Free Tin Lily by Joann Swanson Page A

smiling down at me.
    “You don’t like people holding doors for you?” he says. That’s when I realize he’s tried to get out in front of me.
    “I can open doors,” I say. I prove it with the next set of heavy glass. I hold it for him.
    He gets an even bigger smile going. “You ever consider an illustrious career in the growing field of door management?” His eyes are almost translucent in the bright afternoon. There are no more gray clouds dimming everything. It’s all sunshine and heat and summer blue again, which for sure feels better than the cold steel of the elevator doors.
    “I guess that wouldn’t be so bad,” I say.
    He laughs. “Lily Berkenshire, Door Manager. It has a ring.”
    I glance at this boy, this smiling, happy boy, and see something I didn’t notice before. Something familiar. “I’ve been called worse.”
    Nick laughs because he thinks it’s a joke. “Why’d you smell your sweater when Tiffany looked at you?”
    “I used to live next to a dog food factory.”
    Nick’s face is one big question.
    “The smell got into my clothes, into everything.”
    “Where was that?”
    “Salt Lake City.”
    “You live in Utah?”
    “No. Not anymore.”
    “Then why would you still smell like dog food?”
    I shrug. “She gave me a funny look. I thought she might have smelled it.”
    “Oh.” He grins. “You want to know why she made that face? And why she ignored you?”
    “Okay.” We’ve walked over to the big fountains out in front of the building, so Nick has to talk a little louder because the water’s shooting up, splashing back down. It’s reflected in the windows, all that glass alive with dancing water. Not splintered glass, not glass hoping for wholeness. Whole on its own.
    “It bothers Tiffany when she meets someone prettier than her.”
    I look at Nick and feel my head tip to the side. I try to see if he’s making fun of me, but there’s only his smile. And now his easy laugh.
    “You don’t believe me?”
    I see my pasty face distorted in the elevator doors again. I don’t believe him, but I don’t say so. Nick Anders, happiness on his face for the world to see—he’s a good tether. Like Cheetah. I decide I don’t want to say he’s wrong in case he makes up his mind to go away.
    Nick watches me for a little while. I watch him for a little while. “So you live in the city now?” he says.
    “With my aunt. Queen Anne?”
    “Your Aunt’s Queen Anne?” He bows and his hair spills onto his forehead. When he stands he combs through it, making it stand on end again. “I had no idea I was in the presence of royalty.”
    I don’t get Nick’s joke at first, but then I do and give him a look that lets him know it was pretty lame.
    He just laughs again. “Queen Anne’s a nice area,” he says, then gives me the once over. “You don’t dress like most people up there.”
    “My mom made me this sweater,” I say because I’m not sure what he means.
    “It’s a nice sweater. Where’s your mom?”
    I start coughing, double over, try not to choke to death in front of the dancing water. My breath is all caught up in my lungs. My focus is too big. I narrow it, narrow it. Finish The Stand . I’ll be left an empty husk, a breathless nothing if I can’t narrow it. I pluck a loose thread from my sweater. Threads are narrow enough. My thread: finish The Stand.
    “You okay?” Nick asks. He’s worried and busy patting the air above my back as I bend away from him.
    “I’m okay,” I say. “I need to get to my aunt’s.”
    I focus on walking to the curb. First, I make my feet move three steps. Then I make them move three more. Nick interrupts.
    “Are you okay, Lily?” he asks again, like I lied the first time.
    I did.
    “I am not okay,” I say because I’m not. “I am not okay and I don’t want to talk about my mom.”
    “Of course. I’m sorry.” Nick watches me closely. He’s like Margie when she’s deciding if she should push. Finally he puffs a big breath