After all these years, an event still sticks with me: Mom, Kyle and myself at a yard sale at which a herd of My Little Ponies smiled from the 25-cent box. Probably $4.99 at K-Mart the year before, but the owner needed to clear her shelf.

Mom was good for a quarter. Applejack, the orange one with yellow hair and red spots, was the best, in my opinion, but I shouldn’t have announced it, as Kyle didn’t even want a My Little Pony because he’s a boy, but once my choice was made known, he of course had to have Applejack. Brothers!

For some stupid reason, Mom decided that Kyle got first choice, and he smirked and I ended up with stupid Cotton Candy. When we got home, Kyle made a toy parade with Applejack as leader and invited Cotton Candy to march behind because he knew I’d say no. To cement his victory he announced that the parade would be free to the public.

I’d no option but to create my own event. While Kyle held his parade, I assembled my ocean fleet of Mom’s bread pans on the rug. I had a shipwreck and Cotton Candy drowned which ruined his plan, a parade needing more than one participant.

That afternoon, Kyle interrupted my Legos, each row of bricks, just one color. “Applejack wants to have a best friend. Can Cotton Candy come over and play?”

‘“If you help me make them a barn,” satisfied with his concession, as I started to disassemble my tower. “You’ll have to find all the little square white pieces.”

This he did without whining, which didn’t give me the pleasure I’d hoped for. Maybe the two of us should just have fun. “Or how about let’s make a fort for our My Little Ponies against the bad wolves?”

It didn’t matter that our construction was too small to accommodate them because we could just pretend they were inside. As we lacked the Legos to add a watchtower, we made them a secret escape door.

After defeating the bad carnivores -- Cotton Candy fought single-handedly while Applejack snuck around for a sneak attack -- I said we needed to have a victory tango, which Kyle thought dumb, so we danced our toys in a circle. Why a tango? Because Mom said it was the best kind of dance.

Then I said that they needed to take a bath together, which we had them do.

We then decided that it was a house that we’d built and Cotton Candy and Applejack would get married. I sang “Here comes the bride, big fat and wide” and had them make a baby, Kyle knowing as much about it as I did, us having spied on our folks, What amazed me was how next morning, Mom would be putting out the cereal while Dad would be pouring their coffee as if last night he’d not put his cock in her bottom.

Applejack didn’t have a My Little Penis, of course, but we could pretend. Lots of girls have their Barbie get naked with Ken and move her legs apart. As My Little Ponies don’t bend, they have to go about it in other ways.

“Cotton Candy and Applejack,” I ordered, “you have to be on the bed,” and we hopscotched them to a pillow. “Now do it,” putting Cotton Candy on her back and Applejack above. It wasn’t quite right, but conveyed the idea.

We had them doing that when Mom stuck her head in, saying to wrap it up, and I had to think fast, “They’re doing the tango.” It must have worked, as Mom let us keep playing.

I said that we could be My Little Ponies, ourselves, and when he didn’t get it, added, “if we got naked.” I could see I’d caught him off guard, but after some thought, he said maybe, but I had to go first.

“Or we could wear our underpants,” I backed off, as who’d actually want to get naked with her brother?

And that’s how we figured out how to rub together, me as Cotton Candy and him as Applejack. He didn’t want me to know when he got a boner, but once he got used to it, it was part of our game.

Mom’s nuts about the tango. As she has neither the flashing eyes nor the ruby lips, her passion befuddles us, but mothers can have odd interests. Heather Wagner’s, for example, recently took up kickboxing.

Dad’s a good sport and tried to learn, but for him, the tango is just the steps, not what makes the tango, tango. He’s happy to stick with the boog-a-loo and when he and Mom hit the floor at the Elks -- so they tell us -- they sometimes draw applause. Kyle and I don’t plan to be Elks, but we think that’s pretty cool.

Mom’s teaching Kyle and me because she thinks we’re natural partners. Tango dancers first provoke each other, but always end up together, and she says she’s watched us go after each other forever and we always make up.

