9. Frankie
NINE
frankie
“Francesca! You have company!” Allegra shouts over the Frank Sinatra album she’s playing in the front room.
Frankie sighs heavily from where she’s stretched out on her bed. Her parents are two of her favorite people in the world, but their arrival in her home has rendered her a teenager again almost overnight. Sometimes she tells them she needs an afternoon nap just so that she can have a few moments of peace.
“Coming, Mama,” she says to herself, swinging her feet over the side of the bed and patting her hair to make sure it’s not too rumpled.
“And then, when Francesca was eight, she had this little tiny plastic dog she called Monty,” Enzo is saying loudly, clearly relishing the story. “And she used to sleep with him at night and feed him little bits of her dinner because she thought that if she prayed hard enough, he’d turn into a real dog.”
Her parents both roar with laughter at the memory. Frankie walks into the sunken living room in time to see Jo sitting on the couch, laughing along with them.
“That’s precious,” Jo says. She’s wearing a skirt, feet crossed at the ankles. Her hands are in her lap. “Hi, Frankie,” she says, beaming up at her friend. “How are you?”
Frankie takes a deep, fortifying breath and smiles to show that she’s totally fine. “Good. I wasn’t expecting you, Jo—is everything okay?”
“Of course—things are great. I was just in the neighborhood,” she says in a joking tone, “and I thought I’d drop by to see how you were, and to say hello to your parents.”
“I’m so sorry.” Frankie runs a hand over her housedress and smooths it across her thighs. “I should have invited you over sooner. I meant to.” She really should have invited Jo over after introducing her to Allegra outside the butcher shop, and Frankie would have done well to follow up and have her come by to meet her father as well. “I’ve been really…tired lately,” she says apologetically.
A flicker of concern passes over Jo’s face and she and Frankie exchange a look. “Oh, please. Don’t give it another thought. I actually baked an extra loaf of banana bread, so I thought I’d drop it by and officially welcome your parents. But since I’m here, what would you say to going out for a walk with me?”
Jo looks to Mr. and Mrs. Lombardi to make sure this is okay with them.
Allegra nearly jumps up from her seat and shoves them out the front door. “Yes! Girls, please--go on a walk. I’m making pasta here, and I can have it ready by the time you get back. I’ll feed you both.”
Enzo, who has an unlit cigar clamped between his teeth, waves them off. “Go have fun, young people,” he says.
Frankie is ready to protest—she is, after all, wearing a housedress and slippers—but Jo stands and offers her a hand. “Let’s get you changed and we’ll just stroll. I’m not really wearing shoes for a long walk anyway.” She smiles at Allegra and Enzo as she keeps her hands on Frankie’s shoulders, steering her down the hall.
“But Jo…” Frankie trails off. She’s realizing as they walk back towards her bedroom that she’s just been ambushed. “Did my parents pay you to get me out of the house?”
“No payment necessary,” Jo says chirpily as she closes Frankie’s bedroom door and sits on the edge of her bed. “Go put on a dress.” She points at the walk-in closet. “I’ll wait.”
Inside the closet, Frankie flips on the light and stands before her racks of beautiful clothing. She eyes the dresses and wants nothing more than to send Jo away so that she can keep napping. Instead, she unzips her housedress and hangs it on the back of the door before choosing a simple yellow dress and a pair of flat, woven huaraches.
“Did they ask you to go on a walk with me?” Frankie calls out over her shoulder as she zips the dress over her white bra and underwear.
“Of course not,” Jo says. “I just took one look at you and realized that you need some air. And also that we haven’t seen one another for more than a few minutes since before Christmas, and I’d really like to catch up. I hope that’s okay with you.”
Frankie turns off the light in the closet and emerges fully dressed. “Of course it’s okay.” She looks at Jo as she sits there on the foot of the bed. “I just think my parents start to worry when I don’t get out enough.”
“Sure,” Jo says. “That’s understandable. Any reason why you’re feeling so tired and staying in this much?”
