Malinda Lo

and tearing the article out beneath the table as quietly as possible. She knew she shouldn’t, but she had needed to have the picture in a way she didn’t consciously understand.

She couldn’t put into words why she had gathered these photos together, but she could feel it in her bones: a hot and restless urge to look—and, by looking, to know.

The first time she’d been forced to endure an air-raid drill had been in first grade; she still remembered because it had frightened her so badly. Their teacher had told them they had to practice hiding in case the Japanese attacked, and she remembered trembling beneath her desk at Commodore Stockton while several of her classmates cried for their mothers. She’d had nightmares afterward, but she didn’t remember the details, only her mother waking her up in the middle of the night and saying, You’re dreaming, you’re dreaming. The drills continued year after year, although the enemy who might attack them changed. Japan was vanquished but Korea and China might invade, and now it was the Soviets who could drop atomic bombs. She had secretly welcomed their potential Soviet invaders, because at least she’d never be mistaken for a Russian.

“Is she new this year?”

“Oh no. We’ve been in school together forever but never really been friends until now.” She added, “Maybe because this year we’re the last two girls left in math. It’s us and all the boys.”

“I’m glad you have an ally. I was the only girl in most of my college math classes. You’ll have to get used to it if you’re going to major in math or engineering, but I know you won’t have any trouble.”

Her aunt was always supportive like this, always confident in Lily’s abilities and dreams, and now she knew about Kath—her ally,
what a funny way to think of her—and Lily realized how unusual Aunt Judy was. Shirley thought Lily’s dreams were ridiculous; Kath didn’t tell her parents what she wanted to do because they would think she was crazy.

“Just between you and me, I think women are better than men at math,” Aunt Judy added slyly. “Don’t tell your uncle Francis.”

It seemed like such a grown-up joke to make. Lily swelled with pride at having been allowed to hear it. “I’m sure he already knows,” she said boldly.

Aunt Judy chuckled. “You’re probably right. Oh, I’d love to talk more but we’ll have to do it later. Go and get Eddie, will you?”

“Would they really be able to jump so high on the moon?” Lily asked.

“Well, the gravity is much lighter there,” Judy said. “I’m sure I
could calculate how high a man could jump.” Judy considered the math and laughed. “Oh, it would be funny to see!”

“They could hop on the moon,” Francis said. “Like a giant bunny rabbit.” He reached the sidewalk and began to hop down it awkwardly, flapping his arms as if he were a seagull.

Judy laughed. Francis was so childlike sometimes; she thought it was his Americanness coming out. “That’s not how it would look!” Judy chided him. “It would be much more graceful.”

“Like what?” he challenged her. “Show me.”

Judy saw several bystanders surreptitiously watching them. “Oh, Francis, I can’t—”

“Why not?” he called. “Come on, there’s plenty of room.”

Judy shook her head, but she slipped her arm out of Lily’s and handed her purse to her niece. “Hold this,” she said. Then, before she could second-guess herself, she elevated her arms as if she were a ballet dancer and lightly leaped across the sidewalk. “Very little gravity,” she called over her shoulder. “Light as a feather!”

Judy saw Lily break into laughter. She saw Francis’s face, surprised and overjoyed all at once. He leaped after her, and when he caught up, he enfolded her in his arms. She let out a giggle as she pretended to push him away, but after a second she relented and allowed him to hold her.

Francis was bold, and he kissed her gently on the lips. “My moon lady,” he said under his breath.

In China, she would be embarrassed to be kissed by her husband in public, but this was America. Things were different here.

“I heard that the Five Twenty-Nine Club might be starting up a Saturday night show with a new male impersonator,” Sally said. “Have you ever been there?”

“I heard it’s all hookers and dykes, and you can get bennies there under the table,” Jean said with a grin.

The words shocked Lily, but Jean said them as casually as one might say girl or boy or aspirin. She fought the urge to look over her shoulder.

A couple of boys in the row ahead of Lily whistled and hooted, and when a teacher came down the aisle to shush them, Lily dropped her gaze to her knees as if she had been admonished herself. There was a difference between those boys’ whistles and what she had been thinking, but she wasn’t sure why or how. She
only knew she felt caught, and her face flushed. She was glad the auditorium was dark.

She missed Kath. She missed having Kath to talk to, yes, but she also missed having Kath listen to her. Rockets to the moon didn’t seem so far-fetched when Kath listened to her. She made previously unimaginable things seem possible.

Walking home from Union Square later that day, Lily wondered if she’d run into Paula again—or maybe Claire, or even Sal. She realized, with a jolt, that the city must be peppered with women who frequented the Telegraph or similar clubs; women who watched performers like Tommy Andrews, made friends with each other, made girlfriends of each other. At each intersection she cast skittish glances at the women waiting for the light to change, wondering if she was one of them too, or her, or her.

“I think you’d like one.”

Kath seemed taken aback. “A suit?” She shook her head. “Where would I wear it?”

“Oh, you’d find a place,” Rhonda said, shooting an appraising kind of glance at Kath. “I can see it.”

Kath looked uncomfortable. “Nah. It’s not my style.”

“Not yet.” Rhonda sounded amused. “I can see them coming a mile away, those baby butches.” Her voice was honeyed, teasing.

Kath was holding another half-smoked cigarette in her hand, and now she raised it to her mouth and took a shallow puff on it, the smoke emerging in a cloud rather than a stream. She shook her head, but there was a hint of a smile in her eyes, and Lily realized she was trying to hide the fact that she was pleased. Rhonda had apparently paid Kath a compliment, and Lily felt an electric clutch in her belly as she recognized it, butch like a blue ribbon awarded at the county fair, baby like a promise.