The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

Matryoshka Syndrome

Previously: "Secondary Thoughts of a Secondary Character" 

Sean's suggestion gnaws at you all day, and for the first time since donning Kristy's disguise you feel yourself actually wearing a disguise. Kristy's body does not feel like it is your own, but is a sheer body stocking you have pulled down over yourself. Her skin, when you brush and surreptitiously pinch it, is as alive and natural as before—is as alive and natural as your own—and the change in your relative height to the other students keeps you conscious that you are not wearing a mask but have actually altered your body to align with the size and contours of Kristy Suffolk's. But that very acute consciousness—that sense that you are someone else looking out at the world from behind a face not your own and manipulating a body-machine that is not your own—distances you from your impersonation. More than once you almost call out to Caleb, and in the locker room before basketball practice you disrobe with a reluctance to touch yourself—of course you'd be nervous about touching a naked girl—and when Stephanie calls sharply to you, you jump guiltily, half-expecting her to denounce you as an imposter before raking you across your face with her nails.

But you're not the only person in a mood. Dominique Hughes is snappish and biting both before classes start and during practice. At a lull during the latter you sidle up to Stephanie, who like you is blown from jogging around the circumference of the gym. "What's Dominique's deal?" you ask. (You ask it less from curiosity than a nagging sense that Kristy would ask it and that you'd better keep up the pretense of being her.)

"Beats me," she mutters back. Her expression is hard.

"Bad conscience," murmurs Almida Jones, the team captain, who is standing with you both.

"Shut up," Stephanie growls back.

"Don't talk to me that way."

"Psht!" Stephanie jogs off to join Haley Flanagan and Julia Paez, who are resting with their hands on their knees on the other side of the court.

"Bad conscience about what?" you ask Almida.

"That thing with Hannah Westrick. The prank."

"Oh? Did Marc yell at her or something?"

Almida looks startled. "Marc? What's it got to do with Marc?"

"Well, he's mad at—"

And now you realize that you forgot to pass Eva's warning on to Stephanie and the other girls who were behind the prank. Briefly, you relate Eva's story of how Marc was promising to "kill" the girls who'd shaken up his girlfriend.

"I haven't seen or heard from Marc," Almida says. "I dunno about Dominique. She hasn't said anything. All I know is—"

Coach Tesla blows her whistle, and gestures all the girls to join her under the basket. But under her breath, Almida concludes her story: "She met me in the parking lot this morning and dumped all that voodoo shit on me. She said she didn't ever want to look at it again."

* * * * *

It sounds like the sort of thing Dominique might do if Marc had cornered her and yelled at her really hard. Everyone likes Marc Garner, and you'd bet jealousy of Hannah Westrick was the prime reason that she and the other girls (including Kristy) banded together against Hannah. Most of the soccer team is against her too, though she does have some friends there. Some of those friends are Kristy's friends too, and if you were in more of a mood to be Kristy you might hang out with them after school, to talk to them about Hannah and Dominique and Marc. But instead you have this itch to peel off Kristy's skin and restore your own; and besides, you get a text from Maria Vasquez asking you to come out to the storage complex for a meeting after school.

Schedules have to be juggled before the meeting time can be set, and it's not until after dinnertime that you arrive at the storage complex. The studio is already crowded when you arrive, with people who look like Philip Fairfax, Eva and Jessica Garner, Cindy Vredenburg, and Carlos Montoya. Sean and Taylor Mitchell are there too, and Sean has taken off Scott's mask so you get your first direct look at the twins together in their natural state. They really are identical, and if it weren't for their contrasting reactions when you come in—one smiles warmly, while the other coolly chucks his chin at you and turns away—you doubt you could tell them apart. Both are meaty individuals with broad shoulders and muscular torsos; close-set eyes and flat noses; blonde whiskers that run along their jaws to meet in fuzzy patches on their chins; and close-shorn hair that curls up just over their ears. They look enough alike, that you glance for the tattoo that Sean has and which Taylor doesn't. Having spotted it, you drop down on the floor with your hip against his. After a moment's hesitation, he puts one arm behind you and leans on it so that it just touches your back.

