The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

One Very Odd Protection Program

Previously: "People Have Inhibitions for a Reason, You Know" 

You must not have heard right: "What are you talking about, us being him, him being us?" you ask.

Caleb just snaps his fingers and points at the portable behind you; its door, you notice, is hanging open. "Let's get him inside there," he says, and lifts Gordon by the arms.

"I don't know what you're thinking—"

"I'm thinking we need to move this fucker before someone comes," Caleb hisses. He tries pulling Gordon, but he might as well be pulling a semi. "We gotta hide him before anyone calls the paramedics, before the mask comes out of him—"

"Why did you even put a mask on him?"

"Just help me, goddamn it!"

So, straining every fiber, you and Caleb somehow get Gordon through the portable's narrow door. The inside is dark and dusty, smelling of old wood and sweat and paper and— "Christ, Dane and his stoner friends have been using this place as an opium den," Caleb mutters. "Thank God they were too high to close it up right when they were done." He drops his share of the burden and hops over to shut the door. But he leaves the lights off.

"Will you tell me what we're doing?"

"We're trying to keep you from being killed," he says. "Or did you want Gordon to paint the outside of this portable with your guts? Jesus, what did you do? He's never come after us before!"

"I mouthed off to his girlfriend," you confess. "She must have sent him after me."

"Brilliant. What a clusterfuck. Anyway, I saw him carrying you along, so I followed and used a mask on him."

"One of the blanks? What were you even doing with it here?"

"I was gonna pass it along to you, obviously, to use tonight. We can't do that now, though, and we can't leave him like this. If he was out to hurt you before, he'll be out to kill you now."

"But you're the one who—"

"He doesn't know that! But he knows you were there, so that's why we gotta put your mask on him.

"Listen to me, man," he says as you stare back blankly.. "He's going to be looking to mess up Will Prescott good, and you know how good he and Patterson are at messing people up without getting attention. It's not like we can go into a witness protection program. You will spend the rest of the school year losing weight, hair and sanity. He'll sic that giggling psycho Lynch on you. We just fucked up his ego, you think he's just going to let that go? But if he wakes up and discovers that he is you, who can he hurt?" Caleb grabs and feels your bicep. "He won't have the upper body strength. Meanwhile, you'll be hiding out as him, which will make you doubly safe."

"He'll think I'm a fucking wizard who stole his body!"

"Yeah, like that's not the truth? So what's wrong with him thinking it? Who can he tell? Who would believe him?"

"He might buy a gun and shoot me! Or worse, he might go back to my place and piss off my dad! It's not like with us pretending to be each other! He hasn't got a reason not to fuck up my life!"

"Listen, it'll only be for a couple of days, until the weekend. We'll let him get good and freaked out, then we'll talk to him and promise to change him back. But we'll also tell him that he has to treat you okay afterward, or else we'll switch him with— I dunno, Grossie Gutierrez.

"How would we do that?"

"We wouldn't have too, you fucking moron! It's called a bluff, and after finding himself in your body he won't dare call it!"

You'd argue some more, but a glow catches your eye, and your sphincter tightens to see the mask has reappeared on Gordon's face. And that decides it for you.

"Go find another open portable," Caleb says, and thrusts his bag and Gordon's mask at you. "You'll hide and change in there while I take care of him in here."

* * * * *

The portable next door is also unlocked, and Caleb tells you to undress there and wait. He packed the sealant in his bag as well, so while you sit, shivering, in a creaky old desk, you paint the inside of Gordon's mask with the lacquer. You're about halfway done when Caleb comes in to collect your things and to dump Gordon's. When he comes back a few minutes later, he finds you contemplating Gordon's clothes. "Why aren't you in those yet?"

