When I was six or seven, I used to play doctor with Lisa, the girl next door.

It started when I got home from school on day and Lisa was sitting on her front steps looking bored. We lived in a duplex, so her front door and steps were right next to ours.

"Whatcha doing?" I asked.

"Nothin."

I heard her mom and dad yelling inside her house. Her momma worked and her daddy didn't. My mother said he was a drunk and a disgrace. So, Lisa's parents fought a lot. "Wanna come over a play?" I asked.

She shrugged and said, "Guess so."

When we got inside, I noticed she had an old black eye that was turning yellow. "What happened to your eye?"

"Nothin."

"You can tell me, Lisa. I won't tell anyone." I remember my mom making me promise to never tell anyone about daddy hitting her. "I promise. Cross my heart." I said crossing my heart.

She shook her head. Lisa was a year younger than me, so she was still in kindergarten. So, she got off early and was pretty bored by the time I got home at 3:30. She came over a lot, but I hadn't seen her for about a week. We usually play games like Sorry or Chutes and Ladders or maybe Monopoly if my sister Robyn is around to play with us.

"Wanna play Parcheesi, or something?" I asked.

"I guess." We heard something, or someone, hit the wall between our houses and she flinched.

Over the game I try to find out what happened to her. "Did you go anywhere last week for Easter?"

"My grandmas"

"Did you have fun?"

"No"

"Why not?"

"I don't know."

"What happened?"

"Nothin."

I was getting frustrated. I was even letting her win.

"Well, I had fun at Easter." I told her. "I saw my sister kissing my cousin Steve."

"Really?!"

"Uh-huh. He even had his hand down her pants!"

"Wow," was all she said and then she got quiet again.

After a few more minutes, I saw it was almost time for Star Trek. "Wanna watch some TV?"

"What about the game?"

"It's ok, I quit. You're winning anyway."

"Really? Thanks."

She sits right next to me on the couch, which was kinda strange. She usually sat by herself in the chair while I stretched out on the couch.

It was a good Star Trek with the brains and that hot fighting girl.

I noticed Lisa kinda leaning up against me so I put my arm around her. She snuggled up against me and smiled at me.

"How did you see them?" she asked.

"See who?"

"Your sister and cousin."

"We were playing hide and seek and I was hiding in the basement closet. I guess they forgot about me. When I gave up and started to come out, they were on the bed kissing and stuff."

"What kinda stuff were they doing?"

I look at her a little funny, but at least she's talking. "You know kissing at first, but then Steve unzipped his pants and pulled out his thing. It was all big and hard and red. It was kinda gross."

"Wow," she said again. I noticed she had her hand on my leg near my thing, too.

"What did he do then?" she asked.

"He made my sister rub it!"

"Did she do it?"

"Yeah, the weird thing is she seemed to like it. That's when he put his hand down her pants."

Between talking about Easter, seeing the hot babe in the silver on Star Trek and Lisa having her hand stroking my leg, my thing was getting hard, too. I hoped she didn't notice.

I almost jumped off the couch when Lisa put her hand right on it.

"What are you doing?" I almost yelled.

She jumped back like I had hit her and started to cry.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Please don't cry. I didn't... I mean... You didn't... I mean..." I sputtered. "Why did you do that?"

Between sobs she managed to say, "I'm sorry...I thought... you wanted... me to..."

This thought had never occurred to me. I liked to play with myself and stuff, and Jimmy and me used to played with each others sometimes last summer up on the farm, but I'd never done it with a girl.

"Sure," I said trying to sound cool. "You just surprised me, that's all." I pull her to me and put her hand on my thing. She stopped crying and kinda squeezed it.

Robyn picked that moment to come home from band practice. Lisa jumped back as Robyn asked "What are you two doing?"

"Nothin," we both said together, then laughed.

Robyn ran up the stairs to her room shaking her head.