Author's Note: Forgive me if this seems to be a bit… sophomoric. I've had it in my comp saved for almost 2 years now, and I just remembered it tonight.

"Hey, can I play?"

Rail turned around and saw a tall skinny kid standing in the lawn beside their driveway wearing a backwards baseball cap, soccer shorts, and a red t-shirt. He assumed that it was the new kid that had moved next to him since he had never seen him before in neighborhood. He shrugged and moved back, creating a triangle between his cousin Stephen and the kid. He tossed the football to the kid.

Instead of throwing it to Stephen right away, he took it in his hands and looked at it. Rail thought this was odd behavior, because he had also assumed that this kid was about seven or eight, nine at the most, and seven and eight year olds did not inspect footballs.

"You have a rubber ball?" the kid asked in a tone Rail didn't like. He blushed angrily and sent him a dirty look.

"So?" he muttered irritably, his face flushing. The kid shrugged.

"Better grip, I guess."

Rail heard Stephen laugh.

"Whatever," he said as he wrapped his long skinny fingers around the ball, drew the arm that held the ball back and positioned his free hand towards Stephen, and rocketed the ball forward in a fundamentally perfect throw. The ball spun like a brown (rubber) lemon through the air and Stephen caught it without even extending his arms. He grinned, impressed. "Nice."

The guy shrugged. Rail wished he'd stop shrugging.

Stephen drew his arm back and threw the ball. It wafted lazily through the air, spinning fast but moving slow. Stephen always threw it too high, and Rail always had to catch it right in front of his face. He never told anyone but he was secretly afraid that someday, he wouldn't catch the ball and it would end up disfiguring his face.

No, Rail never told a soul.

"So did you just move in?" Rail asked as he threw the ball.

"Duh, doofus," Stephen answered, catching the kid's throw. Stephen was thirteen, only three years older than Rail. He was at that age, he heard his mom say to his aunt, that he thought he knew everything, and he'd be like that for a long time.

The kid grinned and had a dimple in his left cheek. Odd… Rail had a dimple in each cheek, and his older sister didn't have any at all. Rail still believed that he and Pillar weren't related and that she had been found under a rock while vacationing in Montana. His parents said that they had never been up to Montana before.

"What's your name?" Stephen asked as he received the ball.

"Rae," he answered, taking off the blue hat and shaking it in his hand. A brown ponytail flopped from side to side. Rail stared.

"Are you a girl?" he asked before he could stop himself, his throw lofting off to the side. He - she walked over and kicked it back to where she used to stand.

Rae gave him an odd look. "Yes," she said, brows furrowing. She found the question odd and rather random. The guy to her side only laughed.

"Rail, what can I say? You're a real moron!" he said between laughs. He waved his hand in her direction. "Don't mind him," he advised her, "He can be real dense sometimes."

Rae could feel her cheeks heat up and she put the cap back on and picked up the ball. "It's ok," she said to Rail, walking over and handing him the football. "Happensalot. I need to go now."

Rail didn't need Stephen to inform him that he had hurt his new neighbor's feelings, but that didn't stop his older cousin. When they went inside for some lemonade, Rail told his mom as well as a ten-year old could. She didn't bother to hide her laughter as she patted her son's shoulder and could only advise him to think before he spoke.

She handed him a plate of cookies and deliver it to their new next door neighbor. He brought it over and timidly rang the doorbell. Rae answered and she scowled as she opened the storm door. Her hat was no longer on and brown bangs brushed to either side of her head, tucked behind her ears.

"What?"

"I'm sorry," Rail said honestly with ten-year-old earnest and sincerity.

"Um… that's ok." She bit her lip as he stood there, holding a platter of cookies. "How about we properly introduce ourselves?"

"That sounds like a good idea." The cookies smelt awfully good.

"I'm Rae and I'm a girl." She thought for a moment. "I'm ten years old," she added proudly. She smiled wildly at him and stuck out her hand, looking him in the eye and daring him to take it.

Something in Rail's head told him that she was a more than a little weird. But that was ok. She was the only kid in the neighborhood, she could throw better than Stephen could, and, besides, she intrigued him.

"I'm Rail, I'm ten years old too and I'm a boy," he said, taking it and shaking.

… Six Years Later...

