The Loud Silence of Francine Green

by Karen Cushman

  "Do you know this one?" She held up Little Women.

  "Yes," I mumbled. "I liked that. And Heidi. Stuart Little. And..." My mind went blank and I couldn't think of another title. My face flamed.

  Finally Sister Pete took pity on me. "Go ahead and shelve those books now, Francine. We'll talk another time. And thank you for your help."

  I shelved books for a while, wondering while I worked where I could get a quarter for the movies on Saturday. Movie prices were sky-high (metaphor) and I was broke. Wouldn't it be wonderful, I thought, if there were a library that had movies instead of books? You could check one out, take it home, open the covers, and the movie would play. Now, that would be even better than television.

  I sighed and went on shelving: The Runaway Sardine. Jean Craig Grows Up. Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People. Stories of Virgin Martyrs for Girls. Ye gods.

  I picked up a book with a blue cover. Someone was lucky enough to have just read A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I had seen the movie a couple of years before, and then I had read the book for a book report in the sixth grade. The book was a lot longer, but both were great. Francie Nolan seemed so real. I liked how she survived and grew in a hard world just like the tree outside her window.

  I didn't like how her father drank so much. He didn't just have martoonies at dinner. He would not go to work and spent all their money getting falling-down drunk. My father was pretty boring and didn't listen to me much, but at least he wasn't bad news like Mr. Nolan.

  I understood when Francie felt alone sometimes, but I didn't know why she was so nice to her mother when her mother clearly loved her little brother better and let him go to school but made Francie work in a paper-flower factory.

  I liked how she was strong and brave even though she was mostly obedient and didn't like to get into trouble. I wondered how she managed it.

  I liked that her name was like mine.

  By now I'd read everything worth reading in our library, and there was nothing left for me but Nanette of the Wooden Shoes, Great Moments in Catholic History, and biographies of every saint God ever made. I'd read Stuart Little over and over, and the public library was too far away for me to walk from with an armload of books. I wondered if my father or Wally would drive me.

  And I wondered if Francie was happy when she grew up.

  Walking home, I passed Twentieth Century Fox. As usual, no movie stars were sitting on top of the fence, waiting for me. It was frustrating to live so near and yet so far. I knew movie stars were in there, but I had never seen one.

  They would have known what to say to Sister Pete. Actors always knew what to say. No matter the problem or situation, movie actors had the right words and weren't afraid to speak up. If I were an actress, 1 would never be at a loss for words. But the reality was:

  Metaphor: Francine's tongue was tied in knots.

  Simile: Sometimes Francine's brain is as empty as a barrel.

  Oxymoron: Hear the loud silence of Francine Green.

  And irony: How proud we are when we are able to use what we learn in class in our real lives.

  7

  Fifteen Flavors of Butterfat

  "mother, we're going to Riley's for sodas," I called, linking arms with Sophie at the front door.

  "Me too. Take me too." Artie, of course.

  "No, Artie, you stay here," I said, giving him a little push. I was not about to suffer another outing with Artie so soon. "Be a good boy and I'll bring you a comic book."

  "Donald Duck?" he asked.

  I much preferred Archie—a lot of what I knew about being a teenager I learned from Betty and Veronica—but I nodded. "Donald Duck." Artie trotted off.

  "Francine Louise Green! Where do you think you're going?" my mother asked from the kitchen door.

  "I told you—to Riley's."

  "Not like that you aren't."

  I looked down: an old white shirt of my father's, blue jeans rolled up to the knee, and saddle shoes fashionably grimy. Very respectable. "What's wrong?"

  "Your shoes are in desperate need of a polish." She shook her head. Jeepers, I heard her crowd ate goldfish when they were my age.

  I could see Sophie trying to suppress a smile. Lucky Sophie, who didn't have to suffer maternal torments. I sighed. "Mother, all the girls wear—"

  "Francine Green, you are not 'all the girls.' You are my daughter, and my daughter polishes her shoes. And combs her hair." I gave my shoes a quick polish while Sophie rolled her eyes, and finally we were on our way to Riley's.

