Mother's Underthings

This is how he wrote:

He steals into his mother’s room as she sleeps. He moves quickly and quietly to her bureau, to the second drawer where she keeps her underthings. Places his hands carefully, applies pressure slowly and evenly, removes a bra and a pair of panties.

Closes the drawer as carefully as opened, moves quietly out of the room and quietly down, quietly into the cellar to a small study wedged between the washer-dryer and a wall of over-stuffed home-made shelving.

Careful to leave the door at the top of the stairs slightly ajar, just in case his mother woke and came to look, although she never had.

Removes his clothes and puts on his mother’s bra and panties. He would turn on his PC and turn off the lights. If his mother ever did wander down looking for him— unlikely she’d venture past the top of the stair— perhaps calling down to him.

But he would have heard her steps and dimmed the screen. He would sit silently in the dark until she’d give up and go looking for him elsewhere in the house, giving him time to dress.

How would he come out of the basement? How could he return her underthings to her drawer? The plan was not perfect, but that was part of its appeal. He was at risk.