The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

A Couple of Surprises for the Boys in Your Life

Previously: "It's a Mad Mad Mad Madison World" 

Temperatures are in the low fifties the next morning as you pace the driveway in front of your house—Madison Crawford's house, but you're Madison Crawford now—waiting for your ride to school. You are wearing stockings under a long pair of flannel running shorts, and a shapeless sweater under an overlarge jacket, but still you hug yourself against the cold. The sky is still dark, for the sun won't rise for almost another hour.

At last, a pair of headlights turn onto your street, and you hurry down to meet them. The car brakes to a sudden stop, and the cabin light springs on as you hurl your book bag into the front seat and clamber in after it. "Oh my God, am I so glad to see you!" you pant.

Caleb Johansson stares at you from behind the wheel.

"We can go now," you prompt him. "I have to be up at the school by seven."

Still he says nothing as he slowly accelerates back into the street. You ask, "Have you been worried about me?"

"Will?"

"Yes! I know you got my text message last night 'cos you replied!"

Silence. "I got a text message from a Madison Crawford."

"Which is me! I told you that!"

"Well, I didn't know what to expect," he grumbles. It is dark inside the car, but you can just make out his head as he turns to look at you. "So what the fuck is going on?"

"It's my new alias. Permanent alias, finally, I hope. Madison Crawford, sophomore."

"Oh, Christ!"

"Look, don't start with me, man, it's been a hectic few days! This is the third girl I've slid into since last time I saw you."

It takes you the rest of the trip to school to explain it all to him, and Caleb explodes at a couple points—like when you tell him that there are now two sophomore girls who know about the masks—and he can only sit in the car, nursing an aneurysm, it sounds like, after he parks in the deserted student lot at Westside High. His voice is numb when he asks, "So will you need a ride home this afternoon?"

"Yes, if you're offering, but you'll have to stay late 'cos I got gymnastics after school. But this won't be a regular thing," you add as Caleb mutters in the back of his throat, "'cos there's carpools in the mornings and afternoons I can usually take. But I wanted to talk to you."

"So what am I supposed to do until school starts?"

"Take a nap. Go get donuts. Jerk off." You climb out of the car, but pause to lean back in before slamming the door on him. "Do me a favor. Just don't jerk off while fantasizing about me."

* * * * *

You are way early up to the school because you've got swim practice, which starts at seven and continues through first period. Madison is an excellent swimmer, and it was going to be her athletic specialty, until the start of her freshman year when she got hit by good news and bad news. The good news was that her boobs finally came in, and in a big way, and the whole curve and contour of her body changed that put a bit of a drag on her aquatic performance even as it gave her something to preen about. The bad news was that, after being thrown into high school with a bunch of other people from other middle schools, she found she was no longer the best swimmer in her class. It was a real come down, and that was when she started looking at gymnastics and then cheerleading.

But you're looking forward to the class, and not just because you'll get to see girls like Andrea Varnsworth and Olivia Byrne in the locker room as they change into their suits.

"Whadja do for your last birthday?" you ask Matthew Adams as you splash around in the pool, warming up. Matthew is another sophomore, a cutie-pie with short, frosted-blonde hair. Madison has made out with him, and she'd for sure be interested him in except that he makes no bones about being a "player."

"My folks took me out to eat," he says.

"No, I mean with your friends. You did something with friends, didn't you?"

"Hung out and swam, ate hot dogs on the back patio. Why?"

You look past him to Lucas Bell, another sophomore. He's a stoner, and his hair is so long and bushy that, like most of the girls in the class, he has to put it up in a cap. "What about you, Lucas? What did you and your friends do for your last birthday?"

"Partied at the river."

"Oh, bullshit," Matthew cries. "You're such a freaking liar!" He pushes Lucas, who pushes him back. You kick off from the side of the pool, rolling your eyes as you launch into a lap while the two guys wrestle in the shallow end.

