“Ummm .. . Massha?” I said carefully. “I’ve always meant to ask. Why don’t you . . . ummm . . . wear more?”
“I like to dress cool when we’re going into a hot situation,” she winked. “You see, when things speed up, I get a little nervous . . . and the only thing worse than havin’ a fat broad around is havin’ a sweaty fat broad around.”
“I think it’s a sexy outfit,” Guido chimed in. “Reminds me of the stuff my old man’s moll used to wear.”
“Well thanks, Dark and Deadly. I’d say your old man had good taste … but I never tasted him.”
I studied them thoughtfully as they shared a laugh over Massha’s joke. Any hope of a quiet infiltration of this unknown dimension was rapidly disintegrating. Either Guido or Massha alone was eye-catching, but together they were about as inconspicuous as a circus parade and an army maneuver sharing the same road. Then it occurred to me that, not knowing what things were like where we were heading, they might fit in and I would stand out. It was a frightening thought. If everybody there looked like this….
I forced the thought from my mind. No use scaring myself any more than I had to before there was information to back it up. What was important was that my two assistants were scared. They were trying hard not to show it, but in doing so, each was dropping into old patterns, slipping behind old character masks. Guido was playing his “tough gangster” bit to the hilt, while Massha was once more assuming her favorite “vamp” character with a vengeance. The bottom line, though, was that, scared or not, they were willing to back my move or die trying. It would have been touching, if it weren’t for the fact that it meant they were counting on me for leadership. That meant I had to stay calm and confident… no matter how scared I felt myself. It only occurred to me as an afterthought that, in many ways, leadership was the mask I was learning to slip behind when things got tight. It made me wonder briefly if anyone ever really knew what they were doing or felt truly confident, or if life was simply a mass game of role-playing.
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