Chapter Text
(1994)
The report card landed on the kitchen table in front of Shawn with a smack. “An F in art class? Really?” Henry Spencer demanded.
His son looked up sullenly from a lukewarm plate of mac and cheese. “So? You said it was a waste of time when I signed up. You called it, and I believe I’m quoting directly here, ‘a softball course for brain-dead hippies’.”
“Which it is. Getting an A, hell, a D, should have been easy.” Henry sat down and tapped the bright red F accusingly. “Unless you didn’t even bother showing up.”
Shawn glared at his plate. “When did you start caring about anything other than my future as a super-cop? Am I supposed to be busting perps with my knowledge of the color wheel?”
“You never know what might come in handy. I was called into a major investigation up in LA this year around an art theft, I know I told you about that. We had to track down several million dollars worth of—”
Shawn met his father’s eyes again and Henry stopped. He could tell he was losing him, both in this conversation and in so many other ways.
“Shawn. It’s not about what you’d be doing in that class, supergluing macaroni to construction paper or who knows what. It’s about showing even a little self-discipline. You’re filling your schedule with blow-off classes and then failing them anyways. Anything can be an art, even detective work. But that takes care and commitment, two things that you, for some reason, seem incapable of.”
“I know, dad.” Shawn set down his fork with a plaintive sigh. “It’s been a tough school year, alright? And I don’t see Gus that much anymore, so when he told me he was taking this class, I had to sign up. But then he got stuck in a different section, and… without Gus there, I just didn’t see the point.”
For a long moment, Henry was silent, studying his son’s face. Then he shook his head.
“Nice try, kid. You’ve gotten better at lying your ass off, but I’m your father, and I do talk to Gus’ parents sometimes. You’re never gonna pull one over on me.”
Shawn took his fork and stabbed his macaroni with renewed frustration. “Maybe someday. Maybe lying to you is going to be my art.”
Henry Spencer laughed as he stood to leave. “You know what they call people who practice their lies? Con artists. Trust me, Shawn. If you don’t have what it takes to be a cop, you definitely don’t have what it takes to be a con man.”
* * *
(2009)
“Ah, dear familiar Santa Barbara Museum of Art,” Shawn Spencer said, strolling up the stairs to the main entrance wearing a Transformers: The Movie t-shirt and preemptively applied expression of boredom. “Location of class field trips taken in the years 1987, 1988, 1989, 1989 again, 1990, and 1992. Remind me, Gus. Why are we—two handsome young men perfectly capable of talking to women—here, again, of our own free will?”
“You know they rotate out the exhibits, Shawn,” Gus said. Shawn’s best friend was wearing a crisp yellow button-down and familiar expression of mild exasperation. “I’m here because they happen to have some privately held works by Manet on loan this week only. You’re here because you followed me into the car while describing the plot of an episode of Baywatch. That I've already seen, by the way.”
“I was on a roll, okay? Also: I believe it’s pronounced ‘Monet’.”
“That’s a different guy, Shawn.”
“Mmm, I’ve heard it both ways.”
“You’ve ‘heard it both ways’ because they’re entirely different people.”
“You can’t just change one letter of a famous painter’s name and pretend it’s someone I’ve never heard of, Gus.”
Part of friendship with Shawn was knowing when to stop taking the bait. Gus shook his head and continued his beeline towards the banner which read Characters Welcome: The Personalities of Early Modernist Realism.
“Why don’t we go see if they still have those comic book paintings?” Shawn suggested as he trailed behind, transparently attempting to play to his best friend’s interests. “Those were cool.”
“Of course you like that hack Lichtenstein,” Gus countered, unimpressed. “You know those paintings are basically all uncredited tracings of the work of underpaid Golden Age comic artists, right?”
“They have style, Gus. This stuff–” Shawn gestured to the paintings lining the gallery’s walls. “This is good, and good is boring. We have cameras and Photoshop now. ‘Realism’ is basically obsolete.”
“You’re obsolete.” The quality of Gus’ comebacks always dropped off as his irritation increased. “Why don’t you go find a painting to go all Cameron Frye at before you get us banned from yet another fine Santa Barbara institution?”
“There’s your mistake, Gus. You’ve always been the Cameron Frye of the two of us.” Shawn’s tone was lighthearted, but his expression was slightly pained.
“Look,” he continued, a little quieter. “You know I basically have a camera in my brain. We’ve been here for maybe thirty seconds, and I’ve already memorized every painting in here including accompanying text and placement in the room. There’s a reason I prefer my images moving.” He paused. “Wow, they really spelled ‘Monet’ wrong on all these plaques.”
“Which is more likely, Shawn: that they made the same typo all over the museum, or that Claude Monet and Édouard Manet are in fact different people and you’re an idiot?”
Shawn pursed his lips. “The option where I get to be right?”
“Nobody actually has a photographic memory,” said a new voice.
Shawn and Gus turned to see a trim blonde woman, seemingly around their age. She stood facing the largest painting in the room, an intense look on her face and a drawing pad in her hand.
