I just don’t know shit. Not ‘bout nothing. Not ‘bout Linnie. We been kids together for so fucking long and that’s how I think of her. Kent says I’m bullshitting. He says Linnie is fuck-me-standing-up gorgeous and he says I can’t be blind to that, which I tell him I ain’t. And if it was any other girl, I’d have no problem with what Kent says. Only, it’s Linnie and I’ve known her my whole life.
Our moms are friends and our dads drink beer together on Saturday afternoons and they talk garden tools and cars and sports. And our families get together for things like thanksgiving and Easter and shit. Been that way forever. And Linnie, she’s like a sister.
‘I’d fuck my sister if she looked like Linnie, straight up I would,’ says Kent and he licks his fingers and rubs them against the ball of his thumb like he’s feeling the nap of fine cloth or the slippy of grease or ballbearings.
I ain’t never looked at Linnie like that before. Hand to fucking god I ain’t. Not even when we was skinny-dipping up at Tucker’s pool last summer when we shoulda been in school. We just stripped down to our bones and it was like nothing and it was like we’d done a hundred times before – at the time it was. Now, like I said, I don’t know shit. Now, it’s like the whole fucking world is turned on its head and it don’t look like the world I know no more.
We’re at Pip’s party. Her folks are away for the night and so she’s got an open house. We’re all there. Linnie’s across the room from me and she’s looking at me funny, and the music’s so loud the floor is shaking and I can’t hear myself think. Maybe it’s the same for her as it is for me and maybe she’s seeing it all different, seeing me different. Then she’s drinking beer from a bottle, her head thrown back and her lips sucking like a long kiss. And Kent’s right about something. He’s right about how drop-dead gorgeous she is and I pinch myself for not seeing it before now.
Later, and I’m a little drunk, drunk enough I don’t know right from wrong and my head’s swimming and I can hardly stand straight. And Linnie pulls me into this walk-in cupboard and she shuts the door. The music is muffled in there and there’s a dull yellow light from an uncovered bulb and I can hear my heart drumming and Linnie’s breath coming short and fast like she’s been running.
‘So,’ she says.
I shrug and I put on a face like I don’t know what’s what, which I don’t. I tell her that I’ve had too much to drink and she says the same and like that we have an excuse for what happens next. I tell her she looks pretty and I tell her that’s the first of me noticing just how pretty.
‘How’d I miss that before?’ I say.
Linnie shrugs, and it’s a little awkward, and it’s getting hot in that cupboard and the music’s still going on the other side of the door. Then Linnie says, ‘Fuck it,’ and she moves into me and kisses me. And like I said before, I don’t know shit. Not ‘bout nothing. And not ‘bout Linnie. And me and Linnie kissing, it’s like I’ve been waiting my whole life for this and at the same time it’s so fucking weird. It’s just kissing, still it’s weird, but I’m so drunk – and Linnie’s so drunk, too – that neither of us gives a rat’s arse, not then, not in that mother of all cupboard-kiss moments.
Patricia Ann McNair 
I just don’t know shit. Not ‘bout nothing. Not ‘bout Linnie. We been kids together for so fucking long and that’s how I think of her. Kent says I’m bullshitting. He says Linnie is fuck-me-standing-up gorgeous and he says I can’t be blind to that, which I tell him I ain’t. And if it was any other girl, I’d have no problem with what Kent says. Only, it’s Linnie and I’ve known her my whole life.
Our moms are friends and our dads drink beer together on Saturday afternoons and they talk garden tools and cars and sports. And our families get together for things like thanksgiving and Easter and shit. Been that way forever. And Linnie, she’s like a sister.
‘I’d fuck my sister if she looked like Linnie, straight up I would,’ says Kent and he licks his fingers and rubs them against the ball of his thumb like he’s feeling the nap of fine cloth or the slippy of grease or ballbearings.
I ain’t never looked at Linnie like that before. Hand to fucking god I ain’t. Not even when we was skinny-dipping up at Tucker’s pool last summer when we shoulda been in school. We just stripped down to our bones and it was like nothing and it was like we’d done a hundred times before – at the time it was. Now, like I said, I don’t know shit. Now, it’s like the whole fucking world is turned on its head and it don’t look like the world I know no more.
We’re at Pip’s party. Her folks are away for the night and so she’s got an open house. We’re all there. Linnie’s across the room from me and she’s looking at me funny, and the music’s so loud the floor is shaking and I can’t hear myself think. Maybe it’s the same for her as it is for me and maybe she’s seeing it all different, seeing me different. Then she’s drinking beer from a bottle, her head thrown back and her lips sucking like a long kiss. And Kent’s right about something. He’s right about how drop-dead gorgeous she is and I pinch myself for not seeing it before now.
Later, and I’m a little drunk, drunk enough I don’t know right from wrong and my head’s swimming and I can hardly stand straight. And Linnie pulls me into this walk-in cupboard and she shuts the door. The music is muffled in there and there’s a dull yellow light from an uncovered bulb and I can hear my heart drumming and Linnie’s breath coming short and fast like she’s been running.
‘So,’ she says.
I shrug and I put on a face like I don’t know what’s what, which I don’t. I tell her that I’ve had too much to drink and she says the same and like that we have an excuse for what happens next. I tell her she looks pretty and I tell her that’s the first of me noticing just how pretty.
‘How’d I miss that before?’ I say.
Linnie shrugs, and it’s a little awkward, and it’s getting hot in that cupboard and the music’s still going on the other side of the door. Then Linnie says, ‘Fuck it,’ and she moves into me and kisses me. And like I said before, I don’t know shit. Not ‘bout nothing. And not ‘bout Linnie. And me and Linnie kissing, it’s like I’ve been waiting my whole life for this and at the same time it’s so fucking weird. It’s just kissing, still it’s weird, but I’m so drunk – and Linnie’s so drunk, too – that neither of us gives a rat’s arse, not then, not in that mother of all cupboard-kiss moments.
Love this, Lindsay. Love it.
Thanks again, Patty. Glad and grateful that you read it. Thanks.