Haunteds

Chapter 23

"And the rest was, well, history," The tour guide concluded. After hearing that the second time, I'm still not sure if the tour guide intentionally made that bad pun. If she did, then why isn't she fired?

"Hey, man," Leo called, handing me the pen. I signed in. While the others were still in line, I entered the gallery, along with the steady stream of guests and students.

There were already a lot of people inside. I took a quick look around, trying to see if anyone is giving us funny looks but it seems like the disguise works because not one person even spare us a glance. The room was cold from the square air conditioners installed on the ceiling. The marble walls were white and bare. I saw only one exhibit. In the center of the room was a huge, standalone wall that almost takes up the entire room. Mounted on the wall was a painting of the same size.

Tourists were flocking in front, blocking my view so I stepped a bit closer towards the painting. Right next to Indigo and Cana.

They were both fixated at the thing, scanning every inch of the painting, absorbing every hue, every stroke on the canvas with the same intensity a dog would give to a half-eaten hamburger.

The painting depicted the Shade, the old Shade, of course, just a black shadow, a silhouette of a man hovering in the middle of the room, in the middle of sleeping children. It looks like it was set in a room inside an orphanage, with the kids sleeping in separate identical beds wearing identical white pajamas. I say sleeping but their eyes were wide opened.

At the far end of the room was an open door. Under the doorway was the nanny, slumped to the ground, her head leaning at the door frame. She was staring, just staring with a blank expression tinged with a faint smile. A smile of absolute surrender in a hopeless situation.

"It's hauntingly beautiful..." Cana said, suppressing a smile.

Indigo stared at her as if she's speaking in a foreign language. "Why are you smirking?"

"You know...because it's the Shade. And the Shade haunts us..."

Her mouth gaped when she gets it. "Oh!" She was laughing as if Cana just told her the first joke in the world. Then I remembered that she's homeschooled so maybe terrible puns are not part of her upbringing.

She stopped, catching her breath. "Thank you, by the way."

"You know, you don't have to thank someone for their corny jokes." I told Indigo. I immediately felt Cana's elbow dug into my ribs.

"I know that!" Indigo said, irritated by my treating her like an idiot. "I meant for the compliment."

She turned to Cana. "You really think it's beautiful?"

"I do...but," Cana said, looking as confused as I was. I look at the portrait of the Shade again. It is beautiful but why would she thank Cana? Even she doesn't get it. Then, my eyes drifted to the bottom right of the painting, at the feet of the bed of a curly redheaded boy, the name INDIGO was written in blue paint.

I turned to Indigo. Now it's my jaw's turn to drop. "No way."

She just smiled.

"So when you said you paint, you meant"-I pointed at the painting.

"Mm-hmm."

"Oh!" Cana exclaimed, taking Indigo's hands in hers. "That's incredible!"

"Wow..." I said. "So, you're a genius, uhh, a gifted, like uhm, a prodigy?"

Indigo blushed. "Aww, thank you."

We heard Major Coleman called over for us. We head back to the group. Major Coleman led us towards the back of the painting. The backside of the wall was actually a huge, commemorative plaque. Names of previous haunteds who died were etched in gold. They were arranged in columns based on the year of their deaths. We didn't stop to appreciate the plaque more and head straight for the exit.