AN: I just saw Little Miss Sunshine, and I really liked it. So I logged on to fanfiction...
And promptly noticed the considerable LACK of Little Miss Sunshine fanfics. So I snapped into action and spent an hour typing this out. It's a short piece about Frank Ginsberg, A.K.A. Uncle Frank, A.K.A. Suicidal Gay Proust Scholar Frank. Hope you enjoy. And please review!!
The first day of school. New textbooks smelling of ink and paper. Freshly sharpened pencils. Just-washed brand name clothes, polos and sweaters and jeans of every imaginable variety. Nervous chatter. Laughter. Grins. Scowls.
Frank sat behind his desk, distractedly re-arranging his pens. The black one went on the outside left, then the blue one, then the red one, then the purple one he only used on Tuesdays.
Frank wasn't obsessive-compulsive. He just wanted everything to be perfect.
He smiled at a young blonde woman as she walked through the door. She was wearing a distressingly short skirt and a pale blue tank top. She winked at Frank suggestively, and he quickly stopped smiling.
He glanced at a clock. Noting that it was eight o' five, he closed the door and gave his students a once over.
They were pretty average, your usual crowd. There was a girl with glasses almost as big as his niece's head, a boy in a beret, and a small group of boys wearing tee-shirts with "Carpe Deim" plastered across the chest. Aside from a select few, most of the class looked like your usual grad school Starbucks afficianado.
Frank cleared his throat. "Hello. I'm Professor Ginsberg, as you can see by this lovely nameplate on my desk." He gestured towards the nameplate, which indeed said his name. There were a few giggles from the blonde girl.
"I hope that we can all learn a lot from each other this year." Frank said. "Marcel Proust was perhaps the greatest writer of our time. It took him more than twenty years to write his book, which a masterpiece that almost no one reads, so you'd better appreciate it."
There were more laughs this time. Frank grinned.
"Okay, everyone get out a sheet of lined paper and a pencil."
After five hours of teaching lunchtime finally came, bringing with it excited noise and welcome peace. Frank sighed, gathering his classes' papers and neatly organizing them on his desk. He uncapped his red pen and was about to start grading when someone coughed above him.
He looked up. There was a young man standing beside his desk, nervously clutching a thick book.
"Did you want something?" Frank asked.
The boy smiled weakly. "Um… yeah. Hi. I'm Josh." He thrust a hand forward. Franck edged back a little and shook the boy's hand.
"Nice to meet you, Josh. Did you have a question?"
Josh ran a hand through his hair. "Yeah. Yes. Do you think that… um…" he looked as if he were deep in thought. Frank leaned forward, arching an eyebrow.
"Do I think what?"
"Do you think that Proust's… um… very family was an influence on him at all?" the young man looked very relieved for some reason.
Frank blinked. "Well. I think that one's family is definitely an influence on their character." He thought back to his family and almost winced. "Proust's family was very important to him, I guess."
Josh grinned. "Oh. Thank you." He scurried out of the room.
Frank stared after him. Well… that was weird.
"You're WHAT?!"
Josh dragged his immense suitcase through the apartment. "I'm leaving you!"
Frank ran after him. "You can't do that!"
"Why not?"
"Because… because you can't! Because I say so, and I'm older than you!"
"Larry's older than YOU!"
Frank froze in mid-step. "Larry? Larry who?"
Josh sniffed. "Larry Sugarman."
Frank let out a scream so loud that it made a dog in Arkansas howl. "You're leaving me for LARRY SUGARMAN?!"
"Yes!"
Frank grabbed his boyfriend's arm, stopping him from going out the door. "Don't go!"
"I don't love you anymore!"
"I don't care! I still don't want you to go!"
"I don't care that you don't care!"
"Well I don't care that you don't care that I don't care!"
Josh scowled. "This is ridiculous! Frank, let me out of here!"
"No!"
"Let me out or I'll call the cops!"
"I don't give a shit!"
"Let me out NOW, Frank!" Josh slapped his arm. "Let go of me!"
"I don't want to!"
Josh wrenched himself out of Frank's grasp and stormed out the door and down the steps to the waiting taxi. He loaded his bags into the trunk, then turned back to Frank who was standing in the doorway.
"Get over it, Frank." He said, and then he got into the taxi and drove away.
Frank sat there the rest of the night. The next day he did something in public that he would rather not ever mention again and got fired. The next week Larry Sugarman became the proud recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant.
"…And that's when-"
"He decided to check out early." Grandpas muttered, gnawing at his chicken.. Frank stared at the old man for a second.
"Yes. Yes. And I failed at that as well."
Olive looked sad, and for a second Frank regretted telling her. She was only seven, after all. She looked even more upset when Richard started going on and on about how "losers were losers" and "winners weren't losers".
No shit, Richard.
AN: Hope everybody liked this! Don't forget to review, even if you're just flaming! I'm THAT desperate!