No Sanctuary by Richard Laymon

she asked, “don’t you?”
    Rick certainly did not want to stay by himself. “Sure,” he said.
    They started out, Dad leading the way. It soon became clear that his plan was to hike entirely around the lake. Though the lake was not large, maybe a couple of hundred yards from one end to the other, the shoreline trail petered out on the other side of a rushing stream just beyond camp. After that, the lake was bordered by rocks: tilted pale slabs, chunks the size of cars, piles of smaller blocks, some that wobbled or slid underfoot.
    In spite of the rough terrain, the going wasn’t difficult. Rick felt amazingly light and springy in his sneakers and without the burden of his pack. He leaped from rock to rock, strode easily across slanted sheets of granite, hopped over crevices.
    Mom, just ahead of him, sometimes looked back to see how he was doing.
    He watched her feet, and stepped where she stepped. Now and then, his gaze wandered higher. Her slender legs looked dusky through his sunglasses. Her shorts were cut so high in the rear that he could see the creases where her buttocks joined the backs of her thighs. Isn’t she wearing panties? he wondered. He felt himself getting hard, and guilt swarmed through him.
    She’s my mother, he warned himself.
    Not really. His real mother had left Dad when Rick was six. Two years later, Dad married Julie.
    That doesn’t mean you can get the hots for her, Rick thought.
    But sometimes he did. He just couldn’t help it.
    He looked away from her. He watched the rocks in front of his feet.
    Soon, however, his eyes found their way back to her. He stared at the faded seat of her shorts, at the way the curves under her rear pockets took turns rising and falling with the movements of her firm rump as she walked. He stared at the exposed crescents of her buttocks. There was little more than a narrow strip of denim passing between her legs. If she got high enough above him, maybe he would be able to see up inside the shorts and—
    Rick yelped with surprise as his foot came down. Rock was supposed to be there, but wasn’t. He glanced down. Saw his shoe and jeaned shin drop into a crevice. Tried too late to push out with his other foot. Fell forward. Shrieked out his pain as the bones snapped.
    Mum threw her arms around him, catching him in time to prevent the bones from ripping through muscle and skin. Then Dad was there. They eased his leg out of the fissure and lowered him onto the rock.
    They both knelt over him. Dad, who never seemed to lose his calm, had a frantic look in his eyes. Mom’s face was twisted with fear. “Are you okay?” she asked. “It’s not broken, is it?”
    Rick, teeth clenched in pain, nodded.
    “Let’s get those jeans off,” Dad said.
    As Mom unfastened his jeans, Rick noticed that her tube top was askew. It must’ve been pulled when she stopped his fall. On one side, a smooth half-moon of dark skin showed above the fabric hugging her breast.
    He was in too much pain for the sight to arouse him.
    But he remembered where he had been looking when he stepped into the crack.
    He shouldn’t have been looking there. It was dirty of him, even though she wasn’t his real mother. The fall had been a punishment.
    “I ruined everything,” he muttered.
    “Could happen to anyone,” Dad said, and pulled the jeans down Rick’s legs. His left leg, below the knee, looked swollen and slightly bent. Dad ran his hand along it. “There’s a break, all right.”
    “What’re we going to do?” Julie asked.
    That was when Rick stopped thinking of her as Mom. It didn’t seem quite so terrible to have gloated over a woman who was not Mom, just Julie.
    “Hold his knee,” Dad said.
    Julie clutched his knee with both hands, and Dad tugged sharply on his ankle. Rick flinched rigid as white-hot pain streaked up his body.
    Dad fingered the shin again. “I think that set it. You okay?”
    Rick nodded.
    Dad stood up, looked around, apparently didn’t spot whatever he wanted,