Little Girl Lost

And the challenge for Evangeline Lilly? After a year that took her from Vancouver to Hawaii, from Sunday school to an international object of obsession, it's figuring out just who she is while the whole world is watching. Lilly doesn't have the most polished acting chops in prime time -- what people react to in Kate is her own personality, vivacious and a little inscrutable. "I really don't want to be mysterious," she insists. "Women in this business are expected to put forth a poised and perfect persona. I want people to see that I'm an ordinary-Joe girl. I blow my nose after work, I drool in my sleep and my shit stinks."

Some areas of her life, however, Lilly emphatically wants to leave obscure. When I ask her about recent British newspaper reports that she was married for one year and got divorced soon after Lost started shooting, she laughs and declines to comment, saying, "I don't talk about that kind of stuff. Wherever they got their information, it wasn't from me." She then abruptly changes the subject to the coral abrasions on her legs.

"She's a Christian, but she's a pottymouth," says cast mate Monaghan, formerly known as a Lord of the Rings hobbit. (The two are reportedly dating, although neither will confirm this.)

"Over and over again," Lilly says, "I've been called a walking oxymoron. I do things that you wouldn't associate with a good little Christian girl. People say I'm half-boy, half-girl." Before I can object that the visual evidence suggests otherwise, she continues, "I love style and dressing up, but I've also got competitive testosterone and I'm incredibly stubborn. When I'm going for a jog and I come up behind a guy on his bike, I try to beat him, even if it kills me."

Lilly is now earning far more than she ever did as a stewardess or an oil-change grease monkey (another early job), but her lifestyle hasn't changed all that much. She lives with two roommates (both of whom worked as her stand-ins on Lost). She relishes the idea of being an actress for five to ten years, then walking away and having babies.