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A high school student finds a grimoire that shows how to make magical disguises. |
Previously: "A Surprise from Teresa"  "Dude!" Keith wails. "You're gonna let me go in by myself?" It's lunchtime, and you and he and Caleb have just settled in at your usual spot behind the school to eat. (Teresa, as she commonly is, is late arriving.) Keith came swaggering up, asking if you were going to be ready after school to "score half a dozen" in your masks, and his face fell when you told him you didn't bring a mask to school. When he asked if you were going to go home to get one, you said you were going to take a short break from things. Hence, his wail of betrayal. "I'll help you out," you assure him, for you are feeling a little guilty at seeming to abandon him. "I'll keep a lookout." "So why don't you help me get one?" he begs. "Will is offering to help you 'get one'," Caleb snaps at him. "I'll help too." Keith looks wounded. Then he snorts. "Okay, well, then, I ain't gonna copy my ho into one of your masks after I catch me one!" he hotly declares. "Of course not," you snort in turn. "Because we didn't bring masks." Keith makes a face at you, then falls into a sullen silence as Caleb motions him to shut up. Teresa is walking toward you. * * * * * You don't know why he tried to keep things under wraps, because he tells her later what Keith is planning to do after school. So now here she is, hanging out with you and Caleb as you wait near the front office for Keith to come back in from changing into his mask. The corridors are still humming with activity, for the final bell rang only fifteen minutes ago, so your trio can't be conspicuous. Still, you can't help feeling like you're being looked over, watched, and judged, as you wait. They know we're up to something, you think, even as you keep telling yourself not to be paranoid. It's no relief when Keith shows up, because his girlish disguise has a creepy "uncanny valley" vibe to it. Looked at one way, she looks like Lin Pol—a Chinese-American beauty—if her face had gotten mashed up from sleeping on it wrong. From another angle, she looks like Keith Tilley, if Keith had let his hair grow down to his shoulders and taken some sex-change drugs. Caleb quickly takes charge. "You take the F wing bathroom," he tells Keith, pointing across the intersection at the nearest girls' restroom. "I'll cover the G wing bathroom, Will'll take D wing, and Teresa E wing." "You can't go in the girls' bathrooms," Keith blurts out. "I'm not going to," Caleb snaps. "We'll watch from outside. If we see someone go in and it looks like they're alone, we'll send you a text and you can come running. That way we have four bathrooms covered and watched. You got that?" he asks you and Teresa. You nod. "Good. Oh, and don't tap out a whole text. Just tap the letter of the wing you're in." Feeling like you're part of a special op, you swing away as the whole group parts. You feel even more exposed as you loiter across from the D wing restrooms, leaning against the lockers. You drop your pack between your feet and take out your phone, to cruise online. You hope desperately that you just look like you're waiting for someone, and that no teacher will stop to ask what you're up to. But as the minutes tick by, you gradually calm down. About ten minutes later you lift your head as one of the janitors lopes by, and as you watch he sets some yellow hazard markers on the floor: the kind that show a picture of a stick-figure slipping and falling on its ass, along with the warning "WET." You watch as he sets down a plastic bucket, dips the mop he is carrying in it, and wipes at an area of the floor. Then, after a minute of work, he picks up the bucket and leaves. What he was cleaning up, you have no idea. But the sign he left behind lingers in your mind, and is still in the back of your brain when a girl with dark, bobbed hair darts into the girls restroom. She is alone, and no one else has gone in or out since a trio of giggling freshmen girls (by the looks of them) used the restroom ten minutes ago. You quickly thumb a "D" into your phone, and hit send. A minute later, Keith, looking frightened but excited, comes hurrying up. You point at the door, and she runs inside. Then, congratulating yourself on your cleverness, you pick up that plastic warning sign and set it in front of the restroom door. You send texts to Caleb and Teresa, telling them that Keith is in the D-wing girls restroom with a target. You didn't expect them to treat it as a summons, but join you they do. "What's with the sign?" Caleb asks, pointing. "I put it there to keep anyone from going in while Keith's in there." Caleb cocks a