Chapter #13Some Unexpected Confessions by: Seuzz   "Hey." You clear your throat. "Hey?"
"Yeah?" Frank snarls back with a glare.
This reaction almost causes you to flee, but you've already poked a hole in the ice. "What is that thing?" You point to the mask in his hand.
"It's a fucking mask, asshole," he says. "The fuck does it look like?"
Joe kicks Frank's chair. "I should set you on fire and piss on you to put it out," he growls. "This cocksucker asked you nicely and--" He snaps his mouth shut, closes his eyes, and smiles to himself. When he opens his eyes again, he turns to you with a friendly gaze. "It's a mask," he says in a pleasant tone. "Something we found while snooping around in--"
"Joe!"
He kicks Frank's chair again. "A nudge is as good as a wink for most people," he says through gritted teeth. "Am I gonna have to kick you in the balls?"
Frank stares at him, then shrugs elaborately. "Go ahead, then. Tell him what we were doing, so we can get fucking expelled. You're not learning anything in your classes anyway," he adds in an undertone.
Joe smiles tightly. "I've been memorizing the cheerleaders' cup sizes. That counts for something, I'm sure."
"It'll account for about eighty percent of your brain space, that's--"
"Shut up." Joe flexes his hand into a fist. "I helped you get rich off the tooth fairy when we were kids, and I can arrange for her to make another deposit under your pillow tonight." He turns back to you with a clear expression, and gestures you to join them. When you hesitate, he yanks the mask from Frank's hand and pulls his chair over to your table. "Yeah, it's a mask," he says, and presses it into your hands. "We found it and that box while snooping around the underground boiler room back at school." He offers a conspiratorial grin.
You look at the mask. Yes, it's definitely the same kind of thing as Caleb has been making: oval, like a tragedian's mask, with ridges corresponding to lips, nose, cheekbones, and brow, but without eyeholes. It's a bright, gleaming blue color. You turn it over, but there is no name floating on its inner surface.
"You know, uh, I've seen things like this before," you say in a halting voice.
"Really," Joe says. "Where?"
You are suddenly seized by second thoughts. "Oh, you know." You avoid his eye. "Like in theaters and stuff."
He laughs. "Hey, I know a really great riddle about a mask. Wanna hear?" He presses on without giving you a chance to answer: "I want to go home but I can't, because a man wearing a mask is waiting for me. The masked man doesn't want to hurt me, and home isn't my house. So what's my problem?"
You stare. "Huh?"
"Here, say it with me, so you get it. I want to go home but I can't, because--" You repeat the riddle after him, struggling to get the words right. When you're done, he smiles. "We're playing baseball, I'm on third, and the catcher is waiting for me," he says without giving you a chance to figure it out yourself. "Isn't that great?" he grins.
"It's stupid," you blurt out.
He laughs again. "Maybe. But have you ever seen masks like this before?"
"Yeah, I got a friend who makes masks like these," you say. You blink: Maybe you're just so offended by that dumb riddle you've lowered your guard. "Yeah," you add. "He's got this book that tells you how to make them."
"Cool!" Joe enthuses. "Is it like an arts and crafts book?"
"It's a book of magic," you say, and then gasp to yourself.
"What does your friend do with them?"
"We use them to make copies of people." Your voice comes out as a croak, and you have a feeling like you're going to faint.
"What's your friend's name?"
Joe's voice is almost drowned out by a roaring in your ears. "Caleb Johansson," you say.
You're revived by the touch of his hand as he clasps yours; an electrical thrill seems to run down your arm, and you jerk straight in your chair. "Well, mine's Joe Durras, and Miss Manners at the other table is my brother, Frank. And you are?"
"Will Prescott." You're alert again, but your lips feel numb.
"Well, Will, it's really awesome to make your acquaintance," Joe says, and his eyes are dancing madly. "Can we go find your friend now?"
"I guess, but he's in school. At Westside. I'm skipping."
