The Book of Masks (Vol. 5)

The Meat Counter

Previously: "Meet the Larsons" 

You can hardly believe that you're doing what you are in fact doing. You're spraying down a buff, twenty-something man with a garden hose.

Trask Larson has stripped off his shirt, exposing a burly torso with meaty pecs and a stomach that, though it bulges out a little, is still lightly ridged with abs. A great mat of hair spreads across his chest and trails down to his belly button. His arms and shoulders don't have the definition of his friend's, but they are big and obviously strong.

He smirks heavily as you spray him up and down his chest, and turns around and around so you can hit him from every angle. He also lifts first one arm and then the other so you can hit him in his hairy armpits.

You move your thumb off the hose when he jerks his chin at you. "Drop it," he says as he bends to screw the faucet off. "Josh can cool himself off when he turns loose of your friend."

My friend? you wonder, then stagger back a step as Trask drops to pick his shirt up off the ground. The way he bounces down and then up puts you in mind of a gorilla, and you have the sudden fear—or is it desire?—that he'll rush you like an ape and sweep you into his arms.

He doesn't put the shirt on, but with another smirk bunches it into a rag and stuffs part of it down into his back pocket. With a curl of his arm, he invites you to follow him back around front. You stagger along with his meaty paw on your hip, but at least he is mindful enough not to pull you close, for the water is still dripping off his bare torso.

Out front, Jared is laying the meat out on the grill while Josh—Thor Jr.—is leaning against the shed doorway, talking casually with Linda.

Maria glances over as you and Trask come around the corner together, and her smile deepens with suppressed laughter.

* * * * *

It surprises you—and relieves you, too—that Trask quickly drops his hand as you join the others, and in fact he doesn't even talk to you that much, instead talking to Jared something going on in the "back forty." The ground seems to be subsiding, and Jared needs to tell his folks how it might need to be filled in before it gets too deep or soft.

He also asks Jared about the state of the shed, and when Jared tells him about the bull snake, he actually goes off to look for it: "Bruh!" he shouts to Josh when he comes tramping back, carrying the dead snake by the tail before him like a trophy. "Look what the Larson ladies killed in the barn!" The snake is black, thick-bodied, and muscular, and it's so long that the other end drags in the grass by his feet.

"Throw it on the grill!" Josh shouts back. "Tastes like chicken," he tells Linda, who is gaping in horror. But Trask, after grinning at you, takes back to where he got the thing, and hurls it away.

The meat is sizzling by the time Micah, Cody, and Jenny get back. They've got three six-packs (two packs of the same cheap beer already being drunk; one pack of another, equally inferior brand) and other goodies: chips, two bags of cookies, and a plastic tray of chocolate cupcakes. These get broken into by Trask and Josh even as the meat's still cooking, and they gobble down most of them between themselves.

"What's your brother and his friend do?" you ask Micah when you find yourself on the edge of the crowd with him. "I mean, I assume they're graduated."

"Trask's graduated," he says. "He works for our folks. You know we own a H-Vac company?" He squints at you, and you nod. "Yeah, he works for them. Josh's still in school, he's a senior."

"At Eastman?"

"McGuffey. He lives in McGuffey, he's one of them McGuffeys, the ones the city's named for. Where do you live?"

"Uh, Acheson."

"Cool, me too." His gaze is searching but somehow vacant, as though he's unsure if he's interested in you or not. "I'll ride my bike out to your place tomorrow, see you."

"Uh, uh, no," you stammer.

"How come not?" he asks, and for the first time this evening he seems to look you in the eye directly.

"Uh, tomorrow's a bad day. I mean, I'm not gonna be home."

"Where you going? I'll come see you Sunday anyway."

"I'm, I'm going out of town for the weekend," you stammer.

"Yeah, where?"

"Camping. Up by where my, uh, grandparents live."

"Where's that?"

"Cuthbert." You wince inwardly at the name. You lunged for it because you do have relatives in that mountain village: inbred, hillbilly, skunk-eating relatives that you've only seen once and never want to see again.

