The Book of Masks (Abridged)

Gym Rats

MAYBE YOU'RE LETTING YOUR HORMONES run away with you. From the back of your head you feel a jab of intuition: Don't push her. "I'll let you make plans for tomorrow. We'll do whatever you want."

"Don't you have practice after school?" she asks.

"It'll make it easier for you to manage me."

"Or you'll be a beast," she giggles. "You'll be all wound up."

"I'll be exhausted. I promise."

"Not too exhausted, I hope."

"Make up your mind, won't you?" The phone is feeling slick in your hands as your palms sweat in anticipation. "Can I stop by tonight anyway? On my way home? Just for a minute?"

"How come?"

"Loan you a book and give you a kiss good night?"

"Give them to me tomorrow."

"I can't give you a kiss goodnight tomorrow morning, you silly girl."

"Then save it up and give me a big one." You hear a faint voice, and Anne's voice becomes indistinct. "I have to go. It's time to eat."

"I'll see you tomorrow," you murmur. "Lots of you, I hope." She says her goodbyes, and you fall forward to rest your forehead on the steering wheel. You're hoping your cock will fall as you take deep breaths, but you have to give up, and it doesn't settle down until you're several blocks from the school.

* * * * *

"Come on, get it up, you pussy," Ethan Nieves says in a soft but rough voice. "That's only six."

Your eyes are clenched shut, but you can picture the stony look on his face. Your mouth is torn into a rictus, and you feel the tendons bulge and strain in your neck as you push the barbell up. Your elbows briefly lock as you fully extend your arms, and then you carefully lower it back to your chest, inhaling deeply. Again, you push it up. "Seven," says Ethan.

Your arms are trembling badly as you lower the weight again; your pecs heave and strain as the bar touches them. You shift your fingers a little. You have to get up to eight ...

"Up ... up ... up ... That's it," Ethan says encouraging. He helps you guide the weight back into its cradle. You sigh deeply and press a palm against your chest as you sit up, trying not to groan. The weight on the end of the bar--it's like a millstone--catches your eye, and you allow yourself a brief grin. In your old form, you certainly couldn't have lifted it, let alone both it and its twin, even once.

You stand, and Ethan slides onto the press as you take the spotter's position behind him. Hoarse chortling and the clink of metal comes from the other guys, most of them on the football team, who are with you during second period doing weights in the open loft over the gym floor. Sean Mitchell, Erik Carstairs, Marcus Johnson, Nathan Hall and his brother Kevin ... Ethan lifts the weight and lowers it, but you keep an ear cocked at the others even as you count off for him.

"Five ... six ... This is where you turn into a pussy," you tease him. He grimaces like you did. You glance over your shoulder; voices are getting loud from one of the machines over in the corner. "Seven." A rough shout and some hoots come from behind you. "Come on, get eight. Come on, buddy." Your fingers flutter near the bar. You don't like the noises you're hearing, but you can't leave Ethan. "There you go."

"Go for nine," Ethan mutters.

There's a thump behind you, but you don't glance back. "No, I need you up," you retort as you grasp the bar, but he's already lowering it again. You curse softly to yourself. "What's going on back there," you bark as you glare down at Ethan. He's letting the bar rest briefly on his chest, then strains as he lifts it again. You screw up your eyes so you won't look away, even though you're desperate to see what's causing all the thumping behind you.

Ethan's teeth clench, and his face turns purple. When he's got the bar high enough, you grasp it and put your own muscle into lifting it back into its cradle. Ethan's eyes pop open in surprise, but once the bar clanks into its cradle, you wheel around.

It's a scrum, and a quiet one, which tells you it's serious. Very serious. "Hey, off! Off!" you yell as you dash over and grab at a burly form in a t-shirt. You've barely time to see a snarl on a face before you have to jerk your head away from the thrown elbow. You duck and charge in, grabbing someone around the torso, then swinging around to pull them away. It's Marcus Johnston, and his expression freezes and falls when he sees who you are. You glower at him, then jerk your head at Ethan as your spotter materializes behind him. "Help me break this up!"

