on Li'l Bit, following her life from age eleven to nearly thirty-five. It centers on her relationship with her uncle by marriage, Peck, showing how that relationship grows closer and closer to a sexual one and how Li'l Bit's life becomes increasingly disorderly as she matures. When she is eleven and her mother does not want her riding in a car alone with Peck, she assures her mother confidently that she ‘‘can handle’’ him. She basks in the attention that he gives her throughout the years, posing for pictures for him and accepting gifts. When, at puberty, her breasts develop, her mother and grandparents make her self-conscious, and other children at school make her feel like an outcast, but Peck speaks to her sympathetically. When she goes away to college, Li'l Bit stops going to class and develops a drinking problem; removed from Peck, she can see their relationship for what it is, and she tells him they can't see each other anymore, even though it destroys him. In late her twenties, she picks up a high school boy on the street and has sex with him to feel the power over a younger person that Peck felt. In the end, as she drives off, she sees the image of Peck, long dead, in her rearview mirror.

Lucy See Mother

Aunt Mary Aunt Mary is the sister of Li'l Bit's mother and the wife of Peck. Li'l Bit describes her as ‘‘beautiful.’’ In a monologue announced as "Aunt Mary on behalf of her husband,'' she speaks to the audience, explaining Peck's good qualities: he is always willing to help out the neighbors, and he works hard to provide for her and even brings her furs and diamonds. She explains the psychological trauma that he must have experienced in the war. She is well aware of the relationship between Peck and their niece, she says. She blames Li'l Bit: ‘‘She's a sly one, that one is. She knows exactly what she's doing; she's twisted Peck around her little finger and thinks it's all a big secret.'' Her response to this is to wait until Li'l Bit goes away to school, so she can get her husband back.

Mother Li'l Bit's mother, Lucy, is skeptical of men. While giving Li'l Bit advice about how a lady should drink, she warns against particular drinks, stating vaguely, ‘‘Believe me, they are lethal ... I think you were conceived after one of those.’’ When she and her mother are talking about sex with Li'l Bit, she is the one to contradict the grandmother's warnings that sex is frightening. "It won't hurtyou—" she tells Li'l Bit, ‘‘if the man you go to bed with really loves you. It's important that he loves you.’’ She is angry at her parents for turning their back on her when she became pregnant, for telling her, "You Made Your Bed; Now Lie on It.'' She does practically the same thing, though, when Li'l Bit is eleven and wants to go on a long car ride with Uncle Peck. The mother gives in, even though she suspects Peck of having sexual intentions, telling the girl, ‘‘All right. But I'm warning you—if anything happens, I hold you responsible.’’

Uncle Peck Uncle Peck is the only one in the family who takes Li'l Bit seriously when the others make fun of her, and she is the only one to take him seriously. His wife, Aunt Mary, says that she understands his suffering but that she does not talk to him when he is feeling bad. When Li'l Bit is thirteen, he says that talking to her makes him feel better and gives him the strength to battle his alcoholism. When she agrees to meet with him to talk regularly, a quasi-sexual relationship is established: their meetings must be secret, and she must be allowed to "draw the line.’’ All future meetings between them lean toward sexuality. He takes pictures of her in his basement, planning for the day when she will be old enough to pose for Playboy. When she receives her license, he takes her to a restaurant that will serve her liquor. As she approaches her eighteenth birthday, when she can have sex legally, Peck sends letters, each with the number of days until her birthday, showing his excitement. When he visits her on her birthday and she breaks off their relationship, he starts drinking again. ‘‘It took my uncle seven years to drink himself to death,'' Li'l Bit tells the audience. "First he lost his job, then his wife, and finally his driver's license.’’

Waiter The waiter at a restaurant on the Eastern Shore is the only character in the play to interact with Peck and Li' l Bit when they are together as a couple. He is skeptical about serving alcohol to a sixteen-year-old girl, especially when she orders a martini, but he does it, hoping that he will receive a big tip.