Hanukkah's Gifts

"Well. Really, there's not much to talk about... I've moved out. Moved in with Lindsay."

"Lindsay. I see... or actually, I don't see. But I... ok. Whatever."

Simone tapped the hang-up button on her phone, then waited. She thought perhaps he'd call back, and she held the phone in her hands. Her arms felt limp, and the phone seemed heavy. Like someone had handed her a sack of potatoes. No, a sack of shit.This, this is that it felt like. She felt suspended, like one of those pairs of beat-up sneakers she saw hanging off the electrical wires in the old LA neighborhoods where they hadn't moved all those underground. Rotating in mid-air, hanging by a pair of dirty shoelaces. The one-two punch had gotten her, her mother's confession and Pete's declaration.

Or was it three? The doctor's last advice had added to it all. "Go home, spend some good quality time together. It's important, taking our good byes." She knew what he'd meant but hadn't processed it, obviously. She wondered if he'd said the same thing to her mom, if that's what had prompted her confession. But then she remembered her mother's whisper on her first day in the hospital. "I want to tell you a story, Mona..."

A Hanukkah gift. The first night's gift, finally delivered. Well... she knew then her mother was already saying her goodbyes, cleaning out the dust bunnies in her closets. Giving Simone the last of her motherly advice, and her complete legacy. Her father was not her father; someone she had spent hardly any time with, someone she barely knew, was. She'd heard of these kinds of things, but had never imagined something like this would happen to her. Her life had been placid, normal. Her parents had been happy, or at least had seemed happy. Weren't they? Both of them had loved her. Hadn't they? Had her father known? Had he loved her any less, or her mother? Maybe he didn't know, like her mother claimed. Were there any signs she could recall to indicate whether he really knew Simone was not his child? Too late to ask him, too late for all of that now.

It was already past the time she should have lit the seventh candle of her mother's menorah. All of a sudden it was very important, for some reason.

He had woken up cranky, and by midmorning, after filling out a bunch of job applications, his mood had barely improved. He was too old for this shit. He had lost his enthusiasm for making nice to snot-nosed, younger bosses that were less educated than he, despite their paper diplomas. Toilet-fucking-paper diplomas. He'd applied for too many jobs that had seemed perfect for him, but had had precious few calls back.

He turned to music. He practiced some scales and some tunes, letting his frustrations melt away in the blues. As he felt better, he switched to jazz and R&B, then to fusion. His guitar always made him feel better, however dark his moods were. And with his pick striking and caressing the strings, his knees bouncing up and down and his hips swaying with the sounds and the rhythms of the tunes, his mind took him back to his sweet night with Simone. The morning after had been very nice as well.

Had she left or was she still in LA? He wondered how her mother was doing, if she'd gotten better or worse. He felt like calling her, but that seemed too intrusive. Texting however, maybe that was OK. She shouldn't mind that.

Simone, this is Martin. How is your mother, and how are you?

He hit "Send" and laid the phone down, imagining he wouldn't hear from her right away. It was another ten or so minutes when the vibrations of the phone against the table got his attention, faster than he'd thought.

Hey.

How's your mom?

Home now. Sort of better.

That sounds a bit ominous. I hope she'll pull through just fine.

Yes. The doctor's not sure, so...

Are you still here? In LA?

Yes. Staying with her, making sure she's fine before I go back. But...

Hmmm. Should he ask? There was something about that small little word.

But?

Ten seconds or so passed. He wasn't sure she would answer, except he knew she was polite, and would not leave without saying "good bye."

I may stay longer. We'll see.

You sound like you could use some distracting. Would you care to have a drink, or a cup of coffee?

A drink sounds good. Great, in fact. But you have to let me buy.

Twist my arm. You got it.

He sent her a time for later that evening and the address of a laid back, more quiet place. When they exchanged their goodbyes, he felt warmth infuse his chest. The least he could do was try to make her feel better.

On a whim, he addressed one more message to her.

Happy Hanukkah, Simone.

Silence. Then, How'd you know?

I'm right, then. Your name.

Ah... yes. Good guess. You win a prize.

smiley

Thank you, Martin. And I'll have to see about the prize. winky

LOL See you soon, Simone.

As he put the phone down, he looked at their exchange of texts again. The winky seemed to actually wink at him, and he conjured up her smile. Well, good. Perhaps he'd already managed to lift her mood a bit. He picked up the phone again and scrolled through the emojis, not finding what he was looking for, so he shifted to a web browser and looked for an image until he found what he was looking for. Everyone could use a little gift now and then. He sent her a text with the image attached.

Immediately, his phone vibrated with her answer.

Hanukkah geld! I love Hanukkah geld!

I'm glad. It's the only Hanukkah candy I know of.

rose rose rose And I'm a chocoholic!

I've been warned. I can handle it. smiley

Simone ate her bowl of cereal and delivered a light breakfast to her mom's room, together with cups of hot tea for both of them. When she'd returned from her walk the previous night, her mother had gone to bed and Simone hadn't wanted to wake her.

