The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)

Who Wants to Be a Star?

Previously: "Before the Rehearsal" 

Charles Hartlein is still glaring up at you from the lip of the stage, and he spares Laura only a short, angry word before he goes back to glowering at you. You hate the feeling you've got of being bullied at a distance by a skinny gay guy with a weedy beard, but with a sinking feeling you know that if he came up and told you, in that nasty, superior way he has, to get out of the theater, you probably would slink out.

But you manage to ignore him, until with a visible shudder of disgust he turns around.

"Your old girlfriend's mom is at her house," Blake murmurs to you. "If you remember where she lives, I bet we could catch her alone and—"

"She wasn't my girlfriend," you mutter back. "Anyway, let's try for that actor. If he shows up."

Blake doesn't immediately reply. And you're concentrating on Charles. He has stalked over to Mr. Wilkes and is talking to him. The drama teacher looks up at where you and Blake are sitting.

For a moment, matters hang. Then Mr. Wilkes rolls his eyes with a shrug and turns back to directing the movement of equipment on stage. Charles shoots you a quick, spiteful look before turning around. There is something melodramatic about the gesture, as though to say You didn't beat me, I am rejecting you!

"You mean Paul Griffin?" Blake says. "He's not a mom!"

"I know that. But why do we have to stick around Saratoga Falls? Why can't we get out of town? There's nothing keeping me here." You wipe a sweaty palm on the knee of your trousers. "The faster we get out of this shitty town, the better!"

All at once you get a feeling like masonry crashing down around your head. Leave Saratoga Falls? The thought comes like a panicked shout. Leave your home? Your friends, your family, everything? Maybe never to see them again?

At the same time comes a rush of giddiness. Yes! Freedom! No more school and dumb classes, no more friends who backstab you! No more girls laughing at you behind your back! And no more Molesters and Kirkhams and Javitses, no more football players and basketball players and the vermin of school!

No, just you and Sydney, together, off on a new and exciting life together! In Hollywood! In New York! In London and Paris and Tokyo! On red carpets and at gala premieres! At celebrity parties! Waving to the paparazzi and making inane chatter at entertainment-TV hosts about how great the new project is and how much work you put into it, but now it's done and the fans are just going to love it! They're going to love you, see you inside!

And in back of it all will be a small, powerful cult of magic users, wielding their secret influence from behind famous but fake faces.

Your heart does cartwheels, and there's a roar in your ears, through which you can barely hear Blake say, "Really, you want to drop everything and just take off?"

Can Sydney really not understand what you've just said and what it would mean? You grab Blake's hand and lean in close.

"Do you wanna stay in this bullshit burg?" you growl. "Do you like it here? All these nobodies? Just little shits in a high school someplace, that's all these—" You gulp. "That's all we are. Everyone. Even—"

A wave of dizziness grips you. Yes, even Chelsea Cooper and her claque of cheerleaders and basketball bullies, when you really get a perspective, are a lot of nobodies. God, you think, why was I ever impressed with them or scared of them? They're just the tiny tip of a tiny little pyramid inside of one shitty school that no one's ever heard of, in one city that's barely on any maps, in one state crowded around by a half dozen others just like it and all full of the same doughy, anonymous nobodies. Whoever heard of anyone inside this school, except themselves?

Whoever heard of me?

You try to pass this insight, like an electrical signal, through your grip on Blake's hand. But you only say, "Let's go to Hollywood, Sydney. Let's be someone who lives in Hollywood. Let's be people who matter in Hollywood!"

Blake's dark eyebrows lift, and a crooked grin of delight breaks across his mouth. "Well, this is a change of plans, Will!"

* * * * *

So Sydney approves, and she tells you so. She is soon just as excited as you are, and both of you squirm excitedly in your seats as you imagine the events what will come when the curtain goes up on the next act of your lives.

Nor do you have to wait long before your ticket to Hollywood shows up.

Paul Griffin turns out to be on the short side when he enters the theater, but there's electricity in his presence—an almost palpable crackle of energy that you feel when he walks into the theater. You don't even have to recognize him to guess who he is, and you are about to nudge Blake, to tell him you should make an approach, when the actor, in a bouncing trot, launches himself down the aisle at Mr. Wilkes.

