Page 67 of Handle with Care
On Thursday and Friday, Will’s been playing baller bank guy, dishing out the cash stipends in envelopes to the incoming art couriers. Clearly, that’s his forté as the economist. They’ve come to collect or accompany high-value exhibits from the deinstallation of the previous show to return loans to their home museums or galleries.
Meanwhile, I’ve been helping the exhibition technicians play the match-the-crate game, coordinating the numbers from our exhibition spreadsheet and locations to the actual exhibits, then doing the condition reports alongside the art couriers to satisfy both of our insurers as the objects get packed up to go home or on tour. There’re two teams of techs working at the same time at different ends of the gallery, and I’m back and forth between them, as is Lily. Then Will also joins in the melee, too, when a third tech crew starts. Lily wasn’t kidding when she said it would be all hands on deck in well-timed, synchronized chaos as led by our project manager.
It’s a blur of paperwork and packing materials and people. Friday goes much the same way, except to add to the fun, we now have the incoming exhibits starting to arrive at the third work area. Will and I have barely a chance to talk to each other on either day. We work late on Thursday night and have early starts on Friday. The only good news is we’re due to finish at theusual time tonight, though we’re scheduled to work tomorrow as well as the trade-off. We’re due to meet Gray at a bar along the Thames at 6:00 p.m., which is something I’m looking forward to.
What I don’t expect is Will to come find me in the prep room in the middle of the afternoon when I’ve come to find more packing tape. There’s a box of tape somewhere in here. It’s a blissful moment of peace away from the bustle of the gallery.
“Hey.” My expression softens at the sight of him. He’s in a pale pink-and-white striped shirt, sleeves rolled up. Then I frown slightly because he looks concerned. “How’s it going?”
“Going.” Will nods, looking weary. He runs a hand through his hair, and I fight the temptation to muss up his hair even more. Or to jump him like last Friday night when we had the museum to ourselves. It’s hard to believe that was only a week ago. “I’m wondering if you know where we put the box with the Vivienne Westwood loan.”
I shrug. “It’ll be on the exhibition tracker.”
“Mm, about that.” He gives a surreptitious glance around, though we’re the only ones down here. He lowers his voice. “It’s not.”
“It’s not?” I blink at Will. “What do you mean? Everything’s on the spreadsheet.”
He groans, shaking his head. “I’m telling you, it’s not there.”
“Want me to show you where it is on the spreadsheet?”
“Dylan.” Will fixes me with a stern look. “I know exactly where it should be on the spreadsheet,” he whispers with crisp irritation. “And believe me, it’s not there. Plus, our laptops are up in the gallery.”
“Well, fuck.”
“Shhh.”
I shhh for a moment long enough to frown at him. Will’s turned away, and he has started to hurriedly flip through thebinders that hold the duplicate copies of the transfer receipts for each item we’ve brought in.
“You think it’s in there? The location isn’t going to be?—”
“Please help, Dylan. This is serious.”
“I know it is.” I frown at him, bristling. Then I have to admit to myself it’s truly serious if we can’t find an exhibit. Especially that exhibit. “Is it one part of the collection you can’t find or?—”
“The whole lot.”
“Well, fuck.” I glance up at him from the binder, twisting my mouth. “That’s a problem.”
He gives me a dark look, rolling his eyes. “Rather.”
“Hey. Don’t blame me. Are you blaming me?” I ask, my eyebrows lifting. He can’t seriously be blaming me. “What’s going on here?”
“Keep your voice down.”
I roll my eyes in turn and grab another binder in an effort to appease Will, even though I’m sure it’s going to be futile. There’s no reason the storage location info at the museum would be on the transfer receipt. At any rate, we’ve been filing the paperwork alphabetically by collection. Logically, it should start withVfor Vivienne Westwood, but it could also beWfor Westwood. Shit. The exhibits could also be underCfor clothing orPfor punk collection, now that I think about it.
We hurriedly flip through reams of paper in binders.
“One of us has to go upstairs soon. Lily will wonder where we are if everything grinds to a halt in the gallery without us there,” I point out softly.
Will looks about ready to pull his hair out. I put a hand on his forearm. “Hey.”
His head snaps up as he stares intently at me.
“It’s gonna be okay. It’s just misplaced somewhere. And look. Here’s the receipt.” I turn the page of the binder in front of him. “It should be under ‘We,’ but looks like it’s at the end of theWs.”
Will stares down miserably on the page, turning it back and forth. There’re signatures from both lender and the museum as the recipient, and the date, but nothing about the location in the museum, as I expected. “Shit.”
