The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)

Lords of Discipline

Previously: "Developmental Psychology" 

You continue lecturing the boys about what they did at school while keeping your expression carefully neutral. And all the time you are calculating: Can I get each of them alone, get a mask onto him, convert him, without the other one realizing what their mother is doing to them?

But the longer you temporize and strategize, the more you lean toward waiting to consult with Sydney. When you get home, you send the two boys upstairs to get an early start on their homework, then go up to the spare room and knock on the door.

There's no answer. You look inside, and find it empty. That's when you remember that the truck isn't in the driveway. It usually isn't, which is why you didn't notice its absence, but you should have realized that Eric isn't home.

Then it occurs to you that you don't know if that's even where Sydney is. You haven't talked to either Eric or Alec since last night. So which one is Sydney off being? You hesitate to text: As you don't know where she is, you're not sure how the pedisequoses will react if you poke at them with a query.

You still haven't heard from either one of them when five o'clock rolls around and you start on supper. You're cutting up pork chops for a quick-and-dirty sweet-and-sour recipe that one of Heather's church friends gave her when you're startled by the appearance of the twins in the kitchen doorway.

"We've been talking about what you said, Mom," Micah tells you. (Or is it Riker? You'd have to peer at him more closely to tell for sure.) "We understand now about what we did that was wrong."

"Do you? Tell me." You return the slicing the meat as you listen.

"Steven doesn't have any friends," Riker says. "Well, not a lot of them, not in P.E. On account of he's—"

"Overweight," Micah bursts in. "We were just trying to make him feel like he was one of the guys, you know, horsing around with him like we horse around with the other guys."

"And when he told you to stop it," you ask, "why didn't you?"

"We got carried away," Riker resumes. "And we didn't realize he's so sensitive about being, um—"

"Overweight," Micah interrupts again. Even out of the corner of your eye, you can't miss the smirk that twitches at his lips. "If he'd get in shape, though, he'd probably feel a lot better about himself, and, you know, be more like one of the guys."

"Well," you say, "that could be. But—"

"So we're going to talk to him about working out with him," Riker says. "Like Eric and Alec work out with us. We wanna show him that we want to be friends, and that'll be our way of showing it."

You pause in mid-slice. This doesn't sound like the best idea the twins have ever had—it fairly makes the hair on the nape of your neck stand up—but you can't decide if they are clueless about their plan or if they actually know what they're doing and are planning for exactly the kind of awful consequences you can imagine.

"Well, you just make sure that it's something that he wants to do," you tell them. "Okay? I mean, how would you like it if— What does Steven like to do? Do you know?"

"He plays the clarinet," says Riker. "He's in the school band." His smirk is now even wider than his brother's.

"Well, how would you like it if Steven told you that he wanted you to play the clarinet, and that he was going to make you play it?"

Micah snickers through his nose. "That'd be awesome," he says. "I'd love to see him try to make us."

Riker nudges him. "We'd try it with him. Because we really do want to be friends with him."

Micah wheels. You have the unmistakable impression that he doesn't want you to see him crack up with laughter.

You decide to ignore it, as whatever mischief they're up to won't last more than another day or two, by which point you will have them converted.

"Well, as long as you understand," you tell them. "How about you invite him over in a day or two. If he's going to be your friend, you'll want to be hospitable."

"Oh." Riker's face freezes. Then he smiles. "Sure!"

"Alright. Go get cleaned up. We're—"

But already they are away, and with a thunder of footfalls they fly up the stairs.

* * * * *

You are seriously on edge when Victor gets home. Supper is completely prepped—it took much less time to prepare than you were planning for—and you are further wrong-footed by having to set the table yourself in order to kill time.

But the worst part, of course, is that neither Alec nor Eric have shown up, and you haven't heard from either of them.

