Halfway down the block, he ducked down and watched two officers questioning Lardo on the street. They let him go. They hung around another minute or two, checking the alley with flashlights. When they finally returned to the squad car and left, Bobby Ray went back. He didn’t have Lardo teaming with him, so he had to tie the rope and walk down the wall. He worked for another few minutes and used the black marker he’d made from PVC pipe to write BRD.
“I knew you wouldn’t be able to leave it alone,” Lardo snarled from below.
Bobby Ray hauled himself up to the roof and stuffed the rope in his bag. The piece was big enough to draw attention, small enough to be precise, and positioned where volunteers wouldn’t be in a hurry to risk life or limb to cover it.
He spotted someone in the apartment house across the street. Was the guy reporting him or viewing the graffiti as an improvement? Bobby Ray shouldered his pack and climbed down the fire escape to meet Lardo on the street.
The whoop of a police siren made Bobby Ray’s pulse jump. Lardo took off. The size of a linebacker, he could run over anyone who got in his way. “Cut right!” Bobby Ray shouted after him. Lardo understood the message and took a left in an alley. Bobby Ray waited for the cops to spot him before leading them on a merry chase. Adrenaline surged through him, heightening his senses.
The sun was coming up when he climbed, unnoticed, through the window of his latest foster parents’ apartment.
The next morning, Lardo fell into step with Bobby Ray in the high school corridor. “Where you been all morning?”
“Sleeping in.” Chuck, his foster father, had rousted Bobby Ray at ten and told him to get to school. He didn’t want social services breathing down his neck again after last week. Chuck spent most of his time sprawled in front of the television, drinking Budweiser. He worked nights at a parking garage. Josey worked days at a grocery store. Bobby Ray could count on his fingers the number of times the three of them had been in the house together. Eight. Always on the day a social worker scheduled a look-see.
Lardo grinned. “You put that red face on the Ellis building? The one making the windows look like eyes?”
“A month ago.”
“Someone was taking pictures.”
Probably the cops who kept files on gang taggers. Each graffiti artist had his own style. Bobby Ray wanted his work recognized, but he’d have to find ways to work faster or end up in jail.
Lardo started talking about another party happening. Bobby Ray wasn’t interested. He needed to get to American history.
He shoved the door open and slid into a desk at the back. Mr. Newman was lecturing again on the Civil War, but Bobby Ray’s thoughts drifted to the Ellis Street building. He’d like to paint it end-to-end with heads, each a different color, all with dark window eyes, doors like gaping mouths screaming, laughing, baring teeth. How many cans of paint would that take? He’d need a crew working with him. He’d have to keep the design simple so others could fill in color. He’d need lookouts and time. Problem was he liked working alone, with one guy on watch.
Someone sitting near him asked a question about Civil War weaponry and brought Bobby Ray out of his dreaming. He tried to concentrate. A girl in the front row took notes. She was one of the quiet ones who kept her head down, studied hard, and dreamed of getting out of the Tenderloin. Bobby Ray opened his notebook and started sketching. He flipped another page and drew a gangsta on the marble steps of city hall, a black briefcase in his hand.
A hand planted itself in the middle of his drawing. Bobby Ray flinched. Mr. Newman turned the notebook and studied the picture. His brows flicked up over his dark-rimmed glasses. “Are you taking art?”
“No.”
The teacher took his hand away. “Test on Friday. In case you didn’t hear. The chapters are listed on the board.” He lowered his voice. “Draw me a Confederate soldier and a Union soldier, and I’ll count them toward the term paper you didn’t turn in.”
Frowning, Bobby Ray shut his notebook and leaned back in his chair as he watched Mr. Newman walk to the front of the class. He itched to get a can of Krylon and break into school so he could put something more interesting than a list of chapters on that sweet black chalkboard. Even if the janitor cleaned it off before the day was over. But he’d get expelled and moved again. He had friends here. He wanted to stick.
He stretched out his legs, thinking. He’d have to do some research at the library if he was going to draw Civil War soldiers.
Lardo met him by the lockers. The two of them were the only ones still attending school; the rest of the gang members had dropped out. They spent most of their days at Reaper’s place, playing video games, eating junk food, and smoking pot.