Chapter 8

YOU WERE at the Tri Delt ice cream social, right?” said the honey-voiced blonde in line in front of Francesca Corleone as she took her food: cling peaches on cottage cheese and a wilted leaf of iceberg lettuce. This, plus sweet tea, was the entirety of the girl’s dinner.

Behind Francesca, Suzy Kimball kept her eyes on her tray and hummed.

“That wasn’t me,” Francesca said. “I’m sorry.”

“Oh.” This was where a normal person would introduce herself. Instead, the girl turned around and went back to her chirpy giggling with the girls she’d come with.

There were many other girls in line at the dining hall who did not have Greek letters on their clothing, other girls who weren’t whispering among themselves, who weren’t cowering underneath their raincoats as upperclassmen came in. These girls existed, but Francesca didn’t see them. What she noticed was Suzy, the quiet dark-skinned girl behind her, choosing the food Francesca chose, following Francesca to a table by the window.

“You know,” said a deep voice behind Francesca, “this used to be a girls’ school.”

Francesca turned around. At the next table was a tanned young man in a seersucker suit. He clutched a wooden replica of a rocket ship. Pushed up in his curly blond hair was a pair of sunglasses, the kind pilots wore.

“Excuse me?” she said.

“ Florida College for Women.” His white teeth revealed a crooked smile. “Until right after the war. Sorry for eavesdropping. I was just there helping my little brother move in. It’s good that your mother’s protective. She really loves you. You’re lucky.”

His own mother couldn’t wait to get him and his brother out of the house, he said. He finally set the rocket ship down.

Francesca felt dizzy, awash in the smell of blooming tea olive bushes.

He’d turned away from a group of people-upperclassmen, from the looks of them, including the blonde with the peaches-to talk to her. There was something about this boy, both awkward and smooth, in the way he couldn’t stop talking. Finally he apologized for not introducing himself. “I’m Billy Van Arsdale.” He extended his hand.

This was her big chance. Fran Collins. Franny Taylor. Frances Wilson. Francie Roberts. As she reached out her hand, she realized her palms were sweaty. Not just sweaty: drenched. But she was committed. No stopping now. In a panic, she took Billy’s hand in her somewhat less damp fingertips, turned it, and kissed it on the knuckles.

Billy’s dinner companions broke out laughing.

“Francesca Corleone,” she said, barely in a whisper and, despite herself, pronouncing all four syllables of her last name, in her best Italian. She tried to smile, as if she’d meant the kiss as a joke. “So, um. What’s the story with the spaceship?”

“That,” Billy said, “is a really lovely name.”

“She’s Italian,” blurted Suzy Kimball, bright-eyed, as if she were in class and it was the first time all term she’d known the right answer. She was saying it to Billy’s whole table. “They’re big kissers, the Italian people. I thought it was Corle-own, not Corle-oney. Which is it?”

Francesca couldn’t bear to say anything, couldn’t take her eyes off Billy.

Someone at the other table said, “Mamma mia, where’s-a da mozzarella?” which inspired more laughter. Billy ignored them. “Welcome to FSU. If I can ever do anything-”

“Here it goes,” said one of the men at his table.

“Honey,” said the girl with the cling peaches, “you are incorrigible.”

“-don’t hesitate to ask.”

“Corleone, huh?” said the mozzarella boy. He held up an invisible tommy gun and made ack-ack sounds. “You any relation?” someone said.

“You guys are jerks,” Billy said. “Don’t be ridiculous. They’re jerks,” Billy said to Francesca. “Anyway, I have to run, but if you need anything, I’m in the book. Under ‘W.B.’ ”

“Yes, dahling,” Cling Peaches said, “William Brewster Van Ahhhsdale the Third.”

Billy rolled his eyes, gave Francesca’s shoulder a gentle squeeze, grabbed his wooden rocket, flicked his sunglasses into place, and left. Francesca expected the people at the other table to keep needling her, but they lost interest and went back to talking to one another.

“I’m sorry,” Suzy mumbled. She was quivering like an abused house pet.

What could Francesca say? “You’re right. I am.” Italian. “We are.” Big kissers. There were worse things to be, no? “Forget it. Say my name any way you want.”

Suzy looked up, then covered her mouth. “You should see yourself.”

“See myself why?” Francesca said.

A thunderclap sounded.

Suzy shook her head, but Francesca knew. She could still feel Billy’s touch.

After dinner, they worked on their room. Suzy’s clothes were more like uniforms: nearly identical skirts and blouses, utterly identical bras, socks, and underpants. They agreed to make more room by bunking their beds, and Francesca said Suzy could pick. She picked the bottom. Who picks the bottom? The rain stopped. The dorm mother herded everyone out, handed them small white candles, and marched them across campus to freshman convocation. The marching band played as they entered the football stadium. A misty rain began. There were rows and rows of white wooden folding chairs. Suzy and Francesca sat near the back. The swarthy ones. She had to find a way to distance herself from this girl and not be a bad person.

On a platform at the fifty-yard line, some dean welcomed them. Then he introduced the university president, a lugubrious man in a black robe. The dean sat down, and only then did Francesca notice, in the seat beside the dean, that blue seersucker suit, that blond hair, and even from across the field those white teeth. For a moment, she thought it must be a delusion. The heat. Then Suzy dug her elbow into Francesca’s side and pointed.

“It’s William Brewster Van Arsdale the Third!” she said.

“That was a joke,” Francesca said.

“You have that look on your face again,” Suzy said.

Francesca tried to cock her eyebrow the way Deanna Dunn had in that movie a few years back where she played a killer.

Billy spent the duration of the president’s remarks making notes on index cards. Francesca spent it telling herself that in a world of stupid crushes, this was plainly the stupidest.

The president tugged at his sashes. He told them to look right and look left and that one of those people wouldn’t make it to graduation and to make sure that one person wasn’t you, then he directed jumper-clad Spirit Leaders at the ends of the aisles to start lighting everyone’s candles. Thunder sounded. He said it was now his pleasure to introduce the student body president. “Of course, anyone out there who ever ate any fresh Florida fruit is already a faithful friend of his family.” The president paused to chuckle and call attention to how pleased he was at his own alliteration. “Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. William Brewster Van Arsdale.”

“I thought you said that was a joke?” Suzy said.

Francesca shrugged. Van Arsdale Citrus?

Billy came to the podium, waving. He pulled out the rocket ship from inside his jacket. As he did, the rain began to fall harder. Billy forged on. The rocket was a prop for him to talk about the coming space age in which the students here would live their exciting lives. Candles flickered out. People started to leave. Abruptly, in that Florida way, the skies opened. Francesca buttoned her raincoat. The band ran for cover. Moments later, water filled the track around the field. Billy tucked the rocket back into his jacket and whipped his index cards into the wind. “Our formal education,” he shouted, “should stay in balance with the important things we’ve already learned. Love. Family. Common sense. C’mon, everybody, let’s have enough sense to come in out of the rain!”