Oh, um, hmm. That might complicate things for me. Him liking me. And me being crazy.

GET A HOLD OF YOURSELF.

Note the absence of guilty exclamation points. That was my sane voice telling my cray cray ones to shut up.

Sigh.

I needed a lobotomy.

I walked outside into the fresh air hoping that would help clear my head and that Justin was long gone so he wouldn’t think I was stalking him.

I wasn’t stalking him! Was I?

I promise I wasn’t!?!

Where was that lobotomy? I heard you could use an ice pick through the eye socket and it worked fine.

Groanballs.

Anyway, I really hoped Justin wasn’t being nice to me just because he was interested in me. He wasn’t a jerk like Hunter Snakeley, but he was the editor of The Wombat. I didn’t want him fudging the vote in favor of my wombat drawings just because he thought it might make me like him. And I didn’t want him fudging the vote against me if he thought I didn’t like him. I wanted to win fair and square.

Wait, I just remembered Justin had been the one who approached me in the first place last quarter. He’d been drawing stalking me for who knew how long. You didn’t stalk someone you weren’t interested in, did you?

Groan!

Why was my life so complicated?!?

Not guilty!

I swear!

I mean, I swear.

No exclamation points or question marks that time.

The hot yellow sun rolled across the surface of the Pacific Ocean as I parked my VW in the driveway of the Manos house. I walked to the front door with my keys jingling in my hand. I always felt a sense of relief wash over me when I came home. As I was about to slide my keys into the lock of the double front doors, the door was ripped open from the inside.

“Thank god you’re here!” Sophia blurted, standing in the doorway. Sophia was one of Christos’ other models. I’d met her several times before. She had Eastern European eyes and full lips. Normally she was quite beautiful, but at the moment worry cut her face into ragged lines.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, immediately frightened by her panic.

“Christos is passed out,” she said nervously, pulling me into the house, “I didn’t know what to do. I was about to call 911.”

My heart tripped into overdrive. “Is Christos hurt? Did he fall?” He’d been drinking so much lately, I wouldn’t be surprised if he had. I knew drunk people were supposed to be so relaxed they were less likely to get hurt if they fell down or whatever, but that didn’t matter if you fell through a window and landed on shards of glass or off a balcony onto cement.

“Sort of,” Sophia winced.

“Sort of fell?”

She shook her head, obviously worried. “I don’t know how to explain…”

“What happened?” I did my best not to lose my cool.

“Maybe I should show you,” she grimaced.

 I was suddenly thinking Christos had had a seizure and his mouth would be covered with foamy blood. Could alcohol give you seizures? Or was it something worse?

As we stepped into the studio, Sophia said in a low voice, “I think he’s drunk.”

Shit, was that all?

Sure enough, Christos sat slumped over in a chair in front of the painting of Sophia he’d been working on. There was a huge red streak running across the canvas, cutting down the middle of the face and across the chest. A brush loaded with the same red paint dangled from Christos’ hand.

He was snoring.

“He just fell onto the painting while he was working about an hour ago. I’d told him this morning maybe he should stop drinking, but he ignored me. Who was I to complain? I’m just the model, and I need the job.”

I could relate to that.

“I didn’t know who to call,” she said, “and no one else was here. I almost left, but I thought I should stay until someone showed up. I didn’t want him choking on vomit or whatever.”

“Thanks, Sophia,” I said sincerely. “I totally appreciate your hanging around and keeping an eye on him. If you want, you can take off now. I can handle it from here.”

“Oh, uh, I’m supposed to stay and model until six.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said dismissively. “I’ll tell Christos you were here the whole time,” I winked. “Either way, I don’t think he’ll know when you left.”

She nodded nervously. “You’re sure?”

“Yes,” I smiled, “I promise.”

She heaved a huge sigh of relief, “Thank you SO much! I was starting to worry no one would show up and I’d be stuck here until whenever he woke up. I’ve got a photo shoot in L.A. tonight, and with traffic, I’m probably going to be late as it is. If I get a head start now, I might actually make it. Do you need any help moving Christos before I roll?”

Sophia’s arms looked like pencils. Despite her compassion, I didn’t think she would be much help in the lifting department.

“I think I’m going to need a crane,” I joked. “Or I can just wait until he sleeps it off.”

“Totally,” she grinned.

After Sophia left, I took a good look at Christos. I wanted to make sure he kept breathing and didn’t choke on vomit. Considering he was snoring like a saw mill, I think he was fine. But if the saw mill shut down operations, I’d slide him out of the chair and onto his side.

In the meantime, I took the brush with the red paint out of his hand and folded his arms into his lap so he looked more comfortable.

I examined the red streak on Christos’ painting of Sophia. I dabbed at it with my pinky finger. It was oil, so it was still wet. Should I wipe it off? I can’t imagine he’d be mad. It looked like an accident. Considering Sophia said he’d fallen asleep while painting, it probably was.

Unless he’d intended to ruin the painting? Like the way he’d trashed the painting of Isabella the day my parents had arrived? Oh well. I was going to wipe the red off, just in case it was an accident. If he had meant to ruin it, he could ruin it again in the morning with a clear head.

First, I cleaned off the brush with the red paint on it. Then, I found some clean paper towels and carefully wiped away at the red slash until it was completely gone. I stood back from the painting and examined it from a distance.

Good as new.

Then an irrational fear seized me. What if Christos had meant to put that red slash there? What if it was some genius breakthrough he’d finally discovered and I had gone and cleaned it off?

Oh no.

I remembered that Christos had become frustrated with his paintings of all the models and he was trying to find a way to spice them up. What if that red slash was the first step in a new creative direction that I was too dense to fathom? Maybe he’d had a flash of brilliance and decided to combine abstract art with his realistic portraits in a whole new way? Considering I still didn’t know much about the history of art or how new styles and art movements developed, and I didn’t know the first thing about abstract art, it was entirely possible.

Oh no.

What had I done?

Had I erased the only mark of his newfound genius? I didn’t even have a cell phone picture of it in case he wanted a reminder.

Oh no.

I eyed the glob of red paint still on his palette, and the now clean brush that had been loaded with said red paint. Should I load up the brush with more red, try to recreate the red slash, then stick the brush back in his hand?

He’d totally think my red slash was his red slash. I mean, it was just a slash, right?

Who would know the difference?

Who was I kidding. I knew people liked to say that a baby or a monkey could paint abstract art, but I’m pretty sure that was an exaggeration and one abstract artist could tell his or her work from another’s. When Christos sobered up, he was going to recognize that my lame red slash wasn’t his genius red slash.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

My panic level was up to my eyeballs. I was swimming in panic. I needed a panic snorkel or I was going to drown in it.