The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

A Family Project

Previously: "The Life of a Dad" 

Your dad may have a ton of problems at work, but he never takes them home with him, and he is always home by six. "And how many dragons did you slay today?" your wife asks when you trudge wearily into the kitchen.

"No dragons, just idiots." You put your arms around her and kiss her on the cheek. "A dragon would make a nice change." You hang on to her, and dimly you're aware that you shouldn't be enjoying this quite so much, and that your cock shouldn't be stiffening. But you're too tired to care. "You?"

"Pork medallions for supper. Green beans and a salad."

"I asked about you." You nuzzle her ear. "Not supper."

She wilts a little, and puts her arm around your back. "I fought dragons. Cleaned Robert's stuff. Umm ..."

"Mm-hmm?" You put your nose in her hair and smell it. It's still got some of the shampoo scent, but it's mixed with honest sweat and her own musk. Your motor thrums a little harder.

"We're getting up close to the time, I think, when we'll have to talk to him about ... emissions."

And the motor sputters and stops. "Intentional or accidental?"

"Accidental. Haven't had a big patch yet, unless they happened where I didn't find 'em, but—"

"Okay." You let go of her and rub your eyes. You yourself know that Robert is into the porn, and your dad suspects it. Your mom? You've no idea what she knows, suspects, or plain just won't tell herself about her sons.

And that reminds you that this is your mom you were feeling up. "Where's Will?" you ask as you lean back against a counter. Your wife— Focus, Will, that's your mom! —turns back to the stove, where the beans are gently simmering. "His truck's here, so—"

"Upstairs, I guess. Did you have that talk with Caleb?"

"Yes. I also found out what it's all about."

"I thought you knew what it was all about," she says as she checks inside the oven, where a pork tenderloin is sizzling. Your mom loves cooking and baking and sewing and cleaning. "They were trying to blow themselves up."

"Yes, but I found out what Caleb thought he was doing and why Will was helping. He needed help with his math, and this was his way of paying Caleb back." It's a plausible lie, and you take no great satisfaction in your ingenuity at coming up with it.

"Well, that's good, isn't it?" Martha asks. Yes, think of her as 'Martha'. "It means he knows he needs help and is getting it and he's paying his way. Sort of."

"I'll try to remember to look at it that way," you reply in your dad's driest tone. "But I put a stop to it, and told Will I'd be taking over as his tutor. A couple of hours every night, just the two of us, in my study."

Martha turns with an expression of pure alarm. "Are you sure, honey? Your blood pressure—"

"I'll be fine. I can't very well yell at him two hours straight. Besides, maybe this will, you know, break the ice between us." You wince at the expression, which is horribly apt. "Maybe that's why it's been so long since we've gotten along. We're like strangers to each other."

Martha's expression softens, and she pulls you into a gentle hug.

* * * * *

"Alright, tomorrow I want you to switch out with yourself after school," you tell your fake son later that evening as you close the grimoire. "Send Will in to work, and you go back to the clubhouse to execute the spell."

"Do I still get paid for his time?" Caleb asks with one of your old, raffish grins. He is clutching a list of the ingredients you will need for the next spell. Will Prescott's calculus homework still lies unopened at his elbow.

"Sure." You tap your pen on the desk. "I wish we could find a more secure facility to do this stuff in," you mutter.

"A building at Salopek, maybe?"

"That's the opposite of secure," you retort.

Still you muse on the idea, and your eye settles on your replacement thoughtfully. "You know, if you were older we might fake up a sublease that would give you one of the smaller units to work in." And that gives you another idea, and you study it from a couple of different angles before laying it aside. "But for tomorrow," you resume, "just do it at the clubhouse."

"I could go over there tonight," Caleb says. "Tell your mom I'm going for a quick jog, and you could finish my homework for me."

"Tomorrow is soon enough. And don't go on to whatever spell comes after it," you add more firmly. "I want to look over everything before you do anything."

He rolls his eyes. "Yes, Daaaad," he whines.

"Am I going to get attitude from you?"

"Well, dur. Don't you always?"

You return his snicker with a glower.

The spell Caleb will be executing tomorrow is the one he unlocked by turning your dad into a golem. It looks like a variation on the last two spells, for it uses almost the exact same ingredients but on a smaller scale. The main difference, thankfully, is that it calls for no bodies whatsoever, and only a handful of cemetery dirt. As ever, there is no indication what it makes or what it does, but Caleb will have an answer to that when he brings you the results.

And it seems like the only way forward. None of the spells have come with a "reverse," so the only thing you can hope is that by going forward you will eventually come upon something that will fix your dad. You hope you don't have to keep doing horrible things to people in order to reach it.

Business transacted, you push the grimoire back into your old book bag and pull out some of the other homework while Caleb tackles your math. You can write in both your and your dad's handwriting, so you scrawl out some answers on your Sociology homework, then check over Caleb's work. You only find three errors, and you tell him to leave them uncorrected. "I want Bs, not As," you tell him, "or Mr. Kowalski will spot a fraud. B-minuses, if you can cut it that fine."

Later, you release him to goof off upstairs, and pad into the living room to watch TV with your wife. "It went okay," you reply to her querying glance. "He only rolled his eyes at me seven times. Okay, five times," you say when she gasps. You kiss her. "Thanks for the philosophy talk last night."

"What philosophy talk?"

"About how this is the first day of the rest of our son's educational career."

"Did I say that? I was trying to get you to—" She grabs you down low, and you jump, and she giggles. Fortunately, just then Robert comes through on his way to the kitchen, and she lets go of you.

But she won't let go of you when you get upstairs and in bed, not until you've peeled off your boxers and turned over to get on top of her. You let go and try to pass out as you let your dad's instincts take over.

And your dad's instincts are that he loves having sex with his wife. Hot, grinding, deep-thrusting sex.

* * * * *

"Whew! Someone sure wanted in bad, didn't they?" Jack Weiland says as he shakes his head.

You and Andy Keyes exchange annoyed looks behind his back, but you say nothing, and Andy only says, "I'll set some guys to fixing it."

"It" is a window, high up in the back wall of one of the secure units where Salopek keeps its most valuable materials. The glass has been blown out and lies scattered on the asphalt beneath your feet. The heavy steel shutters have been peeled back like the skin off a banana and hang limply from busted hinges. You are one of half a dozen Salopek employees staring up at it.

You shake your head over it. It's the second burglary within the last two months.

Then you countermand Andy before he can move. "I want Mike Salazar and his team to look it over before we start fixing it up." You turn to Sean Mitchell, who is standing next to you and craning his neck to stare up at the window. "Go find Will, the two of you will start making an inventory of what's in that room. Andy will get you a manifest so we can find out what was taken." You take out your cell phones to call security. "Get in there before the door codes change."

"Why change the door codes?" Sean asks. "If it was burglars, they went in through the window."

"They went out through the windows, Mitchell. The glass." It crunches as you shift your feet. "The explosion came from inside. My first guess is they let the door close on them after they were inside, and this was how they chose to get back out. Phil," you say into the phone, and begin directions to get all the door codes of the complex changed.

And that reminds you that you want to find a new spot for Caleb to do his research in.

* To continue: "The New Spell" 

*
"Table of Contents (Vol. 3)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)"