They saw their friend Mary Kwok coming up the street then and dropped the topic, but later that night as Lily climbed into bed, she realized Shirley had succeeded in distracting her from her original subject: Shirley’s interest in Calvin. It was strange that Shirley didn’t want to talk about it, but the whole day had been somewhat unusual. Spending it with two dozen strangers, for one thing. Lily and Shirley had had the same group of friends for as long as Lily could remember. Although there were always new immigrants from China showing up at school, they were relegated to Americanization classes and didn’t interact much with the American-born Chinese kids. And this was the first time Lily had spent so much time with college students. She couldn’t quite believe that she’d be one of them in less than a year. Their lives seemed so different from hers, both freer and more weighted with responsibilities. Lily also noticed that Shirley had inserted herself deliberately into the college students’ conversations in addition to their volleyball game. She had been charming, too, in a way that she normally wasn’t. She’d kept a lid on her bossier tendencies and instead played the part of modest, cheerful guest.
All of that had gone out the window as soon as they left Calvin and Will on Stockton Street, of course. You can be so oblivious sometimes, she had said. It had irritated Lily that afternoon, and now the feeling flared into frustration at the way Shirley saw her—or didn’t see her.
The sheets felt hot and scratchy tonight, and she threw them off, kicking her legs free. She had opened the little window in her room, but the air was still and didn’t circulate. She heard the sounds of the city floating through the window: car engines chugging up and down hills, the distant sound of someone laughing. She punched her pillow and flipped it over to the cool side, and wondered if what Shirley had said about Will was true.
She called up Will’s face in her mind’s eye, but she didn’t feel anything special for him. She tried to imagine what it would be like to kiss him, but the idea felt distinctly embarrassing and oddly repugnant. He was just Will. Ordinary, same old Will from Commodore Stockton, perfectly nice, who used to want to be a basketball player but now wanted to be a lawyer. She began to imagine Will throwing the basketball through the hoop in the Cameron House yard.
One, two, three, four.
Finally, she was sleepy.
7
On Monday at school, Shirley seemed more distracted than usual, as if she were constantly being dragged back to prosaic reality from some much more interesting place in her imagination.
On Tuesday, when Lily finally commented on it, Shirley said, “Don’t be silly. I’m just busy. The fall dance is coming up soon and my dance committee has so much work to do. I wish you’d joined it. We could really use you.”
“I have a lot of math homework this semester,” Lily replied.
“Typical,” Shirley said, but she sounded more amused than upset.
On Wednesday, Lily stayed late after school to use the library. She wanted to look up the V-2 rocket, which Arthur C. Clarke mentioned in The Exploration of Space. As she was leaving, she ran into Will by the athletic trophy cases.
“I’m surprised you’re still here,” Lily said to him. Most of the after-school rush was over by now and the hallway was largely empty.
“I had science club, but I’m glad I saw you,” he said. “I wanted to talk to you.”
“About what?”
He looked nervous then, and he shifted the strap of his book bag on his shoulder. “Well, you know the fall dance that Shirley’s working on . . .”
When he trailed off and looked past her shoulder rather than directly at her, she grew puzzled. “Yes, why? Did she send you to convince me to join her committee?”
“No, I . . .” He stepped into the shadow of the trophy case and reached for her elbow, drawing her with him. “Lily,” he said hesitantly.
She knew, in that instant, that he was going to ask her to the dance, and even before he spoke the words, a horrified heat crept up her neck.
“Lily,” he said again, “I was wondering if you would like to come with me to the dance. As my date.” And then, to make matters worse, he looked her in the eye, and she saw a startlingly poignant hope in them.
“Oh,” she said, and then words failed her. She had to look away. Over his shoulder she saw the baseball trophies lined up all in a row, each miniature bronze boy holding a bat raised and ready to strike a ball that would never come. Out of the corner of her eye she saw movement through the doorway to a classroom: the suggestion of boys’ lanky limbs folding into chairs. It was Mr. Wright’s room, she realized; he was the teacher who led the science club.
“Lily?” Will said again.
She had to answer him. A voice inside her mind that sounded an awful lot like Shirley asked, what harm will it do to go with him? But she couldn’t bring herself to say yes. The word was stuck in her throat like a tiny fish bone. It scratched.
“I’m not allowed to—” she began, but he interrupted.
“There’ll be a group of us. Flora and Hanson, and some others, I’m not sure who yet. We’re going to do a special pre-dance dinner at Cameron House.”
“A group?” She clung to this. If it was a group, then it wouldn’t be a real date.
“Yes, but it’ll be all couples. So, I’m hoping you’ll go as my date.”
Her stomach churned. He was too close to her, looking eagerly down at her face, and she had to work so hard to keep her expression neutral. She took a step back. “Please excuse me for—for a minute. I have to—I need to go to the girls’ room. I’m sorry.”
She turned and walked away from him, trying not to run.
“Are you all right?” he called.
“I’m sorry,” she called back, and sped up. Her book bag bounced painfully against her hip. The girls’ restroom was down the hall and around the corner, and it had never seemed so far away before. When she finally arrived, she rushed inside, plunging into a stall and leaning her forehead against the closed door. The wood was cool against her flushed skin. Her pulse throbbed in her temple, and she rubbed at it to ease the pressure.
The door to the bathroom opened, and someone entered the stall next to hers. She froze. She saw the edge of the girl’s brown-and-white saddle shoes beneath the wall. She realized that meant the girl could probably see her feet too, and given where she was standing, she obviously wasn’t using the toilet. Lily hung her book bag on the hook behind the door and sat tensely on the edge of the toilet seat, deciding to wait until the other girl was finished. It seemed to take forever, but finally the other toilet flushed. The door of the other stall banged open, and the girl went to wash her hands.
At that moment, Lily’s book bag slipped off the hook. She saw it all in a split second that seemed to last much longer. The hook wasn’t properly secured to the door. The bag’s strap had only been partially looped around the hook, and the weight of the books had dragged it to the tip. And then it slid right off. As the bag smashed against the black-and-white tiles, her math notebook tumbled out, followed by The Exploration of Space. Three pieces of paper fluttered free, and she glimpsed the photo of Tommy Andrews just before it floated out of sight beyond the stall door.