"That Rae is really growing up to be a pretty thing," Mom said, looking out the kitchen window to where Rae was pushing the lawn mower up and down her yard. I had offered to mow it for her all summer long for a minimal fee, but she laughed and said that she could do it herself. I could feel Mom's eyes on me, and I concentrated hard on my sandwich, pretending it was really good. I squished the bun without meaning to, and I hate squished bread.

"Don't you think, Rail?" she asked.

I nearly choked on a piece of ham and bread. I never really looked, or thought, of Rae like I would any other girl. Sure, I knew she was a girl and that she had things that I didn't (never mind the things I had that she was missing out on), but she always resembled a boy in my eyes more than any girl I had ever seen. Maybe that's because we're best friends, or maybe it was because she could kick ass better than any guy that I knew of.

I took a deep drink of water.

Mom was still looking at me when I finished drowning my glass.

Wiping my lips with my hand, I said, "Mom, that's sick. Real sick. You're sick to think that. Quit looking at me like that." She looked exasperated, then shrugged, handing me a napkin. I regarded it with a raised eyebrow before taking it.

"Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it's not there," she said, picking up my glass. "Rae is going to grow up and become something beautiful someday, and you'll wonder when it all happened. And someday, she's going to break more than one man's heart." She glanced from out the window, then to where I sat in kitchen. "Maybe one day, it'll be you."

"Is that a threat?"

"Don't be a smartass," she warned.

I finished my sandwich quickly and shot up the stairs to my room, wanting to escape the kitchen and mom. I didn't want to hear her gush about how damn pretty Rae was going to be when she grew up, and wishing she'd break my heart. What kind of parent wishes that for their kid, anyway? Passing Pillar's old wall mirror, I ran a hand through my brown hair and flopped onto my bed. I was just about to turn on the stereo with a CD that Rae burned for me beside my bed when I heard a loud noise filter through my open window.

The sound of a lawn mower.

I hopped up and moved to my window, pushing the blinds up and letting the light stream in. Rae was pushing the mower down her lawn then back up, around trees and the garden beds her mom had worked so hard to cultivate.

She was wearing loose basketball shorts and a ripped tank, and her hair was pulled up in a ponytail that hit the middle of her back. It was hot, and Rae was sweating heavily. Her entire face was covered with sweat and her dark brown hair was damp. Her hair clung to the back of her neck; her gold arms glistened. I could see the muscles of her calves contracting and relaxing, the defined muscles of her thighs going long, then short. My eyes traveled up to her ass. Sweat from the back of her thighs and the small of her back had plastered the material of the shorts to her legs, lying tight around the muscles. It wasn't large and obtrusive as other girls were. It was there. It was toned. It was nice.

God. That was sick. That was a sick thought. I was being sick.

I laid back down on my bed with my hands behind my head, listening to the sound of the mower. I was disgusted with myself for eyeing Rae like that (have I no respect? She's my best friend!), but she was there, and she was damn pretty.

She was very damn pretty.

For a while, I accused myself of being perverted and sick. But then I thought that it wasn't really my fault I thought she had a sexy body. Because she did. Rae had a body and there was nothing I could do about it. Mom was right, I hated to admit, but if she wasn't done growing, she would turn into something hot. I mean, not that she wasn't hot already.

I was ok, I was a guy, and I could admit that. I could want her and think about her, as long as no one, especially her, knew.

And it wasn't that she just had a nice body. But she did, she had a real nice body. But she was so much more; she was amazing. She had a 4.3 GPA and took all honor classes, played piano and guitar, held a steady job, and played two highschool sports. She was crazy perfect.

I mean, even Stephen thought that she was hot, and this is my cousin.

Rae was my best friend, too. She knew all my secrets, even the one about Stephen's bad throws hitting me in the face, and which goldfish cracker I liked the best (parmesan). She had gone to the principal's office with me a couple times and sat through detention with me more than once. She didn't laugh when I failed to flip my skateboard, and she always called to invite me to the movies or a study group. We've gone camping in her backyard and quizzed each other over the driver's permit test.

She's dated a couple of my friends, and I've dated a couple of hers. And everyone kept saying for a while that we'd someday get married, and we used to laugh at them. But lately, I've been the only one laughing. Rae just thinks that it's not all that funny anymore. I suppose hearing it from everyone, parents and teachers included, for six straight years would get it would get a little tiring.

Come to think about it, I don't even think that I laugh when people tell us that anymore.

