The Book of Masks (Vol. 1)

Another Story From Cindy

Previously: "The Price of Progress" 

You get a text from Carson on the way into school the next morning, telling you to meet him at a donut shop on the way in. But if you were expecting to be treated to an extra breakfast, you are disappointed. He and James (who is with him) are waiting in the parking lot, and just want to know if you've completed your part of the mission yet.

"I'll let you know when I do," you tell them with all the vocal annoyance you can muster. "Jeez, you can't just expect me—"

"It's not hard, Prescott," Carson snaps. "All you gotta do—"

"I know what I gotta do! But I have to talk to Cindy, and that is kind of hard to do. She doesn't like to be seen with me, or something."

"Like that makes her a special case. And you don't have to meet up with her, you can text her and—"

"It's easiest if I talk to her. Besides, it'll be more convincing. I can't just text her up out of the blue and talk to her about her boyfriend!"

"Well, don't waste any time," Carson tells you, and he jams a stiff finger into your chest. James glowers at you from beside him.

* * * * *

You were kindof-sortof expecting to hear from Cindy, but it's Jenny who pops up at your locker before classes to tell you that Cindy wants to meet you after school at the Crystal Cave. "She could text me, you know," you inform Jenny, for you're in a mood to feel insulted.

"I think she doesn't want Seth finding your name in her messages. You don't either," Jenny reminds you. "God, Will, do you know what you're doing?"

"What do you think I'm doing?" you retort.

Jenny looks doubtful. "I'd say the two of you are being study buddies, but it's a weird look."

"Me and Cindy do have the same math class."

Jenny makes a face. "I've heard about your grades, Will. You can't tutor Cindy, and Cindy wouldn't tutor you."

You slam your locker shut, and tell Jenny to tell Cindy that you'll see her later. Fuck you, is the subtext to your message, though.

* * * * *

You're nursing a coffee when Cindy staggers into the Beanfield, twenty minutes after you arrived. She doesn't apologize but with staring eyes and a pale gasp drops into the booth across from you. "Do you have that book here with you?" she asks in a voice filled with horror.

"No," you warily reply. "It's at home."

She groans. "Can you go get it?"

"Sure, I guess." You get up. "You know, you could've asked me while I was at school, instead of waiting until I—"

She grabs your wrist in a claw-like hand. "Bring all the other stuff back with you too!" She closes her eyes and nurses her temple in her hand.

You feel your own eyes widen with alarm, but hurry out and race home.

Cindy is still at the coffee shop when you get back, waiting with a haggard but hopeful expression when you get back, and she grabs the book from you. She mumbles to herself as she leafs through it. "Which one is the spell that made that metal thingie you showed me yesterday?"

"The next to the last one. Well, the next to the last one you can—" You break off as Cindy flips to the page and yanks out her cell phone. But she only moans after she's translated it. "Of all the— There has to be a way!" she hisses to herself.

"A way to what?"

But she doesn't answer, and flips back to the earlier spells. "If you tell me what you're looking for," you inform her, "I might could maybe help you find it."

She finds it on her own, though, eventually, and presses a stiff finger into the page under a particular passage. "God, please, let this work," she mutters as she grips her temple with her free hand. Reading off the page, she mutters to herself under her breath, and pulls at her forehead. Nothing happens, and with sobs that come quicker and harder she tries again and again, murmuring some phrase in a strange language while trying (it looks like) to peel her own forehead off.

At last she succeeds at something. Her hand comes away, she sways, and face plants into the book. You check to see that she's alright. Though her nose looks pink and a little smushed, there seems to be no damage, but she is also asleep.

In her hand, when you pry it open, is a metal band.

It looks like the metal band that you made the night before last—it's the same size and shape and sheen—but you let out a little gasp when you turn it over. The runes have vanished, and in their place are some fiery blue letters that seem to float just over the surface: CATHERINE DENISE MUSKOV.

* * * * *

"I walked off with it yesterday," Cindy says when she's recovered and is restoring herself with a cup of coffee. "And I had it in my pocket—I don't know why—last night when me and Seth went over to Catherine's. And I was talking with Catherine, it was just her and me for a bit up in her bedroom, and I don't what came over me but I just wanted to see ... what would happen ..."

