Some girls are just so damned pretty it hurts. And they’re pretty at all times of the day and not just when they’ve made an effort to do their hair or put on make-up. It’s like they have something inside them, like a light, and it just shines out of them or through them. And I think that’s where the whole idea of angels comes from.
Corinne was like that. Jesus, she just lit up a room by being in it. She didn’t have to say a word, or sing or dance, or make a show or anything. Just sitting sipping tea and she’d turn heads. And the waiters’d be falling over themselves to do her a service and men’d forget the girls they were with and the girls’d forget the men.
She knew, of course. She knew she had this power. I told her often enough. I said how it hurt me inside just to look at her. She said I was just being soft and silly, and she kissed me and I was in blissful pain from that kiss. And she took my hand in hers and she said she loved me, and she said she loved all my silliness, too.
But when Corinne kissed me and she said she loved me, it was not quite what it seemed and that only made it hurt all the more. She’d always kissed me, you see, and always loved me, since ever we were children. It was an attachment rooted in our shared past and not anything more.
Sometimes we’d go dancing, me and Corinne, and we’d drink too much, always we would, and I’d take her home or she’d take me. And we’d end up in bed together and picking at the buttons of her dress and my shirt. And we’d forget ourselves then, all breathless kisses, and in the moment and drunk, and caught up in what we were doing.
In the morning with her hair all this way and that, and she was still wearing her earrings and not much more, Corinne looked like she always looked, like an angel in a vision must look. She’d pretend not to remember, not a thing, and she’d complain of having had too much to drink and how she would not do that again in a hurry. And then she’d just look at me funny, as though she was waiting for me to join in with the lie.
I’d pour her some strong black coffee and I’d say how it would clear her head. Then I’d tell I felt like shit and I’d pretend not to know what had happened – not any of it. It was what she wanted to hear. And I’d say how we couldn’t keep doing this, and that was a lie, too. She maybe thought I meant the drinking too much, and she’d nod and lift the cup to the kiss-shape of her lips.
‘Mind, it’s hot,’ I always said.
She’d put one hand on my arm and say she loved me, and she’d kiss me – coffee flavoured – and she’d say she would always love me. But though she meant every word, she did not ever mean them quite the way that I wanted her to and that’s what hurt.
Patricia Ann McNair 
Some girls are just so damned pretty it hurts. And they’re pretty at all times of the day and not just when they’ve made an effort to do their hair or put on make-up. It’s like they have something inside them, like a light, and it just shines out of them or through them. And I think that’s where the whole idea of angels comes from.
Corinne was like that. Jesus, she just lit up a room by being in it. She didn’t have to say a word, or sing or dance, or make a show or anything. Just sitting sipping tea and she’d turn heads. And the waiters’d be falling over themselves to do her a service and men’d forget the girls they were with and the girls’d forget the men.
She knew, of course. She knew she had this power. I told her often enough. I said how it hurt me inside just to look at her. She said I was just being soft and silly, and she kissed me and I was in blissful pain from that kiss. And she took my hand in hers and she said she loved me, and she said she loved all my silliness, too.
But when Corinne kissed me and she said she loved me, it was not quite what it seemed and that only made it hurt all the more. She’d always kissed me, you see, and always loved me, since ever we were children. It was an attachment rooted in our shared past and not anything more.
Sometimes we’d go dancing, me and Corinne, and we’d drink too much, always we would, and I’d take her home or she’d take me. And we’d end up in bed together and picking at the buttons of her dress and my shirt. And we’d forget ourselves then, all breathless kisses, and in the moment and drunk, and caught up in what we were doing.
In the morning with her hair all this way and that, and she was still wearing her earrings and not much more, Corinne looked like she always looked, like an angel in a vision must look. She’d pretend not to remember, not a thing, and she’d complain of having had too much to drink and how she would not do that again in a hurry. And then she’d just look at me funny, as though she was waiting for me to join in with the lie.
I’d pour her some strong black coffee and I’d say how it would clear her head. Then I’d tell I felt like shit and I’d pretend not to know what had happened – not any of it. It was what she wanted to hear. And I’d say how we couldn’t keep doing this, and that was a lie, too. She maybe thought I meant the drinking too much, and she’d nod and lift the cup to the kiss-shape of her lips.
‘Mind, it’s hot,’ I always said.
She’d put one hand on my arm and say she loved me, and she’d kiss me – coffee flavoured – and she’d say she would always love me. But though she meant every word, she did not ever mean them quite the way that I wanted her to and that’s what hurt.