It seems to be five guys, piled onto each other, clawing and scrabbling at each other. With Marcus's and Ethan's help, you yank them up one by one--and Ethan and Marcus have to push Kevin Hall back against a wall and pin him there with their hands--until there's only two: Scott Bickelmeier, sitting atop Dalton Douglas with his hands at his throat. You grab him around the neck and head and wrench him off.

And once Scott is off, Douglas sits up and kicks him viciously in the groin. Scott strains against you, and you kick him in the back of the knees, buckling his legs. He falls backwards on top of you, and both of you crash to ground. You shout in pain as hard weights drop onto the pair of you, and your vision is clouded as the players you pulled off the first pile jump onto the new pile--the one that has you at the bottom.

* * * * *

"And who are you gonna get to replace them?" Coach Porter quietly asks.

You kick at the grass. "I dunno. Some of the other wrestlers. Haney? Ratliff? Maybe some of the lacrosse guys?"

"You can't keep doubling up," Porter says. "You already have Mitchell and Nieves doing double duty."

"I'll get some juniors. Even sophomores."

"They're not ready." He shades his eyes and looks out at the half dozen football players who are making a lazy jog around track. "You play with the team you got."

"They're no good anyway," you retort. "Buncha stoner--" You catch yourself as he looks over at you sharply. "Stone-age cretins," you lamely cover yourself. "And I can't discipline them."

"Then why are they doing laps?"

"They barely are. Look at them." The Hall brothers had just smirked when you'd ordered the bunch outside to jog around the track, and had shrugged insolently when you'd insisted. Them and Douglas and Carstairs are in one knot, and their jogging is only pro forma. Johnston and Mitchell and Bickelmeier are in the other knot, behind them, jogging just as slow. You can tell just by watching what is going on. The assholes--that'd be Douglas and his buddies--are purposefully going slow so the others will catch up, and they can hassle them as they pass. The others are hanging back so as not to give them the satisfaction.

"So what are you going to do?"

"I wanna kick 'em off the team."

"And you can't do that," Porter insists. Why does he let those assholes Black and Patterson have free reign over the basketball squad, but he won't let you run your team? Oh yeah, it's because the basketball guys are going to the championship, and your guys would rather hang out by the river and smoke pot and drink beer. Five years ago Westside won the football championship, and that's why you went out for football when you reached the school. It's just your luck to be stuck with these assholes when it's finally your turn. And then you have to wince at Porter's next words: "Black runs a tight ship. Talk to him about how he does it."

Because he's a fucking monster, you think to yourself, but just nod your head.

Porter gives what is supposed to be an encouraging slap to your arm and walks back toward the gym, leaving you to watch the approaching joggers. As they draw up, Dalton and his pals slow to a walk. "Get moving," you growl, but they just snigger as they pass.

* * * * *

You let Bickelmeier, Mitchell and Johnston go in early while you force the others to stay on the track; and when they are on the far side you go in so you can change for class. You're not surprised to see Mitchell in the locker room, waiting for you. "So what was all that about, anyway" you ask. His face and nose are bruised, and there are dark red stains down the front of his shirt.

"They were talking shit," Sean says. "Like always."

"It wasn't this bad when it was you and Scott fighting," you observe. "I thought it'd be easier after you guys made up, or whatever you did."

"Scott used to be their pal, so they're making it hard on him."

A brief, meaningful pause seems to descend. "How did he change?" you softly ask.

"Not the way you're thinking," Sean says, just as softly. "It was around the time I changed."

"Huh." You hear voices from outside in the gym. Sounds like the troublemakers are coming. "We should talk about this later."

"Yes we should. We got lots to talk about." He backs out of the locker room while holding your eye.

You snatch up your own clothes and quickly follow; you'll change in a bathroom some place, though it feels like a chicken shit thing to do. But what does Caleb--for that's Caleb under Sean's face--want to talk about? Why did he stick you into this situation? Maybe you should ask him just to let you have your own life back.