Your immediate family is not very wealthy, but your childless and unmarried uncle sure is. So your parents start to push you to be closer with him - nothing inappropriate, of course, but wouldn’t it just be so great if you bonded a little bit more with him? He’s your uncle after all, he’s your family! You should be closer! And if he just so happens to grow fond of you and starts to consider you as the child he never had and decides to leave his fortune to you in his will, well, wouldn’t that just be perfect?
So the next time there’s a family gathering, your mother insists on you wearing that pendant your uncle had given you on your first birthday. It is not your style at all, but you can see how your mother barely holds back a grin when he notices it, when he says how happy he is that you appreciate it. And your parents don’t seem to mind how his eyes linger on your neck and drift down your body.
“Look at you, all grown up. And so pretty, too.”
It makes you feel more than a bit odd, but when you glance at the faces of your parents, you know you can’t bring that up to them. It was just a compliment, wasn’t it? You shouldn’t make a fuss about such things, so you won’t.
They see to it that you sit beside him at the table. You can feel their eyes on you, and urged by their gaze, you laugh at your uncle’s every joke - even the ones that make your stomach turn with anger and shame in equal measure. But you think that that’s the worst of it. A bit of flattery, as fake as it is, is a low price to pay for what you could gain. It certainly seems to work, because he looks at you and he smiles and compliments you.
“So many of the girls in your generation don’t know how to take a joke.”
And then you feel his hand, large and heavy and inescapable, resting on your thigh under the table. You glance at him, but he’s in the middle of explaining some old boating story to your older cousins and your father. He isn’t even looking at you. But his thumb is slowly caressing you through the fabric of your dress.
There’s no way for you to rationalise this. There is no excuse for him to do this. You try to scoot away as far as your seat will allow, but then that idle touch turns into a grip. He doesn’t pause his story, doesn’t even glance at you when he forces you to stay still beside him. You try to search your mother’s eyes, tell her without words that you’re in trouble, that you need help, mom, mom please, but she’s all too engrossed in a conversation on the fate of the department store downtown with her sister-in-law.
For a sweet moment you feel relief when the weight of his hand is lifted from your thigh. But then, his fingertips slide down the fabric, until he finds the hem of your dress and flips it under the table. And then his touch returns, his palm warm and rough and even heavier than before when it rests on your bare skin. Your father is laughing loudly at the punchline of the boating story when your uncle starts to slowly massage your flesh, inching up with every squeeze.
You reach under the table yourself, and grab his wrist. And he lets go - only for a second and only to slap at your hand, as if you were nothing but a petulant child. His touch returns where it was, unbothered. His little finger brushes against your underwear, and your breath hitches. It doesn’t help that you try to clamp your thighs shut, his hand pushes between them anyway. You can almost catch his smile widening when he realises how shamefully slick your panties are.
Your uncle glances at you, and asks you something while his fingers trace your slit through the soaked fabric.
“Awww,” he coos, and at the same time, slips his hand past the waistband of your panties, “Looks like the wine might be getting to you, sweetheart.”
Laughter. Your family is laughing at you when your uncle starts to caress your slick folds, and your cheeks are burning. You force out a hollow chuckle even as you feel like crying. How can none of them see what is happening? How can they just ignore how his arm is moving, outstretched and obvious? They go back to their little conversations like usual and you bite back a whimper when his fingers find your clit.
Your uncle leans close to you, the scent of Amouage Jubilation and cigar smoke unable to completely cover the wine on his breath.
“It’s fine. A little thing like you can’t be expected to keep up with everything.”
Your thighs have fallen open under the table and you glance at him, wordlessly begging him to stop tracing idle, teasing patterns on your slick flesh. But he just smiles, adds another finger, and turns to the others for a new story.
The hand inside your underwear starts to work on you quicker when you notice how your mother looks at you. There’s an uneasy smile on her face that doesn’t quite reach her eyes, and the slightest, helpless crease between her brows. The feeling of betrayal snakes into the bottom of your stomach and laces the pleasure even more bitter than humiliation did.
“Everything okay, angel?”
And you know there’s only one answer she’ll allow. You have to close your eyes so no one would notice them roll back in your head as your uncle presses the heel of his palm against your mound and starts rubbing his fingers in tight circles.
“Yes…” you moan through gritted teeth, eyes squeezing closed as you come on your uncle’s hand, under your mother’s gaze. The seat underneath you has a wet patch now, and you are feeling lightheaded, breathless. Your uncle just pats your thigh, fingers slick and sticky with you. Inconspicuously, in the middle of laughing at his own anecdote, he wipes his fingers in a napkin that he then tucks in his pocket.
Your parents are overjoyed when, after the dinner, your uncle asks if he can take you for a vacation to his house in the Amalfi Coast.
