Fleabrain Loves Franny (24 page)

“It's a nice school, Franny,” said her mother. “And it's time for you to leave your room.”

The Home
was
nice, Franny remembered. She used to speed by it on her bike. It was on Shady Avenue, but in a fancier part of the neighborhood, right near the Tree of Life Synagogue. The school building wasn't very tall; there weren't a lot of stairs to worry about. There were flowers in front, and the walkways were smooth. In the play area she sometimes saw children playing together in wheelchairs or on crutches, many wearing leg braces.

“I don't understand why they need a whole separate building just for kids in wheelchairs,” she said. “Hey, I also wear glasses! Why don't they have a Home for Nearsighted Children?”

Her father smoothed the pillowcase behind her head. “You know it's a bit more complicated than that, honey,” he said.

“I just wish they would give me more time to practice my walking. I promise, I'll practice every single minute.”

Her parents were holding hands. They looked at one another. Franny could tell they were trying as hard as they could not to cry, to
help Franny look at the bright side of things. That was a parent's job. And Franny loved them very much for trying to do something so hard. Something impossible.

As impossible as her ever walking again, even if she stole all the days' marches from the sun, just as the writer James Joyce described, and practiced walking forever and ever. She knew that now.

“Franny, come listen to the radio with us in the kitchen.
The Charlie McCarthy Show
is on,” said her mother.

“I really don't feel like laughing,” said Franny.

“Well, you can't just stay holed up in your room,” said her father.

“Yes, I can,” Franny said. “That's what the poet Emily Dickinson did.”

Min came to sit on Franny's bed later that evening. “Oh, Franny,” she said. She didn't tell Franny to eat or leave her room or stop crying, and, anyway, she was crying herself. Alf licked Min's face. Franny loved Min for being Min.

The ballerina leaped strenuously at 9:37
P.M
., but even she seemed tired of the struggle. Franny, slipping to the floor, dragged herself to her closet across the room to dig out her journal.

Dear, dear Fleabrain,

I miss you very much. We have so many more Wonders to explore. Please come back
.

Love always,

Franny

Lying on the braided rug, Alf stirred.

“Fleabrain?” Franny whispered. She pulled herself to the night table and found the tiny leftover fragment of Sparky's Finest she kept in a drawer. Alf came to her, and she held the glass to her eye as she carefully combed through the dog's tail with her other hand. She turned her head to search the room. Splinters of moonlight. A blur of gray shadow.

But no Fleabrain.

“Fleabrain, can you hear me?” Franny asked. “Where are you? Fleabrain, what should I do?”

Three Little Words

O
f course he could hear her!

“I can hear the beating of your heart and every single breath you breathe!” Fleabrain wanted to shout as he watched Franny from Alf's hairy flank.

But he couldn't say that to her. Those words were embarrassingly maudlin and flowery, not to mention more than three, his allowable quota.

That night Fleabrain labored at discovering the three perfect words to help his dear, dear Francine. Shakespeare, Rumi, Neruda, Kafka, Dickinson, Hughes, the esteemed Howell—no great writer in all of history ever labored harder at his or her creative task.

Certainly a mere three words should be easy to compose.

He industriously filled one and one-half pages of Franny's journal.

I love you
.

Some girl, Franny
.

Do not worry
.

Count to ten
.

Roses are red
.

Chin up, Franny
.

Be proud, Franny
.

You are terrific
.

Never fear, Franny
.

Always hope, Franny
.

Fleabrain loves Franny
.

Fleabrain cherishes Franny
.

Hooray for you
.

Salutes to you
.

You will prevail
.

You will succeed
.

Friends forever, Franny
.

Comrades forever, Franny
.

Amigos forever, Franny
.

Hello, I'm here
.

Fleabrain is here
.

Really, I'm here
.

None of those measly, three-word sentences would truly help Franny, Fleabrain knew. He was blocked, hopelessly and frighteningly stymied, despite his huge, incomparable brainpower.

Frustrated, Fleabrain lay curled on the floor in a “fetal” position. One tiny eye stared at the ceiling, willing his IQ to help him create. He could hear Franny crying in her bed, unable to sleep. Bug it! It was just too much. Who cared about the threats and demands
of the Commanders of All Nuclei! Posh on the Great and Powerful and Majestic Council of the Small! He would write Franny an ode of one thousand verses proclaiming his love, inviting her to join him in a Wonder-filled life, forever and ever.

No. That wasn't what Franny needed.

And then Fleabrain saw it.

High up in its usual corner, lit by moonlight, was the small web of the angry brown spider. A lopsided, accidental
Z
had been spun smack-dab in the web's center.

Of course, it meant nothing, nothing at all. But with no other available source of inspiration, in his terrible frustration and desperation, Fleabrain decided to give it his creative all, one more time. He began to brainstorm using that
Z
.

You have zeal
.

You are my zenith
.

I am Zorro
.

Zinc melts 419.5 C
.

My zinnia, Franny
.

Oh. Wait.

He, Fleabrain, was not the one to help Franny this time, after all. It would be someone else who loved her. Someone from her own world.

Ask your Zadie,
Fleabrain wrote.

