Elizabeth J Church - All the Beautiful Girls

Lily handed him her bouquet of four crayons, the ones she ’d held on to, tight, when the stranger lifted her from the car’s wreckage. “These ones are my favorites,” she said. Periwinkle, Carnation Pink, Cornflower, and Pine Green.

Mostly, Lily remembered that the Aviator hadn’t felt like a bad man. He felt like a sad one.

THERE WERE INTERMITTENT pools of rainwater relief, times when Lily smiled. Those times came when the parcels arrived in the mail, wrapped in brown paper, tied with twine, and addressed in bold black ink to Miss Lily Decker . The first was Gene Stratton-Porter’s Freckles . It was an old book from 1904, with a battered cover and fine engravings of trees, cattails, birds, and clouds. Before beginning the novel, Lily hoisted herself onto the kitchen counter and sneaked exactly ten saltines from Aunt Tate’s larder. Then, she propped herself up on her bed with the book, eating the saltines as slowly as possible. As she sucked the salt from each cracker, she knew she was just like Freckles—crippled and unlovable. Still, she felt a little less lonely.

The mysterious books smelled of time, somehow held the breath of another reader, someone before Lily. The secrecy surrounding the identity of the book-giver made Lily feel special, somehow deserving. The books also let her travel far from the relentless flatlands of her life with Uncle Miles and Aunt Tate.

Pragmatic Aunt Tate didn’t abide mysteries, but if she wondered about the books’ origins, she never said anything to Lily. Aunt Tate dealt with the tangible world, the only exceptions being Jesus, the disciples, and the New Testament miracles. As for Lily, she thought the books might be from her elementary school librarian, who’d often commented on Lily’s avaricious appetite for books about pioneer girls who were held captive by Indians, or the wildly vengeful myths of the Greeks and Romans. In a way, it didn’t matter who sent the books, as long as whoever it was kept sending them.

IT TOOK SOME convincing, but finally Aunt Tate agreed to let Lily sleep over at Beverly Ann’s. The girls had been friends forever. They traded Cherry Ames books, shared after-school snacks of apple slices loaded with peanut butter, and played Chinese jump rope.

“We ’ve missed you, sweetheart,” Beverly Ann’s mother said, kissing Lily good night and promising that they’d have French toast in the morning.

When Mrs. McPherson pulled the door nearly closed so that only a thin pillar of light shone from the hallway, Lily felt a sudden moment of panic. She audibly sucked in her breath as a fleeting image of Uncle Miles’ probing hands crossed her mind. The image was there, he was there, even though she knew that at least for tonight she wouldn’t have to fear the drop of his weight on the bed like a gunnysack of river rocks.

“What’s wrong?” Beverly Ann asked, her voice sleepy.

Lily thought about telling. She could tell Beverly Ann about what happened in her bedroom, when the only noises in the house were crickets and the hum of the refrigerator. Sometimes the furnace clicking off or on. And Uncle Miles’ breath, his huh-huh-huh that got faster and faster.

But she couldn’t tell. It would make her sick to tell. Sicker to tell than not to tell. Beverly Ann would know how disgusting Lily was, and Lily would lose her best friend. And if she did tell, then what would happen? She had nowhere else to go.

“Nothing,” she said, finally, but Beverly Ann had already fallen asleep. Lily listened to her friend’s deep, regular breathing, the breathing of a girl who could trust, even in the dark. Lily felt her own eyes fluttering closed as she nestled in sheets that smelled of a sun-kissed clothesline.

The next morning, Lily came home from Beverly Ann’s begging for a pogo stick, but Aunt Tate said it was “too dear,” and Lily nearly stomped her feet. Beverly Ann got to have everything ! Lily’s friend’s life was a constant reminder of all that Lily had lost, and sometimes—like this time—Lily felt her cheeks flame hot with jealousy and anger.

But a few weeks after the sleepover at Beverly Ann’s, Uncle Miles beckoned a hesitant Lily to join him in the backyard beside his workshop. In his hands, he held a pair of homemade stilts.

“I sanded the handles real good so you won’t get splinters,” he said, turning the stilts so that Lily could admire his workmanship. “And I know these aren’t the same as a pogo stick, but you can learn to do tricks on them. Here,” he said, motioning to Lily to come closer. “I’ll help you get up on them. You’ll learn fast cuz you’re real coordinated.”

He was right; it took Lily no time to learn how to walk steadily, and soon enough she could balance on one stilt and even hop on a single wooden pole while holding the other one in the air. She sang songs and made up dances she could do balanced high on the stilts.

“I still think they’re dangerous,” Aunt Tate said after one of Lily’s stunt shows, performed just before dinner.

“Lord, Tate. Let the girl have some fun,” Uncle Miles had said and then winked at Lily, which made her nervous, not a happy co-conspirator. Lily became convinced that Uncle Miles wanted something in exchange, that he was incapable of a simple kindness. Eventually, that persistent knock of fear led Lily to abandon the stilts next to the woodpile, against the back fence where the squirrels lived.

MAYBE UNCLE MILES loved Aunt Tate. Lily didn’t know. He did love his raspberries—all forty-eight bushes, lined up in rows like soldiers on parade. He inspected them for infestations, dusted them with a white powder that poisoned any bugs bold enough to alight on the sharp leaves. He fertilized. He shooed away sparrows who dared to feast on the ripe fruit. When frost was predicted, he used old pillowcases to shroud the bushes so that they stood like an eerie battalion of child-sized ghosts.

They weren’t pretty plants, not like the boldly bright dahlias that had filled Mama’s flower beds. They were thorny creatures that protected themselves by being nondescript, unwelcoming. But when the fruit came—the faceted gemstone berries with their lush lobes, the juice running down Lily’s chin—it was heavenly. Aunt Tate would ladle the berries over vanilla ice cream, and they’d sit out back, watching the soft evening descend. It was a puzzle Lily couldn’t solve—the fact that something delicious came from her uncle’s devotion.

Lily’s fourth-grade school portrait showed a tall, gangly ten-year-old with a long neck and indentations at her temples as if someone had pressed his palms to the sides of her skull and squeezed until the bone succumbed. The generous spread of her cheekbones gave her a clear, open gaze. Her indigo blue eyes were large, her child’s lips surprisingly luscious, and she faced the camera without flinching. If Lily had held a numbered placard in her hands, the school photo almost would have passed for a mug shot.

It had been nearly two years since the accident, and from time to time, she saw the Aviator around town. Lily liked to imagine that he was watching her, a presence like God or Jesus or Zeus or Santa Claus. Someone who knew her secrets but wouldn’t tell. He was a potent mystery—not an enemy, not quite a friend. Just there.