Philia/Phobia: Triskaidekaphilia
Genre: Paranormal/Mystery
“You’re next!”
He could hear someone whispering in his ear. Just thinking about it made him shiver in fear. He felt the hair on his spine already standing up. It was already midnight but he was still wide awake. He couldn’t get himself to sleep. Something was bothering him.
Thirteen guys have been killed already and it was always every 13th day of the month. The murderer was still unknown. He probably was hiding someplace where no one could find him. No one knew the reason why this was happening. The investigation was on-going, but there was still no progress. He heard this from his dad, who was the head of the Special Criminal Unit.
He has been doing his investigation about it as well lately. And this was what he has learned or rather, concluded so far: the guys who died have a special connection… and that is they were all ex-boyfriends of Gabrielle Montelucas, daughter of Honorable Raymond Montelucas, the Governor of the province. He thought his dad must’ve hired someone to kill them to replace the life of his daughter. It has been known that Gabrielle was raped, killed and found dead on the 13th day of April, 3 years ago. Maybe they all planned on killing Gabrielle and now her dad was getting even, he thought. But still, only the insane would think of doing such thing.
QUERO AURA MORE TRESE… QUERO AURA MORE TRESE… QUERO AURA MORE TRESE… QUERO AURA MORE TRESE…
“You’re next!”
He heard someone speaking beside him again. He was all alone in his room. His dad was out again for another case, while his mom was still working at the hospital.
“Nico!”
“Leave me alone!” He shouted, pulling the blanket up his face. But the moment he did that, a bloody face of a girl with long, black hair appeared right infront of him. “Shit!” He shouted again, getting up from bed and descending the stairs. He almost tripped going down but he managed to steady himself, despite the fear he was feeling inside.
His first instinct was to get out of the house, but he unconsciously headed towards the kitchen to get a knife. “Show yourself!” He yelled, trying to be brave. And right on cue, there was a noise coming from upstairs. “G-Gabrielle? I know that’s you! What do you want?”
There was no response, only the loud noise from upstairs. And then, he heard footsteps approaching the kitchen. The sound was getting louder and louder, until he saw the face of the girl again standing just a few inches away from him. She was wearing a white dress smudged with blood all over her face and body. And when he looked at her eyes, all he could see was dead space. She had no eyes. “Holy shit!” He cursed again, running away.
He ran out of the house as quickly as he could. But as he crossed the street, a truck passed by swiftly hitting him and causing him to fall hard on the ground with blood oozing from his face and body.
Few days later…
“We found this inside his room, ma’am,” an officer said, handing the box to Nico’s mom.
When she reached inside, she quickly opened it and what she saw made her broke down into tears. All her son’s 13 collections were there. Nico has a strange fascination of the number 13. It was a philia which they called triskaidekaphilia. But that wasn’t what she was surprised about. Inside a photo album contained the pictures of the 13 guys who were killed. Their faces were all marked oddly. There was also the date beside each photo corresponding to the day they were killed. January 13, February 13, March 13, April 13 and so on…
She couldn’t take all of it anymore so she decided to close the album. It was too much for her to handle. But something caught her eye on the very last page of it. A photo of Gabrielle was on it with a note saying: “I love everything about this girl… but the thought of not being with her makes me want to end her life and my own.”
