He heard his parents come upstairs to their room next to his. He knew they would not go straight to sleep. Earlier, he had noticed the way his mother had been attentive to his father, smiling at his remarks and being soft with him. Once, when she thought Tom wasn't watching, he had seen her run her fingers through his father's hair. Now he lay patiently in the silent dark, listening. He imagined his parents undressing, his mother carefully folding each item of clothing as she removed it, placing it tidily on the green velvet armchair on her side of the bed. In his mind he accompanied the removal of each garment: her dress, her tights, her sensible white cotton knickers and finally her little bra that she didn't really need to wear. He knew the order because he had often seen her at home or changing at the beach. She had never been prudish with him. Now she was naked, her sweet little breasts and her lower belly palely framed by the honeyed tan of the rest of her body. Her dark bush that she would not shave although his father had asked. The request made her giggle but she still refused, claiming shyess. I'd feel like a child again, she had said. She slipped easily between the sheets beside his father. Soon it would begin. The night silence would be interrupted almost imperceptibly by murmurs and the rustle of gently shifting bodies, naked bodies fondled by caressng hands that sought and groped moist and secret places with their unique and tantalising aromas. Although it was almost pitch dark and there was of course a wall between their room and his, Tom had a clear vision of his mother's mouth reaching for his father's as his father's hand delved at the sweet cleft reserved for his fingers between her open thighs. Only his father touched her there. He imagined her hot breath on his own face and her whispered endearments in his ear as she encouraged his father to take her and be deeply inside her. The sounds of lovemaking, of panting and low animal grunts, were more audible now, his parents absorbed in a shared cocoon of pleasure and careless of the world outside it, including Tom which gave him a pang of excluded pain. His father was fucking his mother whom he, Tom, loved with such a pure and powerful adolescent love that he dared not speak of it to anyone. Do not hurt her, he thought. Be gentle. Should he hate his father lying on top of his naked, defenceless mother and thrusting himself into her body? There was no answer to the question. The rhythmic creak of their bed seemed to go on for ever until suddenly it stopped and he knew his mother's fucking was over. They were lying side by side, consummated and panting. He let his hand seek his own hardness and quickly release its own tribute to his mother's submssion.