“I do,” Shawn said, unfazed.
“Eidetic memory only occurs in children.” Mystery woman kept laying down careful pen lines as she spoke, not looking up at them. Shawn noted her heavy-duty black boots, dark jeans with oddly dusty knees, and nondescript zip-up jacket. “You can’t rely on it long-term. You have to use tools to fill in the gaps. Notes. Mnemonics. Methods of loci.”
Shawn got the strange feeling that she was repeating someone else’s advice back to him. “Try me,” he said.
She finally turned and narrowed her eyes at him. “Okay. How many–” He half expected her to say hats. “–people are in the painting behind you?”
Shawn closed his eyes. “Ten. Nine if you don’t count the baby. If you’re the type that thinks pets are people too, eleven, little boy dog, bottom right corner.” He pointed, still not opening his eyes. “Five people are facing left, three people are facing right, and two people, one of which is the baby, are facing away.”
He visualized the painting his blonde interrogator had been facing (portrait of a young woman in a voluminous old-timey dress, facing left) and decided to throw her a bone. “Your turn: how many people are in the painting behind you?”
She laughed like she thought the question was funny. “Why would I need to know that?”
Shawn opened his eyes and glanced at the pad in her hand. It was a seemingly abstract pattern of rectangles and lines with no resemblance to any painting in the room. Huh.
“I agree,” Shawn said, changing tacks smoothly. “Who cares about paintings when the real works of art are standing in the room with you? Shawn Spencer, psychic detective. And this is my good friend, Guster Von Gogh. No relation.” Gus waved.
Instead of introducing herself in turn, blondie stared at Shawn like she was trying to drill holes in him with her eyeballs. “Psychic?” she echoed.
“Yes, psychic. It’s a rare gift, I know, and subject to much skepticism. A bit like my photographic memory. Sometimes I even suspect the two are related.” Gus elbowed him in the ribs, which Shawn pretended not to notice.
The woman’s expression unexpectedly turned up several more notches on the scary scale. “You should be ashamed of yourself,” she whispered loudly. “You liar.”
Shawn raised his hands. “Wow! Okay! I’m sensing that you’ve had bad experiences with fake psychics in the past, or are perhaps a devoted fan of The Mentalist. But I assure you that my powers are very real, and I’ve solemnly sworn to use them only for good.”
She relaxed a tiny bit, curiosity getting the better of her. “Good? Like what?”
“Well,” Gus chimed in proudly, “We’re consultants for the Santa Barbara PD, and—”
This turned out to be the exact wrong thing to say. Normally Shawn might not have minded 5’8 of scary blonde getting up in his personal space, but the vibes were suddenly majorly murdery and he’d always imagined dying in a dramatic action sequence on a rooftop somewhere, not a failed social interaction in a museum.
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” she hissed. “How do you sleep at night?”
“Um, usually on my left side, three blankets, extra pillow under my right arm?” Shawn’s attempts to back away were being blocked by Gus’ attempts to hide behind him. “Is this a trick question?”
“Woah! Alice! Hey!” The person who swooped in to save Shawn from certain mauling was a young Black man, taller and—Shawn was willing to admit it—handsomer than Gus or maybe even himself. “What’s going on here?”
“That guy said he’s a psychic,” Alice said, shooting them a look that could probably paralyze small mammals. “For the police. He’s lying, right?”
“We know psychics aren’t real, little mama,” her friend agreed placatingly. “But we don’t want to cause any trouble, alright? Just ignore him.”
Shawn was staring at Alice with a look in his eye that his best friend recognized as the frantic whirring of mental gears. One hand flew to the side of his head.
“Oh, no,” Gus whispered.
Shawn raised his other hand into the air and closed his eyes.
“Do not,” Gus warned.
“I…” Shawn began.
“Not here, and not now,” Gus hissed.
“I am having a psychic vision!” Shawn announced at maximum volume.
Alice, her friend, everyone else in the gallery, and some people standing outside in the hall all stared at him. Gus did his best to look like he’d never met this man before in his life, but since his strategy was to not look at Shawn, it wasn’t very convincing.
“A voice is speaking to me!” Shawn wailed. “Begging for help! She can’t move. Not a muscle, not a finger. Frozen in time like Charlie the iceman, awaiting rescue by that actor Timothy Whateverhisnameis. Why can’t she move? Why?”
Slowly, long-sufferingly, Gus asked, “Is it because she’s in a painting?”
Shawn paused, looking thoughtful. “Oh, probably, Gus. Good thinking.” Then he threw an arm over his eyes and returned to the theatrics. “She knows she is in danger. A hand approaches. A thieving hand, meaning to kidnap her! She begs for our attention and protection! Who are you, sweet damsel in distress?” His free arm reached out, groping, as he stumbled around. “Cry out to me, and I will find you! Here—no, here—no—yes!”
He finally staggered up to the foot of the woman in yellow, collapsed to his knees, and placed his searching hand directly on her gilded frame.
That was probably what set the gallery alarm off.