The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

Administrative Action

Previously: "Inheriting the Meek" 

"Well, I wasn't serious about having you come over anyway," you tell Caleb. "It would be weird."

"How would it be weird?" he asks.

You plop heavily onto the bed and blink at the obtuseness of the question. "Um, because you're a seventeen-year-old high school student, and I'm a thirty-year-old school administrator?"

"Well, okay," he sighs. "So how are we supposed to meet up? If we do need to meet up?"

"Just come into the office and tell me you've got a, uh, scheduling problem. I'll take you back into the conference room and we'll talk there."

"I thought we were supposed to be working together on this thing."

"We are. We will. But I still gotta figure out we're going to do this." You catch yourself squeezing and massaging one of you massive boobs, and force yourself to drop it. "I just woke up, like, two minutes ago, my head isn't where it needs to be yet. Trust me, after I figure this gal's life out, I'll find a spot to put you in."

"How long'll that be?"

"Why are you in such a hurry?" You twist around and start to paw one-handed through Barbara's discarded clothes.

"'Cos it's gonna be kind of weird here, Will. At your place, I mean. It was weird enough dealing with your mom and brother when you were here with me. But when your dad gets home, he's going to be your dad—"

"It's not my dad," you retort. "That's the whole reason we're doing this, because you fucked up my—"

"You know what I mean! It's just gonna be me, playing you, with your family! Which isn't the worst place to be, but it's gonna be freaking weird!"

"Alright," you grumble. "I'll figure something out for you— Jeez, I got another call," you interrupt yourself, for your phone is beeping in your ear. "But I'll call you into the office tomorrow for a 'conference', and we'll talk about it."

"Can you call me in third period? I hate that bullshit Career Plan—"

"I'll call you in when it's convenient for me. Now, go do my dad proud and get me an A on all tonight's homework."

You switch to answer the other call.

* * * * *

It was Miriam Haskins, Barbara's best friend, and she would have been a good choice for Caleb to switch into, except that you don't want to leap into anything without putting some more thought into it.

But first things first.

After binding yourself up inside fresh panties and bra, you pull on some sloppy sweatpants and a sweatshirt, and house slippers, and dump your office clothes into the "dry cleaning" hamper. Then you shuffle into the kitchen to begin supper.

That starts by refreshing the cat's food bowl (Banjo is her name), and then standing in front of the open freezer door until you are on the verge of catching a cold while deciding which frozen entree to prepare. You settle on lasagna because there's a salad pack you need to get rid of. Then, while the frozen dinner heats up in the oven, you perch on a stool by the countertop and hunch over your phone to review your social media and contacts. In the back of your mind, you assess each as a possible imposture for Caleb.

Top of the list would have to be Miriam Haskins, from the school district offices. She and Barbara are the same age—thirty-three—and they quickly bonded as best friends when Miriam came to work at the offices two years ago. The two women are very similar—lumpy and wobbly, but cheerfully so—and they just dote on each other. Miriam, on those Saturday nights when she hasn't got a date, will come over to watch Netflix with Barbara, and most every Friday the two of them put together a party of half-a-dozen gals from the school offices to go out for "Margaritas and Mexican" night. They even shop together.

The only difference between them is that Miriam is black. That all by itself would be a delightful thing to spring on Caleb. But the real advantage would be that Barbara and Miriam are always doing things together, so you and he would look natural together in their faces.

In fact, their very inseparability would make it hard to put Caleb anyplace else. You'd have to cancel a lot of Barbara's social life while you and he were working.

And yet, though the prospect is of turning the skinny, fish-faced, very white Caleb Johansson into a fat, sassy black woman is delicious, you find yourself edging away from it. Even though the whole point of these impersonations is to find yourself a safe and private place to work, and even though it was Caleb's idea that you find yourself some other place than the Prescotts' to work in, you can't escape the feeling that he in part is hankering for an impersonation because he wants to have some fun. And although Miriam, with her "Margarita and Mexican" nights, her dating life, and her constant moviegoing—she goes to the movies at least twice a week, and will see almost anything that is playing—is someone who likes to have fun, and does have fun, you wonder if it is really the kind of fun that Caleb is looking for.

