Masquerade Season by Pemi Aguda

Author:Pemi Aguda
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

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Pauly isn’t sure if he is seeing this right, but the next day, it looks like the raffia masquerade is leaning a little, tilting, no longer as tall as his science teacher. Are the feathers of the third masquerade wilting? Is the aso-oke of the second masquerade duller, less red? When he pours from the keg of palm oil into their bowl, he keeps pouring until it overflows, the red oil running across the illustrated robots’ hands.

Pauly’s mother comes home around noon, earlier than ever. She says the actress loved the belt and has referred her services to all her friends. Pauly’s mother is so happy, grinning so wide that her pink gums are exposed. She wants to take him to Sweet Sensation to celebrate. Pauly is excited. They haven’t been out to eat in forever. He wears his favorite sneakers, he brushes his tight coils; then he and the masquerades stand by the door, waiting.

“Oh, Pauly,” his mother says when she emerges from her room, applying lipstick, dangling her car keys. “I don’t think your masquerades should come. This is mother-son time, and the restaurant might be crowded.”

Pauly looks to the masquerades and before he asks, there is that whispery voice saying, “We are your masquerades.” And Pauly knows he can tell them to stay. He does. “Stay,” he says, and his mother takes his hand.

At the restaurant, when Pauly’s mother says yes to him getting both ice cream and an egg roll alongside his yamarita, everything tastes chalky. He swallows hard as his mother calls him her good and perfect and obedient son. He nods at his mother’s promises: a new house, a new bicycle, more time together.

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