This choice: Pick Andrea's girl friends • Go Back...Chapter #26The Queen and Her Court by: Seuzz   When Charles is done cleaning up, you send him and Kim home with orders to be available for errands. You then call Caleb, trying Steve Patterson's number first. "I'm looking for Caleb," you tell him.
"Don't you want to talk to me?" he asks with an unmistakable leer in his voice.
"Only if you're Caleb," you reply, feeling tired out after only ten seconds with him.
"I can pretend to be him," he says. "I'm a fucking dipshit, and I--"
You hang up and call Caleb's number. "Tell me this is the real you."
"And how would you tell the difference?" He gives a short sigh. "Andrea Varnsworth. Fuck, man, why didn't you tell me that's where you were going?"
"Because I just got through talking to Patterson, and he acted just like I knew you would."
He groans softly. "I've never been so turned on when talking to you. Even when you were being Chelsea."
"You have a better chance with Chelsea." You bend over and touch your toes; the stretch in your hamstrings feels wonderful. "I can get you a list of girls I'd be willing to do it with you as."
"Are you serious? She's--?" he gasps. "Hang on, lemme get a piece of paper."
"Shut up. I just called to let you know where I am. You can take a cold shower when we're done talking. I'll be taking a hot bath." His reply is indecipherable through the strangling sounds. "I'll have Eva or Jessica to pass the book along to you." You click the phone off before he can try any more lame flirtations.
You do take a hot bath. The girl is like a mermaid, totally at home in the water, and much of it splashes over the lip of the tub and onto the tile after you've shuddered through a long and delicious climax.
* * * * *
The next day, at school, you make a point of stopping briefly by Chelsea's locker. She does a double take when she sees you, and gasps. You smile enigmatically back. Of course the golem has recognized you under the mask--and can guess what kind of ideas you have for you and her, now that you are Andrea Varnsworth. That's fine; let it anticipate.
Otherwise you spend the day with your new set of friends--who of course now feel like old friends. At lunch that means sitting on the grass out by the library and listening with hooded and amused interest to Jelena "Yell" Petrovic, Sienna Goldman, Zach Reynolds, Fatima Goldman, and Jamie Lockerbie. Adrian Semple would be with you, but he's off commiserating with Charles: who for the second day is the main topic of conversation.
"If Sagansky had any fucking guts he'd expel Jason," Sienna is fuming while plucking the same string she was plucking yesterday.
"If anyone had any fucking guts, they'd stand up to Jason," Jelena cynically ripostes.
"I'd kick him in the baseballs," Sienna says.
"Like you did with Steve Patterson last year," you can't stop yourself from teasing. She turns red at the memory of being chased down the halls by Steve and Barry Lochner (a since-graduated basketball player) when she made the mistake of snarling back at their wolf whistles.
She mutters something back, but you're distracted by Fatima, who is craning her neck. You follow her glance, and smile to yourself when you see who she's looking at. That could be useful.
* * * * *
Two days later. Caleb has passed the book back to you along with three polished masks. You are sitting on the living room floor, carefully inscribing runes onto three mind bands, while Charles prepares dinner for you in the kitchen. "Don't think I don't love you, Drea," he says when he comes in with the bowls of pasta, zucchini, and fennel (one of your mom's recipes). "But this isn't the natural order of things."
"Nothing about this is natural, Charles," you murmur back without looking up. "Just tell me what's going on with DeMarcus."
He clucks his tongue. "You're so boring. Fatima is boring. DeMarcus Simmons is boring. Not that the idea of him chasing Molly Shaw isn't hilarious," he snickers. "But I thought a lot better of him when he was pretending to be interested in Fatima."
"Molly Shaw," you muse. "I don't know much about her."
"Not much to know, though you can learn a lot by getting her talk, which isn't hard." He picks at his food. "If you're not going to eat, I'm not either. But Victoria Rodriguez and Joe Ysleta are the interesting couple in that group." He snickers again, with more malice.
"You're reminding me why I never listen to you, Charles. Just tell me how serious DeMarcus is about Molly."
