39. Henry
39
HENRY
Amelie locks the door behind us, and it worries me slightly. “What’s going on?”
“I just remembered something,” she says, sitting at her desk. “Have you gotten any feedback on that security photo? The one from your apartment building?”
I shake my head. “No. Haven’t gotten any word from my dad since he told me about it.”
“Ask him.”
I pull my phone out of my pocket and go to the closet.
Truthfully, I don’t understand how he wouldn’t have found anything yet. Surely there’s a photo of this man somewhere. If it is Jensen, the tattoo should’ve been a problem by now, unless he took care to keep it hidden.
It’s not like I’m gunning for him to be caught. In fact, I’m really hoping for the opposite, because I still don’t believe it’s him. I just want an answer.
My dad picks up on the first ring, right as I close Amelie’s closet door behind me. “Henry!” He says. “So glad you’ve finally gotten cell service.”
I wince. My whole convention lie slipped my mind. I doubt he still believes it, but at least he hasn’t questioned me further.
“Yeah, me too. Anything new?”
“Nothing much,” he says, “other than the fact that I’ve finally found a match to the security photo.”
My stomach bottoms out, but I keep my voice nonchalant. “Oh?”
“It isn’t an exact match,” he amends, and relief tugs at my chest. “It mirrors the hand tattoo—not identically, because half his hand is pocketed, but it’s the closest we’ve got.”
“You don’t have a name or face yet?”
“No. He was looking down at the ground for most of the clip. The footage is from a store security camera that I was able to get ahold of. He’s holding hands with a girl for a portion, then shoves his hand in his pocket.”
“You got footage from a store?” I ask. “That’s random.”
“Well, not really.” He sighs. “The footage didn’t get sent to me because of this search specifically. It got sent to me because you are in it.”
He sends me a photo the moment he stops talking, and my mouth falls open.
It’s from the night I went to Bondi’s. When I spoke to Jensen and Meg on the street. His tattoo is barely visible, and his back is toward the camera, but my face is fully visible.
I can play this off. Small talk is a thing. I could’ve been telling him to tie his shoe, right? That happens.
“I don’t recall speaking to him,” I say coolly. “It was probably something quick. Maybe he dropped something, and I let him know.”
“That would be plausible, if the footage didn’t show you three standing there for four and a half minutes.”
I give an exasperated sigh and hope it sounds annoyed rather than nervous. “I don’t know what you want me to say. I don’t remember this.”
“You don’t recall speaking to anyone on the sidewalk?”
“I talk to a lot of people.” A lie. “I wouldn’t remember someone specific.”
“Do you remember this night, based on the clothes you were wearing? It doesn’t look like what you often wear. Much more casual. And I know you weren’t at the museum, because I was.”
This is where I start to panic.
I can’t tell him the truth. He’ll get the footage from Bondi’s, and Amelie and I will be in serious trouble. I hadn’t even thought about the cameras there, but I also hadn’t anticipated the situation we got ourselves into.
“I was just on a walk,” I say weakly.
He nearly snorts. “At ten at night? In February ? It was snowing, Henry.”
“It helps me get inspired.”
That answer is horrible and untrue, and the likelihood of him believing it is slimmer than this conversation ending in my favor.
“I’m going to be honest, Henry,” he says, voice cold. “I think you’re lying. I think you remember exactly where you were this night.”
“I don’t ?—”
“I think you were meeting with Amelie Benoit.”
Hearing him say her name makes my mind go blank.
“Why—why would you think that?” I ask. “That’s ridiculous.”
He doesn’t take the bait. “Yes or no?”
I don’t know what to do. Anything I say is going to dig my grave deeper, and at this point, I’m unsure of how to get myself out.
He knows. Somehow, he knows, and we go back tomorrow. There’s no time to deal with any of this. So instead of responding, I end the call, save the photo he sent me, and block his phone number.
Not wise, not mature, and most definitely not the best option, but it’s all I can think of.
With shaking hands, I exit the closet. Amelie is still sitting on her bed, typing furiously on her phone while staring at her laptop in front of her. Somehow, she looks totally focused on each individual task. I take a step closer and peek at the screen, nearly jumping back when I see one of my pieces.
Well, not my piece. Gail Branson’s piece. A name I paint under when my dad needs more to display. But why is she looking at it? It’s not popular; it hardly gets attention. If someone were going to snag one of the Gallery’s pieces, I’d never think it to be this one.
“I don’t know what’s up with that,” Amelie says, and it takes me a moment to realize she’s on the phone with someone. “Is it like…obvious?”
