IT TOOK US FOREVER TO GET OUT OF LINCOLN PARK because of all the hubbub and traffic. Meanwhile, I was cooped up in the backseat of the paddy wagon, dying to talk about it. But I couldn’t—not in front of Mom, who’d already joked that the “coincidence” of the graffiti was bizarre (if not cooler than the birthday sombrero I’d get in a restaurant).
As soon as I could get Heath alone, I was telling him everything. My brother may be a lousy role model, but he’s an excellent listener and advice-giver. He’d give me some perspective.
If I didn’t die first.
We made a couple more stops before we headed home, but I spent the rest of the afternoon on my phone, refreshing Body-O-Rama every minute and checking my email and feeds (still nothing). Now that I knew he’d actually been on the site, it was driving me batty that he hadn’t contacted me personally. I did my best to consider everything rationally. I mean, he hadn’t actually defaced any artwork. If he had? Watch out, buddy. Never mind the world of hurt he’d be in with the law—I would personally hunt him down and strangle him if he’d screwed with the Max Brödel heart.
But he hadn’t. All he’d defaced was a temporary wall—one the museum probably painted over for every installation.
And yet he’d had the balls to walk into a museum in broad daylight and vandalize it. Talk about a jailable offense. Cop cars had descended on Lincoln Park like they were answering a bomb report. Granted, I knew a lot of kids who did crazy things. My own brother had probably broken a million minor laws before he graduated. Unlike me, he knew perfectly well how to be bad, and he was damn good at it. But smoking weed and using fake IDs paled in comparison to citywide infamy.
And then there was the much more personal part of this: the Me factor. What did it mean? Yes, it was my birthday, so clearly it was a nod to that. But for the love of Pete, just send me a Have a Terrific Day! message online. No need to bring a felony charge into the mix. Was Jack a secret adrenaline junkie? I could already hear Mom labeling him a troublemaker.
Despite all that, it was—in a way—incredibly romantic. Or maybe I was just romanticizing it. Maybe he pulled a dozen nutball stunts every day before breakfast.
“You okay back there?” Mom asked when we were nearly home, peering into the rearview to make eye contact.
“A little weirded out by everything, that’s all.” Which was true. “And hungry.” In the wake of what had happened, I’d forgotten all about getting my fancy strawberry shortcake.
“I thought we’d pick up Mae Thai for your birthday dinner. How does that sound?”
I sighed with plea sure. “Heavenly.”
Mom’s eyes crinkled at the corners when she smiled at me in the mirror. I really hated lying to her, especially when she’d been so nice to me today. This whole situation with Jack was exhausting. If this was what it was like to have a crush on a bad boy, I wasn’t sure if I could handle it. I mean, Howard Hooper—aka the only real boyfriend I’d ever had—was kind of a jerk, but not in a tough-guy way. In the way that geeks sometimes are when they look down on everyone who doesn’t know the name of every Avenger or what 1337 meant .
Howard Hooper would probably wet his pants if he even daydreamed about doing something as ballsy as vandalizing a museum in broad daylight.
Where are you, Jack?
When I finally got so frustrated I couldn’t handle it anymore, I decided to throw caution to the wind and posted the pic I took at the museum. I added the vaguely troll-rific comment Golden Apple Vandal wishing me a happy birthday.
Once I’d hit send, I had a minor panic attack. There it was in my feed, for all 167 people who followed me to see. Okay, almost none of those people actually knew me, so maybe I was overreacting. Besides, I really only wanted one person to see it, because hey, you just can’t make an epic public declaration like that and then walk away as if nothing happened.
When we finally got home, a printed note was stuck to the door from some place named Godspeed Courier. “Sorry we missed you, but we need your signature. We’ll try again ___.” The blank wasn’t filled in, and there was no name.
“Bike messenger?” Mom said, hefting steaming bags of takeout. “What is this, Heath?”
“How should I know? I didn’t order anything. Maybe it’s a birthday present for Bex.”
“Right. Because I have so many friends who use courier service.”
“Probably the wrong address,” Mom said, taking the courier note before heading toward the kitchen.
“Maybe it was meant for Julie.”
“Who knows,” Mom called back. “I’ll ask her about it next time I see her.”
“I can run it up to her,” I said.
“I said I’d take care of it, Beatrix,” she snapped in a very un-Katherine way.
“Sheesh,” I mumbled. “Bossy much?”
I remembered Mom’s late-night phone call. She’d told the person not to mail anything. Was this what she was talking about?
“I thought you were starving. Come help me get ice in the glasses,” she said in a nicer tone from the kitchen before I could read anything more into it.
Besides, I had other things to worry about, like the ding on my phone. One HAPPY BDAY text from Lauren and Kayla in LA (who couldn’t even spare enough time to send separate texts or type the IRTH). While I was at it, I checked my email. Holy freaking alerts, Batman: The photo I’d uploaded two hours ago had been reposted 503 times, which was about five hundred more times than anything else I’d ever posted. Was I the only person who’d snapped a picture?
“Bex,” Mom called again.
“Coming!” Ugh. Maybe posting that photo was a mistake.