Frankie knows that Jo isn’t being cagey and hinting at a possible pregnancy, but she’s been so cornered by her mother’s questions these past couple of weeks that it’s the first thing that comes to mind. “Nothing specific,” she says. “I mean…I guess I miss having Ed here.”
“Of course you do, honey,” Jo says, standing and then smoothing out the bedding with one hand. “He’ll be back soon, won’t he?”
“Two more weeks.” Frankie walks over to the dresser and looks into the mirror: her hair is wavy and unkempt, and she’d hastily applied a little makeup in the morning. Without taking her eyes from her reflection, she picks up a tube of lipstick and swipes it across her lips. “I’m glad you came by.”
“Me too,” Jo says, following Frankie back out to the front room to say goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Lombardi and then out the door and into the breezy late afternoon sunlight.
“Okay,” Frankie says, putting her hands into the pockets of her yellow dress as they walk. “I’m actually really glad to be outside. This is good.”
“A girl always benefits from a bit of fresh air,” Jo agrees. “My grandma always said that right before she kicked me and my sisters outside to play.”
They laugh as they stroll down the sidewalk together. “Sorry I’ve been so quiet lately,” Frankie says, “but having my parents here is keeping me busy.”
“No apologies necessary!” Jo bumps Frankie’s shoulder lightly with hers. “I was just worried about you.” They walk quietly for a minute. “Should I be—worried about you, that is?”
Frankie thinks about how she wants to respond to this question. Should Jo be worried? “Can I be honest with you, Joey-girl?”
“I wouldn't want you to be any other way.”
Frankie stays quiet for a block before she starts talking. “Ed and I have been struggling with starting a family. And it’s not what you think.”
“Oh, Frankie. I’m so sorry.” Jo reaches out and takes Frankie’s hand in hers.
“We’ve been married for three years, and, you know—people start to ask questions.”
“But it’s nobody else’s business.”
“I know. But try telling Allegra Lombardi to keep her nose out of her daughter’s business and you’ll get whacked over the head with a giant salami.”
Jo laughs at this image. “Hey, she’s like every other mother, right? She wants to be a grandma, and she wants you to be happy. She just thinks that both of those things can happen with a baby or two.”
Frankie shuffles along, still holding Jo’s hand. A car passes by them, and a long, thin arm flies out the driver’s side window as their friend, Carrie Reed, waves at them before turning right at the stop sign. Jo and Frankie wave back as Carrie drives on, and then Frankie loosens her hand from Jo’s and instead loops her arm through her friend’s as they walk.
“I don’t disagree with her, but it’s complicated, Jo. More than I like to admit.”
“Okay.” Jo nods. “I don’t want to be nosey, so you tell me what you feel comfortable telling me. And just know that anything you say is locked up in our friendship vault.” Jo mimes locking her own lips and throwing away the key, which makes Frankie laugh.
“We have a friendship vault?” Frankie asks, feeling a warmth towards Jo that she hasn’t felt with another woman in a long time.
“Of course we do!” Jo stops walking and her face registers surprise. “You’re my best friend in Stardust Beach, and I’m here to listen to anything you want to say. I won’t even share what you tell me with Bill, and you know that generally husbands are considered free passes for sharing gossip with.”
“Naturally,” Frankie agrees as they start walking again. “But I do appreciate you not telling Bill any of what I say here. It’s just…of a personal nature.”
“Understood.” Jo holds up a hand as if to tell her to say no more.
“Anyway,” Frankie sighs, “Ed and I have tried—somewhat half-heartedly—and there have been months where I was sure I was pregnant, but then…nothing.”
Jo nods, lips pressed together.
“But before we even got married, Jo, I knew I wouldn’t be the kind of wife who could just give him what he wanted. I knew it, and I warned him, but he said he wanted to marry me anyway.”
“Why did you feel that way, Frank?”
Frankie inhales deeply and exhales before she answers Jo’s questions. “Because there have been men who have hurt me, Jo. And I have a hard time trusting that any man will love me forever and not hurt me again.”
“Even Ed?” Jo asks with blatant concern on her face.
