The Book of Masks (Abridged)

The High Cost of Scientific Advance

AW, HELL. You were never one to wait to open your presents on Christmas Day when you had a chance to open them Christmas Eve, and you never waited to peek at them on Christmas Eve if you had a chance to peek at them before Thanksgiving.

Upstairs, you gather the material for the next spell. This batch of stuff, fortunately, doesn't give off any kind of stink, and just makes a kind of runny paste that you paint onto the inside of the mask. It instantly bonds and dries.

You hold up the mask and regard it and the reflection of your best friend inside it. You're not entirely sure what it will do if you put it to your face, but whatever it does, you don't want to get caught by your parents doing it, so you delay a direct experiment with it. Instead, you lay it onto the book. When you lift it, the next page turns.

The reverse only confirms what you've already deduced: that you've sealed the mask and can now wear it. You go on to the next spell.

It leaves you frowning. As with the first spell, there is no real description of what it does. It does call for some specialized material, though: a strip of metal and some tools capable of carving letters and runes into it, along with some chemicals that you don't have on hand.

You count your much-depleted cash reserves, and decide that you don't have enough money to continue. You suck hard on your lower lip as you ponder what to do about that ...

"Caleb, my friend, you got forty bucks you can loan me?"

"I sure do, Will, right here in my locker which we are standing in front of while our classes change. Here you are, and you don't even have to pay me back. It was awesome of you getting me that job at Salopek like you promised, and I want you to have my first paycheck to show you my gratitude. I'll give you fifty dollars now, actually, as a down payment on it."

"Thanks! Uh, you're not pissed about that thing that happened yesterday, in the parking lot, are you?"

"What thing? Oh, that? No! Actually, I was going to apologize to you for getting so bent out of shape about it. I don't know why I got so mad. Say, here's our mutual friend, Keith. I'll leave you with him 'cos I have to get to class now."

"Yo, Tilley, wassup? You don't have ten or twenty dollars I can borrow from you?"

"I have thirty, and you can take it from me now. Seth Javits is after me, and I don't want him to find it on me 'cos I know he'll take it and I won't get it back from him. Here."

"I can do that. When do you want me to pay you back?"

"I don't need it until I graduate. See ya. Hey, look, it's Carson Ioeger!"

"Yo, guys. Where are you running off to, Keith? Oh, now he's gone. Say, what's all that green for, Will?"

"I'm holding people's money for them, on account of Seth Javits."

"Yeah, he's looking for people to take money from, on account of me and James lifted sixty dollars out of his locker while he was at basketball practice. See?"

"So that's what these newfangled sixty dollar bills look like. Can I touch it?"

"You can have it, Prescott. James and I don't need it, we just lifted it on principle, and would feel dirty if we kept it."

"Cool. Dad! What are you doing at my school? And is that a strip-club dancer with you?"

"It is. I'm researching a certain Christmas present for you. Also, a great-aunt you've never heard of sent you a hundred dollars in today's mail, and I figured you might want to get your hands on it as soon as possible ..."

* * * * *

Midnight. The house is asleep, and your door is locked. The only light is from the streetlamp filtering in through the curtains on your window.

You are laying in your bed with the sheets thrown off. You are stripped to your underwear, and are gripping the new mask while blinking at the ceiling. Your breath is coming in shallow gasps as you psyche yourself up to the experiment.

You're in your bedroom because obviously. You're on your bed because it's softer than the floor. And you're in your underwear because it has occurred to you that if this things works there's a good chance you'll wind up with Caleb's cock and balls, and you don't want them flopping around freely down there.

And you're only in your underwear because you're not sure if clothes will interfere with whatever transformation may take place.

Then, it occurs to you that the underwear is just such an encumbrance that might interfere. So you grit your teeth and peel it off, leaving you shivering and exposed.

Did you just think the word "exposed"? Exposed to what? Magical forces? The forces of darkness? The evil that lives inside sorcerous grimoires?