Her grimace deepens. "It's like I couldn't help myself, but I took the thing out and slapped it onto her forehead!"

You suck in a deep breath, but say nothing.

"It was like with the mask. It's like it sank into her and she fell unconscious. There were all kinds of people there so I was panicked. Michael even tried to come in once, but I managed to push him off, told him Catherine was in the bathroom. The thing came out of Catherine, and I bolted and ran."

She's breathing hard, and her eyes are staring.

"Will," she says in a tiny voice. "I'm not a bad person."

"No. No you're not," you assure her. "You just wanted to see what would happen. This stuff is—"

"No! Will! Because I tried it out! On myself!" Cindy's mouth widens into a silent scream. "You saw, didn't you?"

You lick your lips, and nod.

"I wanted to— Well, I remembered what you said, about how you think the thing copies, like, thoughts and memories. And last night, as I was getting ready for bed— Oh, I guess I was just being nosy! But I couldn't help it! I wanted to see what would happen, so I—" She sniffles, and falls silent.

"So you— What? Put it on your forehead?" you ask. Cindy nods, unhappily. "And what happened?"

Cindy sighs. "You were right," she says. "When I woke up, it's like I knew everything that Catherine knew." She slumps back in her booth.

You don't press her, and just wait for her to speak. When she does, it comes out haltingly, in dribs and drabs.

"At first it was like an echo. Like deja vu. I thought I remembered something, then I thought— No, that never happened to me. But then I was sure it was.

"Then it was like I was remembering people I knew. Except I didn't know them. I knew lots about them. But I'd never heard of them before."

She presses the heel of her hand into an eye.

"And then it all seemed to come together. Like it was being pulled together. And I felt ... Her. Another girl. She was inside my head and I—"

She writhes in place. "And I was her," she says. "Or she was me. Inside me. Trying to be me.

"It was creepy," she goes on. "It scared me. Like, who was I? Really. Was I ... me? Or was I ... her? Was I—?" She covers her face with her hands and mutters indistinctly into her fingers.

She's silent for a long time, and her face is red and streaked with tears when she lowers her hands. But she has mastered herself, and speaks in a low, firm tone.

"It got better after that. It was like she was inside me, but it was like she was a ... a brain I could borrow. An extra brain I could think with. To think her thoughts with. It even got—" A sickly smile comes to her face. "A little fun. Like, I could pretend I was Catherine, but I was ... in ... my body. Oh God!" She twists with embarrassment.

"Anyway, I went to bed soon after that, and I just thought, Okay, I'll sleep like this and then tomorrow morning I'll ... I'll take it off." She winces. "That's when I realized I didn't know how to.

"Oh, God," she groans. "I had a horrible night. I couldn't sleep. Like, what if there wasn't any way to get Catherine out of my head? What if I came down with, like, schizophrenic multiple-personality thingie? I guess I did fall asleep eventually, 'cos I did wake up, and I felt a little better. But today was just wretched for me, trying to get through it. Scared that I would have to be this way forever."

"Well, we did get you out of it," you tell her. "So it's all okay."

It seems like a tasteless thing to say, and you expect Cindy to snap at you. But instead, a little smile comes to her face. After a long moment, she says. "Yes, it's okay. And you know what?" She flinches a little, but the smile remains. "Now that I know how to get out of it, it was kind of fun."

* * * * *

Having unburdened herself, Cindy recovers very quickly, and within a few minutes is deriding herself as a drama queen. She even becomes inquisitive about the metal strip, and how it works, and how it could fit together with the masks.

"You can put them together," you inform her. "The last spell in there makes a kind of glue you can use to glue this thing into a mask. I didn't do it yet, but I did make the glue. It was easy."

Cindy sets the metal strip inside the mask, which you brought with you along with the other stuff. She turns it over and studies the faces it contains.

"Do you want to try it out?" she asks you.

Next: "The New Girl in Your Life" 

*
"Table of Contents (Vol. 1)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 1)"