He and Taylor brought a guest: Sawyer Harrison, who looks much healthier now that he's dressed and on his feet. And yet, somehow, a healthy Sawyer Harrison repulses you more than the sick one did. In a hospital bed, his gaunt cheeks and sunken eyes could be chalked up to illness and undernourishment. But awake and alert, sitting here with you and the others, there is something unwholesome about his glittering smirk.

He's tall and lanky, with bony arms that he's wrapped around his knees; his skin is pink, but it's less the pinkness of health than the pinkness of a sun-scorched pallor. His hair looked dark blonde in the hospital; under the storeroom lights it now has a reddish-gold gleam. His head is long and box-like, with a wide, broad forehead between his side-brushed bangs and the squashed up face beneath. "Squashed up," once the phrase has occurred to you, seems a very good description. It's like his face was sculpted in soft clay, but the sculptor in a fit of pique seizes the brow and chin and forced them together. His eyes are narrow and close set, and they glint from under peaked brows. His lips twitch up at the corners into a smirk. He reminds you (you realize) of a certain kind of kid you knew in elementary and middle school. The kind who waggled their peters at each other in the changing rooms after P.E., and scrawled dirty words on the sides of the library shelves. Boys whose idea of flirting was to snap bras and mutter "Fuck me" audibly under their breaths while the teacher was busy at the blackboard.

Philip introduces you to Sawyer, both by your real name and by Kristy's. He smirks and chucks his chin at you and says, "Hey." His eyes, you note, keep darting between you and Cindy and the Garners. Keith has noticed it too, it seems, and after a minute he moves to sit beside you so that you're half-blocking Sawyer's line of sight. There's some small talk, and Sawyer asks if you're on the cheerleader squad too. You explain that Kristy is on the basketball squad, and Sawyer says that's cool and asks if it's fun. You shrug, and he asks if Kristy's got any friends that it would be "cool to be." You temporize by telling him Lots, which you regret when his eyes widen and a slow grin spreads across his face.

After an awkward quarter-hour of this, Philip's phone chimes and he grimaces as he checks the text. "Josiah's not coming," he announces. "Neither of him." He hesitates. "Well, I guess we don't need him."

He's standing near the entrance to the unit, and he repositions himself so he can address the room and look out down the corridor at the same time.

"So, Sawyer's here because he's friends with Taylor and Sean," he starts, "and so he knows about the masks. He's got some other stuff he could tell us, but it's all pretty technical and I've already talked to him about it. Right now I just want to introduce him around, get everyone comfortable with him, and talk about where— who," he corrects himself, "he can be."

He looks around. No one says anything. Everyone looks at everyone else. Cindy finally stretches out a leg and says, "He can be anyone at the school, right?"

"Why does he have to be someone else anyway?" someone asks, and it's a shock when you realize that you're the one who asked it. You start to stammer as everyone swings around to gape at you.

"What I mean is," you try to explain, "all these impersonations they're to— Well, the way it was explained to me is, they're part of an experiment. Right? A, uh, sociology experiment, to see if the popular people can make someone who ... who, uh, isn't popular ... popular." You feel yourself blushing hard. "You're trying to make me popular," you blurt out. "The guy named Will Prescott." You look around, in case a hole has opened up nearby that you can crawl in to.

"Yes," says Philip. "But it's more complicated now. Sean has indicated an interest in, um, contributing to our original project, but Taylor needs a new identity for reasons particular to his situation."

"What are you talking about?" Cindy asks.

Fairfax turns an even gaze on her. "He's supposed to be dead," he says as though addressing a small child. "So he needs to be someone else."

Cindy blushes. "Then why didn't you just put it that way instead?" she mutters under her breath. "Reasons particular to his situation," she growls.

"But Sawyer doesn't need a new identity," you point out. "He's not dead, and he— Um." Your blush deepens. "I mean, is he going to help us out? Is he going to help Taylor out? Help out on the, uh, sociology experiment? Or is he just going to ... Just fuck around with a mask?"

The atmosphere seems to thicken. The tension isn't dissipated when Sawyer drawls, "I don't mind helping out with that experiment." His smirk deepens.

* To continue: "Masks and Veils" 

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