The Art of Falling

by Jenny Kaczorowski

  “So get one of your lackeys to take notes for you.”

  “All my lackeys are freshmen.”

  Abby heaved an overdramatic sigh. “Then get Alyson to do it.”

  He shook his head. “Nope. You guys know what you’re talking about. Alyson’s notes would be like ‘It’s a picture of fruit. There’s, like, an apple and a banana.’”

  Clearing her throat to cover a laugh, Bria turned to Abby. “He’s right.”

  “Basically I’m stuck with you all day,” Abby said. “Wow. This trip just got better.”

  “Unless someone else wants to volunteer,” Ben said.

  “It should be Bria if you want to actually learn something,” Dolores said.

  Bria kicked her under the table.

  “That is brilliant,” Abby said. “Bria takes Ben, and you and I can finish this homework.”

  “What do you think, Bri?” Ben said. “Can you teach this dumb jock about art?”

  He wasn’t looking directly at her, but something about his request warmed her chest.

  “Sure.” She twisted a piece of hair around her finger. “I can try.”

  The teachers and chaperones began shuffling everyone out the front doors.

  “See you there,” Ben said, pushing up from the table and limping off toward his friends.

  Bria slowly let out her breath, and shook her head at Dolores.

  She shrugged and a smug little smile danced across her face.

  ~

  The buses dumped everyone off at the tram, where they rode up the mountain. Perched at the top, the museum always stirred Bria’s blood and left her a little giddy. She loved the way the uneven surface of the travertine caught the hot California sun so that the entire complex glittered like diamond dust.

  Ben caught up with Bria at the front steps. “That’s a problem.”

  “There’s an elevator.”

  “Have fuuuun,” Abby said, drawing out the word in her singsong way. She pulled on Dolores’s arm, leading her up the stairs in a fit of giggles.

  Bria smiled at Ben, like they had some kind of inside joke. The feeling of shared mischief warmed her from the inside out.

  He shrugged. “This is her doing.”

  “Shall we begin?”

  He tilted his head to take in the building. “The architecture’s pretty awesome.”

  “It’s cleft-cut travertine from Italy. There are fossilized leafs and feathers visible in parts of it. The grounds are gorgeous too.”

  “What about the art?”

  “It’s okay.” She led him back to the elevator. “I went with my dad to this thing at the Rock Hall in Cleveland once. The art museum there is fantastic. I think I could have spent days there and not seen everything.”

  “What’s your favorite piece there?” He hopped along beside her into the lobby.

  “Picasso’s La Vie.”

  “Isn’t he that cubist guy?”

  “Look at you.” She grinned at him. “I thought you didn’t know anything about art?”

  “I took Art I freshman year.”

  “La Vie is from Picasso’s blue period.” She pulled up a picture on her phone. “It’s so sad. There’s this feeling about it that words don’t do justice.”

  He nodded. “Sure.”

  “I totally sound like an idiot, don’t I?”

  “Nope. You just lost me.”

  “Let’s start with something less touchy feely,” she said.

  He followed after her to a directory. “What do you like here?”

  “Degas. I think you’ll like him too.”

  “Ballet, right?”

  The light streaming in the oversized windows cast Ben in a perfect halo. She had a sudden urge to squeeze Dolores. “Among other things.”

  “Where to?”

  “Across the courtyard. Art after 1800.”

  She fell in step beside him, slowing her strides to match his halting movements.

  “Thanks, Bria,” he said. “This probably isn’t as much fun as hanging out with your friends.”

  “Abby always wants to look at naked statues and Dolores just talks about the tragic lives of the artists and their inability to form meaningful relationships or feed themselves.”

  “Delightful.”

  “What about you? There has to be somebody you’d rather be with.”

  He stole a glance at her, turning away when she tried to meet his gaze. “Not really.”

  The hushed, uneven quality of his voice warmed her blood, as if he’d pulled her into a sunlit world that belonged to them alone. Only the crutches kept her from reaching for his hand.