  Mr. Riley's nephew, Gordon, was working at the soda fountain after school and Saturdays, and I had heard he was downright swoony. We were going to see for ourselves.

  Hot winds blew smoke over the city The skies were darkened by the gray haze that burned my eyes and my throat.

  "There's a fire somewhere," Sophie said.

  "Big one," I added.

  We pushed open the glass door of Riley's, breathed in the sweet scent of face cream, hair tonic, and hot fudge, and headed first for the magazine rack. My heart clenched like a fist when I saw the news magazines with pictures of the mushroom cloud of an atomic bomb on their covers. What if that were not smoke outside but the radioactive fallout from an atomic bomb? What would we do? How long would we have to live? What would I be thinking right now? I swallowed hard.

  Sophie nudged me. "Look at that," she said, pointing to the new Silver Screen.

  I looked, grateful for the distraction. "Five pages of photos of Montgomery Clift," screamed a yellow banner across the cover, "the talented young actor the teenagers call drooly and dreamy!" We read the whole magazine before putting it back on the rack.

  "Let's see this Gordon Riley now," I said, ready to be dazzled. We hurried past the aspirin and Band-Aids to the jukebox in the corner. You could see the soda fountain from there. I put a nickel in the jukebox and pushed G7, "Nature Boy" by Nat King Cole. We swayed slowly to the music as we looked over our shoulders toward the soda fountain.

  Susan Murphy's drippy brother, Scooter, was sitting on a stool, talking to a gorgeous guy in a white soda-jerk hat. Gordon Riley. Jeepers, he was swoony with those waves in his hair, his little pink ears, and his dark eyes. He looked a little like a teenaged Montgomery Clift and a little like Joe Palooka, that handsome boxer from the comics. Sophie and I walked over and took seats at the counter.

  "Your usual ice cream, now," the dreamboat was saying to Scooter, "is twenty percent butterfat, but Uncle Frank insists on twenty-two percent. That's what makes Riley's ice cream so good. Butterfat." He leaned over and began scooping ice cream out of the cooler into a dish. I wished I had all the money in the world so I could order gallons of ice cream and thousands of double hot fudge sundaes just to watch the dreamy way the veins and muscles in his arm moved. He set the dish of ice cream in front of Scooter, leaned on the. counter, and said, "Did you know that it takes seven quarts of milk to make four quarts of ice cream?" Scooter shook his head and began to eat.

  Gordon looked up then and noticed us. He came right over and asked, "What'll it be, glamourpusses?"

  "Two root beer floats," said Sophie. "With chocolate ice cream."

  Gordon nodded and began scooping out ice cream again. I kept my eyes on his arm.

  He poured in the root beer and put the glasses down in front of us. Looking right into my face, he said, "Do you know that chocolate is the second most popular flavor in the U.S.A.? Vanilla is first. Think of that. Plain old vanilla. That's what people like. Vanilla. No imagination." He began to clean the counter with a damp rag. "If I were making ice cream, I'd make more flavors than Heinz has pickles. Ten flavors, maybe. Or fifteen. Think of it—not just chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry, but fifteen different flavors."

  "Is that all you know about? Ice cream?" Sophie asked, slurping up the last of her root beer. My tongue lay in the bottom of my mouth like a wet towel.

  "No sirree bob," said Gordon. "I know lots of things, like how to feed a jukebox, tune a jalopy, and treat pretty brown-haired gi
rls with shy smiles." He winked at me.

  "Oh nausea. Let's go, Francine."

  On the way home, Sophie said, "He likes you."

  My heart did a jitterbug. "No, he doesn't. He's just a flirt."

  "Yes, and he was flirting with you."

  I sighed. "He's so drooly!"

  "He's a know-it-all. Ice cream. Who cares?" She took my arm. "Come on over for dinner."

  "Thanks, but I can't. I have to go home." Really I just wanted to be alone and remember the veins on Gordon's arms and the way his lips got all red and pouty when he said "butterfat."

  8

  Searching for a New, Popular Francine

  "I'll just die if 1 don't get a car for my birthday," Dolores said as we got ready for bed.

