The Adventures of a Girl Called Bicycle

by Christina Uss

  When Bicycle was seven, Sister Wanda designed a lesson showing Bicycle how to translate the Sacred Eight Words into fourteen different languages, including French, Japanese, Urdu, Vietnamese, Swahili, and American Sign Language. Although the nun got lesson plans from a homeschooling website, she rarely consulted them. Sister Wanda, as far as anyone could tell, knew everything.

  “What have we learned from this?” she asked after the words had been satisfactorily memorized and repeated. (Sister Wanda loved asking “What have we learned from this?” She believed every experience should be a learning experience.)

  “Um, people can be Mostly Silent in a lot of different languages?” guessed Bicycle.

  “Correct, but don’t say ‘um.’ That’s enough for today,” said Sister Wanda, laying down the chalk.

  Bicycle got up to leave the classroom.

  Sister Wanda watched her walk toward the door. “Bicycle, wait a moment,” she said. “Are you looking forward to tonight’s showing of The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly?” A local movie theater had donated an old projector and a few movie reels to the monastery, and the monks had hung a sheet at one end of the dining hall upon which to project the movies. The monks adored the actor Clint Eastwood, whose tough-guy characters usually spoke very little while communicating a whole lot.

  Bicycle shook her head. “I was going to read tonight.”

  Sister Wanda sighed inside. Bicycle was an excellent student, very advanced for her age in learning and listening. However, growing up in such a hushed place, she didn’t play or run or shout, and didn’t have any friends her age to talk to or laugh with. While Sister Wanda knew the monks were very kind and took the time to listen to anything Bicycle had to say, it was hard to become someone’s friend when you could exchange no more than eight words with them. The nun often wondered if she’d made a mistake by not sending Bicycle to public school, but when she had suggested to Bicycle last month that they could enroll her in school next year, Bicycle had begged Sister Wanda to continue tutoring her. She’d pulled out her perfect spelling tests and above-grade math work, plus the awesome brand-new Sacred Eight Words anagram CHAINSAWED, and then gazed at the nun with a long, pitiful, silent look. Bicycle had advanced to an Intermediate Listening class, which included Facial Expression Control, and Sister Wanda had to admit that the girl had some skills in this area.

  Sister Wanda said, “Well, I know Brother Otto and a few other monks are going to the market to buy popcorn and candy in addition to groceries for dinner. Wouldn’t you like to go with them?”

  Bicycle also sighed inside. She was no dummy. She knew Sister Wanda thought she needed to make some friends. The retired nun had recently begun arranging playdates with kids from the local schools and inviting children from a city orphanage to visit the monastery. However, Bicycle couldn’t stand these other children. None of them wanted to sit in silence, and none of them knew how to listen. In fact, they all talked—a lot. After four years surrounded by Mostly Silence, Bicycle thought that being Mostly Silent was a pretty good way to be. However, she knew Sister Wanda meant well.

  “Sure, Sister, I’ll go,” Bicycle said. She always enjoyed spending time with Brother Otto, who did the grocery shopping for the monastery and loved food—choosing it, cooking it, and especially eating it. With his round face, glasses, and ready smile, he looked like the Dalai Lama might if the Dalai Lama always took second helpings of dessert. It was a pleasure to go to the market with him and watch him pick out some marbled sausage or a bushel of fresh, fuzzy kiwi fruit. He often got so excited that he’d forget his vows for a short time and start describing recipes in tasty detail.

  “Excellent!” Sister Wanda said. “Make sure Brother Otto gets a Snickers bar for me.”

  Bicycle nodded, thinking of her own plans. After the shopping trip and dinner, she’d head straight for the monastery’s library. With everyone watching the movie, she could read in undisturbed quiet for the entire evening.

  * * *

  —

  That afternoon, Brother Otto beamed as he pushed his little shopping cart down the sidewalk on the way home. He’d gotten a very good price on pork chops, and nothing made him happier than getting a bargain on tasty food. Bicycle walked beside the plump monk, followed by three young monks-in-training who were toting bags of groceries. Brother Otto hummed a happy little cooking song to himself, looking off into space and imagining what side dishes he’d pair with the chops.

