The Book of Masks (Vol. 5)

The Party Gang

Previously: "Crushed by Another's Crush" 

You gasp at Caleb. "I'm not going to some party with— with—!"

"Of course you are," he retorts. "You're the one who was all hot yesterday to hook up with some cute guys."

"Micah isn't cute!" you holler. Then you blush, because of course Madison thinks he is.

"Well, it doesn't matter. There'll be some cute guys there. Some guys, anyway." He chortles again. "You might even get lucky."

"C—! Dude!"

Caleb laughs. "You're going, Will."

"You can't make me!"

"No, but I'm going, and you won't want to miss out on that."

"You're not going to—! Wait. You are?" You blink in confusion. "As one of the girls?"

"Sure, I wanna see what it's all about. Wasn't that what we were trying to do yesterday? I wanna go out in one of those things, man! Get myself all rigged up and go out and— Nnh!" He squirms behind the wheel in a way obviously meant to relieve the pressure on a swelling cock. "And if you're not going, you can lend me your mask." He glances at you, then does a double-take. "Or fuck, just give it to me if you're not going to fucking do something with—"

"Alright, I'll go! But I have to go as 'Mickey'! You have to go as— Whatsername!"

"Maria. We'll get Keith to go along too."

You slouch in your seat, sulking, despite yourself. Way to railroad me, dude, you mutter to yourself. You close the x2z.com app, then on an impulse turn on the camera so you can study your—Mickey's—face.

And because you're still trying to squirm out of it, you mutter, "And where the fuck am I supposed to know you from? Maria from?"

"You know me from school," Caleb says. He's finally reached the front of the line of exiting cars, and swings your truck out onto Borman Avenue, gunning it hard to accelerate for the city and home.

"I don't go to school," you retort. "I told him I'm homeschooled." That Mickey is homeschooled, you silently correct yourself. But, staring at your face—that tomboyish variation on Chelsea Cooper's face, one that adds bigger bones and a splash of freckles to her wide smile and dancing eyes—it's surprisingly easy to slip into thinking of yourself as "Mickey."

"So I'm just a friend," Caleb says. "Jeez."

"But where do you go to school? Can't go to Westside," you jeer, "or else he'll come looking for you."

"So let him come looking. It's not like he'll find me."

"He'll ask about your classes! Or someone will. If it's a party. See? So we shouldn't—"

"Then I'll tell him I go to Eastman."

"He's got cousins at Eastman," you retort, and surprise yourself at remembering that detail. "They're gonna be there too."

"Fine! He checks his blindspot, then swings sharply into the other lane as the car in front of him brakes to a stop. "I'll tell 'em I live in— I dunno, Adaburg, or some shit hole like that. They got a high school there, don't they?"

"Sure, we play them this Friday."

Caleb does a double-take. "Since when do you pay attention to football?" he asks.

"I don't." Then you wince. "Madison does, though."

"Oooh!" Caleb chortles again. "Okay, so I'll be from Adaburg. Or maybe I won't. Jesus, Will, we're just going out to have fun, we don't gotta be anyone!"

But as you pout into the lens of your phone—and as the image on the screen pouts back—you find yourself thinking, Mickey deserves to be someone. She deserves to be ... real!

Though what that means—what you mean by it—isn't clear, even to you.

* * * * *

Caleb drives the two of you out to the old school, where you're set up to meet Teresa and Keith. Despite staying after school, you get there first, and with more ambivalence than you pretend, you strip yourself of the mask and clothes and return to your own form. Caleb gives you a beady-eyed glance as you're zipping up your trousers, and because you can guess what he's thinking, you flip him off.

There's a good reason, it turns out, for Keith and Teresa being late: They stopped at Keith's to get that extra mask Keith has, and on the drive over Teresa put it on, to mix her face into it. Her manner and attitude are very prim and correct while explaining all this, and she gives no sign of being either happy or unhappy to be included in the mask shenanigans, and she is similarly businesslike when she asks if you made a "brain copy" of someone to go with it. Feeling a little green, you hold the strip out to her.

