The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

The Lost Weekend

Previously: "New Jobs for New Members" 

"Yeah, alright," you say, without any great enthusiasm, for you feel as though you're being pushed into it by your friends. You look back at the gym. "But I don't want to go back up there now."

"You want to go up there later?" Caleb frowns. "Remember what Patterson said about making an 'appointment'."

"So I'll make an appointment," you growl. "He'll think that's cool or something."

Caleb shrugs, but Keith nudges you. "Can I go with you?" You cock an eyebrow. "In case things are locked up." He twiddles his fingers meaningfully.

"Where exactly did you learn that shit?" you ask, then shrug in agreement.

So later that evening you call Patterson. He says nothing immediately after you request an "appointment" in the fuck room. "Tonight and tomorrow are booked," he says. "And weekends are usually when me and Gordon hang out up there."

"I just want it for an hour," you say. "I can't stay out all night or anything."

"Just a quickie, huh?" He laughs. "How about tomorrow after school, during basketball practice?" That will work for what you want, and agree. "Just try to sneak in and out without Gordon or Lynch seeing you," he says. "I don't like listening to them bitch about you."

* * * * *

A dark cloud seems to hang around you all during school on Friday. Some of it is surely an ugly anticipation of the pretense to come. But part of it is also a morbid curiosity to see the consequences of Lisa and Geoff's "date." You'd only seen them briefly on Thursday, during the one class you share with with, and as near as you could tell there was nothing odd going on with them. Nor do things look that different today, until you see Eva march up to Lisa at her locker, touch her on the shoulder, and start a hurried conversation. Lisa is looking very angry when the two girls hurry off.

You're tempted to go find Mansfield--maybe a well-placed taunt can get him to let something slip. But you change your mind when you remember that you and Caleb (in disguise) are intending to get together with Jessica and Eva soon. That, probably, will be a perfectly good opportunity to find out what--if anything--has happened between Lisa and Geoff.

At lunch, you meet with Caleb and Keith, and you tell them about your after-school appointment. "How about we just skip last period and do it then?" Tilley suggests.

You think. "Yeah, that'll work. In fact--" and it's probably the first time in more than a week that you've smiled at a possible use of the masks. "I can probably just be late. We'll take Jeremy with us, and I'll just send my duplicate to collect my tardy." The others chortle at the plan too.

* * * * *

Keith is already at the top of the stairs leading to the loft when you arrive a minute after the tardy bell has rung. You wait a few more minutes until golem-Jeremy appears. He had been oddly truculent when you found him after lunch, and you had to borderline bully him into agreeing to show up at the fuck room. He only frowns and folds his arms as you unlock the door--a bit of a thrill, that, actually--and slip in.

You cross over to the cabinets where you've seen Patterson linger. There are three doors. The first is open, and inside you find most of the masks you and Caleb and Jason have collected: Lisa, Kendra, Geoff. The second door has a padlock on it. You frown at it, and then pull out the key ring Patterson had given to you: there are two keys, and the second fits the padlock nicely. Inside are some more masks: Caleb's, Keith's, Jason's, and yours. You linger over Jason's until Patterson's warning comes back to you: Don't fuck with your teammates. But it would be so tempting; and you don't trust Jason not to abuse the masks of you and your friends. Probably you should speak to Patterson about keeping the masks of the team in a safer place--maybe give them to their originals. You notice, of course, that neither his mask nor Gordon's are in the cabinet.

The third door has a combination lock on it, and you look over to find Keith fingering it thoughtfully. "Think you can open it?"

"No."

"That's probably why he put that lock on it. He knows about your magic fingers. The really good stuff has to be in there." You continue to stare at it yearningly, then punch Keith lightly. "Come on, let's change and get out of here."

