I couldn’t believe what was right before my own eyes. This picture was always my favorite but I had never noticed the anger that protruded from this woman's eyes. I had not even noticed that she made direct eye contact with the lense. This was peculiar because I had looked at this picture tens of times previously. Typically with my crowd photos, no one ever seemed to notice that a picture was being snapped. Most people were too caught up in their own little moments to notice my attempt to capture a compilation of individual moments of each person’s separate life. That was my favorite characteristic of this photo; the obliviousness of each individual who was too incaptured in their own moment to realise the picture was being taken. Now there was an outlier to this pattern; this angry woman.

I studied the picture a little longer to see if there were any other details that I hadn’t noticed before but everything else seemed to be exactly as I recalled. This one face out of one hundred faces, was the only one to make contact with the camera, while the other faces seemed to keep low and directed to the ground. The woman was the same woman, who was found dead just hours ago, and knew me by name, begging me to tell “Them” that she was not ready. Her face was littered with an engraved X over it now. What was happening and why was I a part of it? I couldn’t sit and ponder much longer. I had things to accomplish and I had work in just a few hours. I had to get up and leave my chair to go to my room.

As I strolled into my room and plopped down in front of my desk, I grabbed some of my textbooks out. I decided to start with my anatomy class because that was most definitely my most challenging class this semester. Page after page, I kept reading and rereading the same information because nothing seemed to stick in my mind. Any thought process that I had was immediately redirected to the situation earlier. Two hours into studying, and I still couldn’t get that womans face out of my mind. Could I have saved her? Maybe, but I still had no idea who “they” were and what I had to do with them. I felt guilt climb on my chest and shoulders. The weight felt unbearable and uncomfortable. I felt like I couldn’t breathe.

My heart was pounding out of my chest and an uneasy feeling crept up on me, a feeling as if I was being watched. Yet, no one was around and I was completely alone in my house. I took a deep breath, in a futile attempt to shake the feeling from my being. I got up from my desk and began to get dressed for work tonight. Dress pants on, work polo and attempted makeup, I knew I looked great and professional, but I still felt that anyone who looked at me could tell that something was seriously wrong. I debated long and hard whether I should call off work, but I needed the money really badly and it simply wasn’t an option.

As I strolled into work, the uneasy feeling grew even more immense and dark. Something dreadful was on way and there was absolutely nothing I could do. I didn’t know what was going to happen, and I didn't know why. I felt useless and powerless. How was I supposed to focus on taking orders tonight when this feeling hovered over me like a menacing overcast.

In the midst of my overthinking, someone approached the front counter and I got my professional persona ready to welcome this customer into our pizza shop and take their order.

I turned to them with a warming smile and got my paper and pen ready. Our pizza shop wasn’t too advanced yet so everything was done by pen and an old cash register that was probably from the fifties. I cleared my throat and announced, “Hi, how are you today sir? Can I help you with anything?” The man looked edgy and troubled. His eyes darted back and forth but he had yet to answer me. “Sir?” I called out.

The man looked at me with eyes of urgency, and signals for me to hang him the pen and a piece of paper. The request seemed a little strange to me but I handed over the pen and paper anyway, because the customer is always right. He looked to both side of him and behind him as well. Then he scribbled a few words on the paper I had given to him. Then, the anxious man handed me the paper in a shaky manner, that was followed by a return of my pen as well.

I looked at him, and was a little apprehensive to read his scribble. However, he looked at me intensly and gave me a strong nod to encourage me to read the note quickly.

I unfolded the small piece of paper he had given back to me. The note read, “The picture. Please help me. They’re coming soon. Tell them I’m not ready. THE PICTURE.” I dropped the note immediately. It felt like a ticking time bomb in the palms of my hands. The man stared straight at me with a bothered expression, but all I could manage was silence. My jaw was dropped and I was terrified. It was all so real. I stared back at the man, not knowing what to say. Once again, he searched all around and finally made eye contact again. This time the man mouthed, “Please, don’t let them get me, too.”

With those last few words, he sped off into the dark night, leaving me speechless and unsettled. My boss came up next to me a few seconds later asking what had happened with him.

All I could say to him was, “The man came in and he didn’t speak. He mouthed that he needed my help and then ran away.” Obviously, I left out some information and stuffed this man’s note into my pocket, but my boss could just think he was some crazy guy in the streets. That was easier to explain something that even I don’t know about.

“Huh, that’s weird. Drugs do crazy things to you, Saphira.” He said. He looked me over and saw that I was shaken up. ”Do you need to go home? Are you alright?”, He questioned.

“Yeah, I’m OK. I just haven’t gotten a lot of sleep recently.” Of course, it wasn’t the whole truth, but it was enough for him to let me stay at work for the rest of the night.

I stayed the rest of the night at the pizza shop and everything else seemed to go as normal. The same washed up forty-year-old men came in and told me to smile. The regular drunk people from the bar came in for the drunk munchie food after finishing out at the bar next door. However, I still could not keep my mind off of this man and his note. He mentioned a picture. Was he in the photograph as well? Was he headed towards the same fate as the woman earlier on?

Right as I got back to my house, I looked at the photograph again, and just as I predicted, there was another engraved X, and another face looking straight at my camera lens. It was the same man from the shop earlier on and he was crying…

To Be Continued...