“If it were obvious, I probably wouldn’t be confused,” the person on the other end of the phone says. Meg, I think. “But that can be dealt with later.”
Amelie looks up at me and chews on her lip, clearly not worried about me eavesdropping. It would probably feel like a win if I weren’t so focused on what my dad just said, and why my painting is on her laptop screen.
“Just be sure to keep the contact,” Amelie says. “As long as you got it done, I don’t care right now.”
“I’ve got it copied,” Meg returns. “It went smoothly, though, and that’s all I can ask for. Until another problem shows up, I’m leaving it.”
Amelie exhales. “I don’t blame you, Megs. Just wanted to let you know. Nothing’s open, right?”
“Right. Everything is closed now. No worries until you get back.”
“I do carry those with me,” Amelie says, looking back up at me. She pats the bed next to her, inviting me to sit, so I do. “I’ll be back tomorrow. Just keep things under control ‘til then.”
“Will do. Giving Jensen your kindest regards.”
“DON’T. I know he’s slept in my bed.”
Meg chuckles but doesn’t deny the accusation. “Bye, Ames. Happy birthday. Stay out of trouble.”
Amelie returns the sentiment, then hangs up the phone. She lets out a sigh and rubs her eyes, looking tired when she slumps forward. “What did you find out?”
“That piece is mine,” I say, completely not registering what she’s said to me. I’m staring at her computer screen instead. “Gail Branson. That’s one of my aliases.”
Her jaw drops. “Why didn’t you say that when I asked?!”
“Because I think I’m under a contract to not say that.” I shrug. “Why are you looking at it?”
Her face flushes. “Henry, I—we got an offer for that. Meg and Jen moved it the other day.”
I look back at the screen, waiting for a pang of annoyance or anger or something to hit me, but it never does. “That’s us, you know.”
“What?”
“The painting.” I nod toward the screen. “That’s us.”
She squints at the image. I can understand why she doesn’t get it, but I’m telling the truth. It’s based on an old photo of ours, one that her mom took the day of our school’s homecoming. I remember it vividly.
This was before the actual event—we were at her house, about to leave. Amelie’s foot nearly slipped out from under her on a loose rug, and I caught her around the waist before she fully fell. She was cackling when I finally got her upright, and instead of trying to walk again, she leaned into me. I settled my arms around her as she laid her head against my shoulder. I remember the feeling of her smiling against my skin; every time I saw this picture, that’s all I felt.
I changed a lot, of course. The environment, the colors, things like that. But it’s still us.
Maybe I should’ve displayed it under my name, but I wasn’t due for another project yet, and I wanted to get it out there. So I foolishly let it go under an alias.
“I’m sorry, Henry,” Amelie whispers, covering her mouth with her hand. “If I’d known, I would’ve told them no. I’m so, so sorry?—”
“You would’ve told them no?”
A nod. “Yeah. I’m not…” She pauses, like this is painful for her to say. “We’re not taking your work anymore.”
“When did this get decided?”
“When you saved me at Bondi’s,” she says in a low voice. “That night, I made the decision.”
I should be horrified at how easily I believe her words.
“I’m sorry, Henry,” she says again, biting at her lip. “I’ll get it back for you.”
“That isn’t necessary,” I tell her. “It’s fine. It was based on a real photo of ours, and I’ve still got that one.”
She looks back toward the screen. Her eyes dart around the image for a few seconds before she says, “The homecoming one.”
My chest constricts, solely because she remembered.
“Yeah,” I murmur. “That one.”
“I had that photo framed in my room. I loved it.”
I bite back the smile that threatens to form on my face. “I had it in my wallet.”
Amelie’s face softens at that, her lips turning up into an apparent grin. She closes the laptop and sets it behind her. “Hey, did your dad have an answer?”
I drag my eyes away from her lips so I can think. “Yeah. He…found a match from the night we went to Bondi’s. Outside a shop. Jensen’s face wasn’t in it—just the tattoo.”
“Oh, that’s good,” she says, and then she notices the wary look on my face. “Why aren’t you acting like that’s good?”
I look at the ground. “Because I ran into Jensen and Meg that night. So my face was in it.”
“Oh,” she mumbles. “So your dad thinks something is up.”
“He accused me of meeting with you.”
A divot appears between her brows, and she stares at the wall in front of us, contemplating. “I’ll figure something out.”
“It’s not your problem to deal with.”
“No, it kind of is.” She gives a dry laugh. “But I’m not worrying about it until tomorrow. Let’s enjoy our last day of peace, okay? I’m going to eat now.”
She stands, and I follow. Neither of us say anything until we’re back downstairs, where Amelie loudly explains that she had a phone call to make and needed my input.