Kim

I glare over at Sully Grimes, curling my lip when he laughs at something my cousin Kelly says and wish a plague on his balls for daring to even be here at Dee’s wedding, his face smug every time he looks at me making me want to beat him to death.

I hate him now, but like a lot, not that kind of hate people use when they say “oh shrimp, I hate shrimp”–which incidentally I love so don’t get the wrong idea.

I HATE him. It’s a kind of I could rip your face off after I have hot sex with you hate that is eating me alive, and the longer I feel it, ironically, the more I want him.

And that hurts me. I want Sully Grimes with an intensity that makes every man I look at lately pale in comparison. When the hell did that happen, I ask myself for the umpteenth time, glaring when Kelly lays her hand on his arm and leans in, her blue eyes sparkling with more than just amusement.

I could rip her face off, too, and hang it on my mantle the way I feel right now. She knows I–

“He’s not going to turn into a toad, you know,” Dee laughs, coming up to stand beside me and throw an arm around my shoulders, the wedding dress we all bought her for the shotgun wedding she didn’t know about looked awesome with her red hair piled atop her head.

A little backstory for those who are not in the know.

Hello, my name is Kim Brady. I live in Hartley, Tennessee which acts like a small town but is actually a real-life city. I have a really big family but before I tell you about the Brogan hillbillies let me tell you about my nearest and dearest.

My daddy is Declan Brady, an Irish transplant who met and fell in love with my mama Rue Brogan, a real life, shogun toting redheaded hillbilly. They had four daughters, most of us Irish twins–born in the same year if you don’t know that.

I was born the same year as Dee, or is it Jack or Bay? Whatever, we’re all like no more than a year apart in age.

I’m number two, the second born, oh yeah, that means I share with Jack, I think. It’s confusing since mama had two daughters born in each year almost eleven months apart, give me a break. Half the time I don’t even remember birthdays.

So they have four daughters, me and Jack, the eldest, and then Bay and Dee. Now Jack is married to Cord Nixon, the boy she loved since we were all in school.

She got suckered into marrying him a few months after her fiancé Felix jilted her at the altar for my cousin Melinda who was knocked up at the time–they’re about to be married and here somewhere avoiding the words whore, asshole, and death.

Jack married Cord in a shotgun wedding where Cord tricked my wedding planner sister into arranging a wedding that turned out to be fake and then wasn’t so fake because when she turned up at the church, he was waiting for her at the altar.

True story.

Then my sister Dee went and fell for Ky, one of Cord’s best friends, and he also tricked Dee into meeting him at the church, only this time it was a for REAL shotgun wedding since Dee was knocked up and mama actually brought her shotgun in case Dee tried to pull a runner.

Today is Dee’s wedding, and she’s said her I do’s, and we’re at the reception where I have to watch her pine for booze but can’t give her any because she has a nugget in her tummy.

At this reception are all the Brady/Brogan clan, including my Uncle Jimbo and his wife Luanne–parents to that whore I love, Melinda who’s marrying Felix and, well you get the picture.

My Uncle Jimbo is the leading moonshine king around here, and my daddy has a brewery that supplies almost all the bars in the area. The other Brogan’s are all here too. Skeeter and Essie and their five kids, the sixth is cooking nicely in her belly. Uncle Flea and the four-leaf clover daddy and mama tattooed on his head a few years back because he stole money.

It’s no big deal anymore, so he’s alright.

My cousin Kelly and her parents, Booker and Looloo–her name really is spelled that way so don’t look at me.

All in all, I have about twenty or so cousins, aunts, uncles, extended family and all the little shitfaced kids that they keep producing like rabbits.

That’s just the bride’s side. We haven’t even started talking about the Hollis’s who are good folk but nothing like mine. They’re actually decent and do things like paying their parking tickets. Suckers.

“Hey, Kimmy? I said he’s not gonna turn into a toad no matter how long you dead-eye Sully,” Dee says again, making me curl my lip.

“Not a toad. I want him to turn into a walking cock and balls because he is a dildo,” I say, sneering and turning away when he smiles and moves closer in a way I have seen Sully do for far too long now.

He’s a manwhore, honestly and no matter how many times I tell myself that he’s got VD, I can’t stop wanting that man. He screws around as if it’s his God-given right to make his way through the entire county and their mamas.

“Kim, the man has the hots for you.”

“Yeah, right. That’s why he turned me down when I invited him in after our one date and then slept with Greta Frays the next night,” I mutter, swallowing the bile that rises just remembering that rejection.

A few weeks ago my cousin Melinda called me down to the restaurant Sully owed and confessed to me that she’s a hooker who deserved to be stoned, but that she’d had her baby, missed her family, and was on the outs with her boyfriend Felix because he wasn’t gonna marry her because his mama hates Mel.