No need to cross anything out. Fleabrain's instincts told him that those three words were perfect.

Zadie's TOTU

Z
adie Ben was singing a lullaby.

Franny had telephoned him the evening before. She'd told him she missed him. Would he have an answer? she'd wondered to herself. Trouble was, she wasn't even sure what her question would be.

And there he was in her bedroom the next morning, singing a lullaby. There were several things wrong with that.

First of all, lullabies were for evening. And Zadie Ben usually sang after Friday-night supper, not Sunday breakfast.

Second of all, lullabies were for sleeping. She knew that Zadie Ben wanted her to wake up, not sleep. Everybody wanted her to do that. Get out of bed, get dressed, greet the morning sun, and smile, smile, smile. Like an uncomplaining poster child.

Third of all, Franny didn't understand the lullaby. The words of the song were in Yiddish. That had never bothered her before, during all the hundreds of times she'd heard it. The tune itself was as familiar as her bathrobe, so familiar, she'd hardly realized there
were words along with it. Zadie Ben said he'd learned the song at his mother's knee, and his mother had learned it at her mother's knee, who'd learned it at
her
mother's knee. Franny imagined a dizzying line of plump knees and warm laps going way, way back in time. Everyone in that line knew what the song meant, except her.

He was sitting in her desk chair, which he'd dragged close to her bed. His eyes were closed, and he held his worn, slipperlike shoes in his lap. He had taken them off to be comfortable because he'd been sitting there for a long time. Zadie Ben smelled like pancakes and tea, and Franny realized she was hungry. She reached for his hand.

Zadie Ben's eyes opened slowly, as if he'd been singing in his sleep. But his cheeks were pink and his eyebrows wriggling, and Franny loved him so much, she wished he could live forever.

“What's that song about, anyway?” she asked.

And so he told her.

The song was an old, old story set to music by someone who preferred to sing. Before the universe was created, the song went, God filled clay vessels with the sparks of light necessary to make an absolutely perfect world.

“Of course, that made for some pretty powerful ingredients,” said Zadie Ben. “The pressure was enormous! KABOOM!”

He sang the song again, in English this time.

The vessels of light shattered,

Shards scattered,

Piercing the sparks,

Hiding the sparks,

Those precious sparks!

Then tumbling, tumbling down
.

“Can you imagine the giant explosion?” he asked her. “Yes,” Franny whispered. She'd seen the newsreels of the bomb bursting over Hiroshima. It was easy to imagine the noise and the stink and the heat, as the vessels of light shattered into shards. She imagined all the broken pieces swirling about the firmament, piercing and trapping the beautiful light, then the shards tumbling down to Earth. It must have been beautiful and terrifying, all at once, and thank goodness no one had been there to experience it.

“And that was that,” said Zadie Ben. “The world ended up, as everyone knows, not-so-perfect. We've been trying to free the light from those broken shards ever since.”

“Someone from long ago had a wonderful imagination,” Franny said.

Zadie Ben rubbed his chin thoughtfully. There was a sugarlike sprinkling of white bristles on his face. He'd arrived very early that morning and needed a shave. “You're right; it may not have happened exactly like that,” he said, “but the song and its story still tell the truth. The important thing to know is that it's the world that needs to be repaired, not you,
feygeleh
. So leave your bedroom and help us fix it.”

“Me?” Franny pulled herself up to a sitting position. “How can I fix it?”

Zadie Ben leaned over to kiss her cheek. The white bristles above his mouth tickled. “You'll figure it out,” he said.

“Well, now she knows,” said Fleabrain.

Fleabrain and the brown spider were both lying companionably on the window ledge several days later, warmed by a sun ray.

“Yes, now she knows,” echoed the spider.

“Franny will be very busy, freeing the light from her world's broken shards,” said Fleabrain. Tears filled his tiny eyes. He would miss her very much.

“By the way, I've been meaning to tell you,” said the spider. “That
Z
in my web wasn't accidental. I spun it on purpose.”

“The thought crossed my mind,” said Fleabrain. “Thanks for the tip.”

“I did it for Franny. She and her clarinet saved my life, that day you were both cavorting inside my web.”

“I remember, I remember,” said Fleabrain. “Don't rub it in. No hard feelings?”

“Not at all,” said the spider. “All's well that ends well, as the Bard would say.”

Fleabrain clapped several tarsi. “Shakespeare! You're a reader!”

“I've been known to peruse a bit, when time allows me to leave the web.”

“I just realized we haven't been formally introduced. I'm Fleabrain,
Ctenocephalides canis
.”

“Chuck, here.
Parasteatoda tepidariorum
.”

Fleabrain leaped seven inches into the air. “You're kidding!” he shouted. “Your name is
Chuck
? Short for Charles?”

The spider's multiple eyes looked hurt. “Charles is my given name, yes. What's the matter? You have a problem with it?”

“No problem at all, actually. It's a perfectly distinguished name. In fact, may I call you Charles?”

“I would love that. No one has ever called me Charles, except my dear, departed mom.”

“Charles, my good friend,” said Fleabrain. “I'd like to share some information with you, but please keep it between you and me. Franny plans to begin repairing the world very soon. OK, not exactly the whole world. Just her little part of it.”