Fireworks Over Toccoa (5 page)

Lily drove her 1937 Packard down Doyle Street, right through the center of town. Her mother preferred that she drive Paul’s company car, the Cadillac, especially for these kinds of outings. Letting such a fine automobile sit in a garage was un-American, Honey would assert. But Lily felt awkward in the massive Caddy, like she was wearing someone else’s shoes. And it attracted too much attention when she drove it into town. That was, of course, one of the primary characteristics Honey admired about it. Still, even in her Packard, folks knew when Lily Davis was coming into town.

Many people out on the sidewalks looked up and waved when they saw the Packard cruising down Doyle. Lily found her smile, part of what she referred to as her “downtown face,” and waved back. Coming to Doyle Street, the heart of Toccoa, always made Lily feel like one of the cheery mannequins in the display window of the Belk-Gallant department store, in front of where she was parking, everyone walking by, peering, assessing. She turned off the Packard and got out, taking in all the decorations that were beginning to go up for the 4th of July homecoming celebration.

This main street in downtown Toccoa looked like many other main streets in many small towns throughout the South. It was lined with two-and three-story brick buildings, storefronts at street level, apartments above. This was the economic center of all Stephens County.

When the Union soldiers retreated, leaving burned fields, mills, and cotton gins, the area was desolate. For several decades at the beginning of the century, King Cotton and “corn likker” provided primary sources of revenue for those who remained, mainly farmers and their families who lived off the land. In the 1930s, as good federally sponsored roads were built and modern industries grew, cotton and moonshine were generally, though not entirely, replaced by a wide variety of businesses in Toccoa, and more and more people started moving out of the countryside and into town.

It was particularly hot today, the midsummer heat rising off the asphalt on Doyle in hazy waves. Lily walked down the sidewalk, by the First National Bank of Toccoa, where her father was an adviser. She walked by the Barber Shoppe, where men played checkers and swapped information about the latest upgrades and modifications being made on their stock cars and made clandestine plans to race them on winding Appalachian roads. A few sipped small glasses of orange juice and “white lightning,” the local shine from Gumlog, a storied hamlet a few miles away whose residents “drank their corn.” Lily waved to a group of 4-H girls in uniform selling paper cups of sweet tea and mason jars of sourwood honey in front of Sosebee’s Dixie Café. She walked by
The Toccoa Register
, Green’s Department Store, and Troup’s Photo Service, which advertised in national farm magazines, bringing film from all around the country to be developed in Toccoa.

Just up the block, Lily saw a large group of townspeople tending to a massive vegetable field that had been cut into the lawn in front of the court house, just one of many Victory Gardens lining plots of city parks, backyards, and vacant lots throughout the city, where neighbors worked together to free up more food for the boys overseas and help feed their own community. The big forty-eight-star flag flapped high above the court house, its dome capped with locally mined Dahlonega gold leaf. The “rebel” Confederate flag, though not the legally sanctioned state flag, flew from the post in front of the courthouse, just above the community’s sprawling Victory Garden.

There was a warmth to this town that was impossible not to feel on Doyle Street. However, along with the charms of Toccoa came a set of rules. Everyone knew them, and like them or not, they defined the world. “Our code of living” was how Lily heard people discuss them, particularly when something or someone threatened to break that code.

Passing her by were a gaggle of her mother’s country club friends, cooling themselves with paper fans as they made their way down the sidewalk, several sipping sweet tea. With their languorous drawled greetings, they looked her up and down, taking in her hair and what she was wearing and where she was going, examining her like fingers running over Braille. More than accustomed to this sort of groping, she just kept her pleasant downtown face in place, submitted to the interaction, and then continued on her way.

Lily walked by a black man in uniform, an Army sergeant, a duffel bag beside him, turning the rusty handle on a drinking fountain, the
COLORED
sign hanging on a nail above slightly askew. He turned the handle as far as it would go, but nothing came out. The man was obviously passing though town and Lily wanted to tell him that as far as she could remember that fountain had never worked, but she did not. Lily saw him looking at the big fountain next to it, which was clearly working, the
WHITES
sign hanging over it, frosty water dribbling out of the head and puddling on the sidewalk. He nodded at Lily, an acknowledgment of her presence. Though he did not smile, it was, strangely, the deepest and most unfeigned greeting she had received on Doyle Street. She nodded back and, after a moment, he moved on.