"And who's 'Jennifer Ashton'?" Teresa asks as she studies the name on it.

"Jenny? She's—" You look to Caleb and Keith for help. For what can you say? Jenny Ashton is Jenny Ashton. Jenny is base. Jenny is who she is and no other.

"She's a friend of ours," Caleb says. "Kind of a tomboy. I mean, she's pretty and all," he adds in a stammer.

"Dude!" Keith grins at him. "You think so?"

"Shut up. Prettier than before what you did to her face!"

"What did Keith do to her?" Teresa asks as Keith's expression curdles.

"He put a mask on her. She was one of the first. Didn't we tell you? I think we did," Caleb insists as Teresa frowns at him. "Well, we got one that's got this doofus's face mixed in with Jenny's, and one that mixes his with—" Caleb looks to you, puzzled. "Who's the other one?"

"Stephanie."

Teresa stares. "You mean you didn't have to make this one, you had some others around?"

"Well," you say when an uncomfortable silence yawns before you, "we just thought you'd want one that, uh, uses your own face in it. Same as we did with ours. The others are sealed up already."

"Hmm." Teresa looks very prim. Then she holds out the new mask to you. "I guess you should seal up this one, then. I'll put it on, then—" She cocks her head. "Maybe you guys could put on the other two? So I can look at them? Because to be honest, I'd like a choice."

* * * * *

Keith and Caleb are the ones who don the other masks, at the same time that Teresa puts on her new one. That leaves you alone. You give a little thought to joining them by putting "Mickey" back on. But they're not going to be in their masks long, so you don't.

You can't help wondering what Teresa will say when she hears about you and Micah Larson, and the invitation you got. She was okay with going out with you all yesterday, and she didn't say anything against trying to run into people. But maybe she figured you weren't going to anyway? Will she be cool with going out to someone's actual house? Also, how much will Jenny's personality change hers? You're not sure you saw much of a change in Caleb's personality yesterday when he was being "Maria," and Keith was just quiet while he was being "Linda." Your personality kind of changed, though. There was definitely something ... liberating ... about being Madison. Will Teresa find it "liberating" being Jenny? Or will she hate it?

It makes you so antsy that you have to leave the basement, so you drive home long enough to drop off your books and get an ETA from your mom about dinner. Having supper plans will be a good excuse to cut things short, because you're nervous about having to face up to what all has happened today.

Everyone's awake when you get back, but you have no trouble telling who is who, not only on account of their clothes but on account of their faces.

Caleb is the easiest to pick out, because he's the only male in the group. True, he does look a lot like Keith—too much, probably for his or anyone else's comfort—but there's enough of Stephanie's face mixed in with Keith's that, when animated by Caleb's impatience and faint contempt, he doesn't look like a dumbass and a pushover, the way the real Keith so often does. He's studying the other two with his hands on his hips, with a rather waspish expression.

Keith, in the "Keith plus Jenny" mask, is obviously feminine, what with her softer face and longer hair, but she still suffers from Keith's bulbous eyes, and her nose is too big. She is just standing there with dangling arms, blushing faintly under the scrutiny of the others.

As for Teresa:

You don't know what the other girl looked like, but she must have had a rounder—or at least shorter—face than Teresa, because this new girl has a face almost like a circle. It is a rather babyish face—soft, with big eyes—but complicated by strong traces of Teresa's own features and personality. Those big, babyish eyes, for instance, are watchful and a little hooded, and the mouth is tight, even when it smiles. It's a rather "knowing" face, more like that of a young woman than of a sophomore girl. Her hair is shorter than Teresa's, falling just to the bottom of her neck, but it is similarly straight and a mousy brown color.

You're not sure that it's a pretty face. And in fact, the longer you look at it, the more you think you prefer Teresa's own face.

She seems to have doubts too, for after staring critically at herself in the mirror for a minute or so, she turns to ask your opinion.

"What do you think?" she asks. "I can't pick between this one and that one."

You're about to reply when you realize she's not pointing at Keith, in the feminine face, but at Caleb in the masculine one.

Next: "Other People's Heads" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 5)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 5)"