You got a good long look at him, though, as he stared intently down at the stage for a long minute. He has dark hair cut rakishly short, and dark good looks, and he's dressed in rugged jeans and a black bomber jacket. You vaguely remember seeing him on television, playing one of those boy-hunk characters who look like they stepped straight from an underwear ad onto a soundstage without taking any acting lessons in between. But he has a quick, charismatic grin, which he turns on and off while chatting with Mr. Wilkes. Work around the stage slows noticeably, though it never comes to a stop, and no one seems to be watching him.

But of course Charles has to shimmy up—undulating like a serpent—to stand with the two adults, as though he's part of the conversation.

Meanwhile, you're trying to figure out what a TV star is doing here on campus. Yes, Laura (who seems to be sleepwalking her away around the stage, doing nothing in particular) said that he went to school at Westside—a fact you can scarcely credit—but why would he come back? And if it's for a visit, why come to a technical rehearsal?

But maybe he didn't even come for that, for after a brief chat with Mr. Wilkes he comes charging up the aisle again and goes out the door. Blake grabs you with a strangled, "Come on!" You just have the presence of mind to grab your sack of masks and supplies before he hauls you out the auditorium door.

Griffin is fast on his feet, and he's already halfway across the quad to the teachers' parking by the time you come staggering out into the late afternoon sun. You jog after him, but don't call out until he's opening the driver's side door to a blue Mustang that shimmers and gleams in the sunlight. "Mr. Griffin!" Blake calls out, and the actor pauses to shoot you a quick, hooded glance. "Hey!" Blake gasps as you and he come pounding up to the car. (And you're content to let Sydney do the talking; even though you've barely heard of this guy, you feel tongue-tied in his presence.) "We just wanted to say— Um. Well, could we have your autograph?"

For maybe half a second the actor stares at you. Then that white smile pops onto his face, and his eyes flash. "Sure thing, guys!" he exclaims. "Cost you a dollar."

You feel your face fall. "What?"

Griffin laughs. "Just kidding. I used to sign dollar bills for people as kind of a gag. But if you got a pen and some paper—"

"I have a dollar bill," Blake says. He digs into his pockets. "But, um—" He turns a desperate frown on you. You stare blankly back at him.

"I got'cha covered," Griffin says. He reaches inside his leather jacket to take out a felt-tipped marker. "Old habit," he says. "Used to never go out unarmed." His brow briefly ripples with what looks like pain.

Blake hands him a dollar bill, and Griffin lays it atop his car. Then he seems to think better of it, and gets in behind the wheel.

Blake snaps a finger at you. It takes you a moment to clue in, then you dig inside the bag to pull out the blank mask you had prepared.

"Here ya go, champ," Griffin says as he hands the autographed bill out to Blake. "Like to see you try to spend that in more than one place."

"Thanks." Blake steps inside the door and leans into the car. "I just got one more favor to ask you." There's a very brief and small struggle, then he straightens back up again. "Don't call me 'champ' when it's you in there, Will," he says to you.

Your skin is crawling as you step up to peep over the open car door and into the cabin. Paul Griffin, TV actor, is slumped inside. His jaw is hanging open and his face is very pale. Suddenly, he looks about ten years older than before.

* * * * *

"So who am I supposed to be?" your doppelganger asks. He runs his hands over the black leather sleeves of his jacket, and glances around the cabin of the Mustang.

"No one you ever heard of," you retort. Then Blake nudges you, and you correct yourself with a blush. "You're supposed to be me." It sounds like a humiliating confession. Have I ever even heard of myself?

"Follow us back to the elementary school," you order the new you. It's Sydney's idea: the parking lot in front of the school is too public a venue to make a switch, so the new you will meet you back in Acheson to make the final transformation. "And then— Well, meet us there," you lamely conclude.

You could make the switch there. Or you could switch later, and spend one more day and night with your family before leaving them ... forever.

Next: "Good-Bye to All That" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 4)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)"