The Mask
Aug 13, 2008 1:13:33 GMT -5
Post by The Storyteller on Aug 13, 2008 1:13:33 GMT -5
Where to start? Well I guess it all starts at Legoland around six months ago. It was my son’s tenth birthday and my wife and I took him there as a birthday treat. At the end we went to the gift shop and I bought him a “Takanuva” set. Then he asked for a bionicle bed sheet, and since he needed new bedding anyway, I bought him that as well. Then he asked for one of the novelty toa masks they had on sale, but I told him no because I had bought him enough already.
He moped all the way home and it was a poor end to a good day. When we got home and after we had put him to bed my wife argued with me that I should have bought him it, and we went to sleep that night angry with each other.
About a week later and the whole thing had blown over. “Takanuva” has been built and pieces of him are already missing. I went back to work, and walked round the city in my lunch break as I often do. As I walked that day I passed an old charity shop, and in the window was one of the promotional masks. I thought how this would be a great chance to get back into my wife good books and bought it there and then.
As I looked at the mask later, I realised it wasn’t quite the same as the ones we saw in the gift shop. It was made of a harder plastic, and its shape was different in some places. More stylised perhaps. I thought it had the Lego logo inside, though I cannot tell you where now.
My son instantly loved it, and to begin with he wore it everywhere we let him. If we made him take it off (for instance to go see Aunt Mildred, or to have a bath) he would put it on again as soon as he was allowed.
Within a week, my wife and I noticed slight differences in his behaviour. He seemed bolder, and more sure of himself. He also went out to play more, often taking the mask with him. We live in a nicer part of the city, and we didn’t worry too much about where he played. We were just glad he was off the computer games.
His behavior at school also changed. He got into more fights, usually taking on the local bullies. His grades stayed around the same, but his attention increased, so his teacher told us.
This is how things remained for a couple of months. Till the phone call.
I was working in the office, trying to work out the tax deductibles for the previous month, when my phone rang. It was my wife. Her voice was frantic and high pitch, and I had to interrupt her to get her to slow down. She told me to get to the hospital, there had been some kind of accident.
By the time I reached the hospital my son was already in surgery. I held my wife so close, and whispered how it was going to be alright, hoping in my heart that was true.
Apparently there was an armed robbery our local bank. My son was passing it on the way home from school. He tried to stop them, a ten year old boy against six armed robbers.
My son died on that operating table. He took five bullets to the chest.
I don’t know if they caught the robbers. I couldn’t care. It wouldn’t bring my son back either way.
The funeral was well attended, and everyone said how tragic it was. The room was filled with family, friends and most of my son’s school. Even the bullies turned up. With us at the front was our local police chief, and I resented him slightly for using this as an opportunity to talk about gun crime.
At the very back of the room stood five people I had never seen before. There were two young teenagers, an older black woman, a middle aged man and a lady who looked in her late twenties. They spoke to no-one else, and left as soon as it was over.
We had the wake at our home. We brought down his toys and posters and placed them round the house. People talked about all the good times they had with my son, and though most of me was numb with the emotional pain, some part of me was pleased in that. My wife hid upstairs in our room. It was all too much for her. It was all too much for me, but I couldn’t not be there.
The middle aged man from the back of the funeral rang the doorbell. At the end of the road I could see the other four, waiting for him. He said his name was Greg, and said that he was sorry for our loss. He told be that my son was a hero. Then he handed me the mask. He didn’t say how he got it, but it was the same mask. I couldn’t mistake it if I wanted to. I thanked him numbly, and he turned away towards his waiting friends. As he left I could see a white thing poking out his backpack. It looked like the mask, but it was white, and of slightly different design. Then he was gone.
A week later and I finally pluck up the courage to tidy away his old room. My wife had gone to stay with her sister for a while. (We’ve not broken up, we both just needed space to grieve.) I folded his bionicle bed-sheets, and boxed up his lego. Then I saw the mask. I had wrapped in a plastic bag and thrown it into the bedroom on the night of the funeral, blaming the mask for my son’s death.
With the bag still on it, I placed it to my face. I felt Its touch through the plastic, and I felt the character of the mask through it. It whispered into my mind quietly true things, and secret things that I could never say out loud, but could never forget. It told me who the five were at the funeral. It told me of life, and death, and everything between. When it was near my face it was like a feeling of destiny, and an understanding that my son should never have worn it. He wasn’t the one who had bought it, the one it had first chosen.
I pulled the mask from my face, glad the bag was around it, a shield against its sweet promises.
Now I sit, unable to concentrate on anything but the mask. I sip the cup of water in my hand trying with all my might to follow the movie on TV. (“It's hard for many people to believe that there are extraordinary things inside themselves, as well as others.” Says Samuel l Jackson to Bruce Willis. I cant quite tell what the movie’s about.)