Your mind begins to fill with morbid fantasies. Perhaps Eric was not fully converted last night after having the mask put on him, and he has kidnapped Alec and has been slowly torturing Sydney in order to get the mask off her. Or maybe it's the other way, with Alec (freed of Sydney's control after she switched into Eric's mask) who has rebelled against his master. Perhaps they have both rebelled, perhaps Sydney is trapped and helpless beneath the masks as the native personalities reared up and overthrew her influence, and both the boys have travelled out to Fort Suffolk to tell their father what has happened, to explain to him that the woman that looks like their mother and his wife is actually an imposter plotting to enslave them all and sell them into the service of a demon.

There are so many ways things could have gone wrong. There is so much about this magical stuff that you don't understand, for you are only following recipes in a book.

And Heather Brown knows all about the ways that recipes can go disastrously wrong when you don't understand the principles in back of them.

So you're not real happy when Victor gets home before they do. "Is Eric out with his friends again tonight?" he asks after kissing you hello. "I notice the truck's not here."

"I don't know where they are, him or Alec," you tell him, and you don't bother trying to keep the edge out of your voice. "I haven't heard from them all day."

"Have you texted them?"

"No I haven't! It's not my responsibility, Victor, to keep track of them. They're old enough and responsible enough they should know to—!"

"Hey, shh!" He touches your lips. "I'll text them then. I'll—"

"I don't want you to text them! When they get home I want you to take them aside and explain to them that if they're going to be out—and especially if they're going to be late—that they need to keep me informed!"

He pulls you cloase and clasps your butt. "Consider them grounded," he says. "Well, consider Alec grounded. For Eric—"

You shove his hands off your ass. "I want you to talk to them, Victor." You set your mouth in the firmest line you can manage.

"Yes'm," he says. "Before or after we eat?"

"Before."

He glances over at the stove. "Will it keep that long? Because I'll be giving them a very long and stiff reprimand."

You suck in your lower lip. "Yes, before," you say. "It'll be awkward at the dinner table otherwise."

"I'll go wash up, then. And I'll text them and meet them outside."

Only after he's gone do you reflect that you didn't have to blow up so hard about it, and that Sydney's probably not going to appreciate the scolding she's likely to receive.

* * * * *

It's another quarter-hour before the pick-up truck rumbles up in the drive. You're watching out the window as two filthy teenage-boys—Eric and Alec look as though they've been wrestling in a pig sty—come tumbling out with giant grins splashed across their faces. But their expressions falter a little as their father steps forward with his hands on his hips.

"Is it ready yet?" the twins bawl out in unison as they step into the kitchen behind you.

"Go wash up," you order them. "We're eating early, just the three of us. Your dad's busy with your brothers," you add.

They react again in unison: eyebrows raised and mouths split into grins. "Oooo!" they exclaim.

"I said, wash up." They scamper off.

There's a sound of running water outside, and of the spray of the hose hitting the house: Victor cleaning up the older boys. Micah and Riker exchange gleeful glances as they settle across the table from you. Everyone is quiet, though, quiet enough to hear the door to Victor's workshop open and close.

Riker sucks on a tooth, stabs a chunk of pork, and elevates it. "Boiled snake eyeball," he surmises as he examines it.

"Just because your dad's not here," you inform him, "doesn't give you license to be gross." You take your own meal very slowly; your gut is twisting.

So you jump a little when the side door opens and Alec—sopping wet—looks in. "Mom," he says, looking very grave. "Dad wants to see you."

"Sit!" you bark at the twins as they bolt up. "Finish your meal. Does your dad need you?" you ask Alec. He shrugs. "Watch them," you order, pointing at the twins. "See they finish and clean up after themselves. I think they're gonna get a talking-to too." You brush past him.

Victor's work shop—a shed where he keeps his tools and a few "projects" to relax over—is in the corner of the tiny back yard, opposite the rear of the garage. The door is closed. Your heart is in the back of your throat as you gingerly pull it open. "Honey?" you call into it. "You—?"

Your query dies when you see your husband propped up in the corner of the shed with his eyes staring blanking from his lolling head.

"Hey, Will." Eric smirks at you; like his brother, he's dripping. "Wanna join the Army?" he asks.

Next: "Strategery" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 4)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 4)"