  But that was probably a good thing.

  Behind them, Dom and Jake, two of the bigger guys from the football team, broke into rough, raucous laugher, slapping her back to reality.

  “So. Degas,” she said, motioning to a small, framed sketch on yellowed, crinkled paper.

  “Brothel Scene,” Ben said, leaning in to read the inscription. “So starving, antisocial artist who hung out with hookers.”

  “He did spend his last years nearly blind and wandering around Paris.”

  “I see. Blind hobo artist. Van Gogh chopped off his ear. That melty clock guy was seriously nuts. Are you sure you want to be an artist? I kind of like you with all your faculties and body parts.”

  Ben’s off-cuff comment hit a nerve but she shook it off. “I’m kind of attached to them too. And the melting clocks are Salvador Dalí.”

  “I like this one,” he said, pointing at a pastel drawing of a ballet dancer in a frothy tutu and a darkly dressed woman beside her.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. That tutu looks sheer. It’s white, but there are so many colors up close.”

  “He could draw air,” Bria sighed. “My pastel drawings are a mess.”

  “I’ve seen your stuff,” he said, looking at her over his shoulder. “I don’t think any of it’s a mess.”

  “Pastels aren’t my thing. Pencils, ink, oils. Those are my mediums. I need precision.”

  “I’m not buying that.”

  “You’re good at throwing and running, right?”

  He shifted his weight on his crutches and pointed at his leg. “I was.”

  “How are you at tackling?”

  “Okay. I see your point.”

  “Being good at something includes knowing your strengths and weaknesses. Like Degas. He’s is usually grouped with impressionists, but he made fun of artists like Monet who painted outside. He didn’t waste time trying to conform to a predetermined label. He knew what he was good at and didn’t worry about the rest.”

  A quick, sad smile twitched at the corner of Ben’s mouth. “Even famous French artists are stuck with cliques? I thought that got better after high school.”

  “Not in the art world.”

  Ben moved toward the next sketch. “So your ex is a painter?”

  It took her minute to recall her conversation with Abby. “Oh, God. You heard that?”

  He crinkled his face into a sheepish smile. “Couldn’t open my eyes for anything, but I wasn’t exactly asleep.”

  Bria pulled out her phone again and thumbed through her pictures. “It’s a good painting. I think he hung it in his bathroom at college.”

  “He kept it?” He took the phone, stilling as he took in the painting of her bare back, a crumpled sheet tucked around her hips. She peeked over her shoulder, with just one eye visible and her hair slipping from a loose knot at the nape of her neck. “Wow.”

  “He’s stupid good.”

  He handed back the phone and adjusted his crutches, eyes fixed on the ground. “What happened with you guys? He sounds kind of perfect for you.”

  Tucking her phone away, she shrugged. “He went to school out of state. Mik isn’t the kind of guy who can do long distance.”

  “Do you miss him?”

  She studied Ben’s profile out of the corner of her eyes. “We were together for three years. He was a huge part of my life, but it’s o
ver.”

  Ben shifted the crutches again, a brief flash of pain marring his face.

  “I’m going to sit,” Bria said. “Write down some notes.”

  He hopped over and lowered himself onto the bench with a groan. “Thanks. These things are killing me,” he said, rubbing at his ribs, just under his arms.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I think so. Just feels kind of bruised.”

  “Let me look.”

  He lifted his shirt, revealing a bright red abrasion.

  “Ouch,” she said, touching the broken skin. “You should get that looked at.”

  “Whoa,” Rafael said, strolling the room, all loose muscles and steady gaze. With his artfully tussled hair and ink stains on his fingertips, he belonged there amid the great works of art and feats of architecture. A perfect, soulful muse. “PDA in the art museum.”

  “It’s not,” Bria said, but she pulled her hands away and folded them in her lap. “It’s nothing.”