"Thanks, Mona. You're very good to me."

Simone sat in a chair near her mother's bed, watching her eat.

"It's your turn, mom. You cared for me and supported me for so long."

Her mother shook her head. "You were easy, Mona. You were our joy. Both mine and your dad's, if you were wondering. He loved you very much, you know. You were his pride and joy."

"He never wondered? Was never suspicious?"

"No. Your dad and I loved each other, as much as you may question it given what I told you yesterday."

"It was a pretty big surprise, mom."

"I know, Mona. I've thought about telling you many times, more so since your dad passed away. I admit I've also wondered about never telling you. But that seemed unfair. I'm sorry I couldn't bring myself to do it earlier."

They both sipped from their cups.

"Did you and dad keep up your friendship with Bernard?"

"Well, we didn't have much of a chance to see each other. He was a good man. In a way, he sacrificed himself to please his parents."

"Did he have a good marriage?"

"I couldn't say. Really, I didn't want to find out. I think I would have felt bad if he were either happy or unhappy. I think, in a way, I simply did not want to know."

Her mother reached for her hand.

"Mona, this is old history, and really, it shouldn't affect how you feel about your dad. He loved you as much as any father could possibly have loved his child. If he had any suspicions whatsoever, he did not share them with me. If you hate me now, for not telling you before, I'd understand, but I'd hope you would not hold it against me. I don't know what you would have done, but I did the best thing I could under the circumstances. I can't stress enough how much you were loved."

Simone nodded, and squeezed her mother's hand in return. She knew she'd be thinking about her mother's confession for weeks and months to come. Years. But her mother was right - there was nothing to be gained by blaming her mother now, when they both felt that her mother had little time to live. Simone swallowed her questions and willed herself to let it go for now.

"I have nothing to reproach you with, mom. I didn't live your life, I wasn't there when you made your decisions. I do believe you had good reasons to do it the way you did it. And if you had told me earlier, perhaps it would have made things worse - perhaps I would have hurt dad if I'd tried to learn more about Bernard, or get closer to him." She patted her mother's hand, then rose and kissed her mother's forehead.

"Anyway, I need to get cleaned up. I am meeting a friend a bit later on, and I still have some work to do beforehand."

Her mother nodded.

"Simone, did you and Pete ever talk?"

Simone was at the door of her mother's bedroom when she turned.

"Yes, we talked. You were right, mom, with your advice. You were pretty subtle, but you called it well. I don't feel like talking about it now, but Pete and I, we'll be going our separate ways."

She was just about to walk out of the room when she turned once more. "Mom, I am glad for your Hanukkah gift. I know it wasn't easy for you to tell me, but I'm so grateful you did. It'll be alright."

She could see the relief plain in her mom's smile.

She met Martin at a bar quite close to The Motor City Pub. He was already there, waiting for her, and when she arrived, he stood and greeted her with a hug. As she'd driven, she had wondered if their meeting would feel awkward, but his embrace had been so natural and warm, awkwardness was the last thing that entered her mind.

She ordered a glass of red wine, he a Newcastle Ale. She answered his questions about her mother's health, but didn't mention her mother's bombshell. He shared his job searching woes and frustrations with his last boss, who'd let him go, as far as he could tell, because he could be replaced with someone younger whose salary would cost the company less.

As they shared their second drink, he asked her the question she'd been expecting. "Why isn't your husband with you, Simone? Supporting you?"

She twirled her glass of wine for a second or two, then lifted it in a mock salute.

"Turns out because he's been too busy fucking someone else." She heard less anger in her voice than she'd expected, and her mother's words came back to her. "Do what makes you happy, Mona."

Martin reached across the table and took her hand. He said nothing, for which she was grateful. Really, there was nothing to say.

"Simone, would you care to join me for a glass of rum? Why don't you come by my place?"

She nodded, needing less than a fraction of a second to decide. She was looking forward to it.

They held hands on the walk back, and at one point he insinuated his hand underneath her light coat, comforting against her waist. They retraced their drive from the first time she'd visited his apartment, surprised at how close he lived to UCLA's campus. When they reached the alley next to his apartment building, he stopped and embraced her, and bent down, bringing his lips to hers. Her mouth was quicker to open to his tongue this time, the tip caressing sensuously.

"I happen to have a joint from a friend on me. I wonder if you'd be interested in sharing it with me. It seems like an appropriate occasion."

"That takes me back to my younger days," she said, smiling and nodding.

As they shared tokes from the joint he proffered, his knee edged between her legs, parting them slightly, and his hand reached down between her thighs and slowly lifted her dress as it traced the inside of one leg upwards. A blend of shyness and excitement went through her, and the trail of his fingers seemed searing. She looked around the alley - it was dark. He stopped above her knee, but below reaching her panties, a polite distance.

"May I?"

His fingers were warm and, despite his light touch, not at all tentative. Simone felt as if they sent their own implied question.

"You may, Martin. Please do."

