BLOOD LEGACIES
Chapter 102: The Woman In The Picture

Chapter 102: The Woman In The Picture

EMMA

~

Owen’s home was really beautiful. I couldn’t help but marvel at the interior decor within, he did say the house was old but it looked quite okay to me, it was well kept and the designs may be multiple like how it looked in the 80s pictures I have seen but it is still presentable. I breathed the air, and now that is certainly the homey feeling.

"I will get you something, juice or..." he asked me.

"Just water," I said as I kept observing. I heard his exiting footsteps but then my eyes caught the picture against the wall, there were many but the ones that caught my eyes were the large ones, they mainly looked like all those framed photos you would see at a museum, it consists of two men and then an older lady. Maybe his grandparents or something.

I leveled my gaze and I found some pictures on the shelves, I tilted my head to the side observing them, well this looked like a family photo, I smiled when I saw a young photo of Owen, well he looked cute, and then a man beside him having matured looks was next to him, they looked like they were fishing or something, I spotted the hat and then the fishing tackle, I didn’t have time to study his looks when my eyes caught one and my eyes merely went wide in shock, and my blood ran cold.

What the heck? What was this? Was I seeing things? Is that?

"Emma?"

I heard Owen but I couldn’t process my brain right now, my shaky hands reached for the picture hesitantly, maybe I was seeing things, maybe a closer look then.

But it was right before my eyes now, my grip on the picture slightly tightened, my gaze quivered and my body tautened, this was the same lady, this was the same woman, this was the librarian, the woman I saw in my dreams standing next to a middle-aged man.

"Emma"

I slowly moved my confused and shocked gaze to him, I was too stunned to speak but I knew I can’t keep quiet for long, not now, I need to tell him. I turned the photo and pointed to her, I noticed his hurtful expression.

"I know this woman" I confessed in a shaky tone, I was still trying to process this but the dots sort of clicked in some way and it both split my head and made me more confused.

"What are you talking about Emma," he said in a tone I couldn’t recognize. I shivered just by the mere sound of it, but I needed to relay what I said, I needed him to understand.

"I know this woman"

"No Emma you don’t" he spoke in a more ardent tone with stern looks like no one could convince him otherwise, doesn’t he believe me?

"I said I-

"She died years ago!" he yelled at me and I jumped.

Yet another dot connected that was why he had hurtful eyes that was why he was speaking to me in a foreign tone, he knew this woman. "She’s..." He began in a shifty tone, it was shaky, partly broken and it felt like he was about to reveal something he couldn’t share with me yet, something kept and what he didn’t wanna talk about because I could feel it he was in pain, I tried to open my mouth to tell him to stop but my brain didn’t let me, the curiosity was overriding my body, taking over.

"She’s my mom" he took a deep breath, it was shaky and hard for him but he continued. "She died the day I was born"

It can’t be! I was forced to cover my mouth. I didn’t know if it was in shock or fear, maybe both, I bit my lip, hard, to the point it gave me what I hated, pain, that was exactly how I felt right now, pain for him!

"So Emma..." he met my eyes but they were distant and cold. "There’s no way you should know this woman, so stop the joke"

Does he think it’s a joke? Does he think I’m lying? Only that I wasn’t, I was telling the truth, the truth that chilled even my bones, I should tell him but I was still frozen in place like I was having a brain freeze, my action was dimmed and my mind a mess.

He turned to leave but I let it set loose.

"I saw her!"

He faces me. "Emma" he breathed like he couldn’t deal with this anymore, well I can’t too!

"I’m telling the truth Owen, I’m sorry" I added in a faint tone, it was hard for him and me too! "I-I-I think I’m going crazy beca-"

"Hey, hey" he held me with worried eyes. I was shaking, I wasn’t the one who needed his comfort right now, he was the one, I just opened an old wound and I regretted it.

"Emma"

My eyes back to him, he was hurt and worried at the same time, can I tell him? Can I? He would think I’m crazy, he would think I was joking but that was the only explanation but then again he deserved to know, he has every right to, so that I can make sense, make sense of it, that the woman I saw was dead.

"The librarian, the intruder, the woman who gave me that book at the bookstore..."

His eyes slowly widened, yes, he was guessing it right and it sounded just as crazy when saying it out loud.

"S-S-She’s the one I saw..." I leveled my eyes back to the picture just to be sure of myself but it remained the same, the same terrifying truth. The woman with curly brown hair and brown eyes, and beautiful, just like how I saw her in the library and in my dream.

The familiar feeling I got from Owen, I have seen that look before.

"...the same person"

~

The silence was getting both lengthy and discomfiting, I kept shifting my gaze to Owen who remained till and lost in thought, his features unreadable. I gulped for the tenth time since we have sat like this, daring myself to break this ardent silence but I couldn’t bring myself to. My head churned with several questions.

I tried maintaining my breathing so that it wouldn’t get out of pitch, I was still shaken from the revelation that was set before us. The woman I saw was Owen’s mother, the woman I saw was a ghost. This explains why the findings about her were unknown, because she doesn’t exist anymore, and in all this, the discovery which shocked me the most and made my blood chill, ’I can see ghosts?!’

"Are you sure?" his question snapped me out of my plight, making my gaze fall back to him but his eyes remained on the table, lost. I could see it, he was thinking, he was hurt and he was confused and it only hurt me further.

I sighed. "Y-Yes," I answered. "B-Brown hair and eyes, I’m certain she’s the one"

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes. "I don’t believe this" he began opening his eyes. "I mean..." he huffed but it wasn’t heartfelt, almost like he was doubting himself. "I’m a warlock which is normal for me but I can’t believe you saw my mom, I mean it..."

He paused when my hand grip his arm and he faced me. "You don’t have to talk about it," I said in a quiet tone.

He shook his head and I was about to speak because I didn’t want more wounds open, he was hurting and I knew it, he grew up without a mother and I only just realized that now.

"When did you see her again?" he asked before I could speak for myself.

"I-In a dream"

He narrowed his eyes at me, in confusion.

"I know it sounds crazy"

"No no" he sighed, he took a minute but he spoke. "I never knew anything about her, I only knew her name" a small smile found his lips but it didn’t reach his eyes. "Mary Sherman. My dad said she was the most beautiful woman he has ever met, gentle, kind, I have always wished that she was here"

I felt a sting in my heart, he never knew her face, her voice, her words, nothing. My grip on his arm tightened and he shifted his gaze to me with a small smile.

"That’s all I know of her"

"S-She was about to say something to me, but I woke up, I haven’t dreamt about her ever since the nightmare"

"What else did she say?"

"She pleaded that it wasn’t her intention to curse me by giving me that book, I think she has a reason for it"

"A reason?"

I nodded, over time when I think about my last encounter with her, I have come to that conclusion.