A Lily in the Light(86)
“Give it a go.” Josie stepped back. Lily tugged. Diamond stayed put.
“Keep trying,” Josie called.
Lily switched hands and made a clicking sound. Diamond followed Lily’s lead until she realized there was nothing to eat in Lily’s closed fist.
Just walk, Esme prayed. That was all this horse had to do to make everyone clap and cheer for Lily, but she wouldn’t do it. Lily dropped the reins and turned toward the exit. Andre stepped forward, but Josie held up one hand.
“Lily, why not try again?”
“I don’t care if it walks.” She scooped a handful of dirt and threw it at the ground. It scattered in the breeze.
“I can see that you’re frustrated,” Josie said. “Why not ask for help?” She walked toward Nick and placed a sugar cube in his hand. “Nick has something that will help now.”
Lily stared toward the cabins, where the shades were drawn to keep the heat out. The air conditioners hummed in the distance.
“Let’s try one more time, Lily, but this time, Nick will help.”
“I’ll help too.” She was the old Cerise again, determined to move that horse for Lily’s sake, but Josie stopped her with a smile.
“Lily, would you mind?”
Lily stared at the uneven dirt in the arena and shook her head.
“OK, let’s try again. Tell them where to stand and what to do.”
Lily pointed to the x Josie had drawn. Nick took his place.
“And what should Cerise do?”
Lily sat down in the dirt. The hat slipped to one side, but Lily let it fall. Maybe this was too much. There were too many new choices. It was hot as hell, and Esme’s mouth was parched. Water wouldn’t even help. She needed to be away from it, in a cool room, alone, where she could close her eyes and recharge. If that was how she felt, how much more overwhelmed was Lily? She handed Lily a water bottle, but Lily only held it between her hands.
“Just hold the horse,” Lily mumbled, pushing her hat into place.
The brochure said families would try new experiences in the gentle presence of a horse, but it did not mention the unbearable heat or that the gentle presence of a horse might not want to budge. How would moving a horse make a difference when Lily moved into Madeline and Esme’s old bedroom, in a new bed with blank walls, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of her parents getting dressed in the morning or making coffee when they would have stayed strangers if the police had not found her in time? How would these things work when Lily had to eat at the dinner table or go to school or make friends? Was this something she wanted? The girl under the straw hat was a blank unknown, even after a week at this place.
You weren’t the Waltz Girl overnight, Esme reminded herself. If she’d known at her first ballet class how long it would take, she probably would have quit. The unknown had saved her then. The comparison should’ve been comforting, but it was unsettling.
Cerise and Nick waited for instructions on opposite ends of the sandy line, holding their piece of Lily’s puzzle, but Cerise was focused on Nick. He looked small in the middle of the corral, surrounded by sand and an endless blue sky, his olive skin pale in comparison to how bright the sun was overhead. Sweat dotted his upper lip, but hours of training, of running and lifting weights and keeping odd hours, had left Nick the most collected in this odd environment. He’d been so quiet on the plane ride or at dinner when the chef had given him things to chop or pick from the garden, silently going about whatever had been asked of him. Now, standing at the end of a line drawn in dirt with a sugar cube outstretched in his hand, it felt like an apology for something he’d never done.
Some of the old hardness fell away from Cerise. She stepped forward, and the horse followed in her footsteps as Cerise walked toward her only son. She wrapped her arms around Nick’s shoulders, lifting onto her tiptoes to reach him. He rested his head on top of hers, and Esme held back a sob. She couldn’t hear what they were saying, but the emotion of it shivered through her.
“You’re going to have obstacles,” Josie said to Lily. “And that’s OK. It’s OK to ask for help.”
Esme leaned against the fence near her father, watching her brother and mother sway in the dusty breeze. Madeline offered Lily a hand and helped her up from the ground. Together they walked Diamond back to the stalls, one on either side.
“I never doubted him,” Andre said quietly.
“It was easy to,” Esme whispered.
“Yeah, well . . .” Andre sighed. “He didn’t make it easy. Even she . . .” Andre looked away. Esme found her father’s hand, calloused from so much time in his garden. Madeline and Lily walked back from the stables without Diamond, but something small and orange squirmed in Lily’s arms, and for a quick second, Esme thought of her fish named Marley.
“Is this going to work, Dad? Any of this? It just feels . . .” Her voice trailed off. The sun was hot on her face and shoulders.
“It has to,” he said finally. Esme nodded. He was right. There was no other option.
“She found it,” Madeline explained, “under a pile of blankets in a stall, and I think she’d very much like to keep it.”
The kitten purred against Lily’s chest. It closed its eyes as she rubbed her pointer finger over its forehead. Cerise looked to Andre, her face still red and bleary, and it took a minute for the smile to break between them, a resigned laugh that said if after all this, Lily wanted a cat, of course the answer was yes.