Frannie in Pieces

by Delia Ephron

  If you have to ask the big question—what rules, brain or heart?—you have to say heart. Which is why life is an illusion. I mean, there are some facts. My dad died. But the sense I make of what happens after or what came before—that’s my heart, filtering, judging. My heart was always biased toward Dad.

  I want to ask Mom about Dad, so I wait for a cozy moment. We’re sorting his things in the garage, up to our elbows in dump treasures. I’m trying to make a more serious attempt at parting with his belongings. “You stopped painting because of me, didn’t you, Mom? Someone had to earn the money.”

  “I love my life, Frannie.”

  “But that wasn’t fair of him.” This is really troubling me. “Was Dad selfish?”

  Mom is combing through ceramic bits and pieces, someone’s broken patio tiles. She takes her time, stacking the tiles in a paper bag, folding over and creasing the top. “Sometimes I thought so. Sometimes I was furious at him. No…” She thinks some more. “The truth is, I was so resentful that until he died, I forgot why I fell in love with him to begin with. All that passion.”

  “If he was so passionate, why did you get divorced?”

  “I changed when we had you. I thought he would too.”

  “How changed?”

  “Frannie, looking at it now with different eyes—”

  “You mean, with your heart. Looking with your heart.”

  “Yes. Your dad wasn’t selfish. It was just that, for him, art was as essential as breathing.”

  I wonder if I’m like that.

  Mom decides we need some refreshment, so she heads into the house. I chase after. “Why did you give the painting to Mel? A memento of your romantic time with Dad? How could you?”

  She stops, a bit stunned. “That painting came out of an experience, but once I completed it, it became its own thing. A work of art. You’re an artist, you understand.”

  “I guess.”

  “I love the painting and I love Mel. I can’t explain it any more clearly than that.”

  Maybe Mom will give the puzzle to Mel too. Until that second, it never occurred to me that this puzzle could end up in the hands of Booper.

  I have no control over that, do I? Dad said that after you die you have no control, but it seems to me that you don’t have much control when you’re alive, either. I mean, look who Jenna fell for. And whoever thought I’d feel at peace gazing into the eyes of a guy who eats art. That was so peculiar, I’d rather not think about it. And Mom. She didn’t have any control about falling in or out of love with Dad.

  I make a drawing. A patio table shaded by an umbrella, a half-drunk cappuccino, a jacket thrown over a chair. Perhaps on vacation in an Italian village called Vernazza, a man goes off by himself exploring. From high up on a stone terrace he takes a photo of the whole vista—the cove, the village, the hotel, rooftops receding up the mountain, and a seaside café. The café is barely visible from afar—a jumble of patio umbrellas, that’s all—but he particularly notices a bright tangerine umbrella tilted at a sharp angle. He returns, and from his hotel window, in this much closer view, he sees the things he missed. Details, people. Under that tangerine umbrella, shaded from the sun, sits the woman he loves. “Laura,” he calls. He raises his hand, their signal. In her haste, running to meet him, she forgets her jacket, leaves her coffee half drunk.

  I’m not sure what I’ll call it. Maybe B.F. Before Frannie.

  31

  Testing its stability, Harriet gives the ladder a shake. “Go ahead,” she tells Simon, who presses his foot on the first rung and gradually transfers his entire weight. The rung bends but holds, and Simon, a hammer tucked into his belt, ascends to the barn loft. As he treads across, the loft floor groans. Bits of hay between the slats dislodge and sprinkle us. I keep expecting his foot to slip between the slats and snare him like a bear in a trap. Simon pries off the board that seals the window, rips off the plastic, bright light floods in, and we’re ready to launch.

  On this last day of camp, Harriet has decided that the Egg Drop is the big event. The campers have invited their parents, whose cars jam the parking lot and stretch along the side of the road. I invited Jenna because she’s been sad about James, but when I leave the barn, Jenna is bounding toward me with a gleeful grin (translation: He’s back). Which is self-evident. James ambles alongside her, carrying four dozen eggs.

  “The eggs are here,” shouts Rocco.

  “Thanks for bringing them,” I tell Jenna and James.

  There’s a pause long enough for my hair to grow an inch. Finally Jenna chirps, “Hi, I’m Jenna,” and Rocco volunteers, “He’s Simon, this is Leo,” and I realize that Simon is hanging out behind me. “Hey,” says Simon.

  “I got great eggs.” James flips a box open.

  “Are those dinosaur eggs?” asks Rocco.

  They are very large and they are green. “Jumbo organic,” says James. “From free-range chickens.”

  “Why are they green?” asks Hazel.

  “The chickens ate only alfalfa grass,” James says. “They make a fantastic omelet.”

  “We’re going to launch them, didn’t you tell him we’re going to launch them?” I ask Jenna.

  “Oops,” says Jenna.

  “Launch?” James appears mystified.

  “They’re going in parachutes,” says Simon.

