"No! You're dead! You've been dead!" Mrs. Bartolome was now freaking out.
I stepped back, Gino and Sarah followed. While Cynthia was witnessing beforehand the truth I told her. We told her.
"Maricar....so I wasn't hallucinating." Mr. Bartolome said.
He was looking at her, at her body. The same exact one he remembered till now.
"You still want me. Still so eager to claim, Jeremiah." Maricar purred. Actually purred.
"You still taste the same." He was practically vibrating.
Mrs. Bartolome looked at him in pure rage and heartbreak.
"Jeremiah!" She shouted, her veins were visible..
But Mr. Bartolome had lost it. He walked over to Maricar and removed the jacket covering her.
Pulling her flushed against him.
"Daddy! What are you doing?!" Cynthia went to her mother and comforted her.
But Mr. Bartolome wasn't even listening. He kissed Maricar.
He was seeing the woman he had always craved for.
But to us?
Gino looked disgusted, Sarah looked horrified. And me? I was puking on the bookshelves, unable to stomach it.
For the Bartolome family, they're seeing the foundation of their family, making out with a beautiful girl.
Twice younger than him.
But to us?
He was kissing a very vicious ghost. Her blood was trickling down, mixing in their....
Ugh... It's too disgusting to detail out. But...yeah...
It isn't saliva they're sharing. It's blood. Rotten blood.
Whil I'm having stomach crisis.
Mrs. Bartolome grabbed her husband's laptop and smacked his in the head with it.
Repeatedly.
Gino managed to snap out of the disgusting display and grabbed Mrs. Bartolome's hands, restraining her.
Maricar was amused and laughed wickedly.
Seeing the ever arrogant Helena, beating her... What she called before?... True love with a laptop.
"How can you do this to me? Twenty three years ago, I fought for us. I showed and gave you everything!" Mrs. Bartolome's voice was full of fury.
"You bitch! I told you I love you. Maricar was just a pleasure hole!" Mr. Bartolome growled. While pressing a hand on his bleeding head.
Maricar didn't like what he said.
The lights flickered, the book flew everywhere.
She was now totally angry.
They all looked at Maricar. Not smiling. The seductive tone and face was gone. She was showing her own form.
The form when she died. Broken bones, part of her head flattened, and bleeding continuously.
"What did you say?" She said growling.
"Don't pretend your innocent, Maricar. You wanted it too. I told you I had a girlfriend that time. Yet you said you're fine with it. It's just pleasure, nothing more." Mr. Bartolome stood up and faced her.
"You still loved it. The way we did it just now-"
"Because my body remembered. I craved your body. But that's it." Mr. Bartolome cut her off.
"What are you two talking about?" Mrs. Bartolome was now confused.
There's thing she didn't know was happening even before.
"Helena... Jeremiah and I... You know that he was fucking me behind your back before right? You caught us, that's why you knew... But we go way back. He was courting you, while I was already his fuck buddy." Maricar said proudly.
Blood was dripping down from her mouth.
These were things teenagers like us doesn't have to know. But here we are.
Involved. Physically involved.
Not me. But the same thing.
"What?" Mrs. Bartolome stumbled back.
Cynthia was just crying, supporting her mother.
"I'm sorry .. Helena. It was hard to stop what became a habit. She was always ready for me. The stall? That became our love nest. I tried to stop. But she... threatened me to expose us. And my body couldn't resist her."
Mr. Bartolome walked to her, and kneeled in front of her.
Mrs. Bartolome was shocked. Shocked of the confession. All she was told, was, Maricar seduced him. To the point she bullied her, every opportunity she got.
But the truth laid bare? There was more to it. It was a hidden arrangement. Something, she was the outcast. The blind one.
"It got worse, when Maricar confessed to me. That she loves me. That if I step away, she'll tell you everything. And I couldn't bare for you to know. Because I love you. It was dumb of me to be in such precarious arrangement with her. I was young, active, and always needy. And I felt disgusted by myself everytime we do it. I felt guilty. That's why I couldn't move the way I do with Maricar."
Mr. Bartolome has lost his cool and charming persona. He was downright begging to be understood.
Seeing him like that, made me feel small as a man.
Why? Why enter something you couldn't get out of?
I have a lot of things I wanted to say. I wanted to punch his face.
Wanted to scold him. And i promised myself, I'll never be like that.
Maricar somehow calmed down. Then started laughing again. But she didn't cause any paranormal activities.
"It doesn't give you the right to manipulate me. Everytime I threatened to expose our arrangement you would touch me like I am all that mattered. You would say things to calm me down. To make me believe. But it was all a lie." She laughed bitterly.
"It was. If I don't coaxed you, you would go spreading things around about us. So I did what I have to. To stop everything. I told my friend to record us, and post it." Mr. Bartolome looked at Maricar.
But his eyes were regretful. He was regretting what he did.
"But it was wrong. The solution you thought of was wrong." I wasn't able to hold back.
I needed to say something.
"All your reasons... They're all selfish. Mr. Bartolome, you should have acted like a man. Came clean when you had the chance....not add more problem to it."
Everyone looked at me. I feel cringed out too. Why the hell did I say that? Where does that come from?
But now that everything's out in the open?
It's time to put and end to it.
Close this chapter so everyone can move forward and write a new one.