The Art Forger Read Online Free PDF Page B

in his hand. I used to try to joke with him about this, but it failed miserably, so now I wait for each question and give him the answers he already knows in a patient monotone. Sometimes it’s hard to keep a straight face.
    “Claire Roth.”
    “173 Harrison Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts.”
    “Art teacher.”
    “Arthur Marcus, Director, Art DYS.”
    “Green East.”
    He checks his notes and glares at me as if I, too, have committed a crime. “GE 107,” he barks. That’s the room I always use. Maybe the kids would do better if someone in this place actually had a sense of humor.
    I wend my way through the serpentine corridors, contending with a countless number of thick, heavy doors. Press the button, look up and smile at the camera, wait and hope that whoever’s running central unit today isn’t a jerk. In the past, I’ve waited up to ten minutes to be buzzed in, and I can only imagine the satisfaction at central as they watched me shifting from foot to foot.
    I found out the hard way that they can both see and hear you. One afternoon, when I first started coming here, I made the mistake of muttering something under my breath about the asshole who wouldn’t open the door. Not very smart. Turns out the asshole is the great and powerful Oz behind the Beverly Arms curtain, and she never forgets a slight. I hope she’s not in charge today. The buzzer sounds, and, relieved, I pass through the door, which slams and echoes behind me. I’m stopped in twenty steps by yet another door.
    As I head into the last leg of my trip to GE 107, I would be happy to be accompanied by the great and powerful Oz. I walk through the isolation unit, my eyes forward, and try to block out the screams of the angry boys being held in the cells lining the hallway. Some are detoxing, and others are “beefing” with each other through the cracks at the bottoms of their doors, continuing the fights from the streets that got them on this hallway in the first place.
    Everything in here is painted that sick pea-green always associated with institutions. Does blue cost any more than green? Or how about a cheery yellow? When I first started doing this, I thought maybe the walls were green because it was the green block. But no. Turns out the entire place is the color of decomposing vegetables. That’s what gave me the mural idea: Maybe losing some of the green would help the kids. I’m told the recidivism rate is at 73 percent. There’s not much to lose.
    The deal on the mural is that each kid has to draw something from the outside that he misses using charcoal on newsprint; pens and pencils aren’t allowed because they have sharp points that can be used as weapons. When the drawings are finished, we’re going to project them on the wall of the dayroom, trace them, then paint them. Good-bye rotting veggies.
    I don’t tell the boys what to draw or make any judgments about its value. I don’t even give them pointers on technique unless they request it. My theory is that the boys—“youths,” as they’re always referred to in here—have lots of art inside them and that my job is to give them materials and let it rip. Xavier is drawing one hundred cans of beer, and Christian is doing a remarkably good sketch of a needle and a dime bag of heroin. All I ask is that they work during class and remain true to themselves. The kids have no problem with the latter. They’re burning to express their own private truths.
    The boys are led into the room by a social worker I haven’t seen before. Burnout is common, and it’s easy to see why. There are only ten boys today, down from thirteen last time. One is new. Four missing. I don’t ask where they are, as I don’t ask what they’ve done to get themselves in here. I don’t want to know.
    I say hi to Jonathan, Xavier, Sean, Johan, Christopher, Reggie, Brian, Christian, and Andres. Most of them respond appropriately. The new social worker, Kimberly Deeny, introduces herself and Manuel, a