The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

The Temptation To Not Be Yourself

Previously: "A Stolen Life" 

"I got some homework I gotta finish too," you tell the guys. It's a lie, but you don't feel much like hanging out with Caleb, not in his new persona. You can tell he's trying not to act like David Kirkham, but just looking at him gives you a bit of a shiver.

"Alright." Caleb bumps you in the shoulder with his fist. "But tomorrow, skip Walberg and come hang out at the portables with me. We'll start making it look like we're okay with each other now."

He turns to trudge up the stairs, then stops to look back when you don't immediately follow. You stir, then with a glance at Gordon, who's been silently preoccupied with his own thoughts all this time, you follow him out.

* * * * *

The new spell has given you a lot to think about, but you put it out of your mind and goof off with some video games at home. Your life has become complicated enough, it seems, just from what you've done with the previous spells: You switched places with, then ultimately befriended, Gordon Black. You're sort-of friends with his friends. And now that Caleb has, at least for the moment, switched identities with David Kirkham, you're supposed to be friends with him. Sort-of.

So why do you need more complications? Wasn't your life just fine before?

No, not really, you'd confess if pressed. Or, yes, it was fine. It was just boring. Boredom punctuated with occasional bouts of terror inspired by people like Gordon Black and David Kirkham.

Still, there's got to be a balance to be found. And you wonder if playing around with the new spell isn't going to unbalance things further than they already are.

But, you discover, the changes you and your friends have made continue to rumble along and evolve even without your further intervention.

* * * * *

You actually forgot about Caleb's invitation to come hang out with him first period at the portables. Which was probably for the best, because it's never a good idea to skip Mr. Walberg's class.

But then, on your way to third period, you see Tanner Evans pushing through the hallway toward you, and looking you straight in the face. Tanner is one of Kirkham's boys, and he helps Gary Chen push weed.

So your first thought when he swerves to plant himself in your path is that Caleb—adopting Kirkham's personality and pissed that you didn't come find him—has sent Tanner to fetch you, the way the real Kirkham sent Mendoza and Thomason to fetch you for a beating.

But that was when it was the real Kirkham. So now, when Evans stops you, you look him direct in the face and will your heart to slow down to fast rattle.

Tanner Evans is one ugly son of a bitch. He has a spotty complexion, a bowl haircut, and a unibrow. More unpleasant still is the sneer he perpetually wears. It's glinting in his eyes and on his lips now as he mutters at you.

"Hey man," he says. "Weekend's coming up. You looking for some fun?"

"Like what?" You decide not to suggest that his sister—if he has one—would be your kind of playmate if you were looking for "fun."

"Oh, something to relax with, take the edge off after a hard week." He pinches two fingers together, and brushes his lips with them. "Can let you have a special rate, something between friends."

You've had people like Tanner try to push weed on you before, but usually they've been either less direct or much more threatening. You decide, after weighing this change of approach, that he must figure you've got a new relationship with David Kirkham, and that he's taking this new relationship seriously. Or, at least, he's pretending to take it seriously.

And you also remember what Caleb told you last night, that Tanner has some excess inventory he needs to unload.

"Sorry, man," you tell him, "talk to me Friday. 'Cept I think Kirkham said something about sharing a freebie with him then."

You try to push past, but Tanner stops you with a hand to your shoulder. He holds your eye with a glittering one of his own. But he can't daunt you, because you're not bluffing, and after a moment he too realizes that you're in earnest. He flushes as he looks away, then he pushes off into the crowd.

You're chuckling to yourself as you're turning into B wing, when out of nowhere you're grabbed from behind, flipped around, and slammed backward into locker. Gary Chen, his dark eyes glittering like mica, and his lips curled back to show a white, sharp canine, glares into your face. "Wuzzat Tanner you were just talking to?" he demands.

"Yeah," you reply, stammering a little despite yourself. "He, uh, offered to sell me something." You can't resist the mischievous thought that occurs to you. "And he offered me a discount."

Chen whitens, and whirls to stare in the direction Tanner went off in. Then, without even glancing back at you, he grabs your face with one hand and bounces the back of your head off the locker before hustling off after Evans.

* * * * *

The second, and more significant evolution, comes seventh period, when you go into the gym to finally try out those weight machines that so many people have been advising you to hit. You're not the only one up on the mezzanine: there's a number of guys, most of them looking like juniors and sophomores (and maybe freshman), clustered in little gangs to joke and trash-talk while spotting each other. You get some looks from them, and you can even hear them chortling about you as you settle in to give a leg-press an experimental tryout. But mostly you are able to ignore them because they seem to forget about you.

But they go back to noticing you when you get a visitor. It's Jason Lynch.

"Hey man," he says, and his smile, though it seems genuine. "So yer actually tryin' these things out," he says as he squats beside you. (You're now facedown on a bench, doing some leg curls.

"Finally," you agree. "It seems like I kept getting interrupted." Lynch's expression chills a little, maybe because he thinks that's a dig about him interrupting you and Kirkham yesterday. So you add, "Pull up a bench, man."

"Nah, I save mine for after school. But I was headin' up to the loft to chill—givin' this period a skip—an' I saw you up here." His smile, which had warmed a little, falters again. "Your friend Kirkham plannin' to come up here after classes?"

"I 'unno. I got detention anyway." You don't add that he and Kirkham also have detention after school.

"Yeah, well, I saw you up here an' thought I'd be neighborly, say hi. And also—"

He hesitates. You've been doing leg curls all this time, but stop and raise up to give him your full attention.

"Well, also to give you a head's up," he says. "You know Gordon and Chelsea busted up, right?"

"Right."

"Yeah, well, maybe you didn't know that Chelsea's blaming you for it. Don't ask me how come," he adds as you blink at him, "'cos I'd like to think it was me and Stevie who finally got through to Gordon about her. But anyhow, I just heard from Kendra that Chelsea's got plans for you."

He holds your eye meaningfully, and says, "Thought you should know."

You rest on the bench for a long moment after he's gone, gathering your thoughts. Then you resume your workout.

* * * * *

Chelsea blames you for Gordon breaking up with her? That's not a surprise, but only because she has a reputation for being a psychotic, both-oars-out-of-the-water bitch. Whatever reasons she got for thinking it's your fault are probably discernible only to her.

But as for what she could do to you: Well, she tried sicking Gordon on you a couple of weeks ago when you lipped off to her. (And now that you think about it, that's when all this stuff started to get complicated, because that's how you wound up meeting Gordon and sharing the masks with him.) If she could get Gordon to do her dirty work, she could get almost anyone to, just by implying that she'd "like it" if someone did something about you.

You just got through getting The Molester and David Kirkham off your ass. But Chelsea could send a whole goon platoon after you.

Maybe if Gordon talked to her—

But you don't want to run off to Gordon just because you're in trouble. Or to Caleb.

So what can you do?

Of course, you wind up thinking about the masks, and about the new spell. Caleb has a fake of himself running around school. If you hid under a mask, you could let a fake Will Prescott take the brunt of Chelsea's anger.

But could you live with yourself afterward? Especially as you've been trying to show Gordon and his friends (and will be trying to show Kirkham's friends) that you don't bend under pressure?

That's all for now.

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