Any Time At All

Chapter Twenty-Two

You and Nancy arrive at the town's funeral home. You walk in casually and see Jonathan looking at caskets with an older man. You both make eye contact with him as you stand in front of the door. He looks like he hasn't slept in days. You give him a small smile. "Can you just give me a second?" He asks the older man. 

"Of course," he responds and respectively gives you guys some privacy.

Jonathan walks over to you two. "Hey," he says. He sounds dead inside or on the verge of crying.

"Hey," Nancy greets him and her face screams pity. "Your mom, um, she said you'd be here." She pauses. "I just - can we talk for a second?" she practically whispers this. You walk out the doors and they sit on the bench against the wall. You lean against the wall opposite of them. Nancy hands him the photo.

"I found this--thing. You took the photo and I was wandering if you saw anything else while you were out there." Nancy asks him. 

"I mean, it looks like it could be some kind of perspective distortion but, I wasn't using the wide angle," He continues to look at the picture. "I don't know, it's weird." He gives the picture back to Nancy.

"And you're sure you didn't see anyone else out there?" I ask him. 

"No." He looks at me and then back to Nancy. "And she was there one second and then, um...gone. I figured she bolted."

"The cops think that she ran away. But they don't know Barb," Nancy misses her friend. "And I went back to Steve's...and I thought I...saw something. Some...weird man or...I don't know what it was," she breathes out. "I'm sorry," she says abruptly. You look at her confused. "I..I shouldn't have come here today...I'm...I'm so sorry." She gets up to leave and you begin to follow her.

"What'd he look like?" Jonathan asks, whipping his head around to see her. Nancy stops in her tracks.

"What?" She turns back to look at him.

"This man you saw, in the woods. What'd he look like?" You can see some sort of fear in Jonathan's expression.

"I don't, I don't know," she stammers. "It was almost like he...he didn't have..."

"Didn't have a face?" He finishes her sentence.

"How did you know that?" She asks bewildered.

"My mom claims that she saw a man like creature, just like you said. She said he had no face," He stands up. "I didn't believe her at first-but now..." He trails off and begins to walk out the doors of the funeral home.

"Jonathan!" Nancy calls out. You and Nancy chase after him and he gets into to his car.

"We need to go to the school!" he shouts out from his window as he drives away. You and Nancy run into your car and you speed after him. 

Minutes later, you arrive at the high school. You meet Jonathan at the front and follow him in.

"What are we doing here?" You ask in confusion.

"We're going to the dark room," he speed walks down the hallways. You get into the dark red room and take a good look around. You've never been in this room before. Jonathan gets right to work with the photo.

"And you're...?" Nancy asks.

"Brightening...Enlarging," he says while moving around different things.He twists the knob in front of him.

"Hmm..." Nancy says as if she understands.

"Did your mom say anything else?" You ask him. "Like, um, where it might have gone to, or...?"