The Book of Masks (Vol. 5)

The Mystery of the Evaporating Spirits

Previously: "The Hidden World" 

"What'll you give me for it?" you ask Keith. "How much?"

"You want me to pay you for it?" he exclaims. "Dude, I ain't makin' no offers—"

"I'm not giving it away for free!" you retort. "Fuck that, I don't get anything for it, I'll just throw it back on the pile in my room!"

Keith snorts.

"Fine. You say you paid two bits for it?"

"Two bucks," you correct him.

"Then I'll give you two bucks." He shoves a hand into his jeans pocket and digs around. "That's tops," he warns. "I ain't givin' you no profit on flipping the fucking thing."

So you flip him off and tell him to keep his money and you'll keep the book.

* * * * *

You still need something for the time capsule, though. So after stopping off at Keith's so he can pick up that fake ID, you drive south of town to AAA Liquor and Wine, which Keith assures you will sell you some spirits just as long as you've got a "plausible looking ID." You're shy enough that you wait in the parking lot while he goes in to pick something up. You do give him two twenties to spend, which is all you pulled out of your cash stash when you stopped at your house.

"Pfft, I dunno if this is the kind'o stuff that's s'posed to 'age well'," Keith says ten minutes later as he clambers back into the truck cab with you. "But maybe your teacher will like it."

You glance at the bottle, but the label means nothing to you. In fact, you're not even sure if it's wine, beer or hard liquor.

"It's wine," Keith retorts when you ask. "A cabinet something. I'll tell you, the guy at the register gave me a funny look when I brung it up to him. For a moment I thought he was gonna say something."

"Because you're obviously under age?"

"Nah, because— Okay, yeah, because I'm 'obviously underage'," he mimics you, "and so I was looking like a total doof-wad for buying it. Think he came real close to telling me to put it back and try picking out some tequila instead. Fuck me, the things I do to help you out."

"Thanks. Do I get any change?"

He gives you a beady-eyed glance, and hands over a couple of crumpled bills.

* * * * *

You're real nervous, of course, when you take the bottle into the school a little later. Not because you're afraid of being busted with alcohol, but because you are suddenly unsure of what Mr. Walberg will say. Almost you run back to your truck to get that book and give it to him instead. But you push on to the bitter end.

And it gets pretty bitter. Mr. Walberg gives you a very long and deep frown of disapproval when you hand it over, and he doesn't look any happier when you protest that you brought it because you thought it would be cool to bring something that would "age" while in the time capsule.

"Did your folks suggest this?" he asks in a very acid tone.

"No."

"Did you ask them advice? Like what kind of wine or vintage or anything like that?"

"Uh, no."

"Did you do any kind of research before picking out this wine?"

You blush hard instead of answering.

"Mr. Matthias, you can put your head down and take a nap if you can't find something better to do," he barks at the shabby stoner who is sitting the middle of the classroom. To you he says, "Where did you get the idea for this?"

"I dunno," you said. "It just ... came to me."

"You had no consultations with anyone? You didn't overhear someone talking about their contribution?"

Now you feel the blood draining from your face as a sudden suspicion hits you.

"Did someone else already give you, uh, something like this?" you ask.

"I'm asking the question, Mr. Prescott."

"No, I didn't overhear anyone say anything. You think I copied someone else's work?" you cry.

Mr. Walberg gives you a very, very long and hard look, as though trying to break you. But you are perfectly sincere that you didn't "overhear" anyone talking about bringing in a bottle of wine. (Still, if you are able to meet his stare with a hard glare of your own, it's because you're thinking of Keith, and silently cussing him.)

"Well, alright, Mr. Prescott," the teacher sighs. "I will accept your submission." He looks down at the label, and sighs deeply. Then he squints up at you. "And how did you manage to procure this ... alcoholic beverage?"

"Someone I know gave it to me. Or, actually, I bought it from him."

He shakes his head and mumbles under his breath. With a dismissive wave of his hand he sends you on your way as he opens the bottom drawer of his desk and slides the bottle inside.