  They were passing the post office when Brother Otto’s shopping cart halted with a clank, blocked by something metal that had fallen over on the sidewalk. Bicycle and the other monks hurried forward to help and saw what blocked their path. Underneath the spots of rust and clinging cobwebs, the two-wheeled machine was glaringly, screamingly, almost unbearably orange. A hand-lettered sign hung from a piece of string: FOR SALE. SEE POSTMASTER.

  “Ooooh!” Bicycle said.

  “Well, that’s fate!” Brother Otto said. Then his eyes went wide with dismay and he clapped a hand over his mouth. Brother Otto simply wasn’t cut out to be Mostly Silent.

  “Is that what I think it is?” asked Bicycle.

  Brother Otto looked torn for a moment, then seemed to think, I’ve already broken my vows today, so a few more words can’t hurt. “Yes, my little cabbage, that is your namesake. It’s a bicycle.”

  The three monks-in-training shushed him with disapproving looks.

  Naturally, it was love at first sight.

  “Brother Otto…do you think I can buy it?” Bicycle reached into her pocket, pulling out eighty-nine cents.

  Brother Otto glanced at the orange bike and then at Bicycle’s face. With no further ado, he took her coins and went into the post office. He must have thrown caution to the wind and completely ignored his Mostly Silent training to get such a bargain, because he came back outside with a big smile and said, “It’s all yours.”

  It was of no surprise to anyone at the monastery when Brother Otto brought Bicycle home with the orange bike. With a name like Bicycle, the girl was bound to start pedaling around sooner or later.

  In fact, Sister Wanda was relieved to see the young girl with the two-wheeler. She wrote child-size bike helmet on her shopping list and said, “It’s high time she found an activity that will get her out of the monastery and engaged with the world. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the girl needs to make friends. Surely a bicycle will help her do that.”

  The Top Monk said, “Sandwich.”

  The cobwebby bike required some tender loving care. Bicycle lost no time getting started. She found a thick bicycle repair manual in the library and wheeled the bike into the monastery’s small garage. She spent the rest of the afternoon dismantling the machine piece by piece, barely looking up when Sister Wanda dropped off a plain black helmet with an admonishment to wear it whenever pedaling.

  “Crankshaft, bottom bracket, pedal, rear de-rail-leur,” Bicycle read aloud from the book, picking up each rusty, fiddly-shaped bit and turning it over and over in her hands. While the monks were watching the Clint Eastwood movie that evening, she scrubbed every nook and cranny with an old toothbrush, greased the parts that needed greasing, and reassembled the bike. By anyone’s standards, the bike was not a pretty thing. It was a dense, heavy, clunky lump of steel. It was quite old, and had clearly been ridden many miles, but it was fundamentally sound and ready to ride with its new owner. It was a smidge too big for her, but if she stretched, she could reach the pedals. Bicycle hugged her bicycle. She named it Clunk.

  * * *

  —

  For the next five years, Bicycle cycled every moment she could. She rode beside Brother Otto to the market every day. She rode around the block so many times she nearly wore a groove into the road. She slept with Clunk next to her bed, and occasionally she thunked down the wide staircase to breakfast on the bike. (Sister Wanda threatened to throw Clunk in the trash heap when Bicycle did this, so she rode down the staircase only when she was sure Sister Wanda was busy on the oth
er side of the monastery.)

  The theater that had donated the movie projector to the monastery had also donated several black-and-white films about famous bicycle races. Bicycle watched those films over and over, shouting encouragement to the racers on the screen. Most of the races took place in Europe, and Bicycle was fascinated with the wire-thin men on their elegant, nimble bikes, whizzing together through historic towns, struggling up mountains, riding in huge jostling packs usually without crashing into one another.

  Bicycle’s shouting at the movie screen attracted the attention of the Top Monk. He liked to watch Bicycle while she watched the screen, and to listen to her shouts of encouragement. He seemed to hear something special in her voice, because he was sometimes inspired to shout “Sandwich!” himself. He gave Bicycle a gift subscription to a popular bicycling magazine. She read each issue cover to cover, and in this way learned about the famous bike racers of the world.