Hooowee, that was a mouthful.

Anyway, I went on over to Sully’s, fell in love with Mel’s daughter Poppy, and then promised to finally go on a date with Sully if he helped me move all Mel and the baby’s stuff to my house.

I thought pulling a midnight flip would force Felix to pop the question and finally propose to Mel. I mean she gave him a kid, the least that toe pus can do is ring her already.

Sully helped me, and I went on a date with him, which was actually really nice. Afterward, I made it obvious that I would blow him and then we could get really nasty, all night long.

He turned me down flat, kissed me goodnight and left, and I haven’t spoken to him since because here’s the thing, I want Sully. I always have. For years in school I wanted him but stayed away because he’s just so…nice.

I am not nice. I’m sarcastic and acerbic, and I like my own space, but I knew, even then, with Sully I wouldn’t want to be anything but sweet. All that considered, I actually asked him out in high school, and again, he turned me down.

To this day I still don’t know why, and I haven’t ever told a soul. Only me and Sully know. I eventually got over that though, took notice of the way he always looked at me and thought, yeah, okay I want him.

So I took my shot, went out with him and just like last time he shot me down and made me feel like nothing, like all I was…was just a date, not even good enough to screw.

Which, yeah, hurt. It hurt a lot. Sully sleeps with everyone. He loves women, and he loves sex, and he is not one of those assholes who have a type.

He likes a woman just because he considers women beautiful and kind enough to sleep with him. He actually said that once, that all men should be thankful women even give them the time of day.

I thought for sure he’d extend me that same courtesy seeing as he’s been watching me for years and yet I must be the only woman he hasn’t ever given the green light.

The man doesn’t even flirt with me anymore, not since that night I touched him and tried to pull him closer. I fully intended to go all the way with Sully, finally frustrated and needy enough to throw all my misgivings out the door.

He turned me down.

That’s all I can think as I watch him ply Kelly with enough charm to have the girl aflutter and giggling.

Dee sighs, gives me a squeeze, and shakes her head.

“I thought for sure you and him were gonna end up together, in the sack at least. He’s always watched you. I just thought…”

“Yeah, well we both thought wrong,” I say softly, my sad meter going on red alert and warning me to drink. More.

“Oh, Kimmy, I am so sorry. Look, maybe I could ask Ky to find out what’s up with him.”

“No. Leave it alone Dee, I mean it. I don’t want any man thinking I’m so desperate for him I need other people to talk me up. I could walk out of here on any dick I want,” I say pompously, knowing it’s true and hating it.

I don’t sleep around, contrary to what many people think. I’m not a slut. Not that I think women who sleep around are, men do it all the time and high five each other.

But I don’t just see a man and think yeah, quick screw. I actually have to like the man before I would consider being with him. Take the baseball player I slept with last year. He was in these parts, down from Mississippi and batting for his team.

He had a shit season and went for a drink which is when I met him, drowning his sorrows. He was an angry guy but sweet, confessing that he was terrified he’d be cut from the team if he didn’t pick up soon, as he was his mama’s only support he was having a hard time.

I talked him up a lot, made him loosen up and sent him back to his team to hit like a pro. He was a nice guy and a good bed partner, and I still get calls from him just to catch up and hear how his mama’s arthritis is.

That’s just me. I like knowing people, making a difference and okay, I like sex, so I’m not being completely altruistic here, but neither am I the girl Sully thinks I am, and even if I was, who the hell is he to judge me?

“Kim, maybe…”

“Drop it, Dee. It’s fine. I’m just hating on him a little. It’ll fade sooner or later, and I can go back to being happy with myself and being with men I actually like.”

“But you like Sully. I know you do, Kimmy. He’s a good guy, and he would be so good for you. You can finally have a family and tell people that you cook,” she says softly, handing me a glass of water that I strongly reject for the bourbon in mama’s hand when she passes by.

I chug it before she can wrestle it back and glare at her, daring her to even say a word. She sniffs and makes the right decision, walking away seeing as I am hopped up on painkillers and booze.

Daddy broke–fine he bruised my rib yesterday giving me the Heimlich when I started choking because Dee told everyone about Sully and me. Or the no Sully and me as the case may be.

It hurts like hell, and I am not happy with the bruise, but he saved my life and now I get to be high and drunk without mama having any say in the matter.

I win it seems, even if I lose, too. That’s fine by me since it’s better than just losing.

“Dee, just let it go. I will. Where’s Ky?”

She snorts and rolls her eyes.

“He saw cousin Matilda crying because her mama told everyone about her eleventh toe and he’s over there trying to convince her it’s not gross. I left because I just can’t lie well enough to pull that off,” she complains, making me grin and giggle.