  “Everyone’s parachute should be in the barn,” I shout. “We’re starting in fifteen minutes.”

  “Parachutes?” says James. “No way.”

  Fortunately Harriet sails up at that moment. She thanks James, whom she knows from Cobweb, whips the egg boxes out of his hands, deposits them in mine, and shoos me and Simon back to the barn.

  “How do you want to do this?” Simon asks me.

  “I don’t know.”

  This riveting communication is our first exchange since we felt each other’s faces. I’ve been avoiding him. As we walk across the field, I know he’s matching me stride for stride. It’s impossible not to be aware of his hulking body next to me even if I’m not looking. Besides, his meaty arm swings to and fro, invading my peripheral vision.

  Since I contribute nothing, he suggests that I go up the ladder and he’ll hand me the parachutes.

  I should go up the ladder. I should stand in the open loft window. I should send the parachutes and their egg passengers to their destinies. “No problem,” I hear myself reply.

  As we’re about to enter the barn, Simon says, “Wait one second,” and sprints over to the tennis court, where the ENP has set up a refreshment table with juice and a bunch of desserts contributed by the moms. The whole activity must have exhausted her, because she’s sitting in a folding chair while Pearl waves a fan to cool her. Simon downs several glasses of juice and chats. They must be making a date, because when she talks to him, she bothers to stand.

  No way am I watching this close encounter, so I head into the barn. The floor is strewn with the campers’ creations, all the crazy concoctions of tissue paper, glue, and toothpicks. I have to negotiate my way carefully.

  I test the ladder, giving it a shake the way Harriet did, and start up. On about the fifth rung I start down, almost miss the last rung in my haste, shove parachutes away to clear space. Not until I am flat on the floor, on my back, in a major time-out, does the panic ebb. I hear Lark declare, “She’s horizontal.”

  “What?” That’s Simon’s voice.

  “That’s what she calls lying down. Hey, why do I have to leave?”

  I hear the barn door slide close and see Simon looming over me. “What’s wrong?”

  “How can you live if you’re scared?”

  “Heavy,” says Simon. He squats down next to me. “Is that one of those questions with no answer?”

  “Maybe.”

  He wrinkles his nose. He looks as if he’s sniffing, but my guess is he’s thinking. “What are you scared of?” he says.

  “Death. What else?”

  “Are you sure it’s not—”

  “What?”
>
  “Life. You’ve got to live, no choice, so the question is how? If you’re not scared, it’s got to be more fun.”

  “Fun?” I hadn’t thought about fun.

  “Anyway, worrying is a waste because there’s no predicting.”

  “What?”

  “Anything.”

  Outside, Lark provides a news report: “She’s resting.” Harriet tells her to hush and continues blasting through the bullhorn about how the campers made the parachutes, and how proud of them she is, and that I am a brilliant arts and crafts counselor. How can a person be brilliant at arts and crafts? It’s hardly an IQ thing. Meanwhile Simon’s face is coming closer. Is he checking to see if my pupils are dilated or if I need the paramedics?

  He kisses me.

  You know how in the movies when a man and a woman kiss, it looks as if they’re swallowing each other’s mouths? As if they’re motivated by hunger. Well, this is nothing like that. This is the opposite. His lips graze mine, then they’re gone. It’s as if he was scouting the territory, checking the lay of the land. I’m about to open my eyes, thinking the whole event is over, when his lips are back, lingering longer, off and back again, this time with a few tender nibbles thrown in. What is this? This is so original. I’m quivering. Did he invent it?

  I open my eyes. Simon is sitting back on his heels, breathing heavily.

  “Grazie,” I say.

  Grazie? How deranged is that? Why do I thank him for kissing me, much less thank him in Italian? How utterly mortifying. But Simon only responds by putting out his hand. I take it, and he hauls me up. As soon as I’m standing, he’s going to grab me, or maybe I’m going to grab him, I might be mixed up about that.

  “What’s going on?” Harriet booms from outside, which halts the fun.

  Simon climbs the ladder. Without discussing it, we agree that this is the better deployment of our workforce. There’s some clapping. I suppose he’s appeared in the loft window.

  After I hand up a box of eggs and Lark’s lion, I slide open the barn door so I can view the launchings.

  Out glides her lion, its mane fluttering. In a swarm the entire camp and their parents follow the trajectory. It hesitates in the air above the tennis court, swaying back and forth, before making a slow descent onto a plate of cupcakes. Harriet checks the mouth of the lion, where Lark has stashed the egg. Thumbs up. The egg survived.

  Lark dances around, waving her lion. “I’m going to win,” she crows, which causes Harriet to raise her bullhorn and announce that there are no winners. “This isn’t a win thing,” she claims.

