Luke Sanchez is part angel and he doesn't even know it. Unfortunately, the demon who's wrecking havoc on campus does.
Will Luke be able to accept the existence of demons in time to stop one from destroying his campus? More importantly, will he come...
Alex was the first to speak, "What's up Luke? What the hell are you doing over here?"
"I could be asking you the same thing," Luke said.
"Yeah well tough titties cause I asked first, so spit it."
Luke gestured to the statue of Mary, "I was praying. Now, what are you two doing here?"
Gio stepped in, "We were searching for the confessions that was supposed to be going on. We got an email about it earlier."
Alex banged his chest and exhaled almost like he had heartburn, while Luke took out his phone and noticed a ton of notifications that he had been ignoring all day. Some were from the Tower, others from his girlfriend Nellie, with the last one saying, "Why are you ignoring me?" Finally, he saw an email notification, one of many, entitled "Residence Hall Confessions." Luke glanced through the email, curious since he wouldn't mind speaking with a priest about the problems he was facing.
Then he noticed the date and time, "It says here it's tomorrow from 8 to 10 PM. And it's going to be held in O1 chapel."
Gio snapped his finger and sucked his teeth, "Damn it, I knew something was up when the doors to the Basilica was locked. I thought it was going to be held here."
"Yeah, I mean how else can they give confession to the whole campus," Alex added while Gio elbowed him.
"I don't think it's for the whole campus. I think it's just for people in a specific building," Luke said.
"Yeah Alex," Gio mocked. "Plus, I doubt they'd even need a Basilica to hold confession for CUA students. A chapel would be fine."
"Then you underestimate the dedicated nuns and walking Bible recordings on campus," Alex said. "They'd swarm the Basilica in masses. These super religious jerks are no joke."
"Jerks?" Luke asked.
"Yeah, they walk around thinking they're better than you cause they pray more. They're all showy and shit, and it's freaking annoying."
"Jesus did say to pray in private and not make a scene," Gio added. "I agree that some of the super religious fanatics on this campus go too far."
A chilly breeze ripped through all of their coats and a shiver jolted down Luke's body as if he'd been hit by a freezing lightning bolt. "It's getting pretty chilly out here. Why don't we head back to the dorm?"
Alex looked to Gio and Gio nodded at Luke, "Yeah, makes no sense sticking around here if there ain't any confessions."
The three of them headed back to the dorm, discussing their upcoming midterms that week and their plans for Spring Break. For once, Luke felt okay. He wasn't discussing the suicide, he wasn't thinking about the fire incident. It was a taste of normal that he had been savoring over since he summoned a flaming ball in the palm of his hand.
On the way back, the wind started to pick up and Luke was tempted to rub his hands together to generate warmth. Then he thought about it and decided it'd be best not to light his hands on fire in front of his suitemates. But for the first time, the thought that he had been trying to suppress crossed his mind, Could I summon that flame again? By asking himself this, he knew he was on the verge of insanity. To ask himself to recreate a flame sprouting from the palm of his hand was accepting the fantasy he had been trying to deny.
Some of you may be thinking, Finally something supernatural has occurred again. I was starting to think this was just a fan fiction of "13 Reasons Why." The weird face in the water: any thoughts on who or what it may be (or is Luke just going insane because of the stress he's been going through)? Cast your thoughts now before it is revealed later in the book (I'll neither confirm nor deny in order to prevent any spoilers, but I'll be reading through the comments for sure).
The cool thing about having a book take place partly in the real world is that you can look up pictures of the actual places described in the story. The Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception is a massive church located in Washington, D.C. on the edge of The Catholic University of America's campus (see the funky photo I took a year ago below):
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Mary's Garden is located towards the right of the Basilica: (the happy birthday balloon was there because the photo was taken on Mary's birthday):
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If the images you conjured up in your mind doesn't match these, that's great because you're creating your own vision, your own version of this place. So stretch those imagination paintbrushes, and keep on stretching them in the chapters to come.