"Oh, well, he's not serious about anything except getting laid, and after Fatima gave in--"
"Fatima slept with him?" You look up sharply.
He gives you a pitying look. "Now you're reminding me how come I have to tell you everything three times before you ever hear it. Oh, that reminds me." He snaps his fingers. "Kelsey and Karl did it in a cheap motel room. Kelsey and Karl did it in a cheap motel room. Kelsey and Karl did it in a cheap motel room." He grins. "There, I've told you three times, so it's finally gotten through. Once for each time they did it that night."
* * * * *
"How long have you had this thing," Fatima demands. She is shrinking back from the book that is sitting on the floor in the midst of you and your friends.
Except it isn't Fatima. It's Jelena, looking for all the world like Fatima, except for the rather hard expression on her face. Jelena, by contrast, is looking uncharacteristically pale--a consequence, surely, of it being Fatima wearing her friend's face. Sienna is laying on her back, apparently asleep, as a third mask absorbs her image.
"Long enough to make these things up," you coolly reply. "And to think about what we might do with them."
"We shouldn't do anything with them," Fatima-as-Jelena says in a voice hoarse with horror. "We should get rid of them."
"Why? You guys look so adorable done up as each other." You caress her face, and she flinches.
"What are you thinking about, Andrea," Jelena-as-Fatima asks. She only calls you "Andrea" when she is being skeptical--which is, admittedly, rather often. "Giving each other really clever makeovers?"
"We could go around pretending to be other people," you suggest. "Wouldn't that be fun."
"I don't think I could imitate Jelena," Fatima says. "Even looking like her."
"Funny, I don't think I could have any trouble imitating you," Jelena snorts, then gives an elaborate little gasp.
"Oh, stop it, Yell," you say. "Anyway, there's a way around that. With these things." The mask has reappeared on Sienna, and you remove it and shake her awake. "How were your dreams," you ask her.
"Give me some fucking coffee," she grumbles, and rubs her forehead. "I feel like I've been asleep for a week."
"Shake the cobwebs out. I'm just getting ready to tell you guys the sequel." Sienna blinks stupidly as you set a mind band out in front of each of them. "Those mask things? According to the book they just copy a person's body. But these things, they copy your mind. All your memories. All your talents. All your personality." Eyebrows go up (on Jelena) and down (on Sienna and Fatima). "Then, if you put on someone else's little strip, you get a copy of their mind inside yours. You'll remember everything that they remember and be able to act just like them. I guess maybe you have to concentrate." You reach over and behind to scratch a troublesome spot in the middle of your back, and it feels good being so limber as to do that. "So if you put on someone's mask, and a copy of their mind, you'd be able to imitate them perfectly." You smile at Fatima.
She doesn't look especially pleased by the idea. "That's sick," she says. "That's, like, mind rape."
You let a half smile creep up the side of your face, and turn to look at the other two. "Maybe. But whether it's sick depends on who's getting mind raped, doesn't it? Can't we all think of one or two people whose minds it would fun to explore?"
There are furtive glances all around.
"And as for imitating people," you continue, "we could use them for spreading a little mischief."
"Like how?" Sienna asks darkly.
"Well, imagine we got one of these masks and one of these bands onto Kendra Saunders." You look around carefully again. Not one girl here doesn't despise Kendra. "We'd know what's going on inside that scheming little brain of hers. We could use it to our own advantage. And if one of us put the mask and the band on afterwards, and put on clothes like hers, and went to Chelsea and said things that would get Kendra in a lot of trouble with her--"
"Oh, fuck!" Sienna exclaims. Jelena bounces up off the floor and crosses her legs. Fatima's eyes widen, and she stares at the floor. "But if we got caught--!"
"That's not the problem," Fatima says. "The problem is that this would all be really wrong."
Fatima is now getting thoroughly on your nerves. You knew she would be the most reluctant one of the bunch. You could try to bring her along with the idea of using the masks only to spy on people. Or you could pull out your trump card (DeMarcus Simmons), even though it would involve telling people about golems.  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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