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21 " Why do I feel like something's missing in my life without them and they don't feel the same about me? "
― Melina Marchetta , Saving Francesca
22 " These guys fart a lot as well. I'm not saying that girls don't. We just aren't as passionate about them. The smell is sometimes overwhelming and I want to gag. They don't just limit these attacks to the classroom-they can come at you from anywhere around the school. The corridor, the stairwell, the canteen line. There's one area we call Fart Corridor because it belongs to the Year Eights and Nines, who are the biggest perpetrators. They make no apologies and feel no embarrassment. If a girl did one at St. Stella's she'd be an outcast for the rest of her natural life. Here, it's a badge of honor. "
23 " And in that dark silence where it seems that everyone is someplace but me, it all comes back. "
24 " Everything's going to be fine. She'll be back at work soon. Let's just keep the house clean." Oh yeah, I want to say, because a clean house will result in peace in the Middle East as well. "
25 " So between you and me," I tell Justine on the phone that night, "we're either bitchy or stupid.""Oh God," she moans. "Everyone thinks I'm an idiot.""Thanks! "
26 " It's a weird smile, but it reaches his eyes and I bottle it. And I put it in my ammo pack that's kept right next to my soul and Justine's spirit and Siobhan's hope and Tara's passions. Because if I'm going to wake up one morning and not be able to get out of bed, I'm going to need everything I've got to fight this disease that could be sleeping inside of me. "
27 " A piece of me is gone," she told me once while we were bra shopping. "I think we're made up of all these different pieces and every time someone goes, you're left with less of yourself. "
28 " Do something that scares you everyday. "
29 " I used to tell your mother she looked like Sophia Lauren." He looks at me, frowning, and then it registers. "Oh God, some guy's using that line on you, isn't he?""Not just 'some guy'." I tell him. "The guy. "
30 " I just stare at him. I want to ask him a thousand questions, but I can tell he doesn't want to be asked. "We make weird friends," I say instead."I've never been into the f-word with people.""I'm privileged, then? Why me?"He thinks for a moment and shrugs again."You're the realest person I've ever known.""Is that good or bad?""It's fucking awful. There's not much room for bullshit, and you know how I thrive on it."We laugh for a moment and begin walking again. "
31 " I miss the Stella girls telling me what I am. That I'm sweet and placid and accommodating and loyal and nonthreatening and good to have around. And Mia. I want her to say, "Frankie, you're silly, you're lazy, you're talented, you're passionate, you're restrained, you're blossoming, you're contrary." I want to be an adjective again. But I'm a noun. A nothing. A nobody. A no one. "
32 " The depression belongs to all of us. I think of the family down the road whose mother was having a baby and they went around the neighborhood saying, "We're pregnant." I want to go around the neighborhood saying, "We're depressed." If my mum can't get out of bed in the morning, all of us feel the same. Her silence has become ours, and it's eating us alive. "
33 " You go shake your foundations, Will. I think it's about time I saved myself. "
34 " Memory is a funny thing. It tricks you into believing that you've forgotten important moments, and then when you're raking your brain for a bit of information that might make sense of something else, it taps you on the head and says, "Remember when you told me to put that memory in the green rubbish bin? Well, I didn't, I put it in the black recycling tub, and it's coming your way again. "
35 " I'm sorry," he says, "for that time I kissed you at that party and for that time at the wedding and more than anything for the thousand times that I wanted to and didn't have the guts to. "
36 " Your friends are at the house.'I sit up, straight. 'Who'?'I don't know. Weird people. The Sullivan girl, whose father got the Gosford police to pick you up.''Siobhan?''And another one who's making cups of tea for everyone, and keeping the boy who's telling Luca fart jokes away from the girl who says he's "the last bastion of patriarchal poor taste".''Justine, Thomas and Tara.'And the drug fiend, Jimmy, is keeping Mia calm and the Trombal boy's rung about ten times. I don't like his manner on the phone.''You won't like any guy's manner on the phone. "
37 " When I grow up, I'm going to be my mother. "
38 " Oh God, Frankie, I breathe in rhythm with that man. You think that's not my flesh and blood after all these years? "
39 " We approach the house and I wave at Jimmy. "And if he thinks he's eating with us, he's got another thing coming," my dad says.Jimmy approaches us and takes the shopping bags from me, looking inside them."Lamb roast. Am I invited? "
40 " For a moment I can't help thinking how decent he is - that there's some hope for him beyond the obnoxious image he displays. Maybe deep down he is a sensitive guy, who sees us as real people with real issues. I want to say something nice. Some kind of thanks. I stand there, rehearsing it in my mind."Oh my God," he says, "did you see that girl's tits?"Maybe not today. "