As Lily pushed open the well-worn oak and screen door and entered Keener’s, a small brass bell mounted above rang brightly.

“Lily! So nice to see you. How’s your mother?”

“She’s fine, Mrs. Keener. Thank you for asking,” Lily responded to the owner of Keener’s Produce & Market without any forethought, and began shopping.

The small plank-floored general store on the corner of Doyle and Pond Streets seemed to be overflowing with goods, compared to just a few months ago when rationing was at its peak and the shelves were nearly empty save for a few paltry items. Along with the usual boxes of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese dinners and tins of SPAM, a prime staple because it wasn’t rationed as a meat, today there were also baskets of just-picked seasonal vegetables; half-peck bags of pecans; smartly arranged rows of canned beans, stewing tomatoes, and chicken soups; sacks of flour and salt; even a little sugar. Treasures from a world returning. Cardboard tubes of M&M’s, packs of Lucky Strikes, and quarts of hand-cranked fresh peach ice cream were also in stock behind the counter.

Many other customers happily shopped as well, but it was Lily who got the most attention from the proprietor. During the early 1930s, when many people were struggling to get back on their feet, Lily’s father had loaned Mr. Keener fifteen thousand dollars so he could keep the market open. No collateral, just Mr. Keener’s word that he would pay it back, which he did. Ever since, the Keeners, like many folks in Toccoa, felt a deep sense of indebtedness to the Davises, which went far beyond an initial loan. Lily was often the recipient of their gratitude.

“Now you be sure to tell your mother I was asking about her,” said Mrs. Keener.

“Of course I will.”

Lily had this kind of conversation—women of the town asking about her mother—so frequently that her responses came as involuntarily as breathing. Ever since she could remember, people asked her, first and foremost, about her parents, her mother in particular. On more than one occasion Lily came very close to screaming out at a church or a bus stop or a hardware store:
My mother?! My mother?! My mother is unyielding and demanding and nothing I do ever seems to please her!
That
is how she is!

“Good afternoon, Lily,” said Evelyn Tabor, whose husband owned Tabor Motor Company and who was shopping with her eight-year-old, Mary.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Tabor.”

“Does your mother have a big party planned at Holly Hills for Paul’s homecoming?”

Lily felt Evelyn Tabor looking her over with the same kind of shameless scrutiny that one uses to examine a melon. Lily just smiled, gracefully tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear.

“You know my mother, she’d never miss an opportunity for a party.”

Lily made her way through the aisles of the small market, smiling a greeting to several others and placing a few items in her basket: summer squash, okra, a small slab of sweet butter, a box of saltine crackers—
oh, how she loved warm buttered saltines!
—a quart of ice cream, and a pack of teaberry gum. Heading for the register, Lily looked in her basket and could hear her mother’s criticism about her whimsical purchases. Visibly rolling her eyes a bit, she headed for the register.

Behind the counter, a young boy with dark hair whom Lily had never seen before unpacked onions from a wooden crate.

“Hello,” she said with a sweet and genuine smile. “What’s your name?”

He just looked at her for a long moment and then returned to his task.

“Lily,” Mrs. Keener called Lily over to the register.

“For the homecoming,” Mrs. Keener said conspiratorially as she produced a bottle of fine red wine.

“Mrs. Keener, that is too generous, I can’t—”

“I insist.”

Mrs. Keener popped open a couple of brown paper “S.O.S.” sacks, the smart “self-opening sacks” that Keener’s had been giving its customers for nearly a decade now. She slipped the bottle into one of the sacks along with Lily’s groceries.

This was an extravagant gift and Lily continued to resist, but her expressions were nominal, polite at best. She was accustomed to people giving her things like this. Her mother taught her long ago that the act of accepting these kinds of things required its own kind of graciousness, even if she knew full well that people were simply trying to curry favor with her family. This was how things were in Toccoa, Georgia. And as much as they often drove Lily to silent, desperate madness, she also understood that they gave her, and everyone for that matter, a sense of place, a sense of belonging. She was Lily Davis Woodward, daughter of Honey and Walter Davis, wife of Paul Woodward. She had a place in the world, and her children would, too.

