The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

How to Sideline Yourself

Previously: "Dark Histories" 

"I was planning on sitting things out," you tell Carlos. "Would that be a problem?" you ask, for he looks a little shocked at your reply.

"Well, I thought we were all going to help out," he says.

"Can't Keith help out by keeping on being Cindy?"

He rolls his eyes. "So I guess you figure if it's too risky for him it's too risky for you?"

You grimace at his words, and mutter, "Something like that."

He looks over your shoulder into the middle distance.

"Actually, you might be right," he says. "Philip says the guy can't have made any more betas after losing the book, but who really knows?"

"So how are you going to take care of Cindy? Are you just going to turn her back to normal? Can you?"

He swings around in surprised. "Sure we can! This isn't forever! We're gonna put everyone back!" Then he starts to stammer. "Just not now, just not yet. Not with this guy, whoever he is, making betas out of her family members, that's for sure. We'll stick another beta in for her, but it won't be any of us. So don't worry about it."

"So why did you want me to do it?"

He shrugs. "Thought you might want some fun."

He turns away, then turns back. "Oh, before I forget," he says, "this is for you." From his pocket he draws out a metal strip.

"What is it?"

"A copy of my dear brother's brain." He flashes a set of Jessica Garner's dimples. "Lucky you!"

* * * * *

It's a metal strip a few inches long and about an inch wide. It's flexible and bends easily without creasing, and on over side of it float large blue letters, like a hologram. MARC DAVID GARNER, they say.

"Just put it on your forehead," Philip tells you later when you catch up to him. "It'll knock you out for about ten minutes, so make sure you're laying down first. When you wake up, you'll have his memories and bunch of other stuff."

When you ask him how weird it's going to be to have two brains all mixed together, he only shrugs. "You'll get used to it," he says. "Just let it come."

Uh huh, you think.

You leave shortly afterwards, for there's nothing else for you to do to help. A little after seven you meet up with Keith at McDonalds, where in typical fashion he moans about having to give up being Cindy, even though he's the one who insists on it. Back home you stay up past midnight to finish your homework, then crawl into bed. You wait until you feel yourself on the verge of drifting off, then fish that metal strip out from under the sheets and slap it onto your forehead. You figured that if it was going to knock you out, it might as well be when you were heading off to sleep anyway ...

* * * * *

Eva Garner is waiting next to the gym as you come sauntering out of the student parking lot at 8:05. She grins at you. "How are you doing, Will?" she asks, and rubs her forehead with a forefinger.

"Doin' great, now. I woke up in a freaking strange bed, but I got it sorted out. Hey Blake!" you yell into the breezeway at the retreating back of the football player who rescued you from The Warehouse Saturday morning. "Where you off to?" you holler when he turns around.

"Social studies! Santiago!"

"Sucks to be you! Anything going on after school?"

"Dunno! Come talk to me in English, or come find me in the gym after eighth!"

"You got practice then or something? Sucks donkey balls to be you!" you add when he nods. He grins and lopes off toward the main building. "Jesus," you mutter at Eva, "I can't believe I'm talking like this to a football player I barely know."

"You picked up Marc's personality, no mistake," Eva says. "So no problems?"

"Like I say, I freaked out when I woke up. Got up to do my stretches before my morning jog, then remembered I don't do stretches or have a morning jog 'cos I'm not Marc Garner. The guy in my head had a little panic attack when that happened, but now—"

But now it's like the world is one of those optical illusions, like the duck-rabbit illusion, or the gif of the ballerina who sometimes spins left and sometimes spins right. Depending on how you concentrate, either you are looking at and talking to the world like you're Will Prescott, or you're looking at and talking to it like you're Marc Garner. "Now, I just take turns with the cocksucker."

"Which one is the cocksucker?" she asks with a smirk.

You smirk back. "You think you're cute, Eva. But I've seen you in a housecoat and fuzzy slippers with curlers in your hair."

She squeals and strikes at you, but you've Marc Garner's reflexes and memories of how far Eva can swing, and you leap away with a laugh.

