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A high school student finds a grimoire that shows how to make magical disguises. |
Previously: "The Chess Club"  You don't understand why Dean is so shy about dancing with girls if he is brave enough to chat with them. It's the opposite with you. Except you're not even brave enough to dance. But if you can talk Dean into dancing, you can yourself into it too, right? You try loosening yourself up as you move around the floor, swinging and swaying in time to an air-thrashing sound that, if it does have a beat, is complex though smothered beneath the crashing chords and jangling melodies roaring around you. The dance floor is huge and mostly empty, once you have fought your way through the tight little scrum that clogs the floor near the door, and once you're out of it you notice that most of the people in the room are spread along the walls, talking to each other while only swaying a little less than you are. You stop dead as you stare thoughtfully around, while willing the blood to not geyser out of eardrums that feel dangerously close to bursting under the pressure of the music. The trouble is that although you found a solo girl for Dean, there don't seem to be any solo girls that you can casually sidle up to. You'd have to go ask one of the girls by the wall. But before you can discover if you have enough courage for that, a girl comes slithering through the crowd, aiming herself right at you. She yells something at you with a smile, but she'd have an easier time being heard over the scream of a crashing jet airplane. You put your hand to your ear and frown. Her smile widens and she starts to dance in front of you. It takes you an embarrassingly long moment to realize that she is asking you to dance. Maybe it was because you were still thinking you'd have to make the first move. Probably, though, it's because the girl is gorgeous. She has an oval face with large, sparkling dark eyes, framed (like a parted curtain) by long, dark hair. Her olive-colored skin is clear and smooth, and she has a small mouth that purses up under her nose. She is slim but with good breasts and good hips. The latter are shown off now to nice effect by tight, acid-washed jeans, and the curve of her torso is lightly accented by a tie-dyed, short-sleeve polo shirt. The latter is by itself strangely enticing. It makes you want to run your palms over her shoulders and down her sides. You've seen her in school before, and last year you had a class with her. She sat on the opposite side of the room, though, and you never talked to her. You do know that her name is Mackenzie, but that's all you know. To your knowledge, none of your friends has ever mentioned her, and you never asked them about her. (None of them were in that class with you to point her out to them.) She has a sleek, cat-like grace as she dances, which makes you feel all the clumsier as you try to reciprocate. Her smile widens slightly as you start to sway, but there's nothing mean inside it. She looks like she's pleased that she's kicked you into motion. You dance in this very awkward way with her, drawing closer and then pulling apart again, for a few minutes, during which you are mostly dazed at the thought that you are actually dancing with this girl when a shadow looms up at your shoulder. It's one of the guys who had been standing by the wall, and he brushes in front of you to take your place with Mackenzie. For a moment you stop, baffled and angered, then you try to step around him to find Mackenzie again. She is frowning, but her eyes light up when she sees you again. But the guy sees you too, and shifts to cut you off again. Okay, now you're getting mad. Yet even as you feel your hair rippling on the back of your neck, and feel the rush of blood to your cheeks and eyeballs, a colder part of you quails. You've never been one to start a fight, and you always do your best to avoid any situation that might escalate. You also remember Carson's warning about what happens to guys who start fights, or even get swept up into them. Maybe, you think, if I just cut in on this asshole like he cut in on me, he'll take the hint and back down. He isn't very big—maybe half-an-inch taller than you, and he doesn't look jacked. Yet you can't help feeling that any jagoff who would push in on you like this would push back. As you are hesitating between Dare I? and Don't I?, feeling that each one would be a crushing mistake, another girl steps in front of you. She clasps the sides of your stomach with both hands and gently tries nudging you away. Hey! she mouths at you over the music with a wide smile, and while still holding you she starts to sway and groove invitingly. You shoot a dark scowl