The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

Dane, Gelded

Previously: "A Reunion of Fakes" 

Gordon Black—who is actually Dane Matthias—doesn't immediately reply to your offer to give him his life back. You ask him again: "What do you think, man? Switch back?"

"Yeah, sure," he says, though he sounds unsure.

"Something wrong?"

"Well—" He squirms in his seat. "Yeah, okay."

"There's something wrong? Something you want to tell me?"

He gives you a couple of quick, sidelong glances. Then, in a rush, he says, "You know, I ain't never got laid as much as since, uh—"

"Oh." Yeah, that makes sense, you think.

So you nudge him. "That's cool," you say. "That's great. Is that what's eating you? You don't want the pussy to dry up?"

He shrinks down in his side of the car, which is hard for him, as he's a burly six-and-a-half feet of muscle. "Yeah?" he says in a small voice.

"That's okay. Tell you what, we can share. Yeah!" you continue as he sits up. "We can switch off. I can be you and you can be me. On weekends, how about that? Or I'll let you be me on, oh, every other Saturday, so you can go out and—"

"You'd do that for me?"

His shout sets your head ringing. "Sure," you tell him. "You're my bud, you took care of things for me while I was taking a vacation."

"Oh, no, I wasn't taking care of nothing for you, I fucked things up—!"

He protests all the way back to the trailer. But you can tell that he is gleeful at the thought of getting a share of Gordon Black's sex life while still getting to live his own.

* * * * *

The switchover takes place in the car while you're parked in front of Dane's trailer. It's an intricate affair, as you have to get Gordon's mask off of Dane, then while he is conked out you place one of the unused brain bands on his forehead. When that's done, you glue that brain band into Gordon's mask—to make a mask that looks like Gordon but has Dane's memories and personality—then seal it all up again with a golem paste that enslaves it to your will. You pop it back onto Dane before he wakes, so that it is Gordon sits up. "What was that?" he asks, but you tell him to be quiet and sit still.

You then crawl into the back seat and pull Dane's mask off yourself. You're out for what feels like half the night before you groggily wake (but your phone says you were only out for the usual ten minutes), and then you make "Gordon," who is giving you very puzzled looks, sits still while you take his face off again. Onto the real Dane, with his shaggy mop of hair, goes the mask of robo-Dane, with his buzz cut. Robo-Dane, upon materializing in the front seat, turns around and blinks a couple of times at you. "Huh," he says.

"You know what's going on?"

He stares a moment, then says, "I think so. You—" He points to the mask of Gordon, which you are holding. "That's Gordon—"

"Right."

"But I— No, I guess it was you," he corrects himself. "You put the stuff in it and put it on Dane, to keep him quiet."

"And so he wouldn't see it was me when I took the mask off."

"Right. And then you put—" He touches his face gingerly, and rubs his hand over his buzz cut. "You put my face back onto Dane?"

"You got it."

"So what are you going to do with Gordon's mask?"

"Don't you know?"

He shrugs. "I know what I was doing, boss, but don't ask me what I was thinking. Does it have to do with those guys that—" He glances around with a fearful expression. "Came around to see me?"

"Yep. So make yourself scarce tomorrow. Go out to the Wilderness or someplace. Don't go to school, and don't come back until you hear from me."

"When will that be?"

"Tomorrow afternoon, I hope."

"And who will I hear from?"

"One of those guys that was out here today."

He blanches.

* * * * *

You give Dane the keys to the car and tell him to drive you back to Shep Tsosie's while you finish the change. During that drive you lay down in the back and put the Gordon/Dane-mask on. You are dizzy and discombobulated and a little carsick when you wake, and for a minute or two all you can do is meditate on the fucking fine weed that Maize scored. But by the time Dane pulls up in front of Maize's shack, you have recovered a sense of yourself. You're still woozy and a little giggly, though, as you clamber from the back of the car, and you get a massive head rush as you raise yourself to your full height of six-and-a-half feet.

You grin inanely to yourself as you look down at your meaty hands—They're like baseball mitts! you marvel—and sway on your tree-trunk legs. This is so awesome this will never stop being awesome, I'm so freaking big! You wheel to lean in through the passenger side window to address Dane. "Thanks for the ride, bruh, I'll talk to you later and don't forget what I told you!"