Look, it's going to be Miriam or no one, you imagine yourself impatiently sighing at him after explaining the situation. If I'm going to be Barbara Meek—

But why do you have to be Barbara Meek, you imagine him retorting. After all, didn't you pick her so she could help you find the real impersonation to carry out inside Westside?

So perhaps you should be thinking of Barbara as a just a temporary way-station. Instead of looking for a place for Caleb, you should be looking for a new place for yourself.

You let your mind drift through the obvious possibilities as you settle onto the sofa with your lasagna and Caeser salad, with Banjo purring on a throw pillow nearby, to watch reruns of The Office.

* * * * *

"So you're saying you wouldn't mind turning black?"

Will Prescott answers your question with a very level look, then leans over to look past your shoulder. He is (you can tell) ostentatiously checking to confirm that you shut the door to the administrative conference room.

It's Wednesday afternoon, and you're making him miss his lunch. But this is the first chance you've had to pull him in to talk about what comes next.

He tensed all over when you greeted him at the front desk with an exuberant, "So you're Will Prescott! I've seen you around but now I get to put a name to the face!" And he followed very stiffly as you led him down the short hallway to the conference room you had reserved for this meeting.

"I'm willing to do whatever we need to do, Will," your doppelganger says. He sounds very unenthusiastic. "I mean," he continues as he pricks you over with a cool glance, "when I look at what you're willing to do to yourself—"

"But you'd like something else," you finish for him. He shrugs.

At least he didn't shoot you down right away, when you told him about Miriam Haskins, and how he would probably have to become her. He didn't look very upset, either, when you took out your phone and showed a picture of Barbara and Miriam, standing in front of the movie theater, both grinning like a couple of high school girls, as they came out of the most recent Chris Previn blockbuster.

He just took it very coolly. So you're not sure if he's telling you that he'd rather have a different face, or that he'd just settle for you settling on someone for him.

The thing is, if you're going to give Caleb a face other than Miriam Haskins's, you are either going to have to put a lot more thought into things, or you're going to have to shift from under Barbara Meek's face into another. And in fact you did make a short list of likely alternatives last night, and you surreptitiously double-checked the personnel files this morning to confirm what Barbara thought she knew about them.

If you want to shift yourself into a teacher or administrator who is single (and who isn't grotesquely ugly), your best choices would be Hannah Cho, Michael Hagerman, or Fidvi Rehman.

Ms. Cho is the new freshman English teacher, a quiet, and stylishly dressed twenty-something woman. She might be the best choice period, simply because she has a younger sister who is a sophomore at Westside, which would surely make it very convenient for you and Caleb to meet by replacing that sister with Caleb.

Mr. Hagerman is another English teacher, a studly one who all the girls crush on. You've no idea what his private life is like, but there would probably be someone in his life who is the equivalent of Miriam Haskins in Barbara's. Or maybe you could pair Mr. Hagerman with Ms. Cho or with one of the other possibles you picked out.

One of these would be Mr. Rehman, who just this last Monday replaced Mr. Fernandez after the administration finally got fed up with the old teacher's habit of showing up to class half-drunk. Barbara doesn't know Fidvi Rehman anything about the teacher, except that he is a twenty-something Pakistani-American with dark good looks, a winning smile, and a faint but exotic accent. And that there has been a thin traffic of female teachers into the office since Monday inquiring about his marital status.

A fourth good possibility you identified is Shannon Welch, who is one of the tutors. At first you thought she was single, but a check on her files shows that she is married to someone named Stephen. Shannon is cute and pert and in her late twenties. She and her husband don't have any children, and if you (and Caleb) could stand being married to each other, a two-couple household would probably be an ideal workplace for the research you need to do.

Next: "Welching on Your First Bet" 

*
"Table of Contents (Vol. 3)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)"