“Even Ed,” Frankie says grimly. “I can’t even relax enough to truly let my husband love me, and I’m not sure how I’ll ever get that open, trusting part of myself back again.”
“Oh, Frankie,” Jo says with sympathy. “I’m so sorry. I want you to have that in your life—that trust. Especially with Ed.”
Frankie nods solemnly. “I know that Ed won’t hurt me, but sometimes I remember the things I’ve been through, and it’s hard to just be in the moment. Bad memories come back to me, and it’s easier just to shut myself away, you know? To make it all go away.”
Jo says nothing, but rests her head on Frankie’s shoulder as they walk. It’s precisely the show of female solidarity and love that Frankie needs right now, and in return, she rests her cheek against Jo’s head, a tear running from the corner of her eye and landing in Jo’s dark hair.
Whit Evans lived at the top of a tall apartment building with a doorman and a bank of elevators. Frankie remembered that the night had shifted for her at some point after she’d gotten up to use the ladies’ room and Whit had ordered her another French 75, but she couldn’t recall quite what had changed.
“Good evening, Mr. Evans,” the doorman said, tipping his cap at Whit and looking away discreetly as Whit held Frankie by the elbow with one hand, his other arm around her waist as he helped her to the elevator.
Frankie slumped slightly against the handrail in the elevator, giggling to herself at how lightheaded she was feeling. “Is this normal?” she asked Whit, falling against him as he reached for her. “Does a French 75 usually make you feel like your head isn’t connected to your body?”
Whit didn’t answer, but instead punched the button for the top floor. “Uh huh,” he said, holding onto Frankie. “It can do that.”
Frankie wasn’t sure why, but the warmth of his attentiveness seemed to have cooled, and now he was answering her the way a grown-up not used to dealing with children might: he brushed off her questions, sounding just a touch impatient each time she spoke.
Whit’s apartment door opened onto a vast, open space. The walls were covered with artwork, and the kitchen looked unused. Frankie stumbled through it as he took off his overcoat and set his keys and wallet on a table by the door.
“This view,” she said, walking over to a wall of windows that looked out towards Central Park at night. “During the day…”
“Yes, it is amazing,” Whit said. The heels of his shoes clicked on the parquet floors as he walked across the room to her, positioning himself behind her with his hands on her waist. She still wore her trench coat and heels. “But you’re more amazing.”
Frankie moved her head from him as he tried to nuzzle into the back of her neck; she wanted to look at this apartment more than she wanted Whit Evans to touch her in any way. On second thought, how had she even agreed to go up there with him? That wasn’t like her. She frowned at her own reflection in the window, the dark night beyond it, watching his hands as they unbelted her coat. The trench fell open, and Frankie’s black leotard revealed her hourglass figure. Whit slipped her coat off her shoulders and tossed it aside.
Frankie was suddenly tired—so tired. Her limbs felt like they’d been dipped in cement, and her head was bleary. Whatever Whit was offering, she didn’t really want.
“Whit,” she protested weakly, placing her palms against the cold window for support as he put one leg between hers and spread them, pressing his body against hers from behind. “I don’t ? —“
But she couldn’t even finish the sentence; her tongue turned to stone.
The last thing Frankie remembered was Whit sliding her leotard off her shoulders as she began to crumple to the floor.
Frankie’s memories of New York have been stirred. Normally, she does not allow herself to think of Whit Evans, of the things that happened in 1958, and of the way she very nearly wouldn’t allow herself to fall for Ed because she didn’t want to hurt him. But now, here she is, hurting him. And she knows it: she can see in his eyes the feelings of rejection when she turns from him at night, and she can read the hopeful surprise when she opens her arms to him, as she had right before he left for Seattle.
Ed deserves so much more than a woman who is hot and cold towards him for reasons he can’t possibly understand. He deserves a woman who doesn’t occasionally stiffen up entirely at his touch (not because it’s him, but because it frightens her to be that vulnerable). Frankie wants to be the kind of wife he deserves—she wants it so much. But she isn’t sure how to turn herself into that person, how to get there from where she is now.