  The most famous, and Bicycle’s favorite, was young Zbigniew Sienkiewicz. He was a tall and lanky nineteen-year-old racer from Poland with a blond mustache. He had won every major race in the world as a rookie, and he always sprinted across the finish line with a grin on his face, waving with wild enthusiasm to his cheering fans. “Dziękuję, Dziękuję!” he would shout, which means “Thank you!” in Polish. Polish, you should know, is not the easiest language in the world to pronounce and understand. For example, although Dziękuję looks like a sneeze when you write it down, it actually sounds like “Jen-COO-ya.” Because Polish was so tricky, none of the racing announcers could pronounce Zbigniew Sienkiewicz’s name correctly (it sounded kind of like ZBIG-nyev Shen-KEV-itch), so everyone called him Zbig.

  Zbig was Bicycle’s hero. She rearranged the letters in his first name to spell E-Z BIG WIN and found the words NICE and WISE in his last name. She started dreaming about winning the Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia and other famous bike races like Zbig did, riding her bike for hundreds of miles with a grin on her face, waving wildly to her own cheering fans. She thought her dream wasn’t too far-fetched. She knew she was growing up to be tall and lanky just like Zbig—after all, she’d had to raise Clunk’s seat post every time she had a growth spurt, and now that she was twelve years old, it was as high as it could go.

  While Bicycle’s dreams of winning international races grew more vivid, Sister Wanda’s dreams of Bicycle making lots of new pals while biking around the neighborhood did not. In fact, riding Clunk seemed to have separated her even more from other children.

  Part of the problem was that Bicycle was a very fast cyclist. If someone tried to start a conversation with her, she started pedaling hard and left them in her dust. Now when Sister Wanda set up playdates with local girls and boys, Bicycle hopped on Clunk and headed outside, passing the children in a flash of flying hair and spinning spokes, pretending she couldn’t hear Sister Wanda telling her to come back and meet Betsy or Billy or Jenny or Frankie. Bicycle didn’t want to meet them. She just wanted to ride Clunk and be left alone in peace and quiet.

  One unlucky Saturday morning, Bicycle heard the sound of a gaggle of girls coming in the front door and being ushered toward the main hall. Clearly, Sister Wanda was going to try another one of her friend-making get-togethers.

  Bicycle hopped out of bed, threw on some clothes and shoes, and decided that if she was quick, she could ride Clunk down the staircase and out the side door near the kitchen before Sister Wanda could see her. She pedaled into the hallway and started down the staircase, but on the middle stair, she felt Clunk’s heavy frame drop out from under her with a terrifying crash. The world went sideways and bits of wood flew everywhere.

  “Help!” she screamed.

  Every monk in the monastery came running.

  Brother Otto pulled Bicycle out of the ruin of the staircase, poking and prodding at her arms and legs, pulling back her eyelids, and peering into her ears. “Are you hurt? Are you broken?” he asked in agitation. Then he clapped a hand over his mouth as the other monks gave him the Mostly Silent Shush.

  “I’m…okay…I guess.” Bicycle was a little scratched and banged up, but no permanent damage was done to her.

  Amazingly, Clunk also came out of the pile of wood and dust with nothing more than a few scratches in the orange paint and a handful of loose screws. But the staircase? The staircase was toast.

  Sister Wanda was a dark thundercloud moving toward Bicycle. Holding Bicycle by the chin, she asked in a dangerously soft voice, “What have we learned from this?”

  “Uh…I will not ride my bike down the stairs ever again?”

  Sister Wanda repeated after her, “You. Will. Not. Ride. Your. Bike. Down. The. Stairs. Ever. Again.”

  Bicycle nodded, chagrined.

  Sister Wanda’s eyes flashed like blue lightning. “Brother Jianyu!” she called. Brother Jianyu was the carpenter of the house. “You will go to town and buy wood to repair these stairs right now, and when you return, you will have this one”—she gave Bicycle’s chin a shake that rattled the teeth in her head—“help you for as long as it takes to fix this.”

  This was the first time Bicycle had ever gotten into serious trouble with Sister Wanda. She meekly went to meet the giggling girls in the main hall. She pretended with all her might to enjoy their company until Brother Jianyu came and set her to work yanking nails out of broken pieces of wood with a claw hammer.

  * * *

  —

  A few weeks later, Sister Wanda took Bicycle out for her annual haircut at the barbershop. Bicycle rode on Clunk, and Sister Wanda jogged to keep up. They were passing a travel agency when a large poster with curly lettering caught Bicycle’s eye. She pedaled over to take a look and almost banged into the side of the building. The poster announced:

  ZBIGNIEW “ZBIG” SIENKIEWICZ TO VISIT AMERICA!