* * * * *

Keith is gone by the time you get back out to the parking lot, and you wait until after dinner before texting to ask him where he got the idea of submitting a bottle of wine. In reply, he asks if it worked. Then whats it matter? he asks when you admit that it did. You're pretty sure he got the idea from someone else—from someone else, specifically, in the same class as you—but decide it's not worth pursuing. You put it out of your mind, and go back to worrying about classes and school.

Life returns to normal, to a normality so normal that even the brief detour into abnormality you took last weekend, at the Warehouse, doesn't even register. You never hear from Patrick or Lorenzo or the girls or anyone else associated with that adventure.

On Friday the time capsule is buried, and Mr. Walberg assigns an essay: write three hundred words on the submission you made and your reasons for picking it. It puts Caleb in a panic: I can't tell him I gave him a thumb drive full of porn! he hisses at you on your way out of the classroom, because that is exactly what Caleb submitted. He even has the wild idea of digging up the time capsule, removing the thumb drive, and putting in something else, and he wants your help, but you tell him not be an idiot. He doesn't tell you that he has given up on the idea, but at least he doesn't ask you again.

And yet the drama around the time capsule intensifies on Monday, when you return to school and learn that over the weekend vandals dug it up and looted it, leaving scattered on the quad what they decided not to take. You silently confront Caleb, and with a glare just as silent he denies any culpability in the matter.

"They were after liquor, is my guess," Carson Ioeger announces at lunch. It is just him and James and Paul Davis out front this day, when you and Caleb and Keith join him.

"What's liquor got to do with the time capsule?" Paul asks.

"Some asshat contributed a bottle of hooch to your class project," Carson explains, "and another asshat went around blabbing about it. Someone must've overheard. Someone couldn't help overhearing," he says with a dark and meaningful look at Keith.

"Hey, what're you looking at me for?" Tilley demands.

"Yeah, what are you looking at him for?" you echo, though you are much more pleased that Carson didn't look at you when he mentioned the "bottle of hooch."

"Oh, I dunno, Tilley," Carson says. "Maybe I'm looking at you because you're the one who came barging up to me and Jenny on Friday, braying about how some-an-such was saying that who-and-some was putting a 'bottle of hooch' in the time capsule and was that true?"

"I was just asking!" Keith protests, though he turns red. "You should'a heard how loud Marc and Jessica Garner were talking about it in English!"

"You should have heard how loud you were talking about it," Carson retorts.

"How did Marc and Jessica—we're talking Marc and Jessica Garner, right?" you ask. "Well, how did they know about it?"

"This has nothing to do with you, Prescott," James snaps. You're about to retort, but you snap your mouth shut, as you remember it is probably wiser not to let anyone think it was your contribution that led to the vandalism and theft.

"That's right. And I'm not saying it's your fault, Tilley," Carson adds. "It's just as much Marc and Jessica's fault as yours. More so, if other people heard them and spread it around too."

"I didn't spread nothing," Keith mutters, and an instant later has gathered up his stuff and stalked off.

"Dude, you didn't have to be so hard on him," you tell Carson as you watch Keith go.

"I'm just reminding him, and anyone else who was eavesdropping," Carson says, "that there are certain things that you don't talk about at school."

There's no missing the very meaningful look that he gives you when he says this.

* * * * *

So you're in a mood to commiserate when Keith calls you later that afternoon to complain about Carson.

"Son of a bitch," he growls. "It was all on account of Jenny he was all laying into me!"

"What makes you say that?" you ask.

"You notice she wasn't there at lunch? Too shame-faced to show herself, is what I think!"

"Over what?"

"What do you think? Over that time capsule stuff! God, your teacher and his assignments suck!" (You'd not disagree.) "But she heard all about it too, you know, 'cos— Okay, yeah, 'cos I asked her about it and she wanted to know about it. But you know Jenny! I bet she was off like a flash to all her other classes talking about it!"

He pauses.

"Wait, you know what?" he says. "Carson's right, I suck. Because if she did that, it was on account of I said something in front of her."

"Don't worry about Carson. And don't worry about that bottle of wine, it doesn't matter."

For you have moved on to something else of fascination: that book you bought at Arnholm's, and rediscovered in your room. You have been looking it over again, off and on, for the past few days, and have grown more curious about it.

That's all for now.

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