Book 1 - The Boy in the Yearbook: The Photograph - Chapter 2 - The Boy in the Photograph

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For several seconds, nobody moved.

The archive room seemed to hold its breath.

Rain tapped against the narrow basement windows. Somewhere inside the walls, an old pipe groaned.

Clara couldn't take her eyes off Professor Evelyn Ashcroft.

Clara: "What do you mean, I was never supposed to see him?"

Professor Ashcroft didn't answer.

Her eyes remained fixed on the photograph in Adrian's hand.

Adrian noticed.

He slowly lowered the photograph.

Adrian: "Professor."

His voice was calm, but there was something underneath it.

Recognition.

Fear.

Maybe both.

Adrian: "You know who he is."

Professor Ashcroft's expression hardened.

Evelyn: "Give me the photograph."

Adrian didn't move.

Noah: "Why?"

Professor Ashcroft looked at him.

Evelyn: "Because it doesn't belong to you."

Maya: "Neither does the school archive, technically."

Noah glanced at Maya.

Noah: "Now is probably not the time."

Maya: "I disagree."

Elena had remained silent.

She was staring at the photograph.

Not at the boy.

At the handwriting.

Elena: "There are two different inks."

Everyone looked at her.

She pointed to the back.

Elena: "The first sentence is faded. The second one isn't."

Clara stepped closer.

She read the words again.

HE WAS NEVER HERE.

And beneath them:

CLARA BLACKWOOD.

Her name.

Her full name.

Written beneath a sentence that appeared to have been there for decades.

Clara: "How is my name on this?"

Professor Ashcroft finally looked directly at her.

Evelyn: "I don't know."

Clara immediately knew she was lying.

Not because the professor looked nervous.

Because she didn't.

Professor Ashcroft was too controlled.

The kind of person who could lie without blinking.

Clara: "You're lying."

Noah looked at Clara.

Noah: "Clara—"

Clara: "She knows him."

Adrian stepped forward.

Adrian: "Who is he?"

Professor Ashcroft's eyes moved toward the yearbook.

Evelyn: "Close it."

Maya folded her arms.

Maya: "That's not an answer."

Evelyn: "Close the yearbook."

Nobody moved.

Then the lights flickered.

Once.

Twice.

The entire room went dark.

Elena gasped.

Noah reached for Clara instinctively.

Noah: "Nobody move."

A second later, the emergency lights came on.

The room was bathed in dim red light.

The yearbook was still on the table.

But the photograph was gone.

Adrian looked down.

His hand was empty.

Adrian: "What the—"

Clara: "Where is it?"

They searched the table.

The floor.

The boxes.

Nothing.

Professor Ashcroft closed her eyes for a moment.

Evelyn: "You need to leave."

Maya: "Someone took it."

Evelyn: "Leave."

Noah: "Professor, somebody was in this room."

Evelyn: "I know."

That stopped everyone.

Clara stared at her.

Clara: "You know?"

Professor Ashcroft looked toward the door.

Evelyn: "There are things about this school that you don't understand."

Clara: "Then explain them."

The professor's expression softened for the briefest moment.

Evelyn: "I can't."

Clara: "You can."

Evelyn: "Not yet."

Then she walked toward the door.

Before leaving, she stopped.

Without turning around, she said:

Evelyn: "Whatever you do, Clara, don't search for his name."

The door closed.

Silence.

Maya looked at Clara.

Maya: "Well."

Noah sighed.

Noah: "That's definitely going to make her search for his name."

Clara didn't respond.

Because she already had.

They returned to the yearbook.

Maya flipped through the pages carefully.

Maya: "There are twenty-three students in this photograph."

Noah: "And twenty-two names."

Maya: "Exactly."

Clara looked at the boy.

Without the photograph, the only evidence of him was the image printed on the yearbook page.

She studied his face.

There was something unsettling about him.

Not because he looked frightening.

He didn't.

He looked ordinary.

A teenager.

Dark hair.

Sharp eyes.

A slight smile.

The kind of person who could have walked through the halls yesterday.

Except the photograph was nearly forty years old.

Clara: "He looks my age."

Adrian stood behind her.

