All the Beautiful Girls. Elizabeth J Church

TATE HAD been wrong about Lily being able to leave her sorrow behind in the house that used to be home. Sorrow was not so easily fooled; it stuck to the soles of Lily’s feet and dogged her every step. It was an undercurrent to every breath.

      Lily stood on the sidewalk in front of Aunt Tate ’s American Beauty rosebush. Making sure that the coast was clear, she dropped down on all fours and began dragging her right knee along the rough pavement, shredding the skin. It burned, but she kept going, checked the raw skin often, and only stopped when she was certain that the wound was serious enough to merit Aunt Tate’s attention. The blood ran down Lily’s leg, into the top of her knee sock. Straightening her cotton twill dress, Lily picked up her schoolbooks and went inside.

      Aunt Tate said, “You need to be more careful,” as she painted Lily’s knee with the bright red Mercurochrome that Dawn had called monkey’s blood. When Aunt Tate softly placed a square of gauze over the skinned knee, when she used the fingernail scissors to cut strips of white adhesive tape and was careful not to hurt Lily as she pressed the tape to Lily’s leg, Lily felt cared for, reassured. As if she mattered.

      Lily created other injuries. She “fell” off of a curb and for good measure bravely struck her ankle three times with the heaviest rock she could find. She knocked her forehead against a doorknob. She burst her lower lip and gave herself a black eye on a rung of the playground ladder. Yet, it wasn’t until Aunt Tate taught Lily how to use a razor blade to scrape hard-water stains from windowpanes that Lily realized she could turn the blade on herself, at last finding blissful release.

      LILY’S TEACHER ANNOUNCED that there was a special, last-day-of-school assembly. Along with her fourth-grade classmates, Lily sat on the polished gymnasium floor and then looked up to see the Aviator standing at the podium. He wore his navy blue dress uniform with the gold wings and rows of medals and ribbons, and in his hand was his uniform cap.

      “I’m here today as the special guest of Lily Decker,” he said. “Lily, please stand and let your schoolmates thank you for making this happen.”

      Basking in the glory, Lily stood, thinking her mouth could not stretch widely enough. All the kids who’d pointedly skirted around the girl of contagious calamity now cheered loudly.

      The Aviator spoke about flying bombers over Europe during the war, of the new aircraft he was testing high above the plains of Kansas and the entire Midwest, and he cited facts and figures about the speed of the planes, what he saw when he catapulted beyond the clouds. The boys shouted questions about how many enemy cities he’d destroyed, and the girls—who were for the most part absurdly shy—asked questions about whether people on the ground really looked like ants, if the Aviator could see into windows and know what families were having for dinner.

      When it was all over, the Aviator asked Lily to come up and stand beside him. She made sure her bobby socks weren’t drooping and smoothed her green-and-blue plaid dress as she walked to the front of the gymnasium. The Aviator held a small corsage with two white roses and some airy greenery.

      “This is for my good friend Lily,” he announced as he pinned the corsage to the collar of her dress. Lily’s heart soared—high, into the stratosphere, venturing far beyond any altitude even the Aviator had ever sought.

      AUNT TATE SAID Lily could go look at the elephants, but she had to be back in ten minutes. Lily hopped down the bleachers, holding her paper bag of popcorn against her chest so that she wouldn’t spill any. She could hardly wait for the show to begin, because there would be trapeze artists in sparkly costumes and maybe those girls in leotards who twirled on ropes.

      Lily made her way past the man selling chameleons tethered on lengths of red thread, and then she stood in the straw in front of the elephants. She decided she liked the one named Bruno best. Lily wanted to run her hand across the terrain of his gray skin, to smooth away his wrinkles and try to make his eyes look less sad. Other kids were holding out fistfuls of peanuts, but Bruno ignored them all. He turned his head and stared morosely at the red-and-white wall of the canvas tent.

      “How are you, Miss Lily?”

      It was the Aviator, standing at Lily’s elbow. He wore a ball cap and a forest-green T-shirt, and Lily saw half circles of sweat beneath his arms. July’s heat was upon them. Soon enough, there would be days in a row of 100-degree temperatures that left everyone in Salina wet and wilting.

      Lily grinned. “Hi,” she managed and then offered the Aviator some of her popcorn. He accepted a few kernels.

      “Are you shy today?” he asked. Lily nodded, and he continued. “Well then, how about I ask you questions? All right? Let’s see,” he said, putting his finger to the center of his chin and pretending to be deep in thought. Lily giggled. “Tell me what you like to do. What’s your ten-and-a-half-year-old heart’s favorite pastime?”

      Lily was thrilled that he knew enough to add that half year to her age, but she wasn’t used to being asked what she liked. She was used to doing what she was told or suffering the hairbrush—Uncle Miles’ favorite form of punishment, one he reserved for offenses like sassing back or stealing nutty chocolates from the box next to his ugly brown turd of a recliner.

      “I like to dance,” Lily said, and then feeling braver, she handed him her bag of popcorn, wiped her hands on her purple shorts, and stepped back from the elephant enclosure. Lily showed the Aviator some of the steps she’d copied from Dinah Shore’s show. She pointed her toes, held her breath, and performed a passable pirouette.

      “What’s your favorite kind of dance?” he asked.

      “All kinds. Any kind,” she said. “I love the June Taylor Dancers. I’ve seen them on The Ed Sullivan Show.”

      “They’re pretty good,” he said, munching on a few more pieces of her popcorn.

      “They kick like this.” She turned sideways, kicked as high as she could, kept her balance. “And when they make those patterns, like a kaleidoscope—I love that. They’re magic. Oh,” she added, “and the outfits. Sequins and feathers. Headdresses!” Lily could hear how fast the words were coming out of her mouth.

      “So, dancing makes you happy.”

      “More than that,” Lily said, looking up at him. “When I dance—when I dance, nothing else matters. Everything else disappears. There is only dancing.” That was it. Dancing took her to another world, a world that Uncle Miles could not reach. A world where her lost family was a faint shadow, not an omnipresent, weeping wound. When Lily danced, she was not a misfit. She belonged.

      But she couldn’t bring herself to say all of this to the Aviator. Instead, she simply said, “I feel happy when I dance. Free.”

      “All right then,” he said, just as the band began playing an upbeat song. Lily was torn—she had to get back to her aunt, but she wished she could ask him to come sit beside her.

      “Here.” He handed her the popcorn. “You can’t miss the show.” He held out his hand, and she took it. “I was very glad to see you, Lily Decker. Now, you go have fun, and later you can tell me what you think of pink and green and blue and yellow trained poodles, all right?”

      Lily laughed. There couldn’t possibly be such a thing. The Aviator was funny.

      “I’m not kidding,” he said, touching the brim of his ball cap in a mock salute. “They dance, too, but not as well as you! Now, promise me you’ll have a good rest of the summer, all right?”

      “I will!” Lily skipped a few steps toward the bleachers and then turned to wave to him one more time. She watched him cross the parking lot, stand beside his tuxedo-black Corvette, and light a cigarette.

      A week later, Lily received a card in the mail that said she ’d been given a Tah-Dah! Dance Studio scholarship, along with a stipend to pay for a leotard, tights, and appropriate dance shoes. It was signed “Your Secret Benefactor.” Aunt Tate said, “Someone has money to burn” but otherwise manifested no curiosity. And so after school Lily rode her faded red bicycle to the studio. It gave her two days a week when she was