Your question gets no better answer in second period from Andrew Bean, who claims (more bullshit) that he celebrated his last birthday with a vodka-fueled orgy at the Warehouse. (Andrew is a partier, but he's a smirking liar and show off too!) But in third period, one of the football players, David Harrell, finally gives you an awesome idea when he tells you that he and a bunch of friends celebrated his last birthday at the laser-tag place behind the mall. Laser tag would be a perfect thing for Ethan's surprise party! Dana enthusiastically agrees when you tell her just before lunch. "So who are we going to invite?" she asks.

"Everyone! As many as we can get! But we can't let them know what it is or who it's for." Your mind is abuzz with schemes. "Wait, the laser-tag place is right next to the minigolf place, right?" You clutch her by the arm. "So we'll set up a thing for a bunch of people at the minigolf place, to throw everyone off track! Then at the last minute we'll move everyone over to the laser tag place for Ethan's party!"

"So why don't we just do it at the minigolf place?"

You make a face. "Ethan won't want to go minigolfing! That's for, like, little kids. But that'll be the cover for— Here, just follow my lead at lunch today!" You feel like your skin is going burst from excitement.

There's already a long line in front of the cafeteria, and you crane your neck fruitlessly looking for friends up ahead that you can cut in front with. But Bradley White has the same idea, and he joins you rather than take his place in the back of the line. "Hey, 'sup?" he asks with a smirk.

"Awesome, I was just looking for you." You briefly grab and squeeze his hand, and a slight blush runs up his throat. "You like laser tag? You and Ethan?"

"Sure."

"'Cos I got reservations and tickets for, um, a couple of weeks from now? Up at the laser tag place at the mall? But I can't use them? So, you and Ethan want them?"

"Sure, if you're giving them away."

"I am. That's great, I'll talk to you about it later, when we're closer to— What's the date of that Saturday? The eighteenth?" You quickly confirm it on the calendar on your phone. "So we got two weeks to talk about it in." Your heart is beating hard.

"What's the deal?"

"No deal. Just a change of plans on my end. Don't want the tickets to go to waste. Tch! I wish I could use them, all four of us could go laser tagging, you and me and Dana and Ethan."

"You'd want more guys along than that."

Perfect! You can hardly keep from shrieking. "So you should totally get a bunch of guys together for it! I know David Harrell likes laser tag. Get him and Darrell and, like, everyone you and Ethan hang out with, go up for laser tag."

"Sure." Bradley bobs his head. "And you need to totally find a way of getting out there with us."

Oh, I will, you think. And I'll bring most of the sophomore class with me when we surprise Ethan there for his birthday!

* * * * *

"Way to make me feel like a leper," Caleb grumbles as he starts his car. "And after ruining my afternoon, too."

"I didn't ruin anything," you retort. "What, did you have a date with Eva Garner you had to cancel?" He answers with a glower. "You have a date with me now."

He gives you a sidelong look, and you feel his eye rake you up the thigh. After swim practice you changed into a skirt and blouse for the balance of the day, but now you're back in shorts and a tank top, to cool off from after-school gymnastics practice, so you've lots of glowing, healthy skin to show off.

Well, let him look you over. Maybe it will make up a little for forcing him to stay after school, and then forcing him to stay another twenty minutes until all your sophomore friends were gone, so none of them would see you climb into a car with a dork like him.

"We have to stop at my house," you tell him, "to pick up the book."

"What book?"

"What book do you think? I've been waiting for things to settle down before trying out the next spell."

"Jesus! We're still doing that, after all the—?"

"Why not?"

"It's been nothing but a disaster!"

"Well, at the very least, we can look at what it does! Maybe it will solve all our problems. You want things back to normal, right?"

Caleb says nothing for the rest of the ride out to your house, and he says very little on the subsequent ride out to the old elementary school, where you park in the side lot and go over the spell using an online translator.

But when you're done, you have to admit that maybe you shouldn't go any further. Online searches show the new ingredients will be extremely expensive. And beyond that, the major ingredient gives you serious pause: Four hundred pounds of earth taken from a graveyard!

Next: "It's a Gift" 

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