Chapter Thirty-Six

"What do you mean?" Lucianne asked, unease settling into her.

"Exactly what I said," he told her. "It's the truth that you're beautiful."

"No, right after that. When you said that my days would be cut short."

"What?"

"I said I wish everyday were like today, and you told me it was a pity that my days would be cut short."

"I didn't say that," he told her.

"No, you did, Gabriel."

"I didn't."

"I heard you loud and clear. What did you mean?"

"I don't know what you want me to tell you, Lucianne. I didn't say those words."

She huffed in frustration. "Whatever," she said, getting up. "I'm heading back."

"Aren't you going to stay a while longer?"

"Not anymore," she said, heading to the door and walking out. She moved down the hallways slowly, turning back to see if he was following her. But he wasn't. She sighed and descended the staircase, and left his mansion.

Returning to her tower, she made sure to lock the doors behind her. When she was in her room, she placed a chair right under the handle so that if he wanted to come in, he would not be able to. She definitely wasn't in the mood to talk to him right now.

She climbed onto bed with her coat, which she wore because it was starting to get cold. As she put it on, she heard the crinkle of paper inside the fabric and was reminded of the photos of Gabriel that she had taken from the photo shop earlier that day. She reached into her coat to pull the folder out and emptied all the photos onto the bed.

Well, he truly was the most haunting person she had ever known. The images of him sang praises to his beauty and as she flipped through them, she began to lament how she failed to take photos of the two of them together.

But his beauty wasn't the only thing that stood out to her. The photos… somehow they seemed like they hadn't been developed properly. She continued flipping through them, and in several of the pictures, there were hazy clouds of white smeared across the paper. She rubbed her thumb against it, thinking it was some stain, but upon a closer look, she realised the white was inside the picture.

She didn't know what to make of it. She placed picture after picture that had the white smears on them on the bed, putting the pictures without them aside. About half of the pictures she had taken that day were stained with the wispy smoke, and she didn't know -

Something hit her.

Wait, wait…

Lucianne's hands flew to action, her fingers picking up photo after photo. The first photo in her hand was of Gabriel, a full frontal with the school as a backdrop. In this, the school was only at the far edge of the picture, and the white smoke came from his body to the school buildings.

Her heart raced in her chest, pounding hard. She picked up another photo. It was another photo of him, but she couldn't see his feet in the picture. Instead, she could see more of the school in the top of the photo. The smoke was coming from his body, and…

She placed the second picture above the first, lining it up. The wisp of smoke aligned perfectly.

Fuck…

She took more and more photos. Photos that began to look up towards the school building, revealing more of it. The wisp aligned perfectly and slowly she placed photo after photo on top of each other. The smoke rose up, up, up towards the school building.

Until it approached a tower.

The tower that faced hers. The smoke stopped at the window of the tower. She looked closely at the picture, and in the sway of the smoke, she saw what seemed like hands stretched out at the window, clawing at it, trying to get in.

She had heard tales before. Tales that ghosts existed. That cameras could catch them in film and they used photographs to communicate with the living.

She swallowed hard. The long stretch of photos with the smoke lining up lay in front of her. The evidence unable to be hidden.

Something bad had happened in the tower opposite hers.