skeptical eyebrow. But only a few minutes later you are able to show him it works when two girls approach the restroom. "Restroom's closed," you shout at them, and point at the sign. They stop, and frown at you. One of them says, "It just says 'Wet floor'." "Yeah, they had to mop up in there," you improvise. "Someone threw all the fuck up all over everything. And she shat herself." "No way!" the other girl sneers. You shrug. "Go in and check," you say. "But there's other bathrooms in this place." The girls exchange an uncertain look, then shuffle away. Caleb looks more impressed with you after that. * * * * * So Keith is able to make his mask his getaway. It leaves you almost as exhilarated as he is, and ready to make your own attempt tomorrow. But Caleb has news the next day, which he shares with your quartet at lunch. "So I was looking over the next spell," he says in a quiet voice after glancing around to make sure he can't be overheard. "It's pretty interesting. It makes a kind of paste that you can put inside a mask, and then— Well—" You feel your skin prickling all over as he takes a deep breath. "I think it does what the last spell does. Turns people into, um—" "Jesus!" someone exclaims. It takes you a moment to realize that it was you. "Except I think it's reversible!" Caleb quickly adds. "Reversible how?" you ask. You glance at Keith and Teresa. She is listening intently. Keith's mouth is hanging open, and he's got a dumb look on his face. Caleb holds out his hand, palm up. "Okay, so you make up this paste, and it uses all the same ingredients as we used when making a golem. Right?" His eyes dart. "I, um, made the stuff last night. Got the page to turn, so I've read the whole spell. Anyway, it makes this paste, and you paint it on the inside of a mask. Then you put some hair into the mask, and you set it on fire. That part I didn't do." Now you understand why he seemed kind of shy and tetchy in the first- and fourth-period classes you had together. He had this on his mind. "Then—" Again he hesitates. "Then you put it on someone. And it turns that person into the person who's inside the mask. I think. Pretty sure." He scratches his head. "The translation is kind of funky, and the explanation isn't really clear. "But it should turn the person wearing the mask into the other person. Just like a mask would do." "Okay," Keith says, for all of you. "But the person—" Caleb licks his lips. "I think it turns them into a golem underneath. Because the copy you created?" he concludes as you bury your face in your hands. "It has to obey you. Like the, um, the guy we made out at the barn—" He runs a tongue over his dry lips. "Has to obey us." No one says anything. You're the first one to speak after you've lifted your face again. "So why do we want to do that kind of thing again?" you ask. "Just in a different way." "I didn't say I want to do it again!" Caleb protests. His face has gone pale. "I'm just saying—" "Didn't you say it's reversible?" Teresa interrupts. "I said it might be," Caleb says. "On account of you can take the mask off the person." "But if it turns them into a, a— a statue," you protest. "Underneath—" "That's why I'm not sure. But I think—" You cut him off by slicing your hand across your throat and giving him a look. * * * * * And that kills your interest in making another mask. Once more you find your appetite for this magical stuff dead. It doesn't kill Caleb's interest, though. That evening he shows up on your doorstep unannounced and uninvited. "Can we take a walk?" he asks you. Dusk is rapidly fading as the two of you walk slowly down the street. October is coming to a rapid close—Halloween is next week—and leaves rattle in the evening breeze. You pull your windbreaker more tightly about your shoulders. "You're acting like you're pretty much done with this stuff, Will," Caleb says. "I'm not 'done' with it," you protest. (You don't have to ask what he means by 'this stuff.') "I'm just— You and Teresa set someone one fire!" "I'm not saying we did the right thing." You can hear the wince in his voice. "If we had to do it again, I wouldn't. But, you know, here we are." He sighs when you don't reply. "Would it make a difference if I said we're not going to experiment on other people?" he asks. "It's my book!" you snap. "I thought— Shouldn't I be the one in charge, the one deciding that?" "Yes," he says in a small voice. Then, before you reply, he says, "I want to try the new spell out. But I'll volunteer." "What?" You spin on him. "Your call," he says. "I'll put that stuff in a mask and try it on, and see what happens. Me. Not someone else." Next: "A Couple of False Conclusions" |
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