Page 31 of Dream On, Ramona Riley

Ramona shook her head, but she couldn’t stop smiling. She liked singing and could carry a tune, but nothing close to a future Broadway star. Still, Lolli’s excitement was contagious, infecting her bones and blood and heart, and she loved it. She never wanted a remedy for this.

“What should I sing?”

“Keep singing what you were. That funny song.”

Lolli spread their arms out, fingers still laced, then held them like that, staring at Ramona with those eyes until she started singing.

Ramona laughed again, her face ablaze, but she cleared her throat and sang the classic Louis Armstrong tune.

Hello, Dolly.

Well, hello, Dolly.

It’s so nice to have you back where you belong.

As Ramona sang, Lolli lit up. She grinned and danced, as though she were Dolly herself, swinging Ramona around in a circle on the sand as she moved, always holding on to at least one of her hands. When Ramona came around toYou’re still glowin’, you’re still crowin’, Lolli put one hand behind her head, prancing and really hamming it up to the point that Ramona could barely sing anymore she was laughing so hard.

“I think you really are Dolly,” Ramona said.

“I think I might be,” Lolli said, then grinned before slowing down to look at Ramona. “And who are you?”

“I’m Cherry,” Ramona said, plucking at her shirt with her free hand.

“Who are you really, though?”

Ramona blinked, a myriad of words spilling into her brain.

Sister. Friend. Daughter. Artist.

Motherless.

Queer…?

She’d heard the word before, of course had heardgayandlesbianand evenbisexual, though she’d had to go hunting for that one on the internet.

“I don’t think I really know yet,” she finally said.

Lolli nodded. “Yeah. Me neither.”

They looked at each other for a few seconds, interrupted only when a flurry of color erupted into the sky.

“Oh my god,” Lolli said, her mouth dropping open at the sight.She kept hold of Ramona’s hand but turned to face the display. When she spoke, her voice was dreamy. “I’ve never seen these, you know.”

“You’ve never seen fireworks?”

Lolli just shook her head, and Ramona could swear her eyes were a little watery.

Ramona squeezed her hand.

Lolli squeezed back.

Another explosion rocketed into the sky, this one silver and gold and sprinkling down like a willow tree.

“When my best friend and I see fireworks that look like that,” Ramona said, pointing to the drizzling color against the black night, “we yell out, ‘Willow!’ ”

Lolli laughed. “Willow?”

“For the willow tree shape it makes.”