The Death Kiss (Nanowrimo)#wattys2017

Chapter 7: The curse of Ella

"No, I don't think so."

She looked at Nathan and smiled. To my surprise, Nathan reciprocated the smile and winked at her.

Marie turned her head towards me, and said "Adrian told us something today during the music Class."

"What do you mean?"

"He told us a story about the Curse of Ella."

"What do you mean?" I narrowed my eyes.

"He said, There was a woman named Ella long time ago. Wherever she went, the death followed her like a shadow. Her parents died when she was just a baby, her uncle took her in. He died when she was hardly 3 years old. Then she went to live with her maternal grandmother, who died when she was 13 years old. The village where she lived was burnt to ashes killing almost 50 people. She met a boy when she was 16 years old named Jonas Wagon. They got married when she was 18 and lived together for almost 5 years when the people found out, about the Curse on Ella. They Considered her a Witch and hanged her. When Jonas Wagon came back home, he was so grieved by her death that he committed suicide. Everybody was happy that the curse was gone, but they didn't know that the Curse never dies. It continues forever."

"So?" I shrugged.

"He asked me to tell you this story, and give you this piece of paper."

She took out a folded paper from her pocket and gave it to me.

I unfolded the paper quickly.

"4218."

"Does it make any sense to you?" Marie asked.

"No, I don't understand. But there's something I need to tell you."

"Before that, I want to ask you something?"

"Yeah?"

She folded her arms and placed them on the table.

"What's going on between you and Adrian?" She narrowed her eyes.

I shook my head. "There's nothing, absolutely nothing between us."

"He asked me about your relationship with Chase after the class today. why would Adrian ask about it?"

I tried to explain,"Yesterday night, Chase and I ...."

She interruped," You two are over eachother too, Lily. You hate Nathan but I don't hate Chase. That's kind of unfair, don't you think?"

"Listen to me, please. It's more important than our ex-boyfriends."
I squeezed the folded paper in my fist.

"Okay, continue then."

I explained to her how we followed Adrian and then how a woman jumped off the building. She kept listening to me without saying a single word.

When I finished my story, Marie said.

"That explains why he asked about you two. He had seen Chase dropping you home. But still why would he bother asking?"
I wasn't listening to Marie. My mind was wandering far away, solving the number written on the piece of paper.

"The number! I think, I know what it is."

"What?"

"4th floor, 21 room number and 8pm." I spoke in a horrified tune.

I unfolded the paper again. At the back of the paper, was written; "The Great Plague; vol 1."

I took out my cellphone and downloaded the book. I quickly entered the page number "4218"

And I started reading the first paragraph silently.

"What if Adrian saw you following him last night and now he's threatening you."

"I don't know. This page number is exactly about the tale of Ella that you just told me. But this book says that Ella was innocent, she was killed by the tribe leader of a town near Timberline. It also state that, the curse was nothing more than a make up story to kill the girl."

"I am so confused." Marie confessed.

"He told me the tale of Jonas Wagon earlier too. May be, he just wanted to complete that story. That's why he gave you the paper... Or may be, he was referring towards yesterday."

"I don't understand what's going on."
Marie shook her head.

We were too busy to notice that almost whole cafeteria was empty now. I saw Chase getting up from his table along with Sabrina. He looked at me, and signalled me to check my phone.

I quickly took out my phone from my bag. Chase had left me a text message.

"We were following the wrong Car last night. It wasn't Adrian."

I replied:

"How do you know?"

He replied back at once.

"I saw his car parked in the morning. It was the number we followed, but not the one parked outside the building."

I texted him back.

"Why didn't you tell me last night? Why you followed that man into the building then?"

Chase said:
"Because you wanted to. Besides, it reminded you of TheDark Knights."

"So what?"

"It felt good to be close to you again."