Breakfast

My mind races as I walk downstairs. Every scent, sound, and sensation is amplified. It's too much for a moment, and I stagger against the stair rail for a moment. I realize I need to think, think, to prevent being overwhelmed. In the back of my mind, I start considering how I could bolster my code project and sell it to generate income. The thought pattern dissipates into the backburner of my mind, but it is still there, and I realize I can diverge my thinking into multiple threads, not unlike a computer. Splitting that additional thought power into another topic leaves me in a manageable state, so I continue downstairs and into our living room.

I expected to find Mom sitting at the table, but instead I see her still in the kitchen, cooking. "Hey, Mom, can I help?" I ask, crossing the living room and wandering into the kitchen beside her. The smells of the food are delicious, and I find myself entrapped by them. But my mind wanders after a moment, and then I realize something. How beautiful she is. The way her hair falls down her back in delicate strands, scraping against her shoulders and raising the hair follicles on her skin. A faint red mark where the strap of her top has agitated her skin, which I suddenly realize is nearly flawless for a woman her age. My eyes travel down her backside, noticing the curves she works so hard for, and I revel in the perfect ratio of her hips, chest, and shoulders. My mind calculates the sizes of her bust and waist, and formulates statistics against them, diverging into conceptual renderings of her in different positions, and how the fabric of her top would stretch and split, yield and give. Her yoga pants, drawn from a segmented fabric that is joined together by quarter-inch wide bands of fabric, sinks into her flesh, revealing that her skin is still soft, although the shape beneath whispers of the muscle she's accumulated from her workouts. The back of my mind creates new renderings, new thoughts, of her lunging in our home gym, squatting, and running. She shuffles on her feet, and a small movement of her ass allows me to calculate the elasticity of her yoga-pants-bound-ass. My mind continues to drift, permutating and I--.

"Uh, Dom?"

I blink, and I realize Mom is staring at me. "Are you alright? You looked a little lost there."

"Sorry, Mom. I was just realizing how effective your workouts are. I never quite noticed it before."

She blushes, and I continue. "Is this all from yoga, or do you still weightlift too? I remember you stopped squatting a while ago."

"Oh, I'm surprised you remember that. I do both again, now. Come, help me with the food." Her blush is even heavier, and it takes me a split-second to realize why. She stopped squatting two years ago, three months, and eleven days ago. I never bothered to check in with her about it again, so I didn't know she had resumed the workout.

And it hits me, just as hard as the nootropic did. I am a fucking shit of a son. Not only that, I realize why my mother has worked so hard to stay in shape. It didn't start until after Dad died, after everyone had drifted away and left us alone. She is using it as a crutch, for her emotions and for her loneliness. She hasn't been with a man in what, ten years now?

"Mom, you know you're beautiful, right?" I ask, the words rising unbidden from within me.

She looks up from the plate she is scraping eggs onto, and I see an odd look in her eye. A mixture of sadness and happiness. Perhaps sadness at the fact it took someone so long to notice, but happiness that someone eventually did. Even if it is her own worthless son. My mind sorts through a thousand memories, even more faint smiles and tired looks. I realize how badly I've failed her, my mother, and I immediately resolve to do better. I won't let her continue like this, I can't.

"Thank you, dear," she says, her voice soft and quiet. Rather unlike the tone she usually takes with me. "Come, let's eat breakfast."

I help her carry the food to the table and sit down across from her. Yet again, I'm struck by her beauty. The perfect contour of her face, the supple arc each side of her lips makes, and how one is higher than the other by a few degrees. How straight her nose is, and how perfectly smooth her skin is, despite not wearing any makeup. And, I realize, the floral scent that accompanies her. It was hidden before by the smell of cooking eggs, but my nose pieces apart the scents and compartmentalizes them. The faint smell of vanilla and lilac wades around her, and my mind shoots into another branch of thinking to calculate the air speed velocity of the air conditioner and how the drag of pulling the scent towards me despite the intake being behind Mom. I stomp the thought out, not caring about it, and blink.

Mom takes a bite of her eggs, and I revel in the soft smile on her lips as she swallows. I follow suit, and I let out a groan as the eggs touch my tongue. "Mom, these are delicious! Did you do something new?" I ask, but then I realize it is probably the ****.

She smiles and shakes her head. "No, same eggs as always, dear. But I'm glad you're enjoying them."

I wolf down the food without another word, the taste of each bite on my tongue enrapturing, until my plate is empty. I sag into my chair after, stomach full and mind kicking into overdrive. I blink, and a plan has been formulated in my mind. A thousand diverging branches are compared, analyzed, and merged down into a single path.

"Mom?" I ask, getting her attention. She pushes the last bite of egg into her mouth with her fork and looks up at me.

"What's up?" she asks, covering her mouth with one hand. She rests the fork back onto her plate.

"I realize I've been a fuck up." She starts to speak, but I hold up my hand. My voice is unusually hard, and I feel my resolve growing as I start to speak. "No, listen. We both know it's true. Barely passed high school, never went to college. Shit, I don't even have a minimum-wage job. But Mom, I'm going to change. I'm already changing. I realized something this morning. Realized what I've cost you. But I'm going to do better. I started studying software development, Mom, and I'm pretty decent at it. I'm going to help you with the bills and be the man of the house that I know you need me to be. I'm sorry I never realized it before, until today. But I'll be there for you now, however you need me to be. If there is anything I can do for you, anything, let me know. I'll never complain about a chore again. I mean it."

I watch Mom for any sign of her response. A second passes, then another. She looks like a deer in headlights, frozen. I slide from my chair and kneel beside her, placing my hand on her shoulder. The skin is soft beneath my touch, tantalizing so, and I imagine running a finger down her tricep and onto her forearm. Grasping her hands in my own, feeling the warmth in her palms. Pulling her into me, wrapping--.

My thoughts are broken when a single sob wracks her. And like that, the dam is broken. The beautiful woman that I've only ever seen smiling begins to cry. I pull her into me, resting her head against my chest.

"I'm sorry, dear," she says, "but what you just said means so much to me. I hope it's true. I only ever wanted the best for you."

I don't respond. I know now I need to prove it to her, not fill her head with more empty words. But I continue to hold her for a moment until the tears stop and she pushes me away. A faint smile brightens her reddened face. "Sorry you have to see me like this."

"You're always beautiful to me, Mom." Without another word, I stand from beside her and carry the dishes into the kitchen, wash them, and place them onto the drying rack. She watches me, obviously surprised. "What? I meant what I said."

She only smiles at me, then stands and moves into the living room. I watch her for a moment, curious as to what she is going to do, but it becomes apparent once she turns on a yoga video. "Care to join me?" she asks, as she rolls out a yoga mat onto the hardwood floor in front of the TV.

"Have another mat?" I ask but pause. Do I want to spend my nootropic time doing yoga with my Mom? Is it a waste? I could be working on my project, trying to make money. Shit, just about anything.

"I do," she says, and I hear something in her voice. My mind analyzes the tone, accompanied by the contortion of her eyebrows as she fosters a weak smile at me. I see the need there, hear it in her voice. Sure, I could work on other things, but she wants me here with her, right now. There is no point in my learning or projects if they interfere with the happiness of the woman in front of me.

"Then I'd love to," I answer, and walk into the living room to join her.