“Thank you, Mrs. Keener. You are so kind. I will be sure to pass on your regards to my mother.”

Mrs. Keener smiled, quite pleased with that response, and moved on to help another customer.

The boy with the dark hair just looked at Lily, blinking, pondering, as if he knew something that she did not. After a moment, she turned away from him and started to leave the store, mindlessly holding grocery bags in her arms.

Lily saw something outside, stopped, and turned. “Do you have any Coca-Cola, Mrs. Keener?”

“Well, not officially in stock. But for you, Lily, I think we can find a Co-Cola.”

Mrs. Keener grinned over her big teeth, yellow as stable straw, reached below the counter, and produced a soft drink bottle, icy and dripping, popped off the metal cap, and handed the Coke to Lily. She could smell the sweet cassia and caramel in the fizzing carbonation.

“Thanks.”

Coke and sacks in hand, Lily walked out, the brass bell ringing over her.

On the sidewalk, Lily approached the sergeant she’d seen at the water fountain. He sat quietly on a bench under the spotty shade of an elm, uniform drenched through with sweat, duffel bag at his feet.

“Good afternoon, Sergeant,” said Lily.

“Ma’am.”

“I wonder if you might help me carry these heavy bags to my car over there.”

He stood up immediately. “Would be my pleasure.”

“I don’t have much to offer you, though,” Lily said. “Except this Coke.”

“That is not necessary.”

“I insist.”

He considered her for a moment. “Well, thank you.”

He accepted the soft drink, took a big, deep swallow, and then took her bags. Immediately feeling how light they were, he knew that she did not need help carrying them. And she could see that he knew this. They exchanged a smile of respect and understanding.

“It’s a lovely day, don’t you think?” said Lily.

“Yes, I do. A lovely day,” the sergeant replied.

They walked together, side by side, across Doyle Street toward Lily’s car. Many people they passed smiled politely.

Mrs. Keener watched through the window of her store as her Coke was given away. A Davis or not, Mrs. Keener thought, there was something going on with Lily that went much further than the expression she carried on her face. Yes, Lily Davis Woodward was a much more complicated girl than most folks knew. And if she wasn’t careful, one day that was going to get her into trouble.

Heading north, Lily drove the Packard down Currahee Street to the east of town until it became Highway 123. After a few miles, she pulled off onto Owl Swamp Road, a rural two-lane that wound through pine forest north of town. It was late afternoon but still wickedly hot, and even with the windows fully rolled down, Lily perspired profusely. But she didn’t care. She loved the forest around her, verdant and hushed, the warm, wet breeze carelessly whipping her hair. Lily unfastened the top buttons of her nice summer dress, letting the wind meet her damp skin.

Nearly halfway back to her house, as she was crossing Prather Bridge, another jarring
boom
shocked her from her heat-induced reverie—but this one was much louder than the one she’d heard earlier with Honey. It shook the car.

Lily pulled over to the side of the road and saw a silver trail of light fly up into the sky. Mesmerized, she opened the door, leaving the engine running, got out of the car, and walked toward the climbing sparkling light. It seemed to be very close, just over her head. She could hear it whistling as it climbed above the grassy field into which she was walking.

Then,
boom-boom
, even louder again, and the trail exploded into thousands of beads of light, each one shooting out on its own dazzling trajectory, filling the entire blue and white canvas over the meadow with shimmering silver tinsel. Lily just stood in the field, looking straight up, slowly, reflexively, turning, as the firework continued expanding, engraving the sky.

Lily had never seen anything like this. It was beautiful and powerful and magical. She was so fascinated, so taken by what she saw, that she didn’t hear the voice that was calling out to her: “
Look out! Get away from there!
”

When she finally heard the voice, registered the alarm it was trying to impart, and looked around to see from where it was coming and what exactly it meant, suddenly a young man in boots, jeans, and a dirty white T-shirt tackled her, pulled her to the ground, and lay on top of her, forcefully covering her with his entire body.

Before Lily could even find a breath to scream, she saw the pieces of smoking debris from the firework landing all around them. Some of the pieces missed them by inches.