at the back of the asshole who stole Mackenzie from you, then start dancing with the new girl. She drops her hands to the top of your hips, and gently but insistently tugs you away from the others, toward a more lonely spot on the dance floor. She's small—much smaller than Mackenzie—with milk-white skin and long, lustrous, light-red hair. Her lips are the color of strawberries. She is dressed in what looks almost like a school uniform: a crisp, white, long-sleeve blouse under a blue vest, with a striped tie hanging from her throat. When you glance down, you see a blue skirt trailing to just the top of her knees, and white hose underneath. Her eyes sparkle and her grin deepens when you look back up into her face. Farther into the empty part of the dance floor she pulls you, never taking her hands off you. And then she begins leading you on a wide circuit of the floor toward a wall. And when you are back among some sort of company she breaks off, puts her arm about your waist, and pulls you toward the door. Well, she isn't Mackenzie, but she is someone, and you are even more startled to have had two girls pull you into a dance than to have had one do it. But she seems to have an ulterior motive. Back in the atrium, where she can be semi-heard over the music, she goes on tiptoes to shout in your ear. "Let's go find a table, then Mackenzie will find us!" You stare at her dumbly, then let her pull you back into the saloon. She picks a booth that is only half-occupied by two couples who are slouched at it with their phones out, and slides in while pulling you in with her. "This is a good spot," she says, and still has to talk loudly to make herself heard. "Just give Mackenzie a few minutes to ditch that guy!" "What's this about?" you ask. She gives you a look. "It's about you and Mackenzie!" When you only stare back, she says, "I saw what that guy did. You don't wanna get in a fight. So we come in here, and Mackenzie comes in here. And there's only room for her!" And that's the way it works out. It's only a minute, in fact, before Mackenzie appears with the guy who cut in on you. She looks around the saloon, then comes straight over to the booth. The other girl prods you to get out to let her in, and then you sit again on the outside. There is no more room for anyone else, and after an awkward moment the other guy—whom you studiously ignore—stalks off after glowering silently at your table. Introductions are made: You, Mackenzie, and her friend Corinne. You recall to her that you had a history class last year; she pretends to remember you, and you don't call her on her bullshit. Mackenzie dazzles you with the intensity of her stare, and the puckishness of her small smile. So dazzled are you that you can't really bring yourself to talk to her, and when the conversation dies back you have to look past her to Corinne, asking her if she knows Kim Walsh. "Kim?" She laughs. "Yeah, I know Kim, why do you ask?" "Because I thought at first you were her." "Yeah, I get that," she says. "We're not related." "Okay." "Because I get asked that too." "You know Dean?" Mackenzie asks. It's more like she's butting in, actually, and she leans forward a little to cut off your view of Corinne. "Who?" "Dean!" she exclaims. "On the dance floor! I saw you with him, you pushed him at this girl!" "Oh yeah!" You blush. "Yeah, I know Dean. I came out here with him. Him and, uh—" You glance around the saloon, looking for Patrick, but fail to spot him. "Yeah, I know Dean too," Mackenzie says. "All those guys." "Cool. Yeah, I ran into them today out at— Uh, up at the mall, we hung out, then decided to come out here." You glance around the saloon again. "They're always doing stuff together," Mackenzie says. "You do stuff with them?" "Uh ... Sometimes." Doing something once, you tell yourself, technically qualifies as sometimes. "We should get together with them tomorrow," Mackenzie says. "All get together, do something." "Mackenzie!" Corinne exclaims with a scandalized smile. "You don't just invite yourself along to whatever Will's doing with those guys!" "Oh, I just meant," Mackenzie protests, both to you and to her friend, "that we could hang out, and that maybe Will would want some of his friends along too. You can come," she tells Corinne. "I'd let you." Corinne still looks scandalized, and looks to you for help. If you really had a choice, you'd like it to be just you and Mackenzie. But you also recognize how shy you feel around her. Social padding, in the form of Dean and some of his friends, might be a good idea. * To do something with Mackenzie alone: "Meeting Mackenzie" * To set up a group hang out for tomorrow: "A Message About Mackenzie" |
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