The Book of Masks (Abridged)

Disaster for Dad

AFTER TALKING IT OVER WITH CALEB a little more at school on Monday, you decide you will try out the golem at Salopek, and the two of you dash over to the clubhouse after classes to get it ready. You swap out into your gym clothes, charge the mask of yourself with your most recent memories, and put it on the golem. "Someone's getting the short end of the stick on this deal," your new double grouses as he puts on your clothes. "And I think it's me." But except for that one complaint, it is completely docile, with you and Caleb both.

When it's gone, you both turn your attention to the next spell. "Most of the same ingredients as the last one," Caleb says, surveying your supplies. "Good thing I ordered up a double helping of the stuff we needed for the golem." He starts mixing stuff together before you've even finished translating the list. "Can we use my hair in this next one?"

"Sure thing," you reply. "You need a golem of your own."

"What I need is a girlfriend," he says. "When your double gets back with the cash, we should make a store run and pick up supplies for some new masks."

"What are you thinking?"

He gives you a pitying look. "We get the masks onto some girls. Like, really good-looking girls. Hot girls. Some of the cheerleaders. Maybe Lisa?" He waggles his eyebrows suggestively. "Put 'em on the golem and wham! Instant lays!"

You were with him up until Lisa got mentioned. "The only way we get a mask of Lisa is if you agree to wear it and give me a blow job," you tell him coldly.

"But the golem--!"

"I don't wanna hear you talking about Lisa that way. What we had was special, it wasn't just ... sex!"

"It wasn't even that," he sniggers under his breath.

"Shut up!"

"Okay, okay," he says. "Still. Cheerleaders. Yumi would be yummy, but Chelsea would be the jackpot."

You talk a little more, until you hit the last ingredient on the spell list. You'd expected it to call for another pile of dirt, but this item is far more disquieting. "A human body?" Caleb exclaims in disbelief.

"A corpse? Or a real person?" You stare at the spell too.

The translation algorithm doesn't turn up an unambiguous answer to the question. "I'm not digging up a dead body," Caleb says firmly.

"Well, we're not using a living person."

"So, we use ourselves as guinea pigs?" He doesn't sound convinced, even after he adds, "We've been experiment on ourselves so far."

You pace the basement. This is definitely the place to break off your experiments, and you tell Caleb so. He's unwilling to make the same conclusion, but there's not a lot of heat in his argument. At the same time, you still feel the tug of curiosity, and the two of you go round and round on possible ways of proceeding.

You're still arguing when the door opens and your double walks in. "Guys," he says, raising his hands in a mollifying gesture. "It's not my fault."

Your heart goes into your throat, and for the first time in your life you sympathize with your father: How many times have you opened a conversation with him with those words or variants on them? "What?" The word, as it escapes your throat, even sounds like the kind of growl your dad makes.

"I haven't got any money for you. Dad confiscated it. Called me into his office and had me sign the check over to him."

"What for?" Caleb demands, but you groan and put your face in your hands.

"I owe him-- We owe him-- God, pronouns are hard to use right now," the golem says. "He lent, uh, us two hundred dollars in exchange for getting the job at Salopek. First paycheck goes to paying him back. In fact, you still owe him fourteen dollars and eighty-three cents," he says to you.

"Why do you say he lent us the money but I still owe him," you peevishly ask.

"Consider what I am," he shrugs. "A counterfeit Will Prescott would be dealing in counterfeit money."

"Well, this sucks," Caleb says. "You mean I was working to pay off your debts?"

"Looks like you'll be going in to work for me another two weeks," you say.

"How do you figure that?" he demands loudly.

You hold out your hand. "Where's the two hundred you promised me for our partnership?"

He opens his mouth to speak, but says nothing. He points to you, then to the golem, then to you again. "Lemme get a piece of paper," he finally says.

It takes almost twenty minutes of argument before you all agree--with no help from the golem, who seems inclined on causing mischief--that he has paid for the partnership by paying off your debt to your dad. Which still leaves both of you broke. "Well, as long as this asshole can go in to work for you, it's no big deal," Caleb shrugs, nodding at the golem. "We can wait for the next payday."

But you decide to go to work the next day as yourself, figuring that if you're going to get in trouble it might as well be you and not your equally feckless twin. "Well, leave your mask with me," Caleb says at school when you tell him. "I'll put it on the golem, and between our two brains maybe I figure out a way around the next spell."

* * * * *

Turns out you were right about one thing: it's a disaster to leave your duplicate in charge of your life. Not that you discover anything wrong at work the next day. It's when you get back to the clubhouse early in the evening. You hear raised voices emanating from the basement even before you open the door. "Jesus Christ," you yell, adding your voice to the cacophony. "Could you be any louder? I don't think the guys in the community center can hear you!" Both Caleb and your double jump and stare guiltily. "What is going on?"

They look at the ground or at the walls or at the ceiling--anyplace but your face. Finally, the fake you nudges Caleb, who furiously nudges him back. "You're the one who did it," the golem hisses. "Well, you went along with it," Caleb hisses back.

"What the fuck is it?" you demand, putting your hands to your hips.

The golem pales. "Jesus, you sounded just like Dad when you said that." He laughs nervously. "Speaking of whom," he adds in a high, squeaky voice. "He stopped by today."

You blink. "What?"

"Yeah, he stopped by the clubhouse. Had a good yell at us. Freaked us out. Then Caleb got a bright idea--"

"Shut up!" Caleb says. He is very green.

"What. Happened?"

The golem swallows a couple of times. "Actually, Dad's still here. In a manner of speaking." He tugs at his shirt.

You stare. Only now do you notice that your double is wearing one of your dad's dress shirts ... and slacks ... and shoes. And then you notice that the golem--the big, claylike slab--is standing in the corner, where you last left it.

You eyes bug out of your head. "Dad?" you ask, and it's your turn for your voice to turn squeaky.

"Um ... Not really," your twin says. He turns to Caleb. "Do the honors?"

Caleb gulps, then reaches over and pulls at golem's face. It comes off ... And standing there is your father.

Sort of. The thing's skin is chalky, grayish-white, as is its hair. But in form it looks just like your dad. You draw close. The detail work is perfect. It's a life-size statue of your dad. Except--

"The good news is that I unlocked the next spell," Caleb says in a rush. "The bad news is ... Well, apparently I turned your dad into a golem."

Through the knot in your throat you choke out the words: "And how did this happen?"

Caleb puts the mask back onto the thing, and your twin reappears. "Is he still there?" he asks.

"You were in on this?" you yell.

"Hey, you'd have done the same thing," it says defensively. "We're exactly alike, right? So if I helped Caleb do it, then it stands to reason that if you'd been here--"

Only a sense of paralyzed horror keeps you from throttling the thing with your bare hands. Before you can move, Caleb jumps in. "The quickest way to explain things is for you to put this on." He holds out a mask, which you recognize as your dad's. You rear back, but Caleb won't be dissuaded. "Look, Will, someone is going to have to go home as your old man. It might as well be you."