30

It takes me until the next day to find out that Tyrone stayed around to help the people who were hurt when the deck collapsed. And because of that, he got arrested. Someone had posted his picture on Facebook and identified him as the SprayPig and one of the cops who stormed the party recognized him. There were pictures on Instagram of him being cuffed and put in the back of a police cruiser. He was taken straight to the youth corrections facility in Whitbourne.

Tyrone’s actual trial won’t be scheduled for months. But his lawyer has decided to contest the conditions of his release on bail. They’re saying he’ll have to live with his mother and Marty. Of course Tyrone refuses.

And so, three days after his arrest, there is a bail hearing.

Everybody piles into the courtroom for the hearing. Miranda is with Tyrone’s mother. Pretty much everybody in grade twelve at Holy Heart is here. Even some of the teachers.

The crown prosecutor shows slides of what he calls Tyrone’s “vandalism” over the past two years. There are slides of the Snow Queen mural, of course, and even one of the portrait of Tyrone’s mother at the waterfall, washing the red dress in the river.

When that image comes up, people in the courthouse fidget in their seats. That painting, even more than the others, shows what an exceptional artist Tyrone is, and everybody can see it’s a portrait of his mother. Even the judge comments on Tyrone’s draftsmanship. Of course it makes me think about the kiss.

I feel sorry for him up there on the stand, talking about making art. He speaks about Marty too, and how it feels to watch someone punch your mother in the face.

But none of that is an excuse for treating people badly, he says. He looks straight at me when he says it.

I’m very sorry for those people I hurt, he says. I know my behavior has been selfish and wrong. And I’m sorry for it.

I know that I’m not in love with Tyrone anymore. But I’m ready to forgive him. And it feels good when I nod at him from my place in the audience, or whatever you call it when you’re watching a person up on the stand in court.

Tyrone’s lawyer talks about the history of graffiti art and compares Tyrone to Banksy — whom everybody in the courtroom quickly Googles on their phones. Except Miranda, of course, who already knows all about Banksy and doesn’t know how to Google anything on her phone.

The biggest argument in favor of different bail conditions, according to Tyrone’s lawyer, is his contentious relationship with his stepfather.

The integrity of Tyrone O’Rourke’s living situation has deteriorated over the last several years, his lawyer says. His artwork is a creative response to this crisis, and though it is certainly vandalism and wrong-headed, Mr. O’Rourke is also a talented young man without a previous criminal record.

Tyrone looks at me again when his lawyer says this, possibly thinking of the headphones.

You’re welcome — almost, I think.

Nobody is allowed to report on Tyrone’s bail hearing or identify him by name because he is still a minor. But that hasn’t stopped the media frenzy over the SprayPig’s arrest. The story is in the newspaper every day for a week, and it’s the topic of three call-in radio shows and two separate segments on Here and Now, each showing images of his work. The newspapers have featured full-page photographs of Tyrone’s paintings, and he’s even had some offers — people wanting to buy his sketches. There’s talk he’s been contacted by a gallery in Toronto.

The judge decided that Tyrone can live in a government-run short-term housing program for youth at risk, just long enough to get himself sorted out. And just days after his court appearance, his mother has Marty charged with several counts of physical assault. So Marty has moved out too and Miranda says Tyrone’s mom is starting to put her life back together — the plan being that Tyrone will eventually move back in with her.

But even though Tyrone’s no longer being held in custody, he doesn’t show up at the Glacier for the Young Entrepreneurs’ Exhibition. I didn’t expect him to. He no longer wants credit for the work he didn’t do. Miranda says he’s going to do grade twelve over again, but this time at an alternative school, the Murphy Centre.

The Glacier has hordes of customers and onlookers passing through the fair. Everybody’s parents show up, of course, and lots of teachers from all the different high schools in the city and rumor has it even the minister of finance is milling around somewhere. The duct tape wallets are a big hit. The bicycle tire sandals not so much. People say they pinch the toes. Somebody from Prince of Wales Collegiate had birdhouses that looked like the bars on George Street, and they flew off the shelves.

I’m fast selling out of the new batch of love potion. After the first one hundred bottles sold, I got to work on a fifty-bottle special edition for the fair — Super Strength Eternal Love. I know I could have sold even more but Fred the glassblower finally packed up his glass studio and set sail for Europe. These bottles are the last ones.

Just as I’m getting near to the end of my stock, Sensei Larry shows up at my stall and buys one, deciding to try it right there on the spot. He takes a mouthful and tips his head back and gargles, just for a joke. Then he downs the whole bottle and smacks his lips, just as Miranda’s coming around the corner with Felix. My brother immediately goes into a very deep karate bow to show his respect for Sensei Larry, and he stays bent down like that for a good minute and a half.

Organic, right? Sensei Larry asks me.

Yup, I say. It’s just a gag. But the bottles are pretty.

So, says Sensei Larry to Miranda, There’s this thing happening, a medieval banquet at the Sheraton. People are coming from all over Canada, and I don’t know if this is your thing, but there are costumes. I’ll be going in chainmail. Anyway, you already have the tiara. So I was just wondering if you’d like to come with me. You know, there’ll be mead, and a meal of venison and quail.

Well, I’d love to, Larry, Miranda says. Thanks for asking.

Sensei Larry puts the empty potion bottle back on the table and I start to pack up.

Right about then, Ms. Rideout, the Wiccan lawyer, shows up at my table. She has the cutest little baby in a Snugli strapped to her chest.

I’d like to make a purchase, she says. She buys a bottle of Super Strength Eternal Love and cracks it open right there and takes a sip.

Just then her baby wakes up and starts screaming. But Ms. Rideout just gazes down lovingly into her baby’s eyes.

Well, hello there, cutie, she says. Mommy loves you, yes she does, yes she does.

Mr. Payne comes by to add up my sales so he can calculate my mark.

You’ve done well, Malone, he says. Especially considering you were working on your own. You’re an independent young woman with a good head on your shoulders. I’m giving you an extra five marks for going solo. I just need to sample your product again for quality control before determining your final grade, he says.

Then he notices Ms. Rideout and her baby.

And who have we here? Mr. Payne asks. He tickles the baby under the chin and the baby is so surprised she stops crying.

Then he takes a bottle of potion up from the table and as he’s chatting distractedly with Ms. Rideout he raises the bottle almost to his lips, but I grab it out of his hand.

I wouldn’t do that if I were you, I say.

Thankfully he doesn’t really notice because he is being paged over the loudspeaker. It’s time for him to announce the winner of the Young Entrepreneurs’ Award for Excellence.

And of course it goes to Elaine Power and Mark Galway, who receive $1,000 to continue their work in environmental activism and communications innovation. Mr. Payne explains, over the loudspeaker, that “although Power and Galway didn’t actually manufacture a unit that could actually, ahem, sell, which was, after all, the most important requirement of the entrepreneurial units, they were brave and defiant and innovative and working to save our planet.”

Also (though he doesn’t say this), Mark Galway’s grandfather sponsors the award.

I realize that after I wire Fred the money for the potion bottles, I’ll still have quite a tidy little sum. I’d love to buy Miranda something spectacular with the earnings. Maybe a beautiful medieval ballgown. It could be her medieval number.

Two weeks later, when Sensei Larry shows up for Miranda’s date, the visor on his helmet has frozen shut because it’s so cold, and he clinks and clanks with every step. But I can see all the neighbors in their windows watching Miranda head off down the road in the fluffiest evening gown Value Village had to offer, with a knight in shining armor.