“What are you doing today, Francesca?” Her dad has emerged from the bedroom in a clean shirt and belted pants, as he always wears. He is freshly showered and smells like the same aftershave that he’s used her entire life.
Frankie looks up at him from where she’s sitting at the kitchen table in her bathrobe, hands wrapped around a warm coffee mug. “I don’t know, Papa. What are you gonna do today?”
Enzo smiles at her, hands gripping the back of the kitchen chair as he and his daughter look at one another in the yellow light of morning. “I would like to take you and your mother for a drive. Can we do that?”
Frankie gets up from the table to pour her father a cup of black coffee, just the way he likes it. “We can do that,” she says, handing him the mug. “Of course we can.”
Within the hour, Enzo Lombardi has his wife and daughter bundled into the white convertible Corvette with the top down. The women wear headscarves and sunglasses, and Enzo whistles happily as he gets behind the wheel of his son-in-law’s car.
“Where are we going?” Allegra asks. He’d rushed his wife through coffee and preparations so that they could get on the road, and now she wants answers. “Why are we leaving so early?”
“Because we have a long drive,” he says, pulling out of the neighborhood and driving through Stardust Beach with both hands on the steering wheel like he’s driving a tank. “I want to see the show.”
Frankie has no idea what show her father is referring to, but she sinks into the backseat with her arms folded across her chest, enjoying the wind as it blows across her face. She tilts her chin up toward the morning sun, closing her eyes behind her sunglasses as he winds through a series of state roads and two-lane highways.
By lunchtime, they’re on the other side of the state in Weeki Wachee, home of the live mermaid show, and Frankie is sitting upright, looking around at the small town as they drive the main drag with Allegra holding a paper map open against the wind.
“Let’s stop there,” Enzo says, pointing at a mint green and pink drive-through restaurant. They wait in a short line of cars to order their food, and then choose a parking spot while a carhop brings them cheeseburgers, french fries, and Cokes.
Frankie is eating happily in the backseat, marveling—not for the first time—how much like an only child she feels right now as she gets all her parents’ attention for herself. Not to mention the fact that she has reverted to being a kid around them, letting Enzo drive Ed’s car, waiting for her mom to choose which cut of meat they’ll eat for dinner, and listening in the evening as her parents debate President Johnson’s policies over their evening cocktail.
And she kind of loves it—all of it. Sure, there have been moments when she’s retreated to her room for some peace and quiet, but there’s a distinct feeling that someone has applied a balm to her soul these past weeks, and that she’s somehow started to exhale again after holding her breath for far too long. Maybe it’s just having a little distance from Ed while she thinks, but it’s been nicer than she thought it could be having the safety of her mom and dad right there with her.
“Fries, mia perla ?” Allegra asks, handing a small container of french fries over the seat from the front. Frankie takes them and nibbles on a hot, crinkled french fry as she holds her soda between her thighs. When she’d woken up that morning, she hadn’t imagined that she’d spend the day on a road trip with her parents, but she’s actually excited to see the mermaids, which she’s been wanting to do. After all, they’re really just underwater Rockettes, aren’t they? Women performing gracefully on a stage of sorts to entertain the masses? Frankie can relate to that.
“Let’s get to the park and buy our tickets, girls,” Enzo says, starting the car. The engine rumbles to life, and he pulls back out onto the main road, following the signs and the traffic towards Weeki Wachee Springs State Park.
Frankie is immediately enamored of the show—or rather, of the showmanship that goes into it. The women perform feats underwater that seem nearly impossible. They move gracefully like synchronized swimmers as the onlookers sit comfortably in a glass-walled underwater auditorium. The mermaids are all so young and beautiful, and as they move through their routines, doing things like eating bananas underwater, drinking a bottle of Coke, and pretending to talk on the phone with one another, they stop intermittently to sip air from long tubes. The fact that they can perform underwater for this length of time, keeping their eyes open and smiles on their faces, astounds the audience. Hell, there were times when Frankie felt her smile falter on stage, so these ladies have her full admiration as she watches them soar and slide through the water like fish.
