$143 to call Franny ( A Jumble)

 

I drove up to Bellingham for a lesson 

I thought about cancelling all week but my left pinky 

has been seizing up, it reminds me of my mother grasping for words

it wraps around the stick, rigor mortis and then exists with me

like residue, like breath held in my lungs or my jaw clenched

or a memory turned into a stony parable for a virtue I found confusing 

in story book form

I called Franny today and was pulled over for it

while I was listening to her tell me about her new home. 

I called her back and it was like eighth grade again. I remember I entered a drum off at Sam Ash when I was 13 and I won because only one other person entered and I had been very dedicated that year to John Bonham triplets and this other person just wasn't. The next day I came back to class with my gift prize stick bag and told Franny rather perplexed that I had won and she seemed totally unsurprised, she said well yeah sheri, you're really good. I believed in her that same way but I remember feeling startled, like I didn't know it was an option before. When she dated the teacher at her new school I believed in her, when she said she didn't mind doing what he asked i believed in her and I remember the only time I said anything was when he drunk called her at the long beach town center, after she clapped her flip phone down i said Franny, you know, I just wonder why he isn't picking on someone his own size you know? you're so smart and beautiful but we're like, ya know, kinda still kids and he's like thirty, why isn't he dating a hot lawyer lady you know? And she said, is it just the taboo sheri and I said no, i don't think so, I don't think that's where i'm coming from.  Franny only got bad grades because she didn't turn in homework, but she actually aced every test, chemistry,  algebra, history, spanish lit. When she emailed me the Los Angeles Times story about Compton High teacher, 28, arrested for sexual assault with a minor, her only note "you were right, i'm sorry" I didn't feel good and didn't say anything back for a while, but a while later she said, you know,  you could have really judged me and you didn't, thank you, and I remember not thinking I had done anything particularly nice for her. But anyway, when she chose art history as a major I believed in her and when she dropped out i believed in her and when she decided it was a good time to live with her father I believed in her, and when she dated Richard who loved coyotes and salsa dancing I believed in her and when she left him I really believed in her. now, married 5 years to a man in the military I still believe in her. The first time she told me i had left her when she needed me most I believed her, the second and third time too. But then when I helped her move the day I got home from a long tour she said, you know, i'm sorry, you are actually here when I need you and that's harder than it used to be. And today when I hung up the second time, pulling into drum teacher Jason's driveway she said hey I know i've bitched at you before about not being a good friend but honestly life happens a lot all the time and its funny that we have said this same thing to each other since we were fourteen and my left pinky has a regiment, and franny is going to try having a baby again next year. We were those two friends in the back of class talking about democrats and republicans, affirmative action, organized religion, eye liner actually making a huge difference, incubus, grinding at the dance,i dont like hip hop and country and all in a language she made up. I remember the dense lined paper square that Ms. Vaque picked up between our seats, will I ever be so smug and proud getting caught, I don't think so. Triangles and squares arranged like disney interpretation of the ancients, gel pen smudge, generic 99 cent store orange and pink.