"Yeah, I dunno where that is," Micah says. "You'll be back Monday, though, for school."

"I'm homeschooled."

"So when're you coming back? I'll ride over'n see you then."

"N-not for a week. It's a long trip. And we're not in Cuthbert, just kind of, um, close to—"

"What's your address?" He takes his phone out.

You sigh inwardly: This is exactly the kind of mess you were worried about getting into, and you wonder if the others are having just this kind of luck as well. What do I tell him when he goes looking for me at some address where I don't live and finds out I lied to him?

Then you remember what Caleb said, that "Mickey" and the others don't really exist, so it doesn't matter what you tell Micah and the others. In fact, after tonight, you'll probably never see them again. You can even delete that x2z account.

"Five-thirteen Churchyard Street," you tell him, which is your real address. Then, in a fright, you quickly correct yourself to "Five-thirty Churchyard," so he doesn't actually show up at your place. "And you should text—or DM!—before you come over," you add.

"Sure," he says as he thumbs the address in. "You ever hang out at the community center down there?"

Your heart goes sideways in your chest. "The— The Acheson Community Center?"

"Yeah." He looks up at you. "You know, used to be an old elementary school?"

"Uh ... I know about it."

"Yeah, we can hang out there, if you wanna get out without your folks knowing you're coming to meet me." His expression is open, but grave. "We can shoot some hoops if you do that. Or I dunno, just hang out."

You nod, and tell him it's a possibility. Fortunately, you're interrupted just then by a shout that the first batch of meat is ready.

* * * * *

"Micah. Jared. Micah's brother." Maria smirks at you. "You little cocktease." She lifts a rib off her paper plate, and sucks the last of the meat off the bone.

"Shut up!" you hiss, and stifle the urge to push your own plate—still piled high with potato salad—into her face.

You're inside the shed, which is dark and dank even with all the light and ventilation coming in through the windows. Maria pulled you in here, as though casually wandering around and exploring as she ate. You didn't especially want to follow—what if there's another bull snake in here?—and now you're really regretting it.

"Anyway," you add as Maria scarfs down a forkful of coleslaw, "Jared's at least as much all over you!"

"You want me to keep him distracted or don't you? So you can concentrate on Micah?" Her eyes glitter with amusement.

"Why do you think this is fun?"

"'Cos it is!" Her smile turns gloating. "These jerks. These assholes. This is almost as much fun as if it was Patterson or Javits."

You grimace. Sure, you can see the comparison—like those jock-assholes back at Westside, these guys are very cocky. But you don't feel the same animosity for them. This is like pranking someone you don't know. Besides, even though Josh and Trask are built like wrestlers or football players, Micah and the twins are built more like you and your friends, and carry no "gym stink" on them.

You're not given time to reply, though. "Hey," a voice calls from the doorway. It's Jared. "You know," he says as he joins you, "I can't be sure we got all the snakes and rats out. Just so you know."

You and Maria both squeal.

"Hey, it'll be okay," he adds. "They won't come out in the middle of everything. And I think we did get 'em all." He catches you by the shoulder as you try to bolt after Maria. "Besides, it looks like it's gonna start raining again, we might hafta move in here anyway."

"I don't wanna stay in here!" You start again for the doorway, through which Maria has already disappeared.

But Jared wraps a restraining arm around your torso. "No, come on, it's okay," he says. "I was coming in here anyway, to put up some lamps. We're all gonna hang out around here until— I dunno, nine or nine-thirty, before heading out."

"Heading out where?"

"Warehouse, probably. Or a party." He looks down his nose—which is long and prominent—at you. "Micah says you're homeschooled?"

"Yeah."

"You go out to parties much? Ever been to the Warehouse?"

"N-no."

"So maybe we'll just stay out here."

"And do what?"

Jared answers by pulling you close, and kissing you on the mouth.

Next: "A Rescue and Retreat" 

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