Part of me want to return the mask to the charity shop, but I fear this would just happen again to someone else. Part of me wants to destroy it, to lay all my blame on it and watch it melt away.
And part of me wants to put it on. I think that is what the mask wants too.
fin
He moped all the way home and it was a poor end to a good day. When we got home and after we had put him to bed my wife argued with me that I should have bought him it, and we went to sleep that night angry with each other.
About a week later and the whole thing had blown over. “Takanuva” has been built and pieces of him are already missing. I went back to work, and walked round the city in my lunch break as I often do. As I walked that day I passed an old charity shop, and in the window was one of the promotional masks. I thought how this would be a great chance to get back into my wife good books and bought it there and then.
As I looked at the mask later, I realised it wasn’t quite the same as the ones we saw in the gift shop. It was made of a harder plastic, and its shape was different in some places. More stylised perhaps. I thought it had the Lego logo inside, though I cannot tell you where now.
My son instantly loved it, and to begin with he wore it everywhere we let him. If we made him take it off (for instance to go see Aunt Mildred, or to have a bath) he would put it on again as soon as he was allowed.
Within a week, my wife and I noticed slight differences in his behaviour. He seemed bolder, and more sure of himself. He also went out to play more, often taking the mask with him. We live in a nicer part of the city, and we didn’t worry too much about where he played. We were just glad he was off the computer games.
His behavior at school also changed. He got into more fights, usually taking on the local bullies. His grades stayed around the same, but his attention increased, so his teacher told us.
This is how things remained for a couple of months. Till the phone call.
I was working in the office, trying to work out the tax deductibles for the previous month, when my phone rang. It was my wife. Her voice was frantic and high pitch, and I had to interrupt her to get her to slow down. She told me to get to the hospital, there had been some kind of accident.
By the time I reached the hospital my son was already in surgery. I held my wife so close, and whispered how it was going to be alright, hoping in my heart that was true.
Apparently there was an armed robbery our local bank. My son was passing it on the way home from school. He tried to stop them, a ten year old boy against six armed robbers.
My son died on that operating table. He took five bullets to the chest.
I don’t know if they caught the robbers. I couldn’t care. It wouldn’t bring my son back either way.
The funeral was well attended, and everyone said how tragic it was. The room was filled with family, friends and most of my son’s school. Even the bullies turned up. With us at the front was our local police chief, and I resented him slightly for using this as an opportunity to talk about gun crime.
At the very back of the room stood five people I had never seen before. There were two young teenagers, an older black woman, a middle aged man and a lady who looked in her late twenties. They spoke to no-one else, and left as soon as it was over.
We had the wake at our home. We brought down his toys and posters and placed them round the house. People talked about all the good times they had with my son, and though most of me was numb with the emotional pain, some part of me was pleased in that. My wife hid upstairs in our room. It was all too much for her. It was all too much for me, but I couldn’t not be there.
The middle aged man from the back of the funeral rang the doorbell. At the end of the road I could see the other four, waiting for him. He said his name was Greg, and said that he was sorry for our loss. He told be that my son was a hero. Then he handed me the mask. He didn’t say how he got it, but it was the same mask. I couldn’t mistake it if I wanted to. I thanked him numbly, and he turned away towards his waiting friends. As he left I could see a white thing poking out his backpack. It looked like the mask, but it was white, and of slightly different design. Then he was gone.
A week later and I finally pluck up the courage to tidy away his old room. My wife had gone to stay with her sister for a while. (We’ve not broken up, we both just needed space to grieve.) I folded his bionicle bed-sheets, and boxed up his lego. Then I saw the mask. I had wrapped in a plastic bag and thrown it into the bedroom on the night of the funeral, blaming the mask for my son’s death.
With the bag still on it, I placed it to my face. I felt Its touch through the plastic, and I felt the character of the mask through it. It whispered into my mind quietly true things, and secret things that I could never say out loud, but could never forget. It told me who the five were at the funeral. It told me of life, and death, and everything between. When it was near my face it was like a feeling of destiny, and an understanding that my son should never have worn it. He wasn’t the one who had bought it, the one it had first chosen.
I pulled the mask from my face, glad the bag was around it, a shield against its sweet promises.
Now I sit, unable to concentrate on anything but the mask. I sip the cup of water in my hand trying with all my might to follow the movie on TV. (“It's hard for many people to believe that there are extraordinary things inside themselves, as well as others.” Says Samuel l Jackson to Bruce Willis. I cant quite tell what the movie’s about.)
Part of me want to return the mask to the charity shop, but I fear this would just happen again to someone else. Part of me wants to destroy it, to lay all my blame on it and watch it melt away.
And part of me wants to put it on. I think that is what the mask wants too.
fin