His fingers traveled higher, reaching the line of her panties, and she heard their simultaneous intake of breath when he ran the tip of his second finger along her panty line, back and forth, back and forth. Then he squirmed his finger underneath the edge of the fabric, and reached up to where her moisture had been seeping out for some time now. First one finger, then another, explored her wet folds, rubbing back and forth between the slick lips of her pussy, while their mouths shared their own moisture.

She gasped as his two fingers ventured farther inside, sinking into her tight depths, reaching with surprising assurance to that rough patch of nerve endings and rubbing it insistently. As his fingers rubbed inside her, she held on to his arms, squeezing his fingers between her walls.

"You feel so soft, so divine. Simone, I love your cunt, I love your clit. I want to suck them both deeply. It's the juiciest cunt I've ever had." As if to show her, he withdrew his fingers and sucked them into his mouth lingeringly, as if her juices were nectar to his lips.

"Would you like to see how good you taste?"

She nodded, speechless both because of the frank lust of his words and because the weed had had its effect, heightening every sensation, focusing each nerve of hers on the slightest pressure and touch of his fingers. He began moving his fingers faster, assured, a touch that was perfect - not too gentle, not too rough, bringing her to the brink where her muscles took over, quivering as if he was plucking the strings of his guitar and drawing out their vibrations.

She trembled her orgasm, holding his fingers still inside her with her clenched thighs and gasping through half-opened lips, her eyes closed until her shuddering subsided.

When she opened her eyes, he was watching her carefully, registering her every movement.

"Martin, that was amazing." She breathed out the words, so taken with the sensations he'd drawn from her that she forgot to be self-conscious at being outside, in the open. She noticed he'd taken care to hide them from the street, but the feeling of possibly being caught had excited her. When he withdrew his fingers this time, he brought them to her mouth and his gaze stayed on her as she licked and sucked her own viscous fluids off his skin.

"Let's go inside. I'm still hungry," he said, and he wrapped his arm around her, leading her into his building and up the stairs. She could hardly move fast enough to keep up with her own excitement, though it seemed to her that every sensation, every slight pressure of his skin against hers was inflaming her even more.

When they entered his living room, he knelt at her feet and immediately slid down her panties, with hardly enough patience to let her take her coat off and drop it on the floor.

"Mmmmmmm," he moaned loudly as he buried his face between her legs, taking her swollen vulva into his mouth, finding her clit and swirling his tongue inside her. He used his lips to suck her clit into his mouth, groaning the entire time as he held onto her upper thighs. She could barely stand, his attention was so intoxicating. Her hips were straining towards his mouth and every touch, every lick, every flicker of his tongue across each fold and surface brought her closer to the precipice until she could hold back no longer and her hips and pelvis shuddered against his mouth with the force of another climax.

"Martin, please, I'd like you to sit down somewhere. On your bed, if possible," and without shame or hesitation, as if this wasn't only her second visit to his apartment, she pulled him by the hand into his bedroom.

"Sit," she commanded, and he did.

"Oops, no. Stand up again," she corrected herself, and fumbled with his fly as soon as he did, impatient fingers grabbing at the opened flap of his jeans to pull them apart. He was naked underneath, his swollen member straining already inside his pants as he freed it. He gripped himself with his fingers holding the hard shaft and sliding up and down its length. She pushed him gently to sit on the edge of his bed and fell to her knees, her mouth and eyes level with his proud manhood. And then, her eyes fixated on the beautiful organ in front of her, she opened her mouth and took him deep, swirling her tongue around his helmet and the length of his shaft and sliding her head up and down. So good!

He filled her mouth, making her salivate and dribble around him, but she didn't care. She loved that feeling of fulness. She cupped his balls with one hand and probed his perineum as she continued her short wet slide up and down, rotating her head back and forth as she did so. She explored his glans, probed the small notch at the seam between the helmet and the shaft, and sucked him as deep as she could. It was hard to breathe but she opened her lips a bit and drew in air around his thick shaft, then closed them tightly around his meat and sucked him in even deeper.

His hips were squirming underneath her, bucking in rhythm with her movements on his cock, and his groans became louder and louder, until she felt him swell even more inside her mouth and the vein running along the underside of his shaft started to pulse. She could feel how close he was to going over, and she intensified her movements. His hands reached around her back and on her head, pulling her to him, his hips and whole body undulating in time with her own movements. What seemed like several seconds of his cock filling her mouth with his warm, slightly salty and sticky cum must have been, in reality, much less - he seemed to spurt into her in slow motion, and yet she felt every pulse and tasted every drop, every swell of his flesh. She loved it - his need and delight, the heat, the wantonness, the feeling of power, of having brought him to complete abandon.

When the pulses and waves finally stopped, she held him in her mouth for another second, relishing his heft, then sucked upwards along his shaft, licking up every bit of the fluid he'd released that she hadn't already swallowed. Loving every lick.

Finally, she grinned impishly and, looking up at him, said, "Thank you, Martin, for your Hanukkah gift. It was even lovelier than chocolate."

The End

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I hope you have enjoyed my Hanukkah tale; consider it my gift to you, dear reader. And if you like it, please do vote.