Adrian: "That's because he was."

Clara turned.

Clara: "You know something."

Adrian: "No."

Clara: "You reacted before anyone else."

Adrian: "Because Professor Ashcroft reacted."

Clara: "That's not what I asked."

Adrian looked away.

Clara noticed something.

His hands were shaking.

Barely.

But they were.

Clara: "Adrian."

He finally looked at her.

Adrian: "My father had an old photograph like this."

The room went silent.

Noah: "What?"

Adrian swallowed.

Adrian: "I saw it when I was a kid."

Clara's heart started beating faster.

Clara: "Of him?"

Adrian nodded.

Adrian: "I don't remember much. My father kept it locked in a drawer."

Maya: "Why?"

Adrian: "I asked him once."

He paused.

Adrian: "He told me never to ask again."

Clara stared at him.

Clara: "What was the boy's name?"

Adrian shook his head.

Adrian: "I don't know."

Elena: "But you recognize him."

Adrian looked at Elena.

For a moment, neither spoke.

Then he said quietly:

Adrian: "Yes."

Clara's stomach dropped.

Clara: "How?"

Adrian's expression became distant.

Adrian: "Because I've seen his face before."

That night, Clara couldn't sleep.

The rain had stopped.

Moonlight spilled across her bedroom floor.

She sat at her desk with the yearbook open in front of her.

She had borrowed it from the archive.

Technically, she wasn't supposed to.

But after Professor Ashcroft's warning, Clara knew one thing for certain:

There was something in that yearbook everyone was trying to hide.

She turned back to the class photograph.

Twenty-three students.

Twenty-two names.

She counted again.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Her finger stopped.

The boy.

She zoomed in with her phone.

His face became clearer.

Dark hair.

A crooked smile.

Something written beneath his photograph.

Clara frowned.

She hadn't noticed it before.

There was a tiny mark beneath the printed image.

Almost invisible.

A number.

17.

She stared at it.

Then another detail caught her attention.

The boy was wearing a school ring.

Clara recognized the symbol engraved on it.

A black raven surrounded by a circle.

The Blackwood Academy crest.

But there was something else.

A tiny letter beneath the crest.

Clara's pulse quickened.

Adrian.

Ashcroft.

Or someone else entirely.

She reached for her laptop.

She searched the school's online archive.

Nothing.

She searched the school's alumni database.

Nothing.

She searched newspapers.

Nothing.

Then she tried the school's library catalog.

One result appeared.

BLACKWOOD ACADEMY — 1987 YEARBOOK

Clara clicked it.

ACCESS RESTRICTED.

She frowned.

Why would a yearbook be restricted?

She tried again.

The screen changed.

A password prompt appeared.

Clara stared at it.

Then she heard something.

A soft sound from downstairs.

A door closing.

She froze.

Her bedroom door was open.

The hallway beyond it was dark.

Clara: "Mom?"

No answer.

She stood.

Another sound.

Footsteps.

Coming up the stairs.

Clara quietly closed her laptop.

The footsteps stopped outside her bedroom.

She held her breath.

The doorknob moved.

Once.

Twice.

Then stopped.

Clara didn't move.

After several seconds, the footsteps disappeared.

She waited.

Then grabbed her phone.

She opened the photograph she'd taken of the yearbook page earlier.

She zoomed in on the boy.

And suddenly noticed something she hadn't seen before.

Behind him, in the school window, was a reflection.

Someone was standing there.

A woman.

Clara enlarged the image.

The reflection became blurry.

But the outline was unmistakable.

Dark clothing.

Long hair.

And around her neck—

a small silver pendant.

Clara knew that pendant.

She had seen it that afternoon.

Around Professor Evelyn Ashcroft's neck.

Her phone slipped from her hand.

It landed softly on the carpet.

Clara stared at the screen.

Professor Ashcroft had been there.

In the photograph.

Forty years ago.

But that was impossible.

Clara slowly picked up her phone.

Another notification appeared.

An unknown number.

One message.

STOP LOOKING FOR HIM.

Clara's fingers went cold.

Before she could respond, another message arrived.

HE FOUND YOU FIRST.

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