Finding Beauty

Chapter 17

~The Beast~

I lay on my bed staring at the ceiling. It's creases and chips start to blur into each other because of how long I've been watching them. With a sigh, I sit up and run my fingers through my hair. My eyes land on the two roses hovering over my nightstand. My new one should give me a sense of pride but it doesn't. What I put Belle through to get it makes me feel guilty so now the rose does to.

I hear another clang of buckets from downstairs. It must be Carina and Belle working on the room. I'm glad they're bonding and Belle is somewhat at peace. Besides, it's good they're both distracted, I have some important work to catch up on.

I pull out my phone and search Crimes in NYC. One of the most repeated answers is the current theft group. They've been showing up to different public locations to shoot and rob people. Of course, now that I live upstate permanently (because my apartment in the city is probably filled with cops now) I'll never be able to just show up when I hear they're attacking someplace. It's almost a two hour drive into the city. The only way I would be able to reach them is if I knew where they were striking before they did and that seems unlikely.

I go through a few public news articles about the attacks. They've successfully conducted 5 so far. The latest 2 being November 7th and November 14th. The first was at a popular Christian book store and the other at a Red Cross center. Looking back at the dates, I realize that they increase at a rate of 7.

"Seven, seven...seven," I say aloud as the pieces click. 777 means something in Christianity and all the places they've attacked were linked to it. I google search "777 in Christianity" and find it's considered to be a holy number. One more 7 and that would land on November 21st.

Anxiousness runs through me as I quickly search up the locations of all the places they've attacked and look for another Christian place close by. I find a local department store run by a Christian family, they have their own flower shop in a section where they sell flowers with Bible verse's attached. If my guessing is correct, that's their next spot and they'll get there on the 21st.

Six days to prepare. I better get to it.

I look back at the two roses hovering over the table. Guess I'll be adding a few roses to my collection after all.

~Beauty~

"I think we're finished!" Carina squeals while taking in the bedroom. We both worked really hard painting this room and it came out wonderful. The room is kind of turning into my room and it makes me feel both more comfortable and terrified. It's nice to have my dream bedroom and that Carina is making an effort to make me feel more at home but this isn't my home. It's my prison and dolling it up won't change anything.

I wander the room touching the desk, the pink curtains, and finally the pink and blue comforter on my bed. The giant tarp still hangs on the special painting Carina made.

"So, do I get to see your art work now?" I ask with a forced smile.

Carina smiles even bigger and it's a real smile. "Of course!" She walks over to the tarp and grabs one end, ready to tug it down to reveal her work when Gale walks in.

"I hope I'm not intruding. I just came to check on how things are going. Looks like you guys are pretty much done," he says with an awkward smile that wrinkles his nose. I watch him carefully, wishing I knew more about him so I could figure out what his deal was. If I ever do get out of this, I'll sure have a story to tell.

Carina's eyes fall on me, then to him, and then back to me. It's like she can see the tension in the air.

"Why don't you be of some use and help me take down this tarp?" she advises.

Gale trudges over to the other side of the tarp and grabs it by it's sides. "Whenever you're ready."

"On one, two, three!"

The tarp is ripped off of the wall and the painting is revealed. Over the blue wall is a giant, outlined in white, transparent, open book with a quote painted along both pages.

"When reading we don't fall in love with the characters appearance. We fall in love with their words, their thoughts, and their hearts. We fall in love with their souls."

I stare at it in awe. How did she know I loved to read? Or that the quote would speak to me so well? The quote was a hundred percent true. Besides Grayson, books were my only friend, my life support. I grew attached to characters until they became my friends, family, even crushes.

But as I look at Gale, who is reading the quote himself, I figure she picked the quote for a specific reason. That reason has to do with The Beast in front of me, the one with the peculiar appearance.

"You like books," Gale concludes with furrowed eyebrows.

"I love them..." I walk over to Carina with a tornado of questions to be asked but pick one out of the storm. "How did you know?"

Carina bounces her shoulders with a smile tugging at her lips. "Like you said, I'm magic."

I laugh. "It's amazing! It's..." Before I know what I'm doing, I wrap my arms around Carina to give her a warm hug. "Thank you."

"My pleasure, darling." She releases me and squeezes my shoulders.

Gale is still staring at the painting when he says, "Yea, but I bet if you found out your favorite character was ugly you wouldn't be so in love with them anymore." At first, I think he is just making a silly remark but then I see his set jaw and blank stare.

I walk over to him, shaking my head. "What the character looks like is of least importance. Like the quote says, you fall in love with their soul and who they are. When it comes down to it, that's all that matters. Beauty withers away over time but who you are doesn't."

"If how you look doesn't matter then why are tons of girls starving themselves to look like models? Why can't I walk down a block looking like this?" he asks more aggressively.

I meet his stare but swap out his aggressive tone with an assertive one. "Because the world makes it seem like how you look does matter. People don't take a step back and think for themselves. Just because a lot of people feel that way doesn't make it right! Books are a representation that you can love someone without knowing how they look like because it doesn't matter."

"Even if you're right, it isn't going to change anything. Anorexia, insecurity, and snobs will still exist no matter what anyone thinks or does!"

"That way of thinking is exactly why nothing will change!" I take a breath to calm myself and think for a moment. "You know what I think? I think you need to accept that your looks aren't you."

"W-what?" he stammers.

"You're obviously insecure about your looks and for some reason don't want to believe that your looks don't define you." The words come out as I think the thoughts, so fast that I might have said too much.

Gale gulps and shakes his head. "You don't know what you're talking about." Then he swiftly exits the room and his footsteps fade as he jogs up the stairs and into his room.

Carina shrugs the little episode off. "Come on, we'll have some tea to celebrate all our hard work."

As I walk to the kitchen with her, I can't help but wonder about Gale. The Beast is a murderer but who is Gale? Who is he really?

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