  "Don't hold your breath," I told her. "On my last birthday I got underwear and a jigsaw puzzle of Saint Peter's in Rome. Remember? I sure don't see a car in your future."

  "But I'll just die. All the most popular girls have cars." Dolores was very popular. She was obviously the right person to ask about what was on my mind.

  She must also have been quite distracted thinking about that car, because she actually let me sit on her bed. I pushed aside her Seventeen magazine. Fun with Ham, it said on the cover, and Are You Ready for Romance? A Quiz. Well, I didn't know if I was ready for ham, but romance? Absotively. "Dolores, can I ask your advice?"

  She put down her hairbrush and stretched. "And why would I help a dishrag like you? I have problems of my own."

  "But that's it, Dolores. I am a dishrag. How will I ever get a boy to like a pathetic wet dishrag like me?"

  "A boy, huh?" She sat down next to me. "It's about time. Let's see. Well, boys like to date popular girls."

  "Of course, but how does an ordinary person like me go about getting popular?"

  She looked at me closely and frowned a little. I could see her thinking. Thinking was very hard for Dolores. She read somewhere that it led to wrinkles, so she tried not to do it very often. Finally she said, "You could try to be more like the popular girls in your class."

  Popular girls? What if that included the Perfect and Admirable Mary Agnes Malone? I would die before I would be like Mary Agnes Malone, and then Dolores and I could be buried together when she didn't get her car. I thought for a moment longer. "Susan Murphy is the most popular, I guess." She was the prettiest girl in the whole school.

  "Well, watch her. Try to do what she does. Or watch me," Dolores continued. "You could do worse than be like me." She Hipped her hair back with a graceful movement of her head and laughed a laugh that sounded like silver bells and hiccups.

  I tossed my head and laughed like someone choking on fruitcake.

  "Practice," Dolores said, frowning. "Then, once you're popular, you can get any boy you want."

  "How? Specifically how do I do that?"

  "Well, honestly," she said, "haven't you learned anything at all in thirteen years? Pick a boy. Find out about what he likes and say you like it, too. Go all goggle-eyed about horsepower and motor oil. Memorize the names of some ball teams. Tell him you always wanted to learn to fish or something."

  I was about to ask Dolores if that would work with ice cream and butterfat, but she was just getting warmed up. "Never criticize him. Or disagree with him. And don't ever express your own opinion. And—"

  "Jeepers," I said. "It sounds like Catholic school, only worse."

  "Well, no one is born popular. You have to work at it. Wear the right clothes, be friends with the right people, join the right clubs, and comb your hair once in a while."

  "Sophie says 1 should just be myself."

  Dolores's eyes opened so wide, they looked like they'd pop right out of her head. "Yourself? Why would you want to do that?" She stood up slowly, straightened her skirt, and pulled her Sloppy Joe sweater way down. Then she walked slowly to the door, where she stopped, looked at me over her shoulder, and winked.

  Holy cow. I couldn't see any boy not following her anywhere after that. I'd have to keep Dolores away from the soda fountain at Riley's Drugs for sure.

  The next day I started right in to be the new, popular Francine. I pulled the fuzz balls off my navy uniform sweater and rubbed dirt into my saddle shoes. The white blouse that I ironed pulled tight across my chest. Shrunk in the wash. I shrugged and buttoned my sweater up over it. It would have to do.

  I'd pin-curied my hair the night before, but still it hung there, bangs to my eyebrows, parted in the middle and tucked behind my ears, limp and messy. What was I to do?

  After school I asked Dolores. "Well, you could go to Maxine's World of Beauty for a permanent wave," she said.

  "What will that do?"

  "It'll curl your hair right up. They wrap the hair in metal curlers attached to wires and then plug them into—"

  "Ye gods. I don't want to be electrocuted."

  She took a clump of my hair in her hand and examined it. "It's not a bad color—kind of like maple syrup—but so stringy. Why don't we try my curling iron? Mom took Artie shopping for school clothes, so we can use the kitchen.

  "Watch me," she said, taking a silver metal tongs-like thing and heating it on the burner of the stove. She twirled strands of her hair around the wand and finished up with a head full of ringlets.

  "Now you." She turned the back of my head into curls before running off for a ride with Wally. I was on my own.