* * * * *

It's a day of small surprises, most of them pleasant, most of them having to do with girls coming up to talk to you. Most of them are girls who texted you on Saturday, and you feel yourself glinting at them as you chat and promise to "catch up" with them later. But a few of them are football players and wrestlers—guys who were working at The Warehouse on Saturday—checking in to see how you're doing. You more or less promise to hang out with some of them after school.

The only real unpleasantness comes during Astronomy, when Stephanie summons you over. "You not get my text or are you just blowing me off?" she says.

You can't help wincing: Stephanie was one of the girls who texted you Saturday with a request to meet up with you on Sunday. "I wound up spending Sunday with Eva and Jessica," you tell her, "it totally, uh—"

And you are overwhelmed by a head rush of memories from Marc's memory strip:
Stephanie coming over to play at your house with your sisters when you were all eight and nine and ten years old. You jumping out of closets and chasing Stephanie and her chasing you; of playing soccer against her and your sisters, losing at first but evening up the score and then pulling ahead as you got bigger and stronger and better; of meeting Stephanie one afternoon at Potsdam Park to kick around the ball at the end of the summer at the start of your sophomore year, and of sliding in to kick the ball away, and of her tripping and falling onto you; of the contours her body resting on yours—the scent of her hair and skin—the warmth in your cheeks—the rush in your shorts—the embarrassment of trying to talk to her afterward.

"And I totally spaced out," you lamely conclude.

"Uh huh. You gonna space out with Kristy?" Stephanie's eyebrows go up, and a canine shows in her smile.

Kristy? Oh, shit! Kristy Suffolk, who you danced with at the Warehouse after your friends set it up with you. And she's a friend of Stephanie's!

"No, I'm not gonna space out with her," you stammer.

"Did you space out on her in English?"

English? Oh, shit, you had her in English and you totally didn't even look in her direction! You pinch the bridge of your nose. "Fuck, I was— Yeah I totally did."

"Yeah, it sure sounds like you did, Prescott. She wasn't even there today."

"She wasn't?"

"No, she was out with a—"

"Jesus, don't fuck with me, Stephanie!"

Her eyes freeze. But you return her glare with a hard one of your own.

"You wanna get cute with me, get cute with me," you tell her, "but don't expect me to roll over and beg for fucking mercy. Christ. I had a busy weekend and I spent a lot of it feeling sick and hung over. If Kristy wants me to notice her, she should put herself where I'll notice her. Otherwise she's gonna have to play by my schedule."

Stephanie's lip curls. "You're really interested in making her feel special, aren't you?"

"Fine, I spaced out in English. Guilty as charged, and you turned a neat trick to get me to confess. You were just looking for a chance to embarrass me, weren't you?"

White spots show under Stephanie's tanned cheeks.

"If I wasn't so pissed off at you, Stephanie, I'd give you a better set of answers. But I'm mad, so yeah, I guess I'm spewing out a lotta shit that's gonna hurt me with her. You and her both. You should be happy, it'll give you something to use against me. That's what you want, isn't it?"

"I don't—!"

"Bite me, Stephanie."

You wheel and stalk over to your desk. You're vaguely aware that the other kids in the room are either staring at you with open mouths or being very careful not to stare at you as you throw yourself into your seat.

* * * * *

By four-thirty, though, you're a lot calmer. Calmer? You are floating on a sea of happiness. That's what a beer and a couple of hits off some really magnificent ganja will do.

You're down by the river with Blake and Erik Carstairs and a bunch of other guys from the football team. You are vaguely aware that you are way too buzzed—Marc's brain said it was okay, and too late realized that what was okay for Marc's physique wasn't okay for yours—but more aware that you don't give a shit. When your phone chimes with a text, you smile at it and show it to Blake. "Lookit that. Kristy Suffolk wants to hang out with me."

"Get 'er out here, man," Blake says. He claps his arm around your shoulder. You grin at Connor Vale, who is pissing into the river. If you like it out here, Kristy would love it!

"Who's that?" Blake asks when your phone chimes again. This time it's a call, and it's Keith. "Have you heard from Carlos and the guys?" he asks. "'Cos I haven't. Not even a text. That professor went home, you know."

"Cool."

"Nothing cool about it, Will. And I can't raise them 'cos they didn't take the girls' phones with them."

"That was dumb."

"Should we go out and look around? Think maybe that professor caught them?"

That's all for now.

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