Because, truth to tell, you're a little daunted by them; they remind you of the scale of what you're being forced to do, because they are made for a guy who is at least half a foot tall than you, and who even at that height is built on a much more massive scale. Leaving aside the underwear (ick) there are the red cotton athletic shorts that are as long as your torso; a gray muscle shirt whose hem would likely drop below your butt; flag-like ankle socks and canoe-like athletic shoes. They all have a stink on them: the stink of alpha jock/bully. "Move it, Will," Caleb barks. "I just put your mask on that fucker, and he's going to be waking up before you do."

You drop behind the teacher's desk at the front of the portable, and Caleb hands you the mask. With a deep breath you press it to your face. The world dims and darks, and you sink backward into a viscous sea of nothingness.

* * * * *

You're grunting and snorting and swallowing as you wake, as though you're emerging from deep water. That is what it feels like, and even when you are out of it there is a fog in your head. You shake it loose and sit up stiffly. You can't see much, but—

Your knees are enormous. You're used to your own skinny ones, but these are round like coconuts; and instead of sticking out like a knob that joins shank and thigh, these are firmly embedded between meaty thighs and calves. Fuck, they actually look like joints in a well-built limb—a leg—and not like a knot of rubber bands connecting two sticks. And your feet seem very far away. But when you sit all the way up and stretch toward them—

To your astonishment your arms actually go that far, though you have to bend almost double, putting your face to your knees. You pull and stretch, and it feels very good. You sit back up again and draw a deep breath, and your chest keeps filling and filling and filling. You rest a palm over one pectoral: it's a thick dome of meat, as big and firm as the weight on a barbell. You roll your shoulder and experimentally flex a bicep; a great bulge swells.

You look over the top of the desk. Caleb is at the window, peering out through a crack in the Venetian blinds. Slowly, quietly, you get to your feet, and sway a little when you're up, for it's like you're standing on top of a stepstool. You can see the crown of Caleb's head from above.

The floor creaks beneath you. Caleb glances over, flinches back. "Jesus, you scared me," he hisses. He peers at you. "Are you in there, Will?"

"Where else would I be? Have you seen—? Has Gordon come out yet?"

"No. Maybe he's getting dressed or freaking out." His attention wavers between you and the window. "Well, you look like you've got everything," he says. "So how about getting dressed?"

That's the matter of a minute, though you take it slowly: underwear, shorts, shirt, socks and shoes. Wallet and keys are on a desk; you slip them into your pockets after briefly contemplating Gordon Black's dead-eyed scowl in the driver's license. You pay as little attention to Black as you can, but it occurs to you now that you've never seen him looking happy. Which is funny, considering what a big man he is on campus, and how he has a hot girlfriend.

Caleb has a fearful expression as he gazes at you. "Christ, you look just like him. I can barely keep from shitting myself just to have you looking at me." He does a double-take at the window. "Sh! There he is!" he hisses. You step to the window, but can only barely make out the figure that has crept from the portable across the way.

It's you—Will Prescott. He's bare-headed and hunched over, and he looks left to right before stepping out of the door to the portable. His expression is tense—freaked out, really—and he scratches his cheek, then looks down at his fingers with loathing. Gingerly, he lofts his backpack onto his shoulder, hangs his cap on his hair, and as though treading on egg shells creeps back toward the school.

"I'll give him a few minutes," Caleb says. "Then I'll go out and circle around and catch up to him."

"What are you going to tell him?"

"Nothing, not right away. I'll tell him I heard about Gordon—you—hauling him back here for a beating. I'll play it from there depending on what he says. If he tries faking it through as you, I'll help him without letting him know it."

"And who's going to help me?" you ask. This was always the flaw in Caleb's plan. "I don't know jack shit about Gordon Black. His classes or where he lives—"

"Just be scary," Caleb says. "You're making a good start on that. You know what he drives, though. Maybe you should ditch school entirely, go off and get acquainted with his shit. You probably don't want the other guy spotting you right away." You don't reply, and he doesn't wait for you to decide. "Okay, I'm heading out. Call me tonight."

He swings his pack onto his shoulder and leaves, abandoning you to your new situation.

* To continue: "The Discovery of Gordon Black" 

*
"Table of Contents (Vol. 2)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)"