The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

A Trap of One's Own Making

Previously: "The Wilderness" 

You feel your hair standing up on end. "What are you talking about?" you demand.

"Look, I'm not making judgements," Caleb says, I'm just—"

"What are you talking about?"

"Yeah," Keith echoes, "what are you—?"

Caleb shuts him up with a look, then turns back to you. But he can't meet your hot glare, and lowers his eyes with a sigh.

"Look, you told her, right?" he says, "that Elle Moore, uh— You and Elle ... made out."

"We didn't make out! She just up and kissed me!" Your face burns.

"So you say."

"It happened!"

"'Cos Leah says that Elle says—"

"Elle's just covering up for herself! Because she's embarrassed!"

Caleb flinches. "Well, you also supposedly met some girl Laura one night—"

"That happened too!"

"And Leah says you're sending fake DMs to yourself."

That statement boggles you. "What?"

"She says you showed her some DMs—"

"From Elle and Laura, yes! And from Leah!"

"She says they're not from her or the other girls, that her friend Jack told you—"

You want to scream. "Okay, so maybe they're fake, someone was sending me DMs from fake accounts! Maybe it's Clover Mystery again and she's—!"

"This fake secret admirer?"

Again, you gape as though slapped. "I don't know who it is! But I'm getting—!"

"It was Rennerhoff and Spencer Osbourne and Christian Padilla who made the video," Caleb says. "So you're saying one of them is your secret admirer?"

"Well, not my 'secret admirer'!" you stammer. "But it's gotta be one of them's that—"

"Maybe they're the ones sending you those DMs from those other girls?" But Caleb sounds skeptical.

Your face is hot as you fumble out your phone and scroll around until you find your x2z inbox with its DMs. You watch the parking lot and the road beyond out of the corner of your eye as you do so. If Maria would just show up now, even though she's late, it would be awesome. You'd only have to show her off to Caleb and Keith, and it would shut down this whole hideously embarrassing scene.

Caleb takes your phone and studies the messages, asking you questions about the DMs. You also explain how they can't be fake, at least in Laura's case, because you did meet Laura and in one of her DMs she talks about something that you told her at that meeting. "Oh, the Eric Murphy thing," Caleb recalls with a grunt.

But he's not impressed. "'Cos here's the thing, Will," he points out. "If you didn't meet Laura that night—"

"I did!" You squeeze your temple between your hands. You feel like you're going mad.

"If you did, why is she lying about it? If you didn't, then who sent these DMs?"

"I don't know why she would lie. We were friends back in middle school, but—"

But what? Could she be mad at you that you're not friends anymore? But that's only because you stopped having classes together. That's not something to be mad at someone for!

"Well, this is why Leah and them think you sent those DMs to yourself," Caleb says. He pauses to let you yell, but you're now too exhausted to protest. "I guess. Because if you didn't meet Laura that night, who was it that would send that DM? It could only be you."

"Dude," Keith reproaches you. You shoot him dirty look.

"I didn't fake these DMs," you insist. "I met Laura. And Elle. And Leah invited me to the Warehouse the other night."

"Did you see her there?"

"No." You sigh again.

"Well, like I told you, I'm not making any judgements," Caleb says. "I'm just telling you, you know, what those other guys are saying."

Your eyes are stinging now, and you have to turn away. This is all so fucked up. From the moment you agreed to help Caleb dig up that time capsule—

"What's this DM from Maria Vasquez?" Caleb asks.

You cringe. "I was supposed to meet her out here. At four," you reply. You bridle at the look that passes between Caleb and Keith. "I don't where she is!"

Caleb scratches an eye. "Is this a, uh, follow up to your date from the other night?"

"Yes! It wasn't a date, but ... Yes. She DMed me and—"

"Where is she?"

"I told you, I don't know! She hasn't answered my—"

"Come on, man, let's go," Caleb tells Keith.

"Where are you going?" you holler as Caleb hops from the truck bed. Keith, with an anxious look at you, follows.

"I gotta get home," Caleb calls back. "If, uh, Maria shows up— Well, swing by my place with her."

You clench your hands into fists, lest you make things worse by flipping him off.

