The Sweetest Decay

Chapter Twelve

The hum of conversation reverberated in the grand, Gothic expanse of the gallery. Every inch of the place, with its towering arches and weathered stone, felt like a relic. The kind of place where forgotten whispers might still echo through dark corners, and long-dead aristocrats might rise from the dust to mingle with the living. Parisian elites roamed about, draped in their finest, discussing with such faux refinement that Graham could barely stomach it.

They looked at the veiled woman, his creation, and to them, it was just another display—something to admire in passing, or worse, something to critique in private. They don’t understand it, Graham thought bitterly. They couldn’t. No one could.

He stood to the side, hiding in plain sight. The artist had become the onlooker, a phantom at his own event, watching people drift from one masterpiece to the next. He hated this. Hated the polished smiles and the charades they all performed. He hated the way they stood before his work and called it beautiful, and in the same breath, dismissed it as just another trend.

Graham McMcgrath—born with too much Irish whiskey in his veins, too much madness in his mind, and too much blood in his hands—was never meant for polite conversation. He could feel the tension building in his skull, the voices whispering, rattling the walls of his mind. They never stopped. Always there, always pushing.

He took a long, deliberate sip of his whiskey. The burn was the only thing that felt real at the moment. Everything else, the noise, the chatter, the people who couldn’t see, couldn’t understand—none of it mattered. He rolled the glass between his palms, savoring the slow descent of warmth down his throat.

There is no art without pain, he reminded himself. The woman in obsidian—a failure—was his torment.

The sculpture of the veiled woman was a thing of terror, an unfinished puzzle in stone. The thing he had tried so hard to capture—the horror, the chase, the fear, the vulnerability—was all there, frozen in time, but he felt it was incomplete. And that, more than anything, gnawed at him. That moment, just before the escape, when the light of understanding would have illuminated her face, he had never been able to reach it. She was more than a subject; she was a piece of his soul he had carved away and left to linger, haunting the gallery with her stillness.

Graham paced through the gallery, skirting the edges of the crowd. The whispers in his head became louder. Unintelligible.

She sees you.

A chill ran down his spine. He could almost smell the smoke now, the scent thickening in the air, coming from the ancient vents in the ceiling. He shook his head, trying to push the rising panic down, but it wouldn’t let him go. His father's voice, a deep, gravelly tone, filled the silence.

“A real man has salt on his brow, boy.”

Graham closed his eyes for a moment, wishing it would all just stop, but it wouldn’t. His fists clenched. If he had one more drink, he’d drown it out.

One more.

His feet moved mechanically, leading him to a quiet corner of the gallery’s balcony. From here, he could see the tangled garden below—a weeping willow with gnarled branches, hanging low, surrounded by purple lilacs and dandelions. He stared at it, the quiet of the scene providing some relief. But then his eyes caught movement. He froze.

A woman.

She stood on the opposite side of the balcony, unaware of his gaze. Her dark curls cascaded down her back, perfect ringlets, a mass of ebony that seemed to catch the faint light. Her skin was kissed by the sun, just enough to give it a warm glow. She was striking, yet there was something more. Something magnetic. It wasn’t her beauty alone, it was the eccentricity that radiated from her.

He leaned forward, his head pounding, trying to focus. She was holding a flute of champagne—her fingers slender and delicate, nails painted a bright red. Everything about her seemed deliberate, poised, and yet… there was an underlying sadness to her that made him want to reach out and pull her from it.

Graham’s heart beat in his chest as the voices in his head spiraled again.

She knows you’re watching.

His gaze flicked down to her fingers, tracing the glass. It was absurd, this feeling of being caught, but he couldn’t look away.

Trying to push the gnawing sensation aside, he spoke. "They say ghosts appear near weeping willows." His voice trailed into the air, as hesitant as the words themselves.

The woman stiffened, startled, and he saw her glance toward him, eyes wide.

She didn’t see me, Graham told himself.

She couldn’t have. But her gaze flickered over him, and for a moment, he felt as though the entire world had paused.

Her voice broke the silence. "Excuse me, Monsieur, I did not realize there was company."

Graham winced, the formality of her words grating on him. He wanted her to be free, unburdened by the pretenses of the event. I want her real, not perfect.

"No formalities," he muttered, shrugging. "I shouldn’t have snuck up on you."

She turned to face him fully now, one hand on her chest as she steadied herself, the flute still in her other hand. Her lips curled into a faint smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

"I had never seen one before," she said, her voice low, almost hesitant. "The tree, I mean. But if it's true…"

Graham’s breath caught at the quiet weight in her voice. She wasn’t just talking about folklore anymore—he could feel it. There was something raw beneath those words, something she hadn’t meant to say aloud. He studied her closely, the slight tremor in her fingers, the way she avoided his eyes.

"I can show you," he offered, his voice gentler now, like he was afraid of scaring her off. “If you want.”

She hesitated, her gaze flicking toward the tree below again. “What happens if you’re already haunted?” she asked, not really expecting an answer.

But Graham understood. God, he did.

“They don’t follow you,” he said after a beat. “They stay where you leave them. It’s us that keep going back.”

Something in her shifted—her eyes, her shoulders, the way she exhaled, like she’d been holding in a breath for years. Then she nodded, slow and silent, and began to walk.

He followed, drawn to her like a tide to the moon, watching the delicate sway of her figure as she moved down the balcony corridor. Her steps were quiet but sure, like she was used to carrying weight she didn’t speak of.

They reached the end of the balcony, where the railing curved out slightly. Below them, the weeping willow moved in the breeze like it knew secrets neither of them could bear to say aloud.

“She looks like she’s bowing,” Yesenia murmured, her arms crossed now, hands tucked under her elbows as if to shield herself. “Or grieving.”

Graham glanced sideways at her. Her profile was lit by the soft amber glow from the gallery behind them, but her expression was far away—her mouth parted, eyes glassy with a memory she wasn’t ready to share.

“I think,” he said carefully, “some trees grow that way because they were always meant to mourn.”

She blinked quickly, looking down, her voice cracking ever so slightly. “Then I’m one of them.”

The silence that followed was thick, weighted. Graham didn’t speak—he wouldn’t cheapen the moment with questions or platitudes. He just stood beside her, close enough that she could feel his presence if she needed it, far enough that she didn’t have to say a word if she didn’t want to.

Eventually, she set her glass down on the railing, her fingers brushing over the rim. “Some days I think I’m doing alright,” she said quietly. “Then grief creeps in like smoke, through the vents, through the cracks in the walls… and I remember—I’m still losing him. Over and over again.”

He swallowed hard, surprised by how much it hurt to hear that. Maybe because it mirrored something in him, too.

“You don’t lose them all at once,” he murmured. “You lose them in pieces. In places. In quiet moments like this.”

Her gaze flicked up to him, finally meeting his. Something passed between them then—not quite understanding, but something close. Recognition. Two ghosts holding space for each other in the world of the living.

She didn’t smile, but she didn’t look away either.

“I didn’t expect to talk to anyone tonight,” she admitted.

“I didn’t expect to care,” he said, and the truth of it startled him.

For a long moment, they stood there, side by side, staring out at the tree and the garden below as the rest of the world buzzed and clinked behind them. Neither of them moved, as if breaking the stillness would mean letting go of something they hadn’t meant to find.But it was there now—shared sadness, quietly sacred. Something neither of them had words for yet.

And Graham knew, with unnerving clarity: he would remember this moment for the rest of his life.

As they walked past his sculpture, the veiled woman in obsidian, Yesenia stopped. Graham could feel the shift in the air, a subtle change as she gazed at the piece