They was so beautiful. I got pictures of em on my wall and in frames beside my bed. They dressed neat and theys hair was all in place and theys smiles was movie-star bright. He was my Uncle Cob and she was my Aunt Fran and I wished they was more than just that.
They din’t have no kids of theys own. Mam said it was a choice they made, but da said it was maybe somethin medical and it was none of us business to be specalatin. I asked Julie to explain what mam and da was talkin about.
Julie is fourteen and I is only nine. Julie is my friend and she’s educatin me into the ways of the world; that’s what she says. She knows stuff, years of stuff, and she always has an answer to the questions I put to her. She showed me how to kiss usin my tongue and she said that was how grown-ups kissed and she made a small moanin noise when she did it and she said that was part of kissin, too. And she said I’d have diddies of my own one day and she stuffed the front of my dress with tissue paper so as I could see what it’d be like when I did. And she brushed my hair a hundred times in a mornin so that it shone like it was wet.
I asked Julie about babies and choosin and what da meant by ‘somethin medical’.
Julie sighed and she rolled her eyes and she made a face like she’d been told to do a hard job. She took my hand in hers and she walked me to the paddock where cows was grazin under a hot sun and bees was fizzing like bottled lemonade when its new opened. And she sat me down in the grass and the clover and she told me stuff, like she was tellin a story of magic and demons.
Julie knows more words than is in books and she teaches me sometimes. I learned ‘cock’ and ‘cunt’ and ‘fuckin’. She talked about the bull at first and how it climbed on the backs of the cows once a year and afterwards the cows growin as heavy as potatoes in a bag; then a new baby calf slip-sliding in the grass, all sticky with blood and water and slime, and blowin bubbles through its nose with its first breaths. Then Julie said it was the same with people.
I din’t understand.
Julie used her fingers to show me. Her right hand was a cock and she made her left into a loose fist, like she was holding invisible rope and she said that was like a cunt. Then she put her cock-finger into the clasp-cunt of her hand and she moved them apart and then tight together again. She said that was how babies was made.
I couldn’t picture Uncle Cob climbin onto the back of Aunt Fran. Not nohow. They was much too pretty for that. I reckoned mam was right when she said it was a choice they made and that was why they din’t have babies. So I sneaked into they’s bed one early morning, just as they was wakin, and I wriggled myself between them and I says to em, meanin every word, I says that they din’t need to be fuckin like no ugly bull climbin on the back of no cow for to have a baby. I told em they could have me – just like Carly when her calf died and they gave her one of Bingo’s calves. I told em that with my hair brushed a hundred times I could be pretty, too, and it’d be perfect. They laughed and they said they’d take me home with em in a minute. But they never did.
May 30, 2014: I wished they were my parents.
Patricia Ann McNair 
They was so beautiful. I got pictures of em on my wall and in frames beside my bed. They dressed neat and theys hair was all in place and theys smiles was movie-star bright. He was my Uncle Cob and she was my Aunt Fran and I wished they was more than just that.
They din’t have no kids of theys own. Mam said it was a choice they made, but da said it was maybe somethin medical and it was none of us business to be specalatin. I asked Julie to explain what mam and da was talkin about.
Julie is fourteen and I is only nine. Julie is my friend and she’s educatin me into the ways of the world; that’s what she says. She knows stuff, years of stuff, and she always has an answer to the questions I put to her. She showed me how to kiss usin my tongue and she said that was how grown-ups kissed and she made a small moanin noise when she did it and she said that was part of kissin, too. And she said I’d have diddies of my own one day and she stuffed the front of my dress with tissue paper so as I could see what it’d be like when I did. And she brushed my hair a hundred times in a mornin so that it shone like it was wet.
I asked Julie about babies and choosin and what da meant by ‘somethin medical’.
Julie sighed and she rolled her eyes and she made a face like she’d been told to do a hard job. She took my hand in hers and she walked me to the paddock where cows was grazin under a hot sun and bees was fizzing like bottled lemonade when its new opened. And she sat me down in the grass and the clover and she told me stuff, like she was tellin a story of magic and demons.
Julie knows more words than is in books and she teaches me sometimes. I learned ‘cock’ and ‘cunt’ and ‘fuckin’. She talked about the bull at first and how it climbed on the backs of the cows once a year and afterwards the cows growin as heavy as potatoes in a bag; then a new baby calf slip-sliding in the grass, all sticky with blood and water and slime, and blowin bubbles through its nose with its first breaths. Then Julie said it was the same with people.
I din’t understand.
Julie used her fingers to show me. Her right hand was a cock and she made her left into a loose fist, like she was holding invisible rope and she said that was like a cunt. Then she put her cock-finger into the clasp-cunt of her hand and she moved them apart and then tight together again. She said that was how babies was made.
I couldn’t picture Uncle Cob climbin onto the back of Aunt Fran. Not nohow. They was much too pretty for that. I reckoned mam was right when she said it was a choice they made and that was why they din’t have babies. So I sneaked into they’s bed one early morning, just as they was wakin, and I wriggled myself between them and I says to em, meanin every word, I says that they din’t need to be fuckin like no ugly bull climbin on the back of no cow for to have a baby. I told em they could have me – just like Carly when her calf died and they gave her one of Bingo’s calves. I told em that with my hair brushed a hundred times I could be pretty, too, and it’d be perfect. They laughed and they said they’d take me home with em in a minute. But they never did.