Elizabeth J Church - All the Beautiful Girls

“I just wanted. I just wished.”

“I know,” he said, taking her hand in his. “But I will always do what I can. I am your friend, forever. And let me make you a promise, all right?” Lily looked up at him. “I will find a way to make it up to you. For the dance, I mean,” he said and then released her hand. He made an X across his heart with his index finger. “I promise.”

“I love the books you send me,” she said and smiled in a way she hoped would convey how much they meant to her. Then Lily took a deep, resigned breath. “Okay,” she said, grudgingly agreeing to his promise. “But don’t wait too long!”

He smiled and stood. “You’re a pretty good bargainer, you know that? But now you need to get home before it starts to get dark. Promise me you’ll be safe?”

“Umm hmm,” Lily said and instead of using the steps hopped off the side of the porch to show him how agile she was.

“You could come through the house,” he told her, but she’d already started to round the corner. The Aviator followed her out front, and Lily felt him watch her climb on her bicycle and ride away.

Lily pedaled as fast as she could—not to rush back, but just to feel the wind blow her clean. She decided she wouldn’t tell her aunt about the dance. She just wouldn’t go. Lily knew no one would have the nerve to ask why the fatherless girl had chosen not to attend.

And maybe in the Aviator’s promise she had something even better than a stupid old dance with a bunch of stupid old girls and their stupid old clumsy fathers. Lily believed the Aviator would come through for her. It felt glorious once more to believe in someone.

Aunt Tate said, “HOW COULD YOU?” and roughly flipped Lily over on her bed where she ’d been reading the Aviator’s latest gift, Beautiful Joe . Aunt Tate held Lily by the arm and struck her with the gut-flecked flyswatter. “That was my mother’s pitcher! My mother’s! You!”— whack —“ungrateful”— whack —“child!” Whack . “After all I’ve done for you!” Whack whack whack!

Lily had no idea what Aunt Tate was talking about. “I didn’t do anything!” Lily protested. “Aunt Tate, I didn’t do anything!”

“Don’t add the sin of lying.” Aunt Tate let go of Lily’s arm and gave Lily’s backside one more good whack . “No supper. Why I took you in is beyond me.” Aunt Tate slammed, opened, slammed the door several times. Bang!

Lily stayed still, as if she were playing freeze tag at school. She sucked in her cheeks and bit down, wondering if she could bite hard enough to tear out the sides of her mouth, chew and swallow the flesh. Her body burned in all the places where the flyswatter had landed. Lily remained there, perfectly still, breathing scant breaths. She fought back tears, ever mindful of her vow to keep control.

Later, when it was nearly dark and Lily was wondering if it might be safe to go pee, Aunt Tate came and stood beside Lily’s bed. “Uncle Miles told me.”

What? Lily panicked. What exactly had Uncle Miles said?

“He knocked the pitcher off of the mantel when he was looking for his matches. He told me you didn’t do it.”

Lily didn’t understand why Aunt Tate automatically believed such awful things about her. What was it about her that led Aunt Tate to assume the worst about Lily? Lily had never been a liar. Why didn’t Aunt Tate believe her?

Aunt Tate crossed her arms and held them against her middle as if she were suddenly cold, or maybe trying to hold something in or even protect herself; as if Lily might stand up and try to punch her in the stomach like they did sometimes on Roy Rogers when there was a fight in a saloon and cowboys smashed each other over the head with wooden chairs.

“I made a mistake,” Aunt Tate confessed. “I jumped to the wrong conclusion.”

Lily thought about the Aviator’s Beautiful Joe and how Joe ’s cruel master cut off his ears and hurt him even though Joe was a kind and loyal dog. A good dog. Then Joe got rescued and lived in a good home where people loved and understood him. Beautiful Joe’s life was the opposite of Lily’s. But why? What was wrong with her? What had she done? What could she do differently so that Aunt Tate wouldn’t call her “The cross I have to bear”?

“Aunt Tate?” Lily dared.

Her aunt tightened her arms about her middle. “What is it?” she said, not unkindly.

“Why can’t you love me?”

“Honey.” Aunt Tate took a step toward Lily but stopped herself. “It’s because I love you that I’m hard on you. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t bother.”

Even though Aunt Tate had half-buried “love” in that brief statement, she had at least admitted it. Still, it didn’t feel like love to Lily. There were no soft, rounded edges to Aunt Tate’s love. It was uneasy, all spiky and fearful, like the sea urchin Tom Bradstone had brought back from his vacation in California.

“I know I’m not very patient with you.” Aunt Tate sighed. “To be honest, Lily, I don’t have much experience with children. Just watching over your mother when she was a young brat.” Aunt Tate nearly smiled. “But now come have a sandwich, and then we ’ll get you ready for bed.” She extended a conciliatory hand.

“Can I have tuna fish?”

“You may have grilled cheese.”

“Oh, with Velveeta.” Lily sighed with pleasure. Her aunt’s hand in hers was neither warm nor cold. It was like dry newspaper, and Lily almost thought she could hear her aunt’s skin crinkle when she squeezed it.

That night, Lily dreamed that she was sitting at the top of the playground slide, looking down the length of it. The polished metal chute went on for miles—down, down, and down to an abrupt end where children dropped off into some kind of a crack in the earth. Someone was behind her, prodding her to release her handhold and let gravity take her. She felt the insistent push of a hand. Tap. Tap. TAP!

Lily awoke to the deepest part of the night. Half asleep, she swatted at something wet that was touching her under her bunched-up nightie.

Uncle Miles clenched her wrist like a slave’s clevis and held it immobile until he finished. After he was gone, Lily fed her pillowcase into her mouth, bit down, and swallowed her cries so that they filled her stomach like sharp gravel.

WHEN SHE CAME home from school the next day, there was an entire box of cherry suckers on the nightstand beside her bed. The kind with the looped rope handles she liked best.

“Go ahead and have one,” Aunt Tate said from the doorway. “But just one, or you’ll spoil your supper.”

Lily stalled, looking uncertainly at her aunt. A part of her was afraid the candy was from Uncle Miles.

“Adults make mistakes, too,” Aunt Tate said. “I made a mistake yesterday, when I blamed you. I’m sorry for that.”

“It’s okay,” Lily said because she could see how badly Aunt Tate needed to hear it.