  One after another, Simon sets the parachutes loose. The Barbies’ honeymoon cruise, as they call their blue-and-silver-starred boat, does a dance, spinning in place, and then collapses. The egg breaks. The Barbies turn wild and stomp the boat to pieces. Gregor’s bomb pleases him no end when it torpedoes south and slams into a rock. Seymour’s parachute is a mountain, at least that’s what I always thought—an all-beige mound of tissue—but this week he covered the peak with a bit of dark-brown tissue. As soon as it commences its disastrous journey straight down, Hazel yelps, “It’s a breast,” and slaps her hand over her mouth as if she’s said something shocking. All the boys shriek with laughter and sock one another. Seymour thrusts his fist into the air. The parachute crashes and the egg shatters. Pearl’s butterfly swiftly blows out of camp. On its gradual descent into the middle of the road, a pickup truck slows down, and a hand reaches out the window, catches the butterfly, and takes off with it. The egg tumbles out, however, and cracks. Hazel’s daisy has the most graceful flight. All the petals flutter as it lightly bounces along a gentle wind, then alights on some tall grass and rests atop it. The egg survives.

  Rocco scrambles by me into the barn and is up the ladder before I can catch him. “Hey, you forgot the egg,” I hear Simon say, as Rocco yells, “Go Leo.”

  As his centipede parachute wafts out, the many legs loosely dangling, I see a tiny triangular head bobbing above the tissue-paper basket that Rocco has built on the centipede’s back. The parachute catches a swift gust and picks up speed.

  “Leo’s flying,” shouts Rocco.

  “Leo’s on the bug,” the Barbies broadcast.

  In two jumps Simon is down the ladder, and we streak across the field, leading the pack. The centipede dips and rises. Has Leo tumbled out already? No one can tell, but we all pound the ground in pursuit. The bug stops midair, hovers while we watch breathlessly, and plummets. We rush to the crash site. Leo’s guts will be spilled, his body in smithereens. I clutch Simon’s arm as we close in on the pile of crumpled tissue. Remarkably, the basket is intact and Leo remains in it. But he’s still. Utterly still.

  Everyone erupts, screaming at Rocco. “Killer!” “Murderer!”

  “I’m not. He loved it. He flew. He’s the first flying lizard.”

  “He’s dead, dummy,” says Lark.

  “No hitting.” That’s a grownup voice. I don’t look, but it’s probably Rocco and Lark’s dad, scolding Lark. There is lots of sniffling.

  I open my hand next to Leo. Slowly he creeps onto it. His lids rise, descend, and rise again.

  “Leo lives!” I shout. “He lives.”

  Everyone cheers so loudly, the trees shake.

  Simon places Leo on his shoulder and Leo rides like a champion to the refreshment table. Harriet beams. “Great job with the parachutes, Frannie.” All the kids drag their parents over to meet me. My hand is nearly shaken off. Jenna sits in James’s lap and feeds him a cupcake. A cloud moves across the sky, and the sun flickers in and out, casting bright beams and shadows, turning Harriet’s hair from flaming red to brown and back again.

  Simon, eating Oreos, has ten campers hanging off him. He’s a human jungle gym. “Hey,” he says, “who wants to canoe?”

  The campers jump up and down, me, me, me, me.

  “Me.” I raise my hand.

  We all troop down to the lake.

  He’s not my type. I could never be with a guy who isn’t an artist.

  But maybe Simon is an artist. An artist when it comes to kissing. A kissing artist.

  I have to think about that.

  Author’s Note

  Vernazza is an ancient village at the base of rocky cliffs in an area of northern Italy known as Cinque Terre (Five Lands). Generally speaking the town exists as I have described it with steep and narrow streets, a small muddy cove, seaside cafés, and a large stone church. However, specific details—the name of a street or hotel, a particular shop, the color of a shutter—are romantic rather than accurate, memories of a visit I took one fall with cherished friends and the man I love.

  Acknowledgments

  Writing a book is a journey, and I always need help so I don’t get lost. Barbara Sjogren, the wonderful art teacher at the Calhoun School in New York City, was so helpful that I was actually able to construct a parachute for the egg drop as well as write about it. Julia and Richard Gregson talked me into a hiking trip to Italy, and even though I could stand the hiking for only one day, I couldn’t have written this book without the experience. My husband, Jerome Kass, the world’s best storyteller, shared as he always does his awesome skills and unerring emotional compass. Naomi Touger took terrific photographs. Lorraine Bodger always gives me excellent editorial advice. My agent, Lynn Nesbit, is perfect. As for my editor, Laura Geringer…occasionally in my writer’s life, I have been blessed with great good fortune. She is extraordinary and I thank her from the bottom of my heart.

  About the Author

  DELIA EPHRON is a novelist and screenwriter. Her books include BIG CITY EYES and HANGING UP. Her screenwriting credits include The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, You’ve Got Mail, Hanging Up, and Michael. She lives in New York City. You can e-mail her at frannieinpieces@aol.com.

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  Copyright

  FRANNIE IN PIECES. Text copyright © 2007 by South of Pico Productions Inc. Illustra
tions copyright © 2007 by Chad W. Beckerman. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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