom is in Prairie St Johns in Fargo, and her dad’s in Alina in the twin cities. Either way is a considerable drive, and they’re in exact opposite directions. Jason tells me that with psychiatric holds, it usually comes down to wherever they can find a bed.

We’re going to play heavy metal and have a big cake for the party. Nettie has just a couple of people from her class she wants to invite, and that’s okay. Even if she didn’t keep to herself so much, she hasn’t been here long enough to make many friends. I was glad that she asked if Cindy, Emma, and Megan could come. I guess she hasn’t forgotten when we tackled that jackass who was picking on her! She also invited Jamie.

Speaking of which, Jason had a wacky idea to set something up to play records for the party, since Nettie has taken such an interest in Jamie’s vinyl rig. He has this old thing in the garage called a console stereo… it’s this massive piece of furniture that has a radio, a turntable, speakers, the whole works all built in. It’s like five feet long and just looks like a big cabinet with the top closed.

Tuesday afternoon after school, he had Jamie over to check it out while Julie and I looked on.

“What do you think?” he asked her. “It powers up, and the turntable spins. I can see it’s missing the cartridge, but I’m not sure what else. I was hoping you could tell me what I need to make this thing work, and if I can get it in just under two weeks.”

“It’s really cool and retro,” said Jamie, “but you’d be better off turning it into a bar than playing your records on it.”

“Oh? Why is that?” Jason wanted to know.

“Because these tonearms are junk, and there’s no way to retrofit a better one. You can’t adjust the tracking force, the azimuth… anything, really. The cartridges that’ll fit these… you can still get them, but the styli aren’t anything you want touching your vinyl, even if you could fix all those other problems. It’d be all right for scratchy old garage sale records, but I wouldn’t let my good vinyl be in the same room with this. I’m really sorry, big brother, but I gotta call it like I see it.”

“Damn,” said Jason. “Any suggestions?”

“You have a preamp or receiver with a phono stage built in?”

“Uh… I doubt it.”

Jamie thought for a moment. “Tell you what,” she said. “I’m not about to move my main turntable… it’s all leveled and everything. But I have an old Technics I’ve been meaning to fix up. I already have a cartridge and stuff, but it needs gone through and I’ve been waiting till I have time to learn how.”

She turned to Julie. “You know a lot about electronics, right?” Julie grinned and nodded. “So if I could borrow Julie this weekend, we could go through it, clean things up, fix anything that’s wrong, and I could do a setup. Then I could bring it over along with an extra phono preamp I have lying around. We’ll plug the whole works into your stereo, then you can rock the house for Nettie’s party. I’ll bring some records she’ll like.”

In other news, I’m learning to play guitar! There are a few songs we’re doing that have two very prominent guitar parts and little to no keyboards. Ralph is going to play guitar sometimes when Jamie’s doing lead vocals, but he’s REALLY bad at singing and playing at the same time. Maybe it’s something he can fix over time, but until then we’d like to have a second guitar on some of the things he sings lead on.

There are two problem songs at the moment. One is called “I Need You Tonight” by Inxs. There’s this sexy little single-note line that pretty much runs throughout, but Jamie can’t play it along with the other guitar stuff. I tried it on the keys, but we just weren’t happy with the way it sounded. There’s a certain articulation you get with a plucked instrument that a keyboard doesn’t capture.

The song that pushed us over the edge, however, is by a band called Poison. We’re mostly avoiding hard rock, but we do want to throw a hint of it in there, and Jamie suggested a song called “Fallen Angel.” We absolutely hated the way it sounded every time she stopped playing rhythm to jump into a lead! With most songs it’s not a big deal, but in this one, it simply Did. Not. Work.

Poison is a one-guitar band, so we checked out a live recording to see how they handled it without the guitar overdubs. To be honest, we thought it sucked. So I’m learning to play guitar. Jamie  has a lot of electric guitars lying around, so she loaned me one, and she and Jason are both helping me learn. So now I’m spending even MORE time practicing music, which is fine by me… it’s the most fun you can have with your panties on!

We’re also getting a backdrop! Roger’s dad owns a printing company, and he’s going to make us a big cloth backdrop with our logo on it. We should have it well before the spring concert. Along the same lines, Jason is going to arrange for us to get into a studio and record that intro tape. He also suggested that we record excerpts from some of the songs we’re doing, and create a radio spot that we can give to the venues we’re going to play. That way if they want to advertise the gig, they’ll have something they can use.

There’s so much that goes into all of this I didn’t know about! I figured you just got a few friends together, practiced some songs, and then went and got gigs. But even at the local level, there’s a lot of business involved. Fortunately Roger seems to have a real knack for it, and we also have Jason to guide us.

Soon to come: Chapter Twenty-Eight!