Episode 2 – The Mushroom Moon | Ben and the Summer of Aunt Mary's Farm
The second week of August turned unusually warm, even for Willow Creek. The kind of heat that makes metal roofs tick like they're counting down to something. Ben had already adjusted to the rhythm: dawn coffee on the porch, morning chores, midday collapse under the big maple, evening beer-and-stories with Aunt Mary until the mosquitoes declared victory.
That particular Tuesday, Mary came back from the far pasture with a small wicker basket and a grin that looked borrowed from someone much younger.
“Found a jackpot,” she announced, tipping the basket toward Ben. Inside were a dozen fat, tawny mushrooms with wide caps and ghostly-white gills. “Chanterelles mostly… but these two big ones? Special guests. Old-timers used to call ’em ‘moon caps.’ Said they make you feel twenty again for one night.”
Ben raised an eyebrow. “You’re not actually planning to eat mystery mushrooms you foraged next to the cow pond, are you?”
“Honey, I’ve been eating things out of this dirt since Nixon was in office. These are fine.” She plucked the two largest ones, gave them a theatrical sniff, then popped them into her mouth like they were popcorn. “Mmm. Earthy. Little piney kick at the end.”
Ben watched her chew, half expecting her to sprout antlers. Nothing happened for ten minutes.
Then the giggling started.
Not her usual big laugh—this was softer, breathier, like someone had turned up the treble on her voice. She leaned back in the kitchen chair, fanned herself with a dishtowel, and fixed Ben with eyes that suddenly seemed three shades darker.
“Lord almighty,” she murmured. “It’s like someone lit a pilot light in my pelvis.”
Ben, who had been rinsing dinner dishes, froze mid-scrub. “You okay?”
“Better than okay.” She stood up slowly, stretched her arms overhead so her tank top rode up and showed the strong roll of her belly and the deep dip of her waist. “Feelin’… spacious. Needy. Like there’s a big ol’ empty room in me that’s been waitin’ for company.”
She stepped closer. The kitchen suddenly felt very small.
“Benji.” Her voice dropped half an octave. “You ever think about how some cravings don’t ask permission?”
He swallowed. “Aunt Mary, those mushrooms—”
“—are doin’ exactly what they’re supposed to do.” She reached out, brushed a wet thumb across his cheek where dishwater had splashed. “I’m forty-eight years old and horny as a teenager on prom night. And right now, darlin’, all I can think about is gettin’ filled up. Back there.” She turned slightly, patted her own wide, denim-clad backside with unmistakable meaning. “Hard. Deep. No polite tap-tap nonsense. I want to feel it tomorrow when I walk.”
Ben’s brain attempted several emergency shutdowns and failed each time.
She didn’t wait for him to reboot.
Mary took his hand—strong, calloused, warm—and placed it firmly on the curve of her ass. “Feel that? That’s years of squats and saddles and stubbornness. It can take a hell of a lot more than you think.”
She leaned in until her breath was against his ear. “I’m not askin’ for sweet. I’m askin’ for rough. I want you to fuck my ass like you’re tryin’ to prove something to both of us. No half measures. No ‘are you sure.’ Just give it to me until I forget what day it is.”
The mushroom haze had sharpened her pupils to pinpricks and flushed her cheeks dark rose. She looked wild, joyful, terrifyingly alive.
Ben felt his own pulse hammering behind his eyes. Part of him screamed this was wrong in seventeen different languages. Another part—the part that had spent two weeks watching this woman lift hay bales like they were pillows, laugh like thunder, and live without apology—whispered something much simpler:
She’s asking.
And she means it.
Mary turned, braced both hands on the kitchen table, looked back over her shoulder with a grin that was half challenge, half plea.
“C’mon, city boy. Show your aunt what you got.”
She popped the top button of her overalls.
The crickets outside were suddenly very loud.
Ben took one step forward.
Then another.
Somewhere in the back of his mind a small, responsible voice tried to file an objection.
It was overruled.
The screen door banged shut behind the last mosquito of the evening.
And the farmhouse kitchen—lit only by the yellow bulb over the sink—became the loudest, sweatiest, most honest room in three counties for the next forty-seven minutes.
Mary was not quiet.
She laughed, she cursed, she begged, she roared.
Ben—awkward and earnest and suddenly very determined—gave her exactly what she demanded: no hesitation, no gentleness, just raw, focused force until her knees shook and the table creaked like it might surrender.
When it was finally over she slumped forward, forehead on her forearms, breathing like she’d run the county line twice.
Ben stood behind her, dazed, sweat-soaked, heart thundering.
Mary lifted her head just enough to look back at him with a slow, sated, wicked smile.
“Well damn,” she panted. “You listen good when you want to.”
She straightened—slowly, gloriously—then reached back and gave his cheek a fond pat.
“Those mushrooms wore off about ten minutes ago, by the way.”
Ben blinked. “Wait… so you—”
“Meant every word.” She winked. “Just needed a little courage to say it out loud.”
She tugged her overalls back into place, stretched like a cat in sunlight, and sauntered toward the stairs.
“Shower’s free if you want it. I’m takin’ the big one upstairs. And Benji?”
He looked up, still half in shock.
“Next time,” she said, voice low and amused, “don’t wait for me to eat funny fungus first.”
She disappeared up the steps, humming an old Tammy Wynette song like nothing extraordinary had happened at all.
Ben stood alone in the kitchen for a long minute.
Then he laughed—quiet, disbelieving, exhilarated.
He turned off the sink faucet someone had forgotten about.
And went to find a cold shower.
Because tomorrow morning there would still be cows to feed, fences to mend, and one very unapologetic aunt waiting on the porch with coffee and zero regrets.
Summer wasn’t over yet.
Not even close.