* * * * *

Maria never shows up or replies, not even after you shoot her half a dozen DMs in quick succession, begging her to tell you that she wasn't in an accident, and telling her that you have to go home. You eat a sullen dinner—so sullen that even your dad doesn't dare poke the porcupine sitting in your chair—and afterward upstairs you stare at your homework. Your heart remains as still as a stone even when the x2z alert goes off, and you finally find a DM from Maria there. God, I'm such an airhead, she writes. Chelsea wanted to talk cheerleader stuff and then we went shopping and I totally spaced out on you. So sorry. Try again tomorrow?

You hover your thumb a long time over the keyboard as you are engulfed with conflicting emotions: rage, fear, lust, resentment, horror. Is this another one of those pranks? Is this really Maria? Or is it—?

No, it has to be Maria, you tell yourself, and try shaking the paranoia from your head. You met up with Maria, spent most of Saturday night with her, and she contacted you through these DMs.

Except that's what Laura did too, you remind yourself.

Suddenly, you are boiling with fury. Not at some unknown persecutor, not at the sinister "Clover Mystery" who might or might not behind all these shenanigans, but against these girls. Against Elle, for kissing you, then shamefully accusing you of lying about it. Of Laura, for saying that she never met up with you that night. Against Leah, for telling Caleb that you are faking the DMs. Even against Maria, for flaking out when it counted most that she not.

Well, "LeahSomethingSomething" was willing to meet up with you at the Warehouse on Saturday. Maybe she'll be willing to meet up with you again? Maybe all of these girls would be willing to meet up with you!

It's still relatively early—not even eight o'clock—so you DM Maria, asking to meet her at a coffee shop somewhere. While she's digesting that, you quickly shoot off parallel DMs to the other "fakes" in your contact list: LeahSomethingSomething, Meryl_Elle, Laura Mac.

You are grimly unsurprised to see that one and all they demur as their replies come trickling back, one at a time, over the space of half an hour. But your cynicism is dented when first Maria follow up with the counteroffer of a coffee date tomorrow evening at around seven, and then Laura Mac suggests setting up a study group. You send out another round of DMs, and find that LeahSomethingSomething and Meryl_Elle are agreeable to the study date idea. Maria stubbornly wants it to be a one-on-one with just you, but after an hour of negotiations you set up two parallel dates for tomorrow. A casual date with Maria at the Milagro Beanfield Warehouse, and a study date with the others at the same location.

It leaves you rubbing your hands with malicious anticipation as you imagine the scene. At last, maybe, you will get a look at the person or persons who have been tormenting you, and you'll have the satisfaction of having Maria with you when you spring the trap!

* * * * *

School passes without incident on Tuesday. Classes and lunch with Caleb and Keith are a little awkward on account of the "intervention" yesterday, but they both pretend like it never happened, and you pretend too. After the final bell you hang out in the library long enough to send DMs to the four girls reconfirming the "dates" for the evening. Only after that do you begin to imagine the various ways the evening could veer into disaster. Like, what if you arrive at the Beanfield and find it empty save for Rennerhoff and his friends, who jeer at you? And in fact your plan to get to the Beanfield early, so as to preempt all the other arrivals, goes awry when supper is late and you get stuck cleaning up the kitchen afterward. So it turns out that you're the one who arrives last.

You are prickling with anticipation as you lope in the coffee shop, which is one of the more expensive ones in town. You place an order with the barista. Then, because the front room is empty you look in the back.

Your heart staggers. At a large table is the nearly complete cast of characters from the recent drama: Leah, Elle, and Laura, along with Brianna, Jack, and a couple of Jack's friends. They have books open and spread out, but they're relaxing and laughing and talking.

Leah is the first one to spot you, and her smile goes glassy and frozen when she sees you. Jack follows her eye, and he too stiffens at the sight of you.

"Hey Will," he calls. "You here to study?" He makes no move to open up a space for you.

"Kind of. Waiting for my own study date to get here."

"Yeah?"

You shrug and shuffle over to a booth, where you hunker down. Conversation at the other table becomes muffled, and your ears burn.

Twenty agonizing minutes later, you look up sharply when Maria walks in. Chelsea Cooper is with her. They scan the room.

And though Maria's eyes meet yours, they sweep past without recognition, and she follows Chelsea to a booth on the other side of the room.

* To talk to Maria: "Face-Time with a Cheerleader" 
* To wait and see what happens: "The Faltering Will" 

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