Or just to the air conditioner, which chooses that moment to come on?

You shiver, but you've broken that brief spasm of fear. You grip the mask firmly, hold it over your face, and lower it.

For a moment it rests there, and you've just time to wonder if that's all it's going to do, when it grows very heavy. Like, anvil heavy. Battleship heavy. All the moons and all the asteroids heavy. It pushes into your face and into you and it pulls all the rest of your body with it. Your mind sinks and you grow warm all over, as though you're being pulled down into a pool of simmering syrup ...

* * * * *

It's the cold stiffness that finally convinces you that you're awake. Eyes open or eyes shut, it's the same darkness, but the chill on your limbs is the familiar cold that you feel when you're trying to wake up from a hard night's sleep. In fact, you feel like you've been beaten all over with sticks.

But that stiffness abruptly vanishes when you sit up and draw your knees to your chin. When you rub your eye with the heel of your hand you feel yourself fully awake.

Now. Where are you and what is going on—?

You twitch all over. The mask. You were trying out that mask! You laid it on your face and then you felt like you were drowning and then ... Here you are? You pat the bed around you, and feel at the pillows.

It's gone.

So where is it? Is it ... inside you? The way it went inside Caleb? And if so, what has it done to you?

There's a mirror inside your closet door, but before checking there you cautiously feel at your face.

It feels like a face. That much is a relief, but you can't tell anything from that. Knees and shins? You pat at those, and you have the impression that there's a lot less hair on them.

Hair! Your hair is totally different from Caleb's. His is cut in short, tight, wiry curls that cling close to the scalp, while yours sticks out in stiff waves like bundles of straw. Gingerly, you rub a palm over the top of your head—

It's like a rug up there! A close-woven fiber rug!

You scramble from your bed and run over to the closet. You yank the door open and flip on the closet light.

Caleb stares back at you from inside the mirror. His eyes pop and his mouth hangs open.

You gulp, and so does he. You feel your eyes widen, and so do his.

Oh. My. Fucking. God. You look just like your best friend! From the top of your head down to—

Yikes! You look back up into your face. The sausage below is not something you need to be contemplating.

You put your hands to your cheeks and rub them. They feel like skin and they move like skin. You pull at them, and the flesh doesn't come away. You pinch it, and grimace. It doesn't feel like pulling at a mask. It feels like ... like it's your own skin.

You grin, and a very Caleb-like light of mischief comes into your eyes.

You could fool anybody with this thing!

* * * * *

Tuesday. First period. "Caleb, my friend, you got forty bucks you can loan me?"

"Fuck off!" Caleb snarls.

"What? What did I—?"

"I'm not talking to you after what happened yesterday!"

"You're not talking to me because I got you that job?"

He presses two middle fingers into your face. After that, he turns around again and refuses to speak for the rest of class.

Second period. "Yo, Tilley, wassup? You don't got ten or twenty dollars I can borrow, do you?"

"No, but I got a giant cock you can suck on."

"Money, Keith, I'm asking—"

"I got a cock, but no money."

"Why, did Javits take it from you?"

He wheels on you. "I don't bring money to school, Prescott! For exactly! That! Reason!"

Lunch. "Carson! You got any money you can loan me?"

"No. You got any you can loan me?"

"Gwah?"

James Lamont, who is seated on the grass nearby, leans into the conversation. "All our money is invested."

"In what? The stock market?"

"Projects, Prescott," says Carson. "Projects."

"What kind of—?"

"Projects," he repeats still more firmly. "But that doesn't mean you can't invest too."

"But I don't have any money!"

He shrugs. "Not my problem."

At supper. "Dad, can I get an advance on my Christmas money?"

"What Christmas money?" he asks as he plops some mashed potatoes on his plate.

"Well, usually Uncle Scott and Aunt Mary give me—"

"What makes you think they're giving you anything this year?" Before you can answer, he adds, "I hear the movie theater is hiring."