You call Jeremy over; to your surprise, he flinches when you reach for his face, and actually seems to think about it when you order him to disrobe, bend over and let you remove the mask. But he complies after a long moment's hesitation. Keith gasps as the grey-white Richards appears when you've taken off the mask. "Yeah, not pretty, is it," you murmur. "Come on, give me my mask. The sooner we get him covered back up again--"

But Keith hangs onto your mask. "How about you go ahead and change," he says. "I'll get things taken care of while you do that. It'll be faster." Something in his manner strikes you as odd: His cheeks are pale, and he doesn't like looking you in the eye. But there doesn't seem anything wrong with his suggestion, so you drop to the mat and put Jeremy's mask to your face.

* * * * *

You gasp and let out a deep breath. You feel like you've been asleep for a very long time. You rub your eyes deeply before opening them.

Caleb is standing over you, frowning. "The fuck is going on with you?"

You blink and stare back at him, feeling far too drained to say anything. You raise yourself up on your elbows and look around. You are in your bedroom--and you are wearing clothes that are far too big for you. "Give me a moment to get my head on straight," you mumble.

The last thing you remember-- You can't decide what the last thing is you remember. It's all just memories. They're not fragmented, but trying to put them together into any neat order seems impossible. It's just your life, laying there inside your head.

You hear a noise, and look over to see another Will Prescott sitting on the corner of your desk. He regards you curiously, and you return his stare. "Okay, I give up," you finally say. "Where am I and what's going on?"

Caleb's eyebrows go up. "You don't remember? The stuff with Jeremy?"

Jeremy? Oh yeah, that plan. You lay back down again, and pluck at your shirt. These must be Richards' clothes. Funny, you don't remember putting them on. You do remember being up in the loft over the gym, and taking the mask off the golemized Jeremy and putting it on. After that, though ... "No, I don't."

"Well, that's ... That's a little freaky, but it kinda makes sense," Caleb says. "You were acting ... Well, everything went okay, but it was like ... It was like it wasn't you under the mask."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, you went along with the plan. We got Jessica okay, but I had to keep explaining things to you. You wouldn't talk much. And you wouldn't take the mask off. I had a hell of a time talking you into coming up here so I could get it off you."

You blink at him. "I don't remember any of that," you say. It doesn't seem to bother you for some reason, though. You just feel like you've been asleep for many, many hours. "You say we got Jessica?"

"Yeah. You went off with Eva, kept her out of the way, and then I went in as Eva and got that copy of Jessica. I was going to let you go off and try to get an Eastman guy, but you were acting so weird I suggested you take the mask off. You didn't want to. And when I tried asking you things-- you know, things that you would know but Richards wouldn't, it's like you didn't know what I was talking about."

"I don't remember being Jeremy," you say again. "Here, let me see the mask." Caleb is very grave, but you feel very calm as you take it from him.

It looks just like a normal mask. Jeremy's image floats in the blue surface. You turn it over. There's his name on the inside-- You blink hard. "Why is the back this weird white color?"

Caleb bends over to peer into it as well. "I don't like this," he says after a pause. "We didn't do this, I'm pretty sure."

"Patterson's work?" You scratch your ear. "Makes sense. He must've gotten to a couple of new spells by now." Your sense of calm is beginning to evaporate. "Come on, let me get changed."

You start pulling clothes off, while Caleb pulls your mask off the golem. At a sharp word from him, you turn around. The altered Jeremy is now standing by your desk, and Caleb runs a finger along its surface. "It's the same stuff as in the mask," he says. "It's got to be."

The golem. You look down at the mask again. A golem inside the mask? You rub the side of your head. Nothing about the masks or these things makes a lot of sense. "Did Keith say anything about me acting weird?"

"No. I haven't seen much of him, though."

You finish pulling on some clothes. "We should get together. Oh, what day is this?"

"Saturday," he says.

You glance at the clock: 9:00 p.m. So you've lost a full day. "You talk to Patterson yet?" He shakes his head. "Think we should mention this to him?"

Caleb looks dubious. "I don't think we were supposed to use Jeremy's mask this way. Think it would piss him off?"

Next: "The Special Mask" 

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