The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

The Very Busy Monday

Previously: "A Consultation with an Expert" 

You've got a lot of plausible hangout choices for Monday afternoon—which is a huge change from the usual for you—but you settle on doing the video. You're excited by the idea of doing something with Cindy, and of having schoolmates see you doing a project with her. It also gives you something you can talk about with those girls you're going to be meeting with. You can tell them (truthfully or not) that you are co-starring in a YouTube venture.

* * * * *

You are now mostly used to your new wardrobe, so you don't get the same tingle Monday morning that you got Friday when you get to school. You do still feel a surge of confidence in having on nice things—including a tie—and that confidence is strengthened by the memory of your trending on x2z over the weekend.

But if you have a tingle, it comes from a different source. It comes from thinking of all the girls you're going to be talking to.

Replies to your texts came trickling in over the evening and night, so that by morning all but a handful of the girls who texted you had replied back to your replies. (And the ones who didn't reply? You sent them follow-up texts, so that they'd at least know you were thinking about them.) You've organized them all on your cell phone like an appointment book.

So instead of heading over to the library or to Walberg's classroom, as you usually do, you saunter over to the baseball diamond, where the school team is already practicing. There are three girls crouching on the bleachers, and they smile at you as you hop up the steps to them. Two of them scoot aside so you can sit between them. The third sits slightly apart. You only know their names, not having had any dealings with them before. The girls who flank you are named Reagan Hackett and Kayla Shea, while the one who hangs apart is Kerri Mullen. They are on the volleyball team—so Stephanie had noted in the list she made up. Reagan flirts with you pretty hard, and when she mentions a Friday-night party she aims to attend, you make a great show of making a note of it on your phone.

Your best friend is in a pissy mood when you catch up to him in Walberg's classroom, and it's not improved when you ask him how his Friday night was. "Short and ugly," he retorts. He confesses to having left early on account of the "noise and assholes" and his not wanting to get blitzed (coughcough) like some people he knew. When you faux-innocently ask if he's been on x2z, he shakes his head, then gets very frosty after he's been on and found that you are still trending.

Somehow, that makes you happy—happy enough that you're not bothered by the ostentatious way that Kelsey, Geoff, and the other AP assholes ignore you all before, during, and after class.

You've no time to plumb Keith's attitude in second period, for Mia DeWitt comes over to chat. She wasn't one of the ones who texted you, but she hangs her boobs over your desk while confessing that she's been one of the ones upvoting your hashtag every time it shows up. You blurt out an invitation to get together to watch some movies, and enter a memo in your phone to find time with her. Some of the other girls in Mr. Hawks' class, you fancy, are watching her and you with slit-eyed jealousy.

In third period you're stopped in the doorway by a scary bunch of dudes in muscle shirts and jeans; you don't know their names, but they usually skip class or hang out in the back when they do show up, and you do your best to ignore them. Today, though, they insist on talking, and they invite you to drop in at the quarry east of town the next time you're down for some shit or other. You tell them you might, if you can borrow a skateboard. (One of them has one over his shoulder.) That elicits good-natured guffaws.

* * * * *

Fourth period: You go over to talk to Kristy, who regards you with grave interest. "Sorry I didn't get to dance with you more," you tell her. "I looked for you but I lost you."

"You looked kind of preoccupied," she says in a very neutral tone.

"Look, I'm not usually that, uh—" You swallow hard. "I kind of lost my head. Um, Stephanie told me there's a party this Friday, but she doesn't know where. Are you going to it? I'm going to be there too, wherever it is."

She smiles and says that'll be great. You look up at someone slaps you on the shoulder.

It's Carlos. "We still on for this afternoon?" he asks.

"Yeah," you reply, and before he can ruin your moment with Kristy by mentioning Cindy you hurriedly add, "We talking about Wrath of Khan? I'm doing a video for these guys," you explain to Kristy. "Movie review thing for YouTube." She's polite enough to pretend to be impressed.

* * * * *

Lunch: You ditch your friends to eat in the cafeteria with some other girls you made a date with. Brianna Gould wears too much makeup for your taste, and the leopard-skin prints are a little too much; but you're more taken with her friend Katie Byrd, who lives up to her surname by being small and flighty and eager to talk about music. They both seem very interested in you, and their two friends Rebecca and Eric—who have their arms around each other—are also keen to talk. You improvise some complimentary opinions about the bands that played on Friday night, but when they ask if you're going out to the Warehouse next Friday you tell them you've already made other plans; when they remind you that the Warehouse will be equally as hopping on Saturday, though, you pronounce yourself interested in going‚if Brianna and Katie are.

Seventh period: Five girls skip their class to join you in the library for your study hall. One of them, Katy, even admits to skipping out on basketball practice so as to sit in on the social session. You soon discern from the conversation that two of the girls‚ Madison Fortney and Delaney McGuire—already have boyfriends are only there for company, which leaves Katy, Abby Derr, and Karen Rogers as the ones who might have a more than passing interest in you. Abby is too fat and plain for your tastes, and you're not keen on the bad job she's done of dyeing her hair green. Karen? She seems very shy, hardly talks, and doesn't look at you while hiding her face behind long blonde hair and the blue ski cap that she's jammed down all the way down to her eyebrows. She had sent you a number of texts on Saturday, but she sure acts terrified of you now.

Eighth period: You skip Astronomy, as one of your correspondents, Alexandria Hull, is in there and has offered to take notes for you while you meet with her friends Jazmin and Danielle. They turn out to be sophomores, and they are very aggressive. They press up close to you, and play with your hat and hair, and talk about those friends they have who are dating guys who are seniors. It's very exciting, but also kind of scary for they all but bully you into flirting back, and though you hold your own you are relieved when the final bell rings.

Not once during the day, though, did you manage to catch up to Dorothy Harmon, the girl who made out with you Friday night and most of Saturday morning. She never sent you a text.

* * * * *

It's been a dizzy, busy day, and you come close to cancelling that video shoot. You're glad you didn't, though, when you find Cindy waiting for you outside the storeroom. She runs up to you with a squeal and squeezes your arm. "Did you have fun Friday?" she asks.

You tell her you did, and refrain from asking her about her Friday night. You're not sure you remember correctly, but didn't she break up with her boyfriend that night? And for your part, you only mumble something when she asks you about Kristy.

Mike and Carlos and their friends Philip and Josiah are already waiting inside. They put you and Cindy behind the desk and spend twenty minutes fiddling with lights. While they do that, they try to remind you of the movie you watched, and the sorts of things that you could say about it. "Don't worry," Cindy whispers in your ear when you lapse into a befuddled silence. "They can make it look good in the editing."

You sincerely hope so, for you are far too tongue-tied during the shoot that follows, and you spend almost two hours doing lots and lots of takes as you try to say something that sounds sort-of intelligent in a way that is even slightly articulate. The guys filming you look grimly unimpressed with your work by the time things wrap up.

Cindy was a real sport about it, though, and almost single-handedly keeps your spirits up. They correspondingly sink when you exit the storeroom alone, for she has to stay behind to make some extra scenes, while you are probably already going to be late for supper. You can almost feel your heart settling toward your appendix as clamber into your truck and steer for the gate.

There's a truck on the other side of it, waiting to go in as you go out. You toss its driver a casual glance as you pass each other, and do a double take.

It's Seth Javits—Cindy's ... ex?

He looks very pissed off.

* To continue: "A Conspiracy Unmasked" 

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