She makes us hold each other the proper way. “Chest forward, neck back. Closer.”

“The judges don’t like him hoisting you around like a sack of potatoes. Contact at three points. Electrical contacts. Sparking’s part of the dance,” which brings to mind the My Little Pony movie, “It’s dance magic, and it’s electric. Let yourself move,” but she wouldn’t know the tie.

Two points of contact are pretty clear, as she has us take off our shirts, “Partners need to be in each other’s skin,” though actually, we’re on each other’s skin, except I’m in my bra. She gets like that, too, being our teacher.

That the lower point of contact is electrified is obvious when she has me take her place with him. At first he tries to squirm away, but she puts a hand on each of our butts and pushes us together.

“That’s it, Holly. Chest against him.” Why she mentions my boobs but not his cock isn’t fair, but I let it go.

“Not so plastered together,” she tells us. “A little friction.”

When I’m with my uncle, Mom leaves the friction up to him. “Up higher, Holly,” she might suggest.

The most important thing, she says, is to be passionate, which she shows me by going at Kyle with her hips. His face turns red when he comes in his pants, but she holds him up and pretends not to notice. I can make him, too, but it’s risky. If I made him do it in competition, though, the judges would probably give us extra points. It’s not fair, however, him getting to and me having to wait till later, on my own.

Champions train together for decades. While Mom harbors no illusions of taking home a trophy, she at least has a partner with whom she has history, her brother Rob. He’s no Travolta, but who cares? The two tango well because they totally know each other. The judges can exactly tell.

As Uncle Rob’s single, he’s got time to practice, which he and Mom do for hours at his place. He’s always good for Girl Scout cookies and helps coach Kyle’s little league. He helps teach me the tango because I need a partner who knows how. He’s the kind of uncle that you want.

If there’s something Mom wants to see on HBO, he’s got the right cable. If his place needs some cleaning, she’ll help out afterward. It works both ways, him stopping by to help out when Dad’s off.

As Mom opted out of the Elks convention in Denver, Dad flew ahead and we’ll pick him up and go camping. Uncle Rob’s along for the ride, and we’ll drop him off in Boulder. We could have made it in a day, but as it’s vacation, why not take a couple?

The first day isn’t long, Mom and Uncle Rob switching at the wheel, us in the back. Kyle mostly dozing, me, his pillow. He winks and I punch him in the stomach, as he shouldn’t be winking. He shouldn’t be putting his arm across my front to make his pillow better, but I don’t mind.

When we switch, my head’s on his lap. I don’t wink, but he punches me to make me stop rolling around. Actually, more of a pat on my boob. I quit rolling once I get my head directly on what’s now a boner.

When we stop for a break, it’s sweet how Mom takes Uncle Rob’s arm in the parking lot. As I’m not about to do that with Kyle, I hop on his back, but halfway to the door, I change my mind and do like Mom with her brother. Back in the car, Mom sees and says we’ll find a motel with a pool.

After we unpack, Mom shoos us kids off. “We paid for the pool. We old folks need a nap.”

She locks the door as we go out.

The pool’s fine, but the Jacuzzi’s better. Kyle plots me onto his lap to remind me he’s the boss, but I bounce enough to remind him that’s not the case.

Fooling around in the bubbles, he almost pops my boobs free, but I have the water for cover while I get them back in. I don’t mind him seeing, but he’d be in trouble if he made me show them to everybody. To get back at him, I toe him from the other side of the tub. Him in his swimsuit, I can see my target.

We bang for them to let us in. Mom had on her bra when we left, but apparently didn’t want to nap in it. As they napped in the same bed, I’ll get stuck with Kyle. Could do that at home, of course, but it wouldn’t be as fun.

Uncle Rob’s still under the covers, his pants on the floor until he tries to pull them on without our notice. Don’t be so shy, I’d like to say. You and Mom sleep together. Except I wouldn’t say that because I like him and don’t want to get Mom in trouble.