Mattie has an extra toe on her left foot that people used to ridicule her about all the time until me and Bay beat them to a pulp in third grade. Aunt Jess sometimes brings it out when she gets mad at Mattie, and then the poor thing cries.

She should have grown up with my mama, she’d be a basket case by now.

“Your husband is a good guy, Dee. I hope you appreciate that not just any man would wake up next to your funk in the morning and still love you.”

“Oh, screw off, have you seen how shit you look when you first get out of bed? Bull refuses to let you babysit him anymore no matter how many times Essie tells him you’re not a monster. That kid is legitimately afraid of you.”

“I had a hangover! I had to drink something after a full day with all those kids. Christ, all five of them snuck tobacco and chewed it. Skeeter’s kids are wild animals, Dee,” I explain patiently.

I adore them and usually get them at least once a month. That’s all I can handle before I need recovery. They really are that wild, even for me.

Dee snorts and shakes her head.

“I hope this bean is at least a little normal or I’m stopping at one. Swear to God I do not know how Essie does it.”

“Pot,” I tell her, grinning when her eyes stretch.

“But she’s pregnant.”

“Yeah, well she actually has to carry the kid full term, and with that family of hers, she’d have gone into labor already. It’s just one joint spread out over the whole week. Chill. It’s medicinal.”

“It’s wrong. No wonder Bull and all those kids are…” Dee peters off guiltily, but I nod, knowing what she means.

Them kids just are not right. Not a one of them.

“She didn’t smoke pot before her fourth so don’t blame the reefer for the kids. She only smokes it now because she’s on the verge of having a nervous breakdown. Skeeter found a dead deer on the highway last week, dragged it home, and told her she could cut the grocery list in half since they had meat.”

“That is disgusting! What did she say?” Dee asks, her curiosity making her tone excited as she breathes gleefully.

I laugh, a loud boom that has me choking and bending over to grab my rib. Shit that hurt.

“She walked into the garage where he hung it, her shotgun cocked and held high and started counting. He got that deer outta there so fast Essie could be heard laughing from the next street over. But see, weed. She’d have shot him for sure before she started toking,” I say, defending her need for weed because I happen to toke with her.

“Jesus, that last kid may just be normal. Do you think it’ll make it normal? The weed?” she asks hopefully.

“We’ll keep an eye. You know we knew those other kids were all wrong from newborns because they didn’t cry.”

No, they stared at you with beady brown eyes until you gave them what they wanted. Thank God Essie didn’t breastfeed, or I am positive she’d be without nipples.

Dee shudders, and I enjoy standing with her watching Jack and Cord dance for a song or two before she hops up and kisses me and struts off to look for her husband.

“She looks happy.”

I snort, not bothering to pay Sully heed because I saw him abandon Kelly at the bar, and I just knew he’d be over here once I was alone. It’s just a Sully thing, he talks to me as if we’re friends.

Which we aren’t. I can’t be friends with a man I want to ruin with angry sex.

“You still ignoring me, Kimmy?” he asks, sitting down beside me while I sip on the drink I stole from Luanne, a fruity concoction that is going down surprisingly well considering the amount of vodka in it.

“Nothing to say, Grimes,” I mumble, pretending an interest in the way daddy is grabbing mama’s ass when in fact I would like to fork my eyeballs right outta my head.

“Nothing? That hurts, babe. I thought we were friends,” he says softly, with real hurt in his tone.

“Yeah? Well, you were wrong. Why don’t go do what you’re good at and leave me alone? I got drinking to do before I can pop another pain pill.”

“You in pain, darlin’? Maybe you should go home and rest. I’ll drive you if you want since you’re over the limit already.”

I snort, turning to finally look at him. He is so handsome it’s a wonder he isn’t fighting women off. He has dark hair that he wears a little longer on the top with the sides neatly shaved and blue eyes that pierce a woman when he looks at you.

He sorta reminds me of that actor Tom something, you know the English guy who acted with Chris Pine and Reese Witherspoon. God, I can’t remember his name, but that really is who Sully reminds me of.

He’s a tad thuggish in his looks and the way he walks, as if he’s not afraid of anything. I think that is one of the things I find most attractive about Sully, he’s always solid.

And for me, he’s never there unless I want to “be friends.”

“The day and night are just getting started, Grimes. Why I bet if I can drink enough I can have meaningless sex in three hours without feeling the pain.”

He tenses, giving me a hard look and rises to look down at me.

“How do you always lie so easily?”

“Just–”

“Enjoy your evening, Kim,” he says, cutting me off and turning to walk away.

I stare after him, dry-eyed even if he just pierced my heart. That’s the third time Sully Grimes has used those exact words on me and every time has been with him walking away.

I guess Dee was wrong, it’s just not gonna be.