Realizing what was happening, she lay still. His cheek pressed to hers, his hands cupped around her face, his chest on her back, his hips on hers, he lay still.

The last of the debris fell. But Lily and the man continued to lie there, frozen, for a long moment. Until, slowly, gingerly, he rolled off her.

“Didn’t anyone ever teach you not to stand under fireworks?”

Lily lifted her face off the ground and took in Jake Russo. Though he was clearly just a few years older than her, he had a quiet, knowing sense about him that was much worldlier than usual in someone his age. His eyes were dark and mature. His tousled hair and three-day beard were ink black. While visibly lean, his body felt muscular, not simply taut, like a young man’s, but hard, presumably from use.

He reached out a hand to her. She took it and he helped her up, never taking his eyes off her.
What is a beautiful girl like this doing in the middle of a field in the middle of Georgia?
he wondered.

“I feel like an idiot,” she said.

“You’ve got a pebble stuck to your chin.”

Lily swatted at her face.

“I suppose I should say ‘thank you.’”

“I suppose I should say ‘don’t worry about it.’”

Jake reached out to her and removed a tiny stone that was pressed to her face. Lily considered him as he did this. He smelled of sweat and earth and black powder. And now she did, too. It was animal. Visceral. Her father smelled this way when he returned from extended camping trips in the Appalachians when she was a child.

Trying to get her bearings, Lily looked around, tossing some stray strands of hair from her face. As she looked up, light refracted in the tawny trails still lingering, like viscous nectar from a great tupelo comb hewn and oozing over the clouds.

Not too far from where they were standing, Lily saw the freight truck and several rows of buried mortars in the field.

“That your truck over there?”

“That’s mine.”

“So you must be the pyrotechnics man.”

“That would be me.”

There was a moment of silence. Jake just looked at her, and she let him. She felt him studying her, considering her. This sort of thing would usually compel her to make some sweet small talk about the weather or an upcoming party and gracefully move the moment along, but she didn’t. She just let this be, surprised by how natural it felt.

“What are you doing out here?” he finally said.

“I was just driving by and I saw the firework, your firework, and I thought it was amazing, and I wanted to watch it.” Without meaning to, Lily let words just fall out of her. She felt so uncharacteristically clumsy and rationalized that she must be a little dizzy from being tackled.

Without realizing it, Jake smiled, in a way he hadn’t for a long time. There was something about her, beautiful, yes, but also something…confident, unapologetic eyes, like blue sapphires, like cobalt, both profound and elemental, a proper dress improperly buttoned, she was refined but bold…so many things, actually, that made her so hard to stop looking at.

Feeling the sun on his neck, beads of perspiration rolling down his cheek, Jake just stood there in the stillness and the heat, legs firmly astride, one knee slightly bent, arms down, palms a little forward as if ready to receive something, maintaining his controlled breathing and his constant gaze at her, afraid that if he broke it and looked away, or even just moved from his stance, she’d see how nervous her beauty and being this near her was actually making him. Finally, he wiped his forehead with the back of his wrist.

“You’re bleeding,” he said, squinting and pointing to her scraped knee.

“Oh,” whispered Lily, embarrassed that she hadn’t even noticed how much it really hurt until just now.

“That has to be cleaned.” He hooked a finger into a belt loop on his jeans and again just watched her.

“Well, I’m just all out of sorts this afternoon.” She tried to wipe some dirt off the wound but only made things worse. “Ow!” This did have to be cleaned.

“I have some antiseptic in the truck. Why don’t you hobble on over to it,” he said, noticing her car off on the side of the road. “I’ll turn off your engine and be right there.”

“You’re too kind. But I feel like I’ve already caused you enough trouble.”

“No trouble.”

Lily looked at him for a moment and, without further reflection, decided to accept help from this stranger. “Thank you. I’m Lily. Lily Davis Woodward.”

“Jake Russo.”

“Pleased to meet you, Jake Russo.”

Jake nodded and began to head for Lily’s car. Then he stopped.

“By the way, what you said about fireworks, I think they’re amazing, too.”

Having no idea how much that comment made her like him, Jake quickly marched off, the late afternoon sun before him bronzing everything it touched.