  “Hey.” Rafael winked at her. “If that’s what it takes for a guy like him to appreciate art, I’m all for it. You should take him over to the statues. He might get a kick out of all the tits.”

  Ben cocked his head. “Not all of us need to see naked chicks to have a good time.”

  “Not all of us call women chicks.”

  “We should get back to the assignment,” Bria said. “I’ll see you later, Raf.”

  “You sure you don’t need back up? It can be kind of rough to explain this stuff to some people.”

  “We’re fine, Raf.”

  “Alright.” He shrugged. “Have fun.”

  “Sorry about that,” she said after Rafael passed into the next room.

  “He’s an asshole, not you.” Ben repositioned his crutches under his arms and hoisted himself upright.

  “He’s not a bad guy. Just cocky sometimes.”

  “I’m going to take a picture of the dancer. Get the title and stuff.”

  He lifted his phone, trying to balance himself and the crutches while he aimed.

  When he started to teeter, Bria reached out her hand brace him, fingers grazing the hard muscles along his side.

  “You know I don’t think you’re an idiot,” she said. “Right?”

  “You don’t need to defend me.”

  She tipped her head back to see his face, the bow-shaped curve of his lips, the strong set of his jaw. “No. I don’t. But he’s not really my friend. You are.”

  “So are you Degas or Monet?”

  “See, I told you you’re not an idiot.”

  “I’m smarter than Abby.” The corners of his eyes crinkled.

  “Abs has a special genius that lets her skate through life with the bare minimum of effort.”

  “You didn’t actually answer my question.”

  She lifted a shoulder. “Let’s keep moving. We need three pieces, right?”

  “Lead the way.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Bria pulled her phone from the pocket of her hoodie and opened the text with the code to the gym. One look at the pictures Dolores had taken and she knew she had to fix it. The skull needed another layer of paint to cover the hunter underneath and the roses lacked depth. The guitar had four strings despite six tuning pegs. Dumb mistakes bred by fatigue.

  Defacing the mural the first time was stupid. Coming back was asking to get caught.

  But she couldn’t let it go.

  She punched in the code and then froze, afraid to even breathe until she was certain the coast was clear. Just before it locked again, she slipped inside, easing the door closed behind her.

  The cavernous room must have triple in size since Friday night. Her boots made too much noise and she stopped to slip them off before finding the light switch.

  Light flooded the mural – her mural – and her heart skipped into overdrive. It had taken her four days to work up the courage to come back and finish it right, but she couldn’t let go of the flaws and standing there, beneath what could be a great work of art, the adrenaline pumping through her overrode any lingering doubts.

  The motto would take the longest, needing time for the layers to dry. Not that anyone would be able to read it anyway. The few Harry Potter geeks who took Latin to learn new words for spells didn’t really spend time in the gym. But the piece needed a proper title, a proper heading to contextualize the images.

  She tested the door to the janitor’s closest. Rafael had promised to unlock it for her at the end of school, but she hadn’t expected him to come through. Even if he always did.

  The door swung open and she retrieved a ladder and several buckets of paint.

  One letter, then one word, at a time, the new motto took shape under her hand.

  “Caro edere est necare,” Ben read.

  “Shit!” Bria said, nearly falling off the ladder. “What are you doing here? I didn’t hear the doors.”

  “Late workout. I just got out of the shower.”

  That image didn’t help her nerves. “Aren’t you supposed to be benched?”

  He limped over to the bleachers and sat down. “Kind of. I’m in PT and off the crutches. Besides, I can still work on my upper body. Arms. You know.”

  Her eyes strayed to where the sleeves of his shirt ended. “But you can’t run.”

  “Yeah. It sucks. I’m going stir crazy.” He frowned at her handiwork. “To eat meat is to kill. Really?”

  “You know Latin?”

  His frown morphed into a grin. “Four years with Mr. Kemel. I should have known this was your work.”

  “I’ll paint it back. If I have to.”

  “But you had to make a statement first.”