  I heated up the iron again and wrapped my hair around it. "Yow," I cried, dropping the iron and sticking my burned finger in my mouth. I smeared butter over the burn and started again.

  The butter made my hand all slippery, so it was hard to get the hair wrapped and unwrapped. I scorched my head a few times. My hair crackled and smoked. I smelled a little like a fire in the dog pound, but I could feel curls in my hair, so I kept at it.

  Between curlings I reheated the iron. I guess it got too hot, because when I rolled my bangs, pieces of hair cracked off and floated around my face. Ye gods.

  I locked myself in the bathroom. My face in the mirror looked unfamiliar, with the curls in back and short, broken hair standing straight up in front. Pulling on the broken hair didn't help. Wetting it made it worse. This was the new, popular Francine, this greasy-faced wretch with a crewcut? I was miserable.

  After crying for a while, I took a short nap, worn out from my efforts, and then tried to fix things up a bit. My hair was wavy in some places, kinky and crackly in others, and very short in front, but at least it wasn't limp and stringy anymore. I went in to dinner only a little bit nervous.

  DINNER AT THE GREENS', Part 2

  FATHER: Good Godfrey, what is that smell? (He picks up his plate and sniffs it.)

  ARTIE: Look at Francine. She burned all her hair off! Fran-seeeeen is baaaaalllld!

  MOTHER: Francine, what have you done to your hair?

  FRANCINE: Dolores and I curled it. What do you think?

  DOLORES: It's very stylish. Except for the front. (Frowning) Maybe a little sailor hat, tilted over your forehead, until it grows out.

  FATHER: You look like a chicken with its feathers singed off.

  MOTHER (to Francine): Never mind, dear. It will grow back and be nice and straight again.

  FATHER (muttering into his soup): A singed chicken ...

  Fade out

  I took to wearing my school beanie pulled down low over my forehead. I might have had to sport a crewcut, but I didn't have to flaunt it.

  I even wore the beanie in class. It was the only kind of hat allowed, as if beanies were holy or something. I told Susan and Gert and Florence that it was a new fashion, the beanie tipped low over the face. "You know how interested I am in fashion," I told them ironically. Funny thing, Florence and a couple of other girls started wearing their beanies the same way. Sister pushed them back on our heads when she passed our desks, but we just pulled them forward again after she'd gone by. Imagine, the new, popular Francine—a trendsetter.

  9. November 1949

  Sophie's Speech and Francine's Unplumbed D
epths

  "Come and help me find something to wear tonight," Sophie said when I came to the telephone. She had written a speech for a citywide contest on the topic "What Today's Youth Can Learn from Yesterday's Saints," sponsored by Los Angeles Catholic Youth, and tonight she was saying it out loud in front of students and parents from the whole city.

  Sister Basil's face got scrunched and red when she heard that Sophie of all people had been chosen to speak, and the other girls started referring to her as "Sophie Bowman, that shining example of Catholic Youth." I recognized that—it was irony.

  Sister Peter Claver seemed fine about Sophie being picked, and she began coaching her in the library after school. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, while I shelved books about elves and horses and dead popes, I heard about the Blessed Martin de Porres of Peru.

  "I have chosen to speak about the Blessed Martin de Porres,'" her speech began, "'even though he is not a saint yet. I think what is important about him is not whether or not he was canonized but that he helped people who needed help, and I don't think he would care if he were an official saint or not. That is one of the best things about him.'"

  "But Sophie," I said when she had told me whom she'd chosen, "don't you think you should pick a holy saint who is important, one who performs miracles and has weeping sores on his body and can talk to God?"

  "Do you think that's what makes someone a saint?" she asked me.

  You could tell that Sophie didn't know much about saints. "Well, sure. Do you know anyone who performs miracles and talks to God?"

  "I think there are different kinds of saints. Listen." She cleared her throat. '"Martin de Porres was born in Peru in 1579, the son of a Spanish knight and a Negro woman. His father was disappointed that the boy looked like a Negro, and he left the family. At twelve, Martin became an apprentice to a barber surgeon who cut hair and also operated on people.