The light in his eye dims a little. "Well, as one criminal to another, I won't say anything about your little escapade if you don't tell anyone about ours."
You nod dazedly, and look up. Frank is towering behind his brother, and the gleam in his eye is a lot less merry.
* * * * *
They sit at your table, and you continue to babble madly about you and Caleb and the book. Early on you shoot a fearful look at Frank; Joe nudges his brother and tells him to go back to class. "I'm hanging out with Will," he says. "The American constitutional system has gotten along for two hundred and thirty years without me, and it can just trundle along to its doom without me today." Frank jabs Joe in the shoulder, mutters something you can't catch, and leaves.
The rest of the afternoon is better. Joe buys you treats and coaxes lots more out of you. It becomes easier as it goes along, and you mostly relax. You can't tell if Joe takes you seriously or if he's just entranced by the mad story about you and Caleb and James and Carson and Keith and what you guys have gotten up to and what you're planning to get up to; either way, he doesn't seem to be making any judgments about you. He also clucks sympathetically over various bullying problems and makes his own waspish comments about "dumb jocks." At around two o'clock he has you send a text to Caleb, asking him to hook up with you after school to meet some "guys." "He's got work after school," you say even as you comply.
"Then definitely we should send him a text," Joe says. He sends a quick text of his own. "I'll go with you and have Frank meet us over there."
* * * * *
A little after three-fifteen you pull into the parking lot near Caleb's car. Your friend appears at about the same that Frank walks up. You point Caleb out to them. "Let me do the talking, okay," Joe mutters to Frank.
Caleb eyes you warily as he approaches. "Who are these guys?"
"I'm Joe," your new friend says excitedly. "This is Frank, and Will's been telling us all about these masks and shit."
Caleb wheels on you. "Are you crazy? The fuck are you--?"
"Hey, we're cool," Joe says. "It sounds like a lot of fun!"
"They had some masks already," you tell Caleb. "That's how I got to talking to them."
"They had ... masks?" Caleb says. Now he really does look wary.
"Yeah, found 'em over at Eastman," Joe says. "We didn't know what they were. Our dumb luck runnin' into Will here, eh?"
Caleb grunts. Then Frank speaks: "We'd really like to take a look at this book Will says you have."
"I have work," Caleb snaps. Then he pauses. "But I can skip. Come on out to the house with me. I'll drive."
"We'll follow," Frank says firmly. "Will, you ride with me and Joe." Caleb seems to seethe.
* * * * *
You wind up on the outskirts of town, in front of a large stone villa. "This isn't Caleb's house," you tell the brothers as you pull up.
Caleb is already out of his car and has stepped in the front yard; he gestures to you to follow. But Frank and Joe remain by their truck, and Frank plants a firm hand on your shoulder. He and his brother stare long and hard at the house. "Is this your place?" Frank asks.
"No," Caleb says slowly. "It belongs to a friend of the family. It's a safer place to keep the book."
"Well, let's get the owner to come out and invite us in," Frank says.
"He's not home," Caleb says. "But I have a key. It'll be okay."
"I want an invitation," Frank says. "It's only good manners."
You glance uneasily at Joe--the only guy here you feel comfortable with, for some reason. He's just staring at the house, eyes bright. Curiously, he seems to be following some movement, though the house looks entirely still to your eye.
"Then I guess I can't show you the book," Caleb snaps. "Will, come on, I wanna talk to you."
"Don't go in there, Will," Joe says. "I don't like this place."
"It's just a house," Caleb says. "Who the fuck are these guys, Will?"
You have no answer to that. It hits you that you know Joe's name, and Frank's, but that otherwise the day was taken with you answering questions, not getting answers to your own. And now you have more: for Caleb, about this house. It's big and squareish and it gleams whitely in the afternoon sun. But it looks like a façade, and you have the sudden, nightmarish vision of it falling forward, like a piece of stage scenery, and disclosing-- You shudder at you know not what.
"Come on, Will," Caleb says impatiently.   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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