The whole show is kitschy and entertaining, and Frankie gets the urge as she watches them to dust off her dance shoes and put on a little stage makeup. Sure, showing Jo’s kids her costumes and telling them about what it was like to dance in New York had been a fun reminder of her glamorous past, but with women right in front of her doing the kind of performing that she has always loved to do, Frankie is reminded of how exciting it is to be in front of a crowd. It’s invigorating to see people’s faces light up as you dance, and it’s hard not to love the way little girls look at you admiringly, wanting an autograph and to tell you that they’re going to grow up to be just like you.
Frankie can’t help but wonder about the women in front of her: are they friends the way she’d been friends with some of her fellow Rockettes? There is a built-in camaraderie that comes with shared experience, and she’d always felt that it was easy to find common ground with the other women backstage, sharing palettes of pancake makeup, checking one another over from head to toe before going out on stage, and sitting around after the show for a few minutes, unwinding and talking about their personal lives: their dating dramas, their other jobs, their children, their loved ones. Frankie is discovering some of that friendship again—that shared experience—with the other astronauts’ wives, but when it’s combined with the giddiness of performing, well, it feels almost like a drug.
“You could do this,” Frankie’s dad says, leaning closer to her on their bench seat and whispering loudly in her ear as he points at the mermaids. “You could be a gorgeous mermaid, Francesca.”
Frankie turns her head to see him looking at the women in the water. Her mother is holding up a camera, snapping photos that Frankie isn’t even sure will turn out when she takes them to be developed. They’re clearly both having a wonderful time, and that makes Frankie even happier.
“And the natural canyon here in Weeki Wachee has one hundred sixty-eight million gallons of water flowing through it each day,” a man’s voice says over a loudspeaker. There is music playing as the women twist and somersault in tandem behind three-inch-thick glass. “And no matter the time of year—winter or summer—the water is exactly seventy-four-point-two degrees.”
The crowd looks at the mermaids with awestruck faces. Frankie smiles; she remembers seeing that same look as a Rockette. People watching and wondering how so many women can have legs that look the exact same length (an optical illusion created by the way the women are positioned by height), and how they can kick at the exact same time (practice, practice, practice). It’s so exciting to be a part of something that brings so much joy and entertainment to people, and right then, Frankie wishes she could dive in and be a part of the show. She needs a hit of the kind of adrenaline that you can only get from the rush of performing. The fact that she has no idea how to dance in water or use the breathing apparatus almost seems irrelevant.
“Oh, Francesca,” Allegra says, leaning across Enzo, who is wedged between them. She is holding her camera as she pats her daughter’s thigh. “This is so much fun! It reminds me of seeing you on stage.”
Frankie smiles at her parents; she’s glad they’re having such a good time in Florida, and she knows that in years to come, she’ll look back on this month and realize what a gift it was to have her mom and dad all to herself.
On the drive back across the state, Enzo leaves the top down on the convertible and turns up the radio so that they can hear it over the wind. Sam Cooke sings “(What a) Wonderful World” as all three of them sit quietly with their thoughts, watching as the sky changes to night and the stars come out.
As they pull into Stardust Beach, hair blown everywhere, faces touched by sun and wind, hearts full from a day that has ended up being unexpectedly fun, Frankie realizes that she hasn’t thought about anything that troubles her for the entire day. Not whether Ed will decide he wants to move to rainy Seattle, not the fact that she hasn’t gotten pregnant in three years of marriage, not Whit Evans. Her mind has pushed all of it aside, and for one glorious day, she’s gotten to be the old Frankie.
And now she wants more of it. She wants far more of the old Frankie.
“Let’s go in,” Enzo says to his daughter as he turns off the car in her driveway. He switches the headlamps off and climbs out, holding his hand for her to take so that he can pull her out of the backseat.
Frankie emerges feeling cramped from her tight quarters and the long drive, but happier than she’s been in a while.
“Thanks, Papa,” she says to him, leaning in for a kiss on his weathered cheek as her mother walks up to the front porch and opens the door, turning on the porch light for her husband and daughter. “I had a good time today.”
“Me too, bella ,” he says to her with a smile. “Me too.”