Free Marked by Norah McClintock Page B

wasn’t for my mom, who has to leave for work at six, I never would have got up. She didn’t just hammer on my door. No, she came right on in and shook me awake.
    â€œI left you a lunch. It’s in the fridge,” she said. She was smiling. She had been thrilled when I told her I had a job. That meantI wouldn’t be pestering her for money all summer. “What time do you think you’ll be home?”
    My job started at six thirty and went to three, including a half hour for lunch. I was supposed to report back to the garage with my work sheet at the end of the day.
    â€œProbably three thirty,” I said.
    â€œI’ll call you when I finish my shift,” my mom said. “You can tell me how it went.”
    After she left, I almost rolled over and went back to sleep. But my mom’s happy face swam in front of my eyes. My mom had it tough. She had me when she was just seventeen. She and my dad got married, but then my dad got sick. He died when I was eight. My mom worked two jobs for a long time. She cut back to one when I started getting into trouble. She thought if she was home more, that would make a difference. It did. It made me want to stay clear of the apartment as much as possible. The last time I got into trouble, I thought her heart would break. When she came down to the police station, she had the same look on herface as she did the night she woke me up to tell me my dad was gone.
    That’s when she decided she needed help too. She got some kind of grant, and now, in addition to working, she was studying to be a dental hygienist. She had six months to go. She said things would be better for us once she got a decent job. She was really excited about it. She said as soon as she got established, she’d get art lessons for me if I promised to stay out of trouble. And, I don’t know, with her being happy and with the new art teacher telling me I had a good eye, I wanted things to be okay for a change. I didn’t want any more trouble. So I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the bed.
    I got to the garage right on time. Ray was already there, sitting behind his desk with the phone in one hand, a mug of coffee in another and half a cruller on a paper napkin in front of him. He covered the mouthpiece with one hand and told me to see someone named Stike.
    Stike turned out to be a large husky guy in coveralls and work boots. He was checking out the girl-in-a-bikini picture that one of the newspapers ran every day.
    â€œYou the new cleanup guy?” he said, looking up from the newspaper like he hoped I’d say no so he could go back to staring at the girl.
    I nodded.
    He sighed, put down the newspaper and heaved himself off the creaky chair. The concrete floor of the garage seemed to tremble as if Godzilla was marching across it. When he reached the floor-to-ceiling metal shelves on the far side, he started pulling down spray bottles.
    â€œYou use this to get the graffiti off the poles,” he said, handing me a bottle and a bunch of rags. “Don’t monkey around with this stuff,” he said. “You fool around and get this in your eyes, you’ll need one of those seeing-eye dogs to get around.”
    He handed me a second spray bottle. “After you get the graffiti off, wait a few minutes until the surface is dry and thenspray this on. This makes it easier to get the graffiti off the next time.”
    â€œThe next time?” I said.
    â€œYou don’t think taggers are going to give up just because you clean up after them, do you?” he said.
    I’d never really thought about it.
    â€œIf it’s a utility pole or control box, it comes off,” Stike said. “I don’t care if they’re pieces or burners—if they’re on electric or phone company property, they’re gone. Anything on city or private property, that’s someone else’s problem. You got that? The utility companies are not paying you to