  A smile pulled at the corner of her lips and she slid down the ladder. “Too heavy-handed?”

  “Depends. What are you trying to say?”

  Her face felt hot. “That violence has no place in a high school?”

  “Then I think it’s just right.”

  “You don’t hate me for destroying your school?”

  He shook his head again and then reached down to adjust the tight bandage wrapped around his calf. “It’s not exactly Degas or Alma-Tadema or who was the other guy we looked at?”

  “Toulouse-Lautrec. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.”

  “Right. The little dude from Moulin Rogue. But at least you have the skill to pull it off.”

  Using the pencil from her hair, she refined the outline of the sugar skull under the hunter’s coonskin cap. “This is probably closer to Andy Warhol.”

  “Soup can guy. We didn’t see any of his stuff, did we?”

  “No. They just have his photographs at the Getty and we didn’t get over there.” She touched up the black swirls and spirals on the skull. “How do you know about him anyway?”

  “Everyone knows the soup can guy.”

  “I have to stop underestimating you.” She peeked over her shoulder at him. “How’d your assignment go?”

  “Aced it. Apparently my analysis of Spring by Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema was both insightful and passionate.”

  Bria snickered. “You should probably get out of here before I get caught.”

  “But I might miss seeing your final masterpiece.”

  “I’ll make sure Dolores takes more pictures.”

  He stood, testing his injured leg before walking, his weight still mostly balanced on his toes. “Don’t get in too much trouble. I’d miss you if you got kicked out of school.”

  ~

  The sense of victory Bria expected didn’t come with the morning. The mural was finished, perfect, beautiful. But it didn’t feel any better. She slogged through her routine, eyes burning and mouth dry. It had taken all night, with her locked inside the gym until the rising sun slipped through the transom windows near the ceiling, bathing her creation in gold. She’d finished and she’d gotten away with it and she felt sick.

  A creeping sense of guilt – of wrongdoing – weighed her steps as she passed through the hall, expecting some one to call her ou
t for what she’d done.

  The words “mural” and “vandalized” echoed around every corner, giddy whispers of delight and anger, depending on social standing.

  The entire school was talking about her work. Again. But this time it wasn’t earned. It was stolen.

  “Cambria Elizabeth Hale.”

  Bria jumped before her bleary vision cleared enough to focus on Abby, standing in front of her locker with her arms tight against her chest and fireballs shooting out of her eyes. “How the hell did you get my brother involved in this stupid stunt?”

  “What do you mean?” She dropped her bag in her locker and covered her mouth to hide a yawn.

  “Ben is down in Principal Erickson’s office right now. He’s probably going to get cut from the team.”

  Bria’s heart dropped into her stomach. After the close call at the football game, visions of Ben’s scholarship getting stripped away or getting kicked out of school or any number of other nightmare scenarios flashed across her mind. Because of her. Because of her stupidity and anger and listening to people who would never have to pay for it.

  She slammed her locker shut and shouldered her way down the crowded hall in a blind panic.

  “Where are you going?” Abby called after her.

  “To fix this!”

  So maybe storming the principal’s office in a black hoodie and combat boots wasn’t the most brilliant idea she’d ever had, but then again, neither was defacing the gym using Ben’s access code.

  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  Whatever else she’d done, she wasn’t going to let someone else take the punishment – or credit – for her crime.

  “Is Ben Harris still in there?” she demanded at the front desk.

  Mr. Cole eyed her over his glasses. His body-hugging vest and skinny tie didn’t do much to make him look older than most of the students. Why anyone in his twenties would want to work in school administration still eluded Bria. But despite his mild appearance, he was as vicious a gatekeeper as any.

  “I couldn’t say.” He pursed his lips, like he’d just bit into a particularly sour pickle. “I suppose you can wait until Principal Erickson is free if you wish. Over there.”

  Before she could protest, the door to Principal Erikson’s office opened and she stretched over the high front desk to see down the hall.