The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)

Piled Higher, So Digging Deeper

Previously: "A Double Game of Doubles" 

OMG! Jack is thinking of asking Olivia Byrne—sexy, shapely swimmer Olivia Byrne?—to go out with him? Like, going-steady-going-out?

You feel your eyes straining from their sockets.

"But Jack," you blurt out. "You're gay!"

His gaze hardens just the tiniest bit. "Yeah, I think I know that."

"So why—? I mean—" It's like the words are getting caught in your teeth. "So if you're asking her out— You mean to hang out? Like you and me do?"

He gives you a very long and level look, but you return it with a defiant stare.

Then he squints off into the distance. "If you're going to be stupid about this, Leah, then I don't wanna talk to you."

Your own anger flares. Fine! you want to yell at him. If you just want to push me away—!

But you can't say that.

You could apologize instead. I'm sorry, Jack, I didn't mean anything, you just surprised me is all. But if you want to go out with her or whatever, you go do it.

That wouldn't be enough either. Because what you want to do is dig. Dig into what this all means.

Dig into what it means that Jack Li wants to date ... a girl!

"Jack." You grip him gently on the forearm. "Can we go hang out someplace? Go someplace and talk, just the two of us? Because—" You bite your lip. "I feel like this is my fault."

* * * * *

Of course, you don't really need to dig to figure out what is going on with Jack. It's as obvious to you as it is to him.

What's going on is that this is not Jack Li.

Oh, he looks like Jack Li and he can even talk and move like Jack Li. But this is really Gordon Black, the (apparently!) very straight captain of the school basketball team, who you and your friends have trapped inside a facsimile of Jack Li's body. You wanted to find out what would happen if you turned Gordon into a gay guy, and now it looks like you've got your answer.

So you could, and maybe you should, report to Philip Fairfax. There is probably nothing more to be learned by talking to Jack. If he has anything more to say, it'll just be a lot of bullshit that he feels like he has to tell you in order to get you to believe that the very gay Jack Li suddenly wants to go out with a girl.

But that bullshit is probably something that Fairfax would want to know. More data for the data geek, amirite?

And, anyway, since you're inhabiting the skin of Leah Simmons, one of Jack's best friends, you feel yourself lashed by her instincts, so you're dying with curiosity to find out what "Jack" would have to say about this crazy twist he's pitched you.

* * * * *

He had already made plans to meet up with Olivia at Panera for salad and sandwiches, and he refuses to cancel to cancel on her, but he does agree to meet up with you later. "We can go dancing again," he tries suggesting. "Out at the Warehouse. You can have fun trying to figure out which of the guys out there is my secret crush."

But that isn't funny, you tell him. I want to talk, and you need to talk about this!

By the time he's able to get away from you, Jack looks like a cat whose fur has been scraped the wrong way, but he has agreed to meet up with you after he leaves Panera. "Let's make it the municipal library," he says. "I know you hate that place, so we won't be there long."

So you have to play coy with people like Brianna and Laura MacGregor when they start pestering you about Saturday night plans, and you pretend that your parents are making your life difficult. In fact, you have to start fielding those texts almost as soon as Jack leaves (they were backing up on your phone during the tennis game) so that you miss your chance to talk to Parker about what Jack said, to get his perspective on whether anything has been "off" about Jack lately. (And you make a mental note to most definitely have that conversation with him.)

With nothing else to do, you drive out to the library early, and a very antsy time you have of it while waiting for Jack, even after you remember that they have a pretty good fantasy and science fiction section. Alas, Leah doesn't much like those genres, and you have to fight her distaste for them along with your impatience as you try to kill an hour.

And when that hour is up, you have to kill another thirty minutes.

And then you have to kill another ...

* * * * *

By the time Jack finally texts to say he's on his way, he's an hour late. You're waiting for him just inside the front doors when he comes strolling in, hands in his pockets, dressed in nice khaki slacks and a soft, billowy button-up shirt. He looks strong, confident, and sexy.

And you have to fight down a secret grin at Gordon Black's expense, because there's just enough sway in his stride to make him look gay.

"Hey," he says, "So I'm only here to pick you up. We're going to the Warehouse."

"Who's 'we'?" you demand. "Just you and me? Or is Olivia out in the car with you?"

His jaw tightens. "She's meeting us out there."

"When? Because it isn't even eight o'clock, and nothing's gonna get started out there until ten or eleven at the earliest. So we got two hours to talk."

He sighs—a strangled sound. "We can't talk in the library."

"We can talk outside. Come on."

"Where are we going?" he asks, for instead of tugging him back out the front door, you're pulling him inside.

"Where I go when I absolutely have to come up here, and can't scream my way out of it."

* * * * *

It's an outside seating area up on the second floor, on the other side of a pair of glass doors: like a wide, long, concrete balcony that stretches halfway around the library perimeter, overlooking the parking lot. There's wrought-iron chairs and wrought-iron tables out there, so you can read and eat one of the sandwiches or drink one of the smoothies that the library sells in its cafe. But it's dark now, and you and Jack have it to yourself. With no one to eavesdrop, and wrapped in the blanket of night, it seems like the perfect place to share confessions and confidences.

You have to get him to relax first, though. After he's fallen into a chair, you drop into his lap and drape your arms loosely around his neck. He gives a start of surprise.

"I'm not letting you get up," you inform him, "until it's all better."

"What's all better?" he grunts. "Nothing's wrong."

"There's plenty wrong. For a start, you're mad at me for making you come out here to talk."

"I'm not mad. I just want to go dancing."

"And you're trying to get back at me, or something."

"For what?" His tone is grumpy, but he sounds genuinely puzzled.

"For all the shit I've been giving you. About eye-fucking the basketball team."

"Oh. That."

"And for making you invite your secret crush out to Legends last night."

"Oh, I didn't invite him. And he didn't show up."

"Pah! I knew it! But you're still mad at me."

"No I'm not, Leah." He wriggles beneath you. If he stood up, you think, I couldn't hold him down. If he stood up and I hung onto him, he'd just scoop me up and hold me in his arms. The thought, somehow, thrills you.

"Yes you are, but you won't admit it."

"You've given me worse shit before—"

"I'm the straw that broke your camel's back."

That catches him short. "What do you mean?"

"You and Olivia. I've been giving you shit, and now you want to start pretending you're not gay anymore. I broke something in you, Jack!"

The words are coming out in a rush, from where you do not know. From Leah's instincts, probably. Your heart is beating very hard, and you don't know why. Again, you can only guess that it's Leah's own reaction to sitting here, in Jack's lap, with her arms around him, and being hurtfully truthful with him. "You're mad at me," you continue, "but you're taking it out on yourself. You're hurting yourself, Jack, if you—" You find yourself gulping. "If you're trying to not be gay on account of the teasing I've been giving you!"

There's a long silence. Jack's eyes are dark as black coffee with only the thinnest rim of white around the pupils, and beneath the fold of his lids, in the darkness, his expression is even more inscrutable than it usually is. But you can tell that he's studying you very hard.

But when he speaks, it's in a very light tone. "Are you jealous, Leah?" he asks.

You pull back. "What? Of who?"

"Of Olivia."

Well, dur! Leah screams inside your skull. Of course I'm jealous!

But aloud you say, "Why would I be jealous of Olivia?"

"Because I told her all my woes. The one's I've never even told you."

You are nearly overcome by a wave of dizziness. Jack confided in Olivia Byrne of all people? And not in me?

Next: "Hijacked from the Inside" 

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