A Lily in the Light(83)
Chapter Twenty-One
At noon, a fire truck wailed mournfully in the distance. A front door opened, and a woman in an electric-blue evening gown waved from the porch, her dress spreading around her like a meadow of taffeta. Cerise wrinkled her nose at the sparkles and trail of ribbon.
The woman walked toward the water and adjusted her crown, made of Popsicle sticks. As if she’d summoned them, children gathered from neighboring homes dressed as mermaids and pirates, tickled with excitement. The Dibble Queen of the Dibble Stick Parade summoned her tiny group closer.
“Come on,” Madeline whispered. They left their blanket and followed the woman in blue, Nick leading Andre by the elbow. Both looked amused.
“Is this the thing from the newspaper?” Lily whispered. Nancy crept closer, just in case.
“I think so.” Esme smiled, fighting the pinprick feeling in her chest that Lily had chosen her to whisper to. “Let’s find out.”
“Ladies and gentlemen, merpeople large and small, pirates of the sea, and all that is divine, we gather here today for the twentieth anniversary of the Dibble Stick Parade, the day the bay opens its waters and welcomes us home for our age-old celebration of dibble diving.”
Children giggled and poked at the ground with water-shoe toes. A breeze rustled the train on the evening gown and sent a web of ribbons flying like blue lightning. The Dibble Queen lifted the crown from her head for the crowd to see.
“And now for the rules.” The queen paused, the crown still held high above her head. Esme eyed Lily nervously. Was this OK? Lily’s head was tipped toward her shoulder, eyes narrowed. How strange this must be for her, but maybe there was something familiar about it, too, something booklike.
“Rule number one: all dibblers will enter the water on a count of three and swim for the dock. All swimmers must touch the dock before diving for dibble sticks. Rule two: after successfully finding a stick, you must yell dibble at the surface.” The crown lowered, and the queen broke it apart stick by stick.
Nick nudged Esme. “Did you bring your bathing suit?”
“Did you?”
Nick winked.
The Dibble Queen handed sticks to mermaids. They ran to the water’s edge, dragging silver tails behind them, and threw them into the water.
“And the final rule.” The Dibble Queen’s voice rose higher. “No matter your age, today we are all young at heart.” The Dibble Queen placed her hand over her chest. The queen must have been one of the mermaids once, shivering with excitement as some other queen spoke the same rules in another beautiful dress.
“Dibblers, on your marks.” Pirate hats and mermaid tails shook to the ground until it was a mess of sequins, felt, and feathers. Nick took his shoes off.
“What are you doing?” Madeline stared at her brother.
“I’m going in.” Nick’s voice was muffled as he pulled his shirt over his head.
Madeline covered her mouth and laughed. “You’re not serious.”
Children lined the water’s edge.
“I’m getting a damn stick.” Nick smirked, his eyes fixed on the water.
“He’ll get it.” Andre shook his head. “Look at him. He already decided.”
“Three!” the Dibble Queen yelled from her place on the dock. Nick was in his underwear. Esme kicked off her sandals. She giggled, and Nick reached his hand toward Esme’s. Without thinking, Esme linked her hand through Lily’s.
“Oh, for God’s sake.” Madeline undid the straps on her sandals. “There’s fecal coliform in there.”
“There’s what?” Cerise asked.
“Shit.” Madeline frowned. “Human shit.”
“What about your clothes?” Cerise held Nick’s clothes over her arm and reached for Madeline’s.
“It’s this or nothing.” Nick snorted.
“Two and a half!”
Madeline’s hand found Nick’s. They were a chain of four again.
They ran for the bay. Grass clung to their heels as Nick splashed into the water and swam for the dock. Madeline and Esme waited for Lily to take off her shoes and roll the bottoms of her jeans. Then they waded through the shallow spots, catching stones and water plants with their feet. The sun made red streaks in Lily’s hair. Lily tipped her face toward the sun and closed her eyes. It was a private moment, a wished-for, imagined dream.
But instead of racing for sticks, Nick dove for the bottom. Air bubbles raced to the surface. For just a moment, Esme forgot the years that separated him from the other swimmers. She wished briefly for that feeling of kicking toward the surface, watching light bend through the water in angular shards, lungs filling with air as she spit salt water from her mouth, a long-ago kid feeling.
“Dibble!” Nick screamed, grabbing a floating stick.
“You didn’t touch the dock!” the queen shouted back. Parents laughed, and just as the others broke the surface, treading water beneath them, holding sticks high above their heads, Esme saw her father smile. “Maybe next year!” The queen blew Nick a kiss.
Lily sat at the water’s edge. Four-year-old Lily would have raced as fast as any of the other kids, laughing and glowing in the ripples of light shining from the water, but now she toyed with blades of grass. The sky was full of wispy clouds. Esme watched the boundary between the water and the sky where Lily was too. It was hard to tell if Lily liked her new family, the world she’d stumbled out of and into again.