Some people say that you're supposed to marry your best friend. And if there was one person of the opposite sex that I was to spend the rest of my life with, apart from family, it'd be her. Not like marriage because that meant that you'd probably have to love them, but I'd spend the rest of my life with Rae because she was the person that understood me the best and knew the most about me.

But it'd probably be real easy to fall in love with someone as perfect and beautiful as her.

And if I did fall in love with her, maybe then I would marry her.

"Where are you going?" I asked her as she walked in the street that was in front of my driveway. I didn't really care, because I'd definitely be going where ever she would be. I had been practicing some moves on my skateboard on the slant of the driveway, not wanting to look like an imbecile in front of the guys at the skate park. Jumping over the slant, I landed behind her.

"Hello to you too, Rail," she said cheerfully. She had taken a shower, and her body was removed of any sweat or funny smells. She smelt of fresh soap and something flowery. Her hair was back up in a ponytail, and I batted at it jokingly. She had on a pair of black guy's shorts that fell below her knees and a green t-shirt. An uncomfortable stirring occurred in my diaphram, like my stomach was being pulled in.

The last time I felt that, I was in 3rd grade and, to make a long story short, ended throwing up all over the stage.

"You wanna know somethin' funny?" I asked her as I skated next to her.

"Sure." Her purse bounced off her hips and hit my leg.

"I was eating a sandwich while you were mowing the lawn today and -"

"Hilarious, you bum."

"And my mom kept on telling me that you were gonna grow up into something pretty and beautiful, and that you'd break some guy's heart." I finished with a smile. Rae was silent as she kept walking, me skating in the street along side of her. 'Did I say somethin' wrong?' I wondered. A constricting feeling came into my chest and I breathed up and down instead of in and out. My stomach churned, and I scratched it.

"That was really nice of your mom to say that about me," she said in a soft voice.

"You mean you don't think it's funny?" I asked.

"Why would it be funny?"

"Well… you don't seem like a heart-breaker… it seemed a little out of character for you." I pushed my foot down and shot off, so her super-hyped up senses wouldn't detect my unease.

She paused again, managing to catch up with me, and when she spoke, it sounded as if she was amused very much by me. I only felt stupid.

"Rail, I'm a girl, no matter how much of a tomboy I am," she explained to my nodding head. I twisted my baseball cap backward, a blue cap like she had worn the first time I met her. An awful feeling shot through my stomach as I stared back at her, and bent my head.

"Any compliment that say someone girl's gonna grow up and be beautiful, so beautiful that she'll be a treasure to guys, is a compliment no matter who it's given to. And being me, I don't hear a lotta compliments about my fabulous looks."

"Who cares if you're pretty or not?" I asked. We rounded the corner out of the neighborhood and down the street to where a strip mall was. Behind that was the skate park.

"Well I care," she admitted to me in the tone that she'd admit a guilty pleasure or a very confidential secret in, such as the time she passingly mentioned that Stephen was 'kinda cute'. "Only sometimes," she added. Looking at me looking at her, she quickly supplied, "Not now."

"Well I think you're pretty." My back went rigid when I realized what I had said. I wanted to slap myself. Think before I speak.

"You're supposed to. You're my best friend," she said sarcastically, though her tan cheeks stained pink. I thanked her a million times mentally that she hadn't made a humongous deal out of my stupid slip of the tongue.

Clearing my throat, I asked her, "Where are we going, anyway?"

A long arm snaked around to pull her ponytail. "Gonna get my hair cut," she said.

"Exciting," I said dryly.

"I know. I'm practically dying with anticipation."

Luckily, the hair place in the strip mall was close by and Rae and I separated, because I don't think that I could have stood any more of those funny weird feelings that I was getting.

"Hey, Rae?" It came out wobbly, and too high for comfort. I cleared my throat and coughed, but nothing came up. Damn, it wasn't that something was lodged in my throat; it was that I was nervous. Around my best friend! That couldn't be good.

Rae looked at me, her eyebrows slightly raised, eyes bright and alert, and lips turned upward in an amused smile, as she was smiling at a secret, inside joke. Her brown hair now touched her shoulder blades, several inches noticeably cut off. Out of her ponytail, it shimmered and shone in the light. The front bangs enclosed her face in perfect wisps like a picture in the perfect frame. She looked the way she always looked, except with the whole-hair-down thing, but my stomach still knotted anyway. I put my foot down to prevent a fall.