  His First-Ever Visit to the United States!!

  Zbig Will Host the Blessing of the Bicycles in San Francisco, California, on July 8

  All bicycles are welcome to be blessed for safe, fast riding. Zbig will choose one Lucky Cyclist at the event to tour the country with him.

  *A Once-in-a-Lifetime Ride!*

  *Reserve your plane ticket TODAY!*

  There was a black-and-white drawing of Zbig at the bottom of the poster. His arms were raised in his signature wave.

  “Sister!” Bicycle exclaimed, and made some unintelligible gargling noises. She had so much to say, the words caught together in a jumbled rush in her throat. Sister Wanda jogged up and read the poster for herself.

  “Yes, yes, I know you’re a big fan of this Zbig fellow.” Sister Wanda paused. For the first time in Bicycle’s life, the indomitable Sister looked dismayed. “I’d like to say we could afford tickets to California. However, we used up the monastery’s savings to fix the broken staircase.”

  Bicycle gulped.

  “I’m sorry. I know you didn’t intend to vaporize the staircase, but you will not be attending that event.” Sister Wanda started toward the barbershop.

  Bicycle followed behind, slowly pushing Clunk, dumbstruck by the bad luck she’d brought on herself. “You’re sure, Sister? There’s no extra money at all?” Bicycle pleaded.

  Sister Wanda pressed her lips together. “Well, there is the emergency fund. And I do have a little reserve of money,” she said.

  Bicycle felt hope leap up inside her.

  Then Sister Wanda continued. “I was going to tell you this next week, but I’ve been saving up to send you to sleep-away camp at the Friendship Factory.”

  Bicycle’s hope crashed back down and went splat.

  “Now, I know you’d rather go see this Zbig bicycle racer person, but you have to understand.” Sister Wanda had that no-nonsense look. “You simply can’t go on this way, refusing the possibility of friendship. Since you don’t seem to be able to find any friends here, it’s time to do something more drastic. The Friendship Factory is a very successful place. They have facilities across the country. There’s one right outside D.C., and they sa
y in their ads ‘Three Guaranteed Friendships or Your Money Back.’ I signed you up for their Spring Break Special, which certifies if the spring session isn’t effective enough, you will automatically be enrolled into their six-week summer intensive.” Sister Wanda’s expression softened slightly. “Please believe me,” she said. “I’m doing this for your own good. Someday you will look back on this and thank me.”

  Bicycle was dazed throughout her haircut and the ride home. Not only could she not meet her bike-racing hero on his trip to the United States, but she was going to be condemned to this dreadful-sounding Friendship Factory. She’d probably be trapped in some drafty cabin in the woods, forced to make friends with annoying children, and boring children, and maybe even some children who were both annoying and boring at the same time. And if it didn’t go well, she’d end up back there for practically the whole summer. Three guaranteed friendships or your money back? It sounded like a guaranteed nightmare.

  She was in a funk for days. She sent a long, pleading letter to Zbig, asking if he might be able to change his visit from San Francisco, California, to Washington, D.C., preferably someplace near the monastery. She also talked to the monks about her problem, and they listened with great patience and attentiveness. However, listening was not enough for Bicycle this time. She wanted someone to talk to her and say, “Wow, that’s terribly unfair,” and “I’ll find a way to make Sister Wanda see reason,” and “You don’t need to make friends; you need to go see Zbig Sienkiewicz and maybe win a cross-country bike trip.” Instead, they said, “Yes,” and “Sandwich?” This was very unsatisfying. Bicycle moped.

  In mid-April, a week before the Friendship Factory bus was scheduled to arrive, a big envelope with a Poland postmark arrived. The return address was from ZBIG S. ENTERPRISES. A reply to her letter! She held her breath as she slit it open. Inside, there was a photo of Zbig crossing some anonymous finish line on his bike, hands up in the air, smiling at the camera. Scrawled on it in thick black marker were the words Keep riding! and it was signed Your Friend, Zbig Sienkiewicz. Bicycle stared at it. As she did, an idea began to form. Once the idea formed, it grew wheels and starting spinning through her mind.