My post-museum panicky high faded into a slow buzz after a movie and massive amounts of Pad See-Ew noodles and lemon-grassy Panang curry. While Mom was in the kitchen, our doorbell rang. It was almost eight o’clock, which was kind of late for someone to be stopping by. My brain jumped to conclusions and screamed Jack, but when Heath swung the door open, it was a uniformed police officer.
The oh-shit look on Heath’s face was mirrored on my mom’s when she walked into the room balancing a plate of three candlelit cupcakes.
“Evening. I’m Officer Dixon,” he said. “Sorry to interrupt your night, but if you don’t mind, I have a few questions. May I come in?”
Mom’s shoulder’s sagged. “Of course. Heath, close the door and sit down. Beatrix, go to your room.”
“You’re Beatrix Adams?” the cop said.
“Umm, yes?”
“You’re the person I’d like to speak with.”
“Me?”
“Did you post a photograph online from the account BioArtGirl?”
My response was caught in some kind of psychedelic slow-motion filter. “Uuuuuh, yeeees, siiiir.”
I barely heard Mom, who was politely introducing herself and sounding disturbingly calm as she questioned the officer: What photo? And what was this all about? And how did they get her daughter’s address?
Officer Dixon matched her on the supercalm attitude. “We traced the account to an art website and found her Facebook link. Lincoln High was on that profile. Your address is in the school system database.”
Holy crap. All of that was set to private. Wasn’t this a violation of my rights?
“Miss Adams,” he said to me in a firm tone, “can you please tell me what your relationship is with the person who vandalized the Legion of Honor this afternoon?”
“None!” Why was my voice so high? “I just posted it as a joke. It’s my birthday. I saw it and took a picture. It’s my birthday,” I repeated dumbly. Could I sound any guiltier?
The officer was a brick wall. Completely unreadable. “Did you witness the vandalizing?”
“No.” I told him what happened, which was fairly easy because I was actually telling the truth. Mostly. And I thought he believed me, but then he got serious.
“Are you aware of an anarchist art group called Discord?”
“I’ve read about them.”
“Then you know that someone in the group defaced a Rothko painting in the Museum of Modern Art two years ago.”
“That was them?”
“Cost the museum thousands of dollars in restoration damage. That’s a very serious crime. So if you even suspect you might know someone in your art class at school who might do some graffiti now and then, you need to tell me. Legion of Honor isn’t taking this lightly. And if this perp”—Jesus! Jack was now being considered a freaking perpetrator?—“defaces something else, the charges are just going to keep getting worse. Right now, they’re looking at one to three years in state prison.”
Years?
“And trust me, if this person is connected to Discord, he or she won’t be getting mercy from the court, because members of that group are facing felony arson charges, assault on a police officer, rioting—you name it.”
“I only read about Discord last week!” I turned around when Mom made a noise. “I swear, Mom. This is craziness. I just posted a photo.”
“I believe you, baby.”
“Ma’am, did you know that parents can be held responsible, too? You can face fines, jail time, and up to twenty-five thousand dollars in damages if your daughter is found to be connected to Discord.”
My future fantasy life in the Mediterranean flashed before my eyes. Jack swore he wasn’t affiliated with them. Did I believe him?
“The graffiti isn’t connected to her birthday,” Mom said. “It was a coincidence.” Now she was getting mad, and I would appreciate her anger a heck of a lot more if I deserved her defense. “My daughter is a talented artist, not a troubled teen.” Oh, Lordy. “She takes AP classes. She works a steady job twenty hours a week.”
“She won an attendance award for not missing a day of school last year,” my brother said from the hallway. “She’s a total nerd.”
Thanks, Heath.
“You’re barking up the wrong tree,” Mom added.
The officer handed me a business card. It said he was in the SFPD Graffiti Abatement Program. “If you think of anything or remember something about one of your classmates, give me a call. Sometimes I’ve been able to mediate a solution between the property owners and the perpetrator. Believe me, I’m a good friend to have.”
I gripped the card as he walked to the door with my mother, but I could hardly feel the paper. My hands and feet had gone numb. The door closed, and after my mom bolted the lock, she turned around and stared at me with her eagle eyes. The silence was choking me. Even Heath was quiet, a sure sign of damnation.
“Please tell me it was a coincidence,” Mom finally said in a low voice.
I tucked my feet between the couch cushions and hugged myself. “All I did was take a photo.”
She nodded, but the doubt wafting off her hung around my head like cheap perfume. And why was I feeling so guilty? I didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not like I asked Jack to do it. I didn’t even know his last name, for Pete’s sake.
“Don’t worry, Bex,” Heath said. “If anyone’s going to jail in this family, it’ll still be me.”
I tried to smile, but my heart wasn’t in it.
“Oh no,” Mom mumbled, rushing over to the forgotten cupcakes. Only one of the candles was still lit, and half the frosting had melted and dripped down the black-and-gold bakery paper. She set the tray down on the coffee table. “Hurry up and make a wish.”
I groaned and leaned over the table. As I blew out the flame, I wished I could see Jack one more time . . . just so I could boot him in the balls.