QotD: In the dream where you show up to school naked, why do you never go swimming?

Sabin came up with a vaccine in 1955, which was also the year of the last epidemic. Kay was one of the lucky ones. She didn’t die, she wasn’t in an iron lung, she wasn’t even in a wheelchair. Lucky, lucky, lucky—although her cheeks burned when she dropped things and the other kids laughed, although she would have preferred a slap to the teachers telling her she needn’t try and could just sit quietly on the sidelines, although mortification was the greater pain when she tried anyway and someone screamed in horror when she fell and bloodied herself.

Home was no better. Dad had been a gymnast in his younger days, had spent his summers performing in an actual circus. He and the boys spent the evenings in the backyard, given over to highbar, rings and trampoline. They had spotting equipment, a broad band to buckle around the waist with long lines running over the top posts so those on the ground could prevent a mistake from turning disastrous. She could have tried without killing herself, but no one wanted to waste the time spotting her. Mom had been a dance instructor, and had even won a contest. She still had the trophy, and never tired of telling about her fabulous free dinner at Chez L’Orange. She listened to records in the evening, and sometimes held baby Louise while she waltzed. Kay, obviously, was too big for that.

Things were different when she slept. She was usually at school when it started. First the sound would change. The hard clump of her left foot would turn to a gentle whoosh, whoosh, as though the air around her was preparing to dance. Heads would turn toward her, eyes would widen as her clothes became thin, thin—flapping like moth wings, sparkling to transparency, disappearing altogether. She’d pirouette, a glance down assuring her that the ugly metal brace had melted away, that her leg was beautifully thick with muscle. Turn, turn, her arms rising as her hair flowed teasingly around her small breasts. A boy or two would step forward, eyes gleaming. She would laugh, bringing her arms down hard to launch into the air.

It was easy, easy to float over their heads, to swoop up above the rooftops, to lazily drift in the sun. They’d run far below her, pointing and shouting. Sometimes she’d sense something beyond envy. A smaller child, a shy girl, an ugly boy: admiring her release from the devastating crowd. She’d swing low to grab that sort of hand, to show them how to shed their coverings, how to play with gravity, how to leave the trees and the clamoring voices behind. They’d communicate in smiles, in gasps, in gentle giggling, and they’d fly, fly into the sweet soft night that promised another day.