"I won't, boss," he says, and pulls away. You stumble back toward Maize's front door.

There's soft music playing inside, a Mexican tune with guitars and a wailing tenor. But there's voices, too. It must be Justin Roth and whoever he found to come out on this Tuesday night. Justin was going to come out anyway, and Dane told him to bring people out with him. You lean against the doorframe before going in, trying to center your brain. You want to be "Dane"—the goofball who says he's Dane even though he looks like Gordon—but you don't want to be so "Dane-like" that you do something stupid. After you think you've found the spot—a head full of a light, giggle-inducing haze, like laughing gas—you bust in through the door with a roar.

"This is the fucking po-lice!" you shout, "And all you are—" Then you force yourself to dissolve into a shower of giggles.

It's only a small crowd, and they all round on you with terror on their faces. Even after they see it's only you, they look pale and scared. "Jesus Christ!" Justin gasps. He's perched atop the back of Maize's ratty sofa, his eyes bulging at you. "I fucking thought—!" He grabs his chest and topples backward, disappearing behind the sofa. There's a thump, and from the floor comes a roar of asthmatic laughter.

Besides Justin there's Shep "Maize" Tsosie, standing in the narrow space between the sofa and kitchen; Kyle Kent, a muscle-y skateboarder with long, coarsely cut blonde hair and a face like a chimpanzee; Brianna Gould, a skinny party girl with stringy red hair and way too much face powder; and Adrian Semple, a stoner with shoulder-length dreadlocks the color and texture of a filthy mop.

"Dane!" Adrian cries. "Dane!" shouts Kyle. Brianna grins in puzzlement at them. "What was that thing Gordon wanted to talk about?" Maize asks.

"Ah, he was just runnin' short on weed," you improvise. "Wanted to know if I had any extra. Rrrggh!" You growl down at Brianna, and scoop her up with a squeal into your arms. She seems astonishingly light, and you have to remind yourself that it's because you're astonishingly strong. "Who's little girl is this?" you ask as she laughs and shrieks in your arms. "And are they doing anything with her now?" You play-snap and play-bite and play-kiss at her face and neck as she thrashes with delight.

You fall onto the sofa, so heavily that something inside it seems to snap—which would be unlucky, because that's where you will be sleeping tonight—and cradle Brianna. "Mmmmm!" You kiss her for real, and she kisses you back. "Miss me?"

"I didn't know you were going to be here!"

"Then why'd you come out? The only reason—" You pinch her hips and thighs. "For you. Or anyone. Any girl. To come out here. Is me!"

"Stop it," she shrieks through her laughter. "Stop it!"

It's Dane's Dane-as-Gordon act you've fallen into, almost without realizing it. Dane has told a lot of the people he hangs out with that he isn't Gordon Black, that he's Dane Matthias, and that him and Gordon had some kind of body swap. Why and how? Dunno! Usually he doesn't even bother to try acting like Gordon. But when there's girls around, he likes to act like he imagines a big, sexy, popular beast like Gordon would act. It started as a joke with one girl, but he's noticed that since he started it, lots and lots more girls have come looking for him. And he's been happy to put on the act with them ever since. Almost all of them have put out for him, or at least given him a blow job.

So as the party continues, you split your attention between Brianna and the others. You don't bother getting off the couch—Maize and Justin bring you beer and weed and anything else you ask for—and balance Brianna in your lap as you laugh hoarsely and josh around with the others. But you keep your arms around her, and when you're not actually talking you dip in to kiss her on the side of the head or nose and stroke the back of her head, as though you're really paying attention to her and only sort-of-kind-of minding the others. Brianna melts into your lap like a hot fudge sundae left out in the sun. More and more you mind her, and the others less and less, until ...

* * * * *

You're woken with a grunt the next morning by someone pushing up off you. You crack your eyes open. Brianna, looking a complete mess, is staggering to her feet. You are sprawling on the sofa, on your back, with your shorts pulled halfway to your knees, and your t-shirt up around your pits and neck.

"Wha' time'zit?" you ask Brianna.

"A little after eight." She yawns and stretches. "You going in to school today?"

Next: "Morning Haze" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 2)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)"