cheek and would wade into more battles.
In the morning, after she drove him to school, she would paint over the
graffiti. As before, some of the neighbors would probably help.
Multiple coats were required over the affected areas because their
house was a pale yellow-beige.
Even so, it was a temporary repair, because the spray paint had a
chemical composition that ate through the house paint. Over a few
weeks, each defacement gradually reappeared like spirit writing on a
medium’s tablet at a seance, messages from souls in hell.
In spite of the mess on her house, her anger faded. She didn’t have
the energy to sustain it. These last few months had worn her down.
She was tired, so very tired.
Limping, she reentered the house by the back garage door and locked up
after herself. She also locked the connecting door between the garage
and the kitchen, and punched in the activating code to arm the alarm
system again.
SECURE.
Not really. Not ever.
She went upstairs to check on Toby. He was still sound asleep.
Standing in the doorway of her son’s room, listening to him snore, she
understood why Anson Oliver’s mother and father had been unable to
accept that their son had been capable of mass murder. He had been
their baby, their little boy, their fine young man, the embodiment of
the best of their own qualities, a source of pride and hope, heart of
their heart. She sympathized with them, pitied them, prayed that she
would never have to experience a pain like theirs–but she wished they
would shut up and go away.
Oliver’s parents had conducted an effective media campaign to portray
their son as a kind, talented man incapable of what he was said to have
done. They claimed the Uzi found at the scene had not belonged to
him.
No record existed to prove he had purchased or registered such a
weapon. But the fully automatic Micro Uzi was an illegal gun these
days, and Oliver no doubt paid cash for it on the black market. No
mystery about the lack of a receipt or registration.
Heather left Toby’s room and returned to her own. She sat on the edge
of the bed and switched on the lamp.
She put down the revolver and occupied herself with the contents of the
three wallets. From their driver’s licenses, she learned that one of
the boys was sixteen years old and two were seventeen. They did,
indeed, live in Beverly Hills.
In one wallet, among snapshots of a cute high school-age blonde and a
grinning Irish setter, Heather found a two-inch-diameter decal at which
she stared in disbelief for a moment before she fished it out of the
plastic window. It was the kind of thing often sold on novelty racks
in stationery stores, pharmacies, record shops, and bookstores, kids
decorated school notebooks and countless other items with them. A
paper backing could be peeled off to reveal an adhesive surface. This
one was glossy black with embossed silver-foil letters: ANSON OLIVER
LIVES.
Someone was already merchandising his death. Sick. Sick and
strange.
What unnerved Heather most was that, apparently, a market existed for
Anson Oliver as legendary figure, perhaps even as martyr.
Maybe she should have seen it coming. Oliver’s parents weren’t the
only people assiduously polishing his image since the shootout.
The director’s fiancee, pregnant with his child, claimed he didn’t use
drugs any more. He’d been arrested twice for driving under the
influence of narcotics, however, those slips from the pedestal were
said to have been a thing of the past. The fiancee was an actress, not
merely beautiful but with a fey and vulnerable quality that ensured
plenty of TV-news time, her large, lovely eyes always seemed on the
verge of filling with tears.
Various film-community associates of the director had taken out
full-page ads in The Hollywood Reporter and Daily Variety, mourning the
loss of such a creative talent, making the observation that his
controversial films had angered a lot of people in positions of power,
and suggesting that he had lived and died for his art.
The implications of all this were that the Uzi had been planted on him,