“Okay then,” I whisper under my breath, checking the time on my watch.
“Are you too busy for me? Before you go, do something spontaneous and try it out. Write something down. Slip it in. You’ll never forget your first time.”
“Excuse me?” It’s as though I’ve entered an alternate reality made of red webs. Are all people in New York this bossy? First Rooney. Now this person.
“Participate. It’ll be good for you,” she says. “I don’t have any more slips, but I’m sure you have a legal notepad on you or something. You suit types always do.”
“Uh.” I pat around my chest and stomach, reangling the box. It’s a B-minus effort to satisfy this person. I feel the flyers from my coat pocket. “I think I have something?”
“Are you asking me or telling me? Do what you gotta do,” the woman says, tucking her empty sketchbook under her arm and turning to go. She proceeds to tell more people about the installation. If she’s not the artist, then why does she know so much about it? She thinks she’s so clever, believing she’s fooling everyone. She and her work leave an impression, I’ll give her that much.
I reach under the scarf to unclip my pen from my sweater’s neckline. I stare at the back of the yellow Gray’s Papaya flyer featuring their hot dog specials. The squiggle of mustard pops against the mysterious red meat mixture.
I settle on “Fate is the hot dog of the universe.” Maybe there’s a quantum entanglement special committee I can join. Something that aligns more with my interests.
I gently pull one of the red strings back and tuck my flyer in. The yellow flyer stands out against the red.
With a shrug, I reach for the nearest piece of paper without thinking too much about it. I untuck the slip from the string. The handwritten words are loopy and red, as though it was written in a hurry. The word “lophole” is printed at the top. I slip the paper into my wallet.
Now it’s really time to get to the conference. I’ll show the higher-ups who really should’ve gotten that promotion.
Chapter 3
ROONEY
Twenty-five minutes later, I’m back at my installation with my newly printed Fate Notes.
I find Mom with an empty sketchbook in hand.
“Let’s see these babies,” I sing, lifting the box lid. My face drops as Mom laughs.
“You went an entirely different direction, I see,” she says, lifting a pamphlet with a high-resolution image of Mars on the front. “Leaning more into the science aspect?”
I riffle through the pamphlets and frown. “Dave must have mixed this up with another customer’s. This is really well done. I’d hate for it to go to waste.”
Mom slides on her reading glasses and holds the glossy paper up in front of her. “There’s ice on Mars? Who knew.”
“He was busy.” I’m just talking to myself at this point. Mom’s too engrossed in whatever this Mars mission is. “This is kind of perfect, right? Fate’s mix-up giving me the extra dose of science for this installation.”
Mom looks up from the pamphlet and shrugs. “Well, there’s no time to go back now. I’m out of sketchbook paper.”
“Okay. Yeah. This is good. We’re all completely fine. This is a blessing in disguise! Honestly, I wish I had thought of it,” I say. I track down Talia and signal for her to distribute the new Fate Noteswhile I stay hidden. Mom and I stroll along the winding string path, where there are more empty stretches of red than I’d prefer to see.
“How was it when I was gone? I see some white paper, but not as much as I expected,” I whisper, my forehead scrunched so intensely, I can see the edges of my eyebrows.
“You’re opening yourself up to new audiences, I’ll say that,” she says vaguely.
A shiny green gum wrapper catches my eye. “Oh no. It’s official. I’ve created the world’s most beautiful garbage net.” I pluck the wrapper from the string, confirm that there are no words written on the back, and crumple it between my thumb and pointer fingers.
“Somewhere a piece of gum just felt that,” Mom jokes.
I take a deep breath in, then out.
“You can’t be here right now,” Mom adds. “This has to exist on its own without your constant monitoring. That’s art, baby. You gave it to the world when you created it. It’s no longer yours.”
Out of nowhere, a loud truck screeches to a stop outside the Washington Arch. Six men in bright yellow construction vests with shears in their hands march toward my installation. One rushes up toEntangledand opens the scissors like he’s about to make a cut.
I run over to them, waving my arms in the air. “Stop!” I shout.
