Read Be Frank With Me for Free Online Page A

to roost on my kneecaps. He looked at his hands again and cut his eyes to my nostrils for the briefest of moments before finishing his sentence with “Alice.” I noticed then that he’d written my name on his left hand, spelled Alis . He saw me looking and slipped that hand into his pocket. “As family archivist, I have brought this album of photographs for you to look at,” he said. I hadn’t noticed it propped against the wall, one of those old-fashioned leather-bound volumes that must have weighed twenty pounds.
    â€œI’d love to see that,” I said. “How did you know I’d want to?”
    â€œI have uncanny intuition unencumbered by the editorial reflex,” he said. “I heard Dr. Abrams explain it that way to my mother when I pressed my ear to the door during one of their marathon discussions. My mother’s response was, ‘Where I come from we call that tactless.’ Can you tell me what she meant by that? I have tacks. Quite a nice collection, in many colors. I understand that thumbtacks have fallen out of favor since the invention of the Post-it note, but my mother knows I am still a fan. When I asked her why she said I was tackless, all she did was sigh. Can you explain that to me?”
    â€œI can try,” I said. “The kind of tacks you have are spelled t-a-c-k-s . What your mother was talking about is spelled t-a-c-t. ”
    When I paused to think about the most diplomatic way to proceed, Frank said, “Oh. It was a case of homonym confusion. I see. Well, do you want to look at these photographs or not?”
    â€œI do,” I said, glad to be off the hook. “Very much.”
    He patted the floor beside himself. “Can I offer you a seat?”
    I slid down the wall to sit next to Frank and he laid the album across our knees, opening it to a crumbling newspaper clipping showing Elvis Presley being kissed by a beautiful young woman in a swimsuit and a tiara.
    â€œYou like Elvis?” I asked.
    Frank shrugged. “I don’t know much about Elvis, other than that his middle name was Aaron and he had a stillborn twin named Jesse Garon and he drove a truck for Crown Electric Company in Memphis before he cut his first record, a single called ‘That’s All Right.’” His voice had just enough tincture of Mimi’s Alabama in it to make him pronounce Memphis as Mimphis . He tapped the woman in the photo. “I do know something about this lady, though. She’s my mother’s mother.”
    â€œShe’s your grandmother?”
    â€œIndeedy.”
    â€œLet me see.” I leaned closer and read the caption aloud. “‘Crawfish Carnival Queen and Ole Miss student Banning Marie Allen welcomes Elvis.’ Wow.” Banning. I couldn’t decide whether I was more surprised to find out that Mimi’s mother was a beauty queen, or that a beauty queen was the source of Mimi’s pen name.
    Frank’s grandmother may not have looked like his mother but there was a lot of her in Frank. “Do you see her much?” I asked.
    â€œNot when I’m awake. She died in a car wreck when my mother was pretty young. Not a kid still, but not old like you."
    â€œThat’s terrible,” I said. I almost said, I can’t imagine, but of course I could. “So, how old do you think I am, anyway?”
    â€œI don’t know. Old enough to know better?”
    I laughed. “Indeedy,”
    â€œYou must be twenty-five then,” Frank said.
    â€œClose. Twenty-four. How did you know?”
    â€œDr. Abrams says that’s when the prefrontal cortex usually finishes developing. That’s the part of your brain that controls impulsivity.According to her forecast, by the time I’m twenty-five I’ll be old enough to know better. If we’re lucky. It might happen later, when I’m thirty. Or never. Some people’s prefrontal cortexes mature earlier than others.