She was always a tough one. Tough as old boots, my da said and he spat in the street when he said it. Not what a girl should be, said my mam. Her name was Fin and she was pretty as get out and her hair was soft as feathers and for fifty cents she’d let you stroke it. A dollar could get you a kiss, but we didn’t always have a dollar.
Tough as tough could be, Fin was. And she never fought fair. Could kick the pants off me and Gimbal and Tooth and she sometimes did. Shit, she could take all three of us at once and probably deal out a licking. It was best to stay on the right side of her, and so we did the what that we could.
For years we was nice as biscuits to her and me and Gimbal and Tooth got on just fine. Fin called us ‘her boys’ and sometimes she gave out kisses to us for free – for everyone else it remained a dollar. We hung out at Maybury park when it was dark. The gates was locked at night, but Fin knew a way in, a gap in the fence that was not easily seen. We smoked cigarettes with Fin and drank red wine from the bottle and that’s when she’d give out her kisses for free.
Once, it was just me and Fin in Maybury park and she showed me her moonlit titties and then asked me if I was hard down there. She was the prettiest girl in the whole of our world, and she was showing me her titties, and I was close enough I could reach out and touch ‘em, and she was asking if I was hard.
I told her I wasn’t and I laughed to show it was nothing. She grabbed me then. Just punched her hand between my legs and grabbed the hardness of me. Fin always had the last laugh, and I shoulda known that.
There was nights after that when I was lying in my bed and I was hard again thinking of Fin with her sweater lifted and her titties showing like two small moons. I pulled myself off just thinking about her. I told Gimbal about it. He wanted to know everything. I said they was the size of lemons and he groped the air in front of him, his hands holding imaginary lemons and squeezing them ever so gently like he was testing their ripeness. I didn’t tell him about the nights in my bed and what I did then.
All of that was a long time in the past. Fin aint Fin no more. She’s Mrs Kirk and she drinks at the Red Lion most every night. She’s still tough as nails, swears like a soldier, and she charges a damned sight more than a dollar these days – though you get more than kisses for what you pay her. She was once the prettiest girl in the street, and that’s not exactly true no more.
Tooth is Fred Parks these days, and Gimbal is Mr Hugh Gebbet. We meet up every now and then, just for a drink. We meet in the Red Lion and Fin sits with us a while and we laugh about how things used to be and she calls us ‘her boys’. Sometimes, Fin slips her hand under the table and bold as brass she grabs me like she did that night in Maybury park, and the thing is I’m always quickly hard even now, and she always laughs.
Patricia Ann McNair 
She was always a tough one. Tough as old boots, my da said and he spat in the street when he said it. Not what a girl should be, said my mam. Her name was Fin and she was pretty as get out and her hair was soft as feathers and for fifty cents she’d let you stroke it. A dollar could get you a kiss, but we didn’t always have a dollar.
Tough as tough could be, Fin was. And she never fought fair. Could kick the pants off me and Gimbal and Tooth and she sometimes did. Shit, she could take all three of us at once and probably deal out a licking. It was best to stay on the right side of her, and so we did the what that we could.
For years we was nice as biscuits to her and me and Gimbal and Tooth got on just fine. Fin called us ‘her boys’ and sometimes she gave out kisses to us for free – for everyone else it remained a dollar. We hung out at Maybury park when it was dark. The gates was locked at night, but Fin knew a way in, a gap in the fence that was not easily seen. We smoked cigarettes with Fin and drank red wine from the bottle and that’s when she’d give out her kisses for free.
Once, it was just me and Fin in Maybury park and she showed me her moonlit titties and then asked me if I was hard down there. She was the prettiest girl in the whole of our world, and she was showing me her titties, and I was close enough I could reach out and touch ‘em, and she was asking if I was hard.
I told her I wasn’t and I laughed to show it was nothing. She grabbed me then. Just punched her hand between my legs and grabbed the hardness of me. Fin always had the last laugh, and I shoulda known that.
There was nights after that when I was lying in my bed and I was hard again thinking of Fin with her sweater lifted and her titties showing like two small moons. I pulled myself off just thinking about her. I told Gimbal about it. He wanted to know everything. I said they was the size of lemons and he groped the air in front of him, his hands holding imaginary lemons and squeezing them ever so gently like he was testing their ripeness. I didn’t tell him about the nights in my bed and what I did then.
All of that was a long time in the past. Fin aint Fin no more. She’s Mrs Kirk and she drinks at the Red Lion most every night. She’s still tough as nails, swears like a soldier, and she charges a damned sight more than a dollar these days – though you get more than kisses for what you pay her. She was once the prettiest girl in the street, and that’s not exactly true no more.
Tooth is Fred Parks these days, and Gimbal is Mr Hugh Gebbet. We meet up every now and then, just for a drink. We meet in the Red Lion and Fin sits with us a while and we laugh about how things used to be and she calls us ‘her boys’. Sometimes, Fin slips her hand under the table and bold as brass she grabs me like she did that night in Maybury park, and the thing is I’m always quickly hard even now, and she always laughs.