"Yeah?" she asked in a voice that meant she was clearly not nervous. Not one bit. I fidgeted again; uncomfortable and regretting I ever opened my mouth, as we continued down the street, me on my skateboard, her beside me. Her eyes on me, my eyes on the sidewalk curb, a mailbox, a fence, anything but her.

I licked my lips and cursed again. I felt uneasy, and she looked at me, probably wondering why the hell I was taking so long to answer. I forced myself to look up to her. Her hair surrounded her face and fell over her shoulders; with it down, I could barely distinguish Rae from the prettiest girl in the entire world. I gulped and an arrow of pain shot through my stomach.

"Rail, are you feeling ok?" she asked hesitantly. "You gonna puke or somethin'?"

I didn't doubt her words, because I felt as bad as I looked. But it wasn't because I was coming down with some illness. "No, I'm fine."

"Ok." She paused for a second, eyeing me suspiciously. I tried to gather some nerves and courage.

"Rae?"

"Yeah?"

"Could you – if you don't mind – um…"

She looked at me, interested and concerned. She shook her head slightly and paused, urging me to continue. Her hair moved and settled out of place, her bangs caught behind her ears.

"Couldyouwearyourhairdownmore?" I asked hurriedly, my words slurring together. I wanted to die.

"Could I – what?" she asked, seriously confused.

"I'm going to sound like a moron for asking this, I mean, not like I'm making an idiot out of myself now, but I was wondering if you could- "

"Cut the crap, Rail. You're babbling." I continued to talk as if I hadn't heard her. She looked expectant, and I felt like an even bigger moron.

"Could you wear your hair down more often?"

She faltered. It was obviously not the question she had been expecting. I wanted to whack myself on the forehead. Several times. I picked up my foot to skate farther away and gather my shards of dignity.

Her right hand traveled up to her hair and grabbed a pile of it loosely, then gripped it. Slowly, she let it go, then traveled up to the top of her head and ran through it, combing it, tucking it behind her ear. Then she pulled a hand up to the top of her head and raked it down, stopping halfway, letting the hair strands run through her hand. She was thinking.

"Oh god, I'm an idiot. Forget I asked, Rae," I said, trying to take it back. Thankfully, the dim light of the fading sun made it impossible to tell that I was fire-hydrant red.

She looked up at me as if hearing me for the first time. Her eyes were puzzled and something else, some kind of emotion I had never seen before. It was so intense, so strong on me that the knot in my stomach tightened again. She smiled slightly, as if the idea appealed to her. I wondered what was going on in her head.

Rae looked hot. She looked smoldering, extremely hot. Small, gold colored strands of hair were falling in front of her face around her almond-shaped brown eyes. Her lips were open just a tad. They weren't full, but they weren't small or bow-shaped either. They were perfect for making out. Her face was tan under the fluoresce lights from the street lamps. Her brown hair was falling over her broad shoulders, making them appear smaller and slimmer. She wasn't rigid, but she wasn't hunched over. She was relaxed, at ease. She was perfect.

"Rail, shut up," she said, addressing me. I stopped admiring her, closed my gaping mouth, and focused on her. I maneuvered my board away and then looping back in.

"Is that what you want?"

"What? To wear your hair down more often?" She nodded her head.

I shrugged. "I don't care."

That wasn't true. I am a big, fat liar. Her hopeful face fell and I felt horrible for lying to her. Not only am I a liar, I am a jerk and hopelessly head-over-heels for my best friend! I deserve to rot in hell.

For a second there, I wondered why she had looked hopeful.

Was it possible that she liked – naw. Don't be a retard. Her girly pride was just insulted. That's all.

"Do you think it looks nice this way?" she asked her voice barely above a whisper. She was careful now, not wanting to be rejected again. I had forgotten about the whole girl pride/compliment thing trying to preserve a little dignity and self-image.

I skated over towards her, careful to not let the side of my board nick her ankle. "Yes. It looks very nice," I said sincerely, taking a hand and running it through it, from root to tip. I tipped the end of the skateboard to stop and look at her and she smirked.

"Maybe," she said softly, and if felt like a soft caress was surrounding me. She turned and looked at me straight in my eyes and I could only stare. The thoughts running through me head all centered on beautiful Rae and a desperate plea for her to marry me, and if not that, for her to kiss me.

"If you like it."

fin