Angel Full of Flowers

❁ 38 ❁

"I told you, papá, everything will be okay."

"Mija, I'm just worried..."

"Don't worry, this is all just a big misunderstanding. I'm handling it my way."

"Just... don't do anything dangerous."

"I won't, I'll call you later I gotta go. Te quiero."

"Te quiero tambien, be careful."

I hung up the phone and placed it beside my laptop. The screen before me showcased the photo I had taken last night. All of this seemed to make absolutely no sense and I wasn't getting anywhere. The headmistress had called my father and told him that I would have to leave by tomorrow morning. However, I had no intention of actually leaving.

The picture wasn't telling me anything as I continued to stare blankly at the screen. It seemed to have been a screenshot of videocam footage outside of the homeless shelter. The only similarity between the girl in the photo and myself was that we both had long brown hair. I felt like I was going crazy and didn't even realize when my roommate came into the room.

"What's that?" She asked from behind me as she threw her pink knitted scarf onto the bed.

I jumped a little in my seat, startled that I hadn't heard her. "Oh, um, it's just a picture of someone vandalizing a homeless shelter."

She leaned in to get a closer look at it and lightly shook her head in disapproval. "That's not a real picture."

I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion and gave her a quizzical look.

"It's photoshopped, can't you tell?" She said as she adjusted her green framed glasses.

To be honest, I couldn't even tell. What even was photoshop?

"What's photoshop?" I repeated out loud to her.

She got close to my laptop again and turned up the brightness all the way. "It's when someone manipulates a photo to make it look a certain way. Look," she pointed as she zoomed in on the girl in the photo. "This girl has been cut out of a different photo and placed into this one. Whoever made this was a rookie. Or just not very good at it."

My mouth dropped open. I could see clearly what she meant–the girl had ridges around her silhouette. Who in the world would go through the trouble of photoshopping something just to slander me?!

"How do you know all of this?" I asked her in a state of panic.

"I'm into graphic design. I'm planning on majoring in it in uni," she replied coolly.

Incredible. Then a thought occurred to me: I had been rooming with this girl for the past few months yet I didn't even know her name.

"I'm ashamed to say I haven't properly introduced myself to you, I'm Camellia De León." I extended my hand to her and she smiled.

"My name is Himawari Suzuki. I've heard a lot about you lately actually, but I don't make judgments on people until I meet them. I knew you were having a hard time so I didn't want to bother you."

My heart felt warm and I smiled back at her. "If it weren't for you I would have never realized that this photo was tampered with. I must attend to something!" I declared as I promptly stood from my seat.

As I took my coat I looked at Himawari and beamed, "Thank you!"

She laughed and waved as I headed out the door. "Oh!" I stuck my head back in our room, "and let's hang out some time!" And left.

I headed straight for the headmistress's office. She couldn't deny that there was clearly something wrong with this photo and that whoever sent it to her had a vendetta against me. As I was about to make a turn towards the administration building, I received an ominous message from a random number.