For her brother she’d fought neighborhood punks, snotty teachers, and unappreciative coaches, loan sharks, landlords, bouncers. From the time she was a scabby-kneed girl she’d taken on her own father, and if push came to shove she’d take on the Father of All, that incomprehensible bully. She was ready. (642)
The truth of the matter is, is that we cannot predict what we would do in stressful situations such as the train incident. All she proves is how much she loves her brother and that she hopes that her love would prove powerful enough to prevent him from dying in a situation similar to the theoretical train. We all, at one point or another, ignorantly predict the choices we would make in impossible situations. This is only ignorant because it is undermining the choices that real people had to actually make. We could not even begin to imagine what they were thinking, feeling, or deciding in these moments of pure chaos. They did the best they could, given the situation they were in. Frances clearly loves her brother and has gone through hell and back in order to protect him. Those were the choices she made, and other people in similar situations may not have put their lives on the line in order to protect a sibling. I am “ride-or-die” when it comes to my brother, and I would do anything for him but I have never needed to protect him from an abusive parent so it would be difficult for me to say that I would. I hope I would, and I hope I would be strong enough to stand up for him but that is all I can do, is hope.