slight pompadour and trimmed neatly around his ears and neck.
He picked up a jar full of new black Sharpies and, handing one to Shay, said, “You can help trace until Emily gets here. Cade, call Emily.” Then he plucked out a pen for himself, dropped onto his hands and knees, and went to work.
Tracing the cartoon wasn’t difficult, but the canvas was so large that it took time.
Cade had divided the original cartoon drawing into twenty-eight segments, then scaled them to perfectly fit the canvas when projected from the eighteen-foot ceiling. They’d trace one segment and then move the canvas and do another.
As they worked, Shay fended off casual-sounding questions from Cade about her background. She’d grown up in Eugene and been placed with foster parents when her mother died, she revealed, and little more. “I have one more year of school, but I can’t do it there,” she said.
“We can fix that,” Twist said. “Cade can come with you.”
Cade said, “Man … you know how I get along with schools.”
“It gets easier the further along you go,” Twist said. “Middleschool is the toughest. High school is easier. College is even easier, and grad school, I’m told, is a walk in the park.”
Twist stood and walked around the canvas, judging the transfer. “It’s gonna work, if Adobe Boy hasn’t messed something up; if it all fits.”
“It’ll fit,” Cade said. “Though if you’d spend a few bucks on decent equipment, it’d be easier.”
“Money, money, money,” Twist said. He sat back down and said to Shay, “Cade doesn’t look like it, but he’s a little rich kid. He’s used to the best equipment.”
“Really,” Shay said. She looked at Cade for a moment and then said, “I can see that. Probably belongs to a country club somewhere.”
“Thrown out of six private schools,” Twist said. “Been to summer school in London, Paris, Rome, Berlin … Madrid, I think.”
“Four schools,” Cade said. “And Istanbul.”
“Ran from the last school. A military school, where they teach kids to march. Showed up here with ten thousand bucks’ worth of computer and camera equipment in a stolen car.”
“Excuse me?” Cade said. “That’d be a stolen Porsche 911 4S.”
“I stand corrected,” Twist said. Back to Shay: “We got the Porsche back to the owner, and Cade’s been our computer guy ever since. He’s almost competent.”
“My brother’s a computer guy,” Shay said to Cade. “Kind of a genius, actually. You have any brothers or sisters?”
“Nada,” Cade said. “My parents realized one was too many and sent me off to boarding school when I was six. The only person who missed me was the nanny they fired.”
“Said his first word in Spanish,” Twist said to Shay. “The nanny was Guatemalan.”
“Yeah, I’m bilingual,” Cade said. “Of course, the schools all wanted French and Latin and screw the Spanish …”
Twist said, “Aw, you’re bringing a tear to my eye. Exiled to a resort for kids where they only taught you French …”
Cade lifted his head and said with a little chill in his voice, “You oughta quit now, Twist, because you’re talking out of your ass. You don’t know.”
After a moment of silence, Twist nodded and said, “You’re right.”
“Dude,” said Cade, and they continued working side by side, following the contours of the drawing with the Sharpies, throwing the pens into a garbage can when they ran out of ink.
They’d been working for forty-five minutes when the door opened and a chubby young woman with a severe black pageboy came in. She was wearing a frilly blouse open to show some cleavage, a short skirt, and white patent-leather boots. She was chewing gum.
“What’s up?” she asked Twist.
Twist, still tracing, said, “Emily—this is Shay. She’s your new roommate and she’s helping us out. She needs to get to Santa Monica to buy equipment for tonight. We wanna borrow your truck.”
“Sure, fifty cents a
He picked up a jar full of new black Sharpies and, handing one to Shay, said, “You can help trace until Emily gets here. Cade, call Emily.” Then he plucked out a pen for himself, dropped onto his hands and knees, and went to work.
Tracing the cartoon wasn’t difficult, but the canvas was so large that it took time.
Cade had divided the original cartoon drawing into twenty-eight segments, then scaled them to perfectly fit the canvas when projected from the eighteen-foot ceiling. They’d trace one segment and then move the canvas and do another.
As they worked, Shay fended off casual-sounding questions from Cade about her background. She’d grown up in Eugene and been placed with foster parents when her mother died, she revealed, and little more. “I have one more year of school, but I can’t do it there,” she said.
“We can fix that,” Twist said. “Cade can come with you.”
Cade said, “Man … you know how I get along with schools.”
“It gets easier the further along you go,” Twist said. “Middleschool is the toughest. High school is easier. College is even easier, and grad school, I’m told, is a walk in the park.”
Twist stood and walked around the canvas, judging the transfer. “It’s gonna work, if Adobe Boy hasn’t messed something up; if it all fits.”
“It’ll fit,” Cade said. “Though if you’d spend a few bucks on decent equipment, it’d be easier.”
“Money, money, money,” Twist said. He sat back down and said to Shay, “Cade doesn’t look like it, but he’s a little rich kid. He’s used to the best equipment.”
“Really,” Shay said. She looked at Cade for a moment and then said, “I can see that. Probably belongs to a country club somewhere.”
“Thrown out of six private schools,” Twist said. “Been to summer school in London, Paris, Rome, Berlin … Madrid, I think.”
“Four schools,” Cade said. “And Istanbul.”
“Ran from the last school. A military school, where they teach kids to march. Showed up here with ten thousand bucks’ worth of computer and camera equipment in a stolen car.”
“Excuse me?” Cade said. “That’d be a stolen Porsche 911 4S.”
“I stand corrected,” Twist said. Back to Shay: “We got the Porsche back to the owner, and Cade’s been our computer guy ever since. He’s almost competent.”
“My brother’s a computer guy,” Shay said to Cade. “Kind of a genius, actually. You have any brothers or sisters?”
“Nada,” Cade said. “My parents realized one was too many and sent me off to boarding school when I was six. The only person who missed me was the nanny they fired.”
“Said his first word in Spanish,” Twist said to Shay. “The nanny was Guatemalan.”
“Yeah, I’m bilingual,” Cade said. “Of course, the schools all wanted French and Latin and screw the Spanish …”
Twist said, “Aw, you’re bringing a tear to my eye. Exiled to a resort for kids where they only taught you French …”
Cade lifted his head and said with a little chill in his voice, “You oughta quit now, Twist, because you’re talking out of your ass. You don’t know.”
After a moment of silence, Twist nodded and said, “You’re right.”
“Dude,” said Cade, and they continued working side by side, following the contours of the drawing with the Sharpies, throwing the pens into a garbage can when they ran out of ink.
They’d been working for forty-five minutes when the door opened and a chubby young woman with a severe black pageboy came in. She was wearing a frilly blouse open to show some cleavage, a short skirt, and white patent-leather boots. She was chewing gum.
“What’s up?” she asked Twist.
Twist, still tracing, said, “Emily—this is Shay. She’s your new roommate and she’s helping us out. She needs to get to Santa Monica to buy equipment for tonight. We wanna borrow your truck.”
“Sure, fifty cents a
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