The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

The Curious Miss Cummings

Previously: "Projects and Projections" 

You text Evie, asking if she wants to hang out. It's a quarter-hour before she responds, and then it's with a neutral-sounding Ok. You have to take the family car back home, so you ask her to pick you up there.

* * * * *

"It's kind of like a clubhouse," you tell her as you beckon her down the stairs into the basement. "It's where we're doing the magic stuff."

Evie, looking very small and skinny and scared, stands in the doorway and cranes her neck to peer in. She was curious when you asked her to drive you out to the old elementary school in Acheson, then cautious when you marched down to the basement door and unlocked it. Now she looks frightened. "Are you sure we should be here?"

"No. I mean, we shouldn't be here, but it's okay. No one'll see. Not if you come in and close the door."

Evie takes a few steps in and pulls the door shut behind her with a thunk. She comes down the steps, but freezes before reaching the bottom. "What's that?" she gasps, looking past you.

It's the fire. You were hoping to find it extinguished, but it's still burning silently away.

"It's a new spell I'm working on. Don't worry, it's not going to burn anything down. You can even stick your hand in it and nothing will happen. Look!" You march over and jam your hand into the flames.

Her eyes wide, Evie inches her way to the bottom of the stairs and shuffles over. But she still hangs back. You give her a smile that you hope is encouraging, and march back over to pull her over to the conference table. "I have to babysit it, at least for a little while, and I wanted some company. So I thought of you!"

Evie gives you a brief double-take but returns her gaze to the fire. "What's it doing?" she asks in a breathless near-whisper.

"I'm not sure. Making something. That's the funny thing about the book I'm using, it— Say, what did Paulina tell you about this stuff, exactly? And, uh, about me?"

Your heart beats a little bit harder as you ask the question, for it only now occurs to you that you've not really had a close, honest conversation with Evie. You've only talked to her at school, where you have to play Madison, or when Paulina was around. What kind of a picture of you has Paulina painted?

Evie shrugs and her eyes dart about without settling on your face. "Not a lot. She, uh, explained to me about, you know, the mask things. And how, uh, you—" Her voice fails and her head droops.

"And I'm really sorry about that." You hop onto the table and gently tug Evie over to join you. "I don't think I'm ever really going to be able to stop making it up to you."

So how will I ever start making it up to Madison? You cringe inwardly at the thought, but thrust it away. There'll be something in the book, way down inside it, you want to tell yourself, that I can use to turn everything back to normal without embarrassing myself or anyone.

"But I don't know how to make it up to you," you continue, "except by trying really hard to be friends with you. And, like, sharing this stuff with you." You put your arm in Evie's, and snuggle up close to her as she gets up on the table with you.

She is very stiff and tense, and she stares at the fire without blinking. Then she sucks in a deep breath, and sags. "I just can't believe all this stuff."

"I know," you agree. "I can't either, and I'm in the middle of it!"

Evie turns to look at you. "So there's a book you're using, to make this stuff?"

"Uh huh. I'd show it to you, except it's in the fire, under all the fuel. But it's really old and, I guess, like an authentic old magical grimoire. And it's like the book itself is magical! You can't turn the pages in it unless you do the spells." Evie looks puzzled, and you struggle (using your hands) to explain it. "So that's how come I don't know what the fire is doing. The front of the page just tells you how to put it together. Then, after you do it, the page will turn and it will tell us what we made."

"We?" Evie queries.

"Well, sure," you stammer. "You and me. And Paulina." Mentally you kick yourself for almost giving away that you've a partner, Caleb, that you've not told her and Paulina about. Maybe I should? Later, maybe. "I told you, I want us all to be friends."

Evie mulls this, and when she speaks again, she has followed the subject onto a new path. "It was weird being that guy," she says. "Wearing that ... mask, I guess it was. I didn't know how to act, what to do!"

"It was only part of a mask," you explain. "I didn't know how to make the part that, uh, copies memories and stuff, back when I made that one. It probably wouldn't have made a difference to you. It would have been awful being Dane, even if you knew how to be him. I'm sorry about that."

"You keep saying that," Evie says, sounding irritated. "You can stop it. But I guess when you made that ... copy of me"—there's a gulp in her voice when she says copy of me—"you knew how to make the full copy. Because Paulina, when she was ... being me ... she—"

"Yeah. Which was good, because I didn't want to mess your life up like I, uh, kind of messed up Dane's. Because I'd like to put everything back, eventually, you know."

"So how come you can't do that now?"

You let out a deep sigh before answering. "Because everything is so messed up. Because the guy who's pretending to be me doesn't know anything about me. And the guy who—"

"Who's pretending to be you? One of your friends? Who are you friends with?"

That question seems to finally break the last of the ice between you, for Evie sounds genuinely curious. So you tell her about yourself and Caleb and Keith, and some of the other guys you hang out with. You take out your phone—which has been dinging all afternoon with texts and alerts that you've been ignoring—and go online to show her some of the few pictures of you and your friends. As for the guy who's pretending to be you, you explain that it's Gordon Black, the captain of the basketball team, and that the pothead that she was briefly pretending to be is now pretending to be Gordon—both of them without knowing what happened to them or knowing how to act.

It shocks Evie to hear all this. "Whoa," she says. "So that's how come it's all messed up on the basketball team!"

"You follow that stuff?"

"Sure. Don't you? Then how come you tried switching places with Gordon?"

"First of all, it wasn't my idea. It—" You just manage to catch yourself before blurting out Caleb's name. "I mean, it wasn't my plan to become him," you stammer. "I was just trying to stop him from killing me. He was going to beat me up real bad, but I had a mask with me, so I got it on him and switched places."

"So how come you didn't just keep, uh, being him?"

"Because his life sucked. So I switched with Dane, and then I found out that his life sucked, so I switched with, um, you. And I guess I thought your life was okay—except for that senior girl on the soccer team who's always yelling at you—but then I guess I just sort of thought— What?" you ask as Evie turns away with a thoughtful expression.

"Hannah," she says when you press her. "You know all about that?"

"Sure. What a bitch. Do you have any idea why she's got it in for you?" Evie shakes her head. "Well, it's totally not your fault." You pat her hand. "I mean, you're a good soccer player and all, so there's no reason she should be yelling at you all the time, or anyone else. Evie?" you prod her when she remains silent, staring into the fire. "I'm sorry I reminded you of all that."

"No, it's not that," Evie murmurs. She hops off the table and starts to slowly pace the basement with her arms folded.

"So what is it?"

She doesn't answer. But you can guess that whatever she's thinking about, it has to do with masks.

So you're not surprised when she asks, "Can you tell me about how you make those masks? Like the one you're wearing?" There's a glint of worry in her eyes when she raises her face to give you a hooded look.

"Well, there's a couple of parts to it," you reply, and go on to explain the mechanics of it all. Making a mask that can copy a person's body, or which can make a new body by copying lots of people; sealing the mask so it will stop copying and can be worn; the metal band that copies memories; and the paste that can attach the metal band to the mask. "You're thinking about something, aren't you?"

Evie swallows and hugs herself more tightly. "I was just thinking, like, you knew all about me and Paulina, right? When you were wearing those masks of us? Like you know everything about Madison? Like, who she likes and why she likes them?"

You nod. You've got a pretty good idea of where this is going, but you let her finish.

"So, I was just thinking, if you, um, made a mask of ... of Hannah, then I'd know, if I put it on—" She starts to turn a mix of green and pink. "How come she doesn't like me."

True. But Evie wouldn't even need a full mask for that.

That's all for now.

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