Each new day brought another complaint about graffiti having appeared overnight on buildings, in parking lots, on monuments, roadways, overpasses... and as Harry Binder had pronounced, pretty much everywhere.
More and more signatures were now adorning freshly painted, sizable, and hideous-looking wall illustrations. Portraits of the likes of Johnny Depp and Lady Gaga had been elaborately spray-painted in a variety of colors on once-pristine walls, situated on both public and private property.
Landscapes of moon craters and subterranean cities stood side-by-side with walls full of ghastly cartoon characters and terrifyingly deformed gargoyles. Every conceivable surface was a potential target for vandals who considered themselves street artists, some of whom had now come to roost in Freedom.
Where they came from and why they chose this particular township was a mystery. They sprouted up overnight and the time had arrived to be more aggressive about apprehending and punishing them.
The Freedom Town Council occupied a neo-Classical building from the nineteen fifties. I made my way through the ornate lobby and hurried to my appointment with Council President Helena Madison.
President Madison had graduated magna cum laude from Stanford Law School and, before relocating to Freedom, was a partner in the prestigious Los Angeles branch of the Wincor, Harris, and Colton Law Firm.
When an unexpected death vacated the office of Freedom Council President, she was persuaded to run for the position and won in a landslide.
She stood to greet me when I entered her large yet modestly appointed office. She was nearly as tall as I, dressed in a black pantsuit, her unruly mop of pitch-black hair now tied in a severe bun. She was a woman of color who had also made a reputation as one of California’s leading female athletes, a basketball standout at both Hollywood High and Stanford.
A mile-wide smile adorned her handsome face as she stepped out from behind her desk and gave me a welcoming hug. She pushed away from me and gave me the once-over.
“Not too bad for a geezer,” she pronounced.
“Ditto,” I said.
She laughed and kissed me lightly on both cheeks. We made ourselves comfortable in the sitting area overlooking the small park that stood in front of the Council building.
She took a sip from a bottle of mineral water. “Okay, Buddy. First I have to know how he’s doing.”
“It’s tough for him, Helena. His faculties are diminishing. He fights, but it’s not a battle he’ll win in the long run.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m sure he’d welcome a phone call. He’s very proud of you. He brags about you as if you were his second daughter.”
She smiled. “Must be nice for him having you around.”
“I hope so. But it’s not always a two-way street.”
“Your fault, no doubt.”
“No doubt.”
Helena Madison and I had met at the basketball court adjacent to Muscle Beach in Venice, California. She was then a young attorney and I a police recruit. We found ourselves playing on opposite sides of a pick-up game which, on that particular day, also included former Laker greats James Worthy and A.C. Green.
Helena was teamed with Big Game James, I with A.C. None of us had anticipated a game of much intensity, but it was a beautiful Los Angeles Sunday, a large crowd was watching, and we played as if there was something at stake.
I was guarding Helena, who began the festivities by introducing me to both of her sharp elbows, which would dog me for the entire game. At first I was reluctant to mix it up with a woman, but within the first few minutes of the game, she made me forget that fact by bumping, grabbing, and generally harassing me from one end of the court to the other.
At half-time, she sidled over to me and shoved her hip against mine and in the doing, pushed me slightly off-balance. “Nice to meet you.”
I resisted the urge to shove her back.
“I’ll be thinking of you tonight when I’m applying the heat packs,” she said.
“Perhaps you’d like some cheese to go with that whine.”
“A wise guy, huh?”
“If you think heat packs are exclusively your domain, perhaps you’d like to take a closer look at my thigh?”
“Not in this lifetime, big boy. I just wanted to warn you that I’m a second half girl.”
“Meaning?”
“Wait.” She winked at me and ambled over to her bench. Once there, she turned back to me.
I flashed her a lopsided grin and rubbed my extended middle finger along the side of my nose.
She glared at me for a moment, then burst out laughing. We’ve been friends ever since.
When she married and moved to Freedom, she and her husband, Gregory, stayed at my father’s house until they found a place of their own. My stepmother was godmother to their first-born daughter, Vanessa. My dad was godfather to their first-born son, Greg, Jr., or Little Greg, as he was currently called, despite the fact he was already tall for his age.
“So, what did I do to warrant this visit?” she asked.
“Graffiti.”
“What graffiti?”
I told her of the developing crisis. “I’m going to have to step up my efforts to wrangle this puppy, and I need your help.”
“How?”
“The current penalty for defacement of property is a thirty-dollar fine.”
“So?”
“I want to petition the Council to raise it to twenty-five hundred.”
“Twenty-five hundred dollars? That’s some fine.”
“And that would be just for openers. First offense.”
“And for subsequent offenses?”
“Thirty-five hundred for the second. And a bump of a thousand dollars for every additional one.”
“You know what, Buddy,” she mused, “I’m beginning to think you may be off your rocker.”
“There’s more.”
“What more could there be?”
“Thirty days in jail.”
“You’re kidding?”
“Have you looked at what’s going on here?”
“At the graffiti?”
“Yes.”
“I can’t say I have.”
“Then I’d like to arrange a tour. For you and the other Council members. I’d like you to see where we stand now, and then again in a week from now. If we don’t create meaningful penalties, we’re sunk.”
“When do you want this tour to take place?”
“Tomorrow.”
She sat silently for a while. “Let me take it up with the others. I’ll get back to you.”
“When?”
“This is going to be a hard-sell, Buddy.”
“When?”
“I hope you realize what a pain in the ass you are.”
I stood. “I’m counting on you, Helena.”
“This isn’t going to be any kind of a slam dunk.”
I grinned at her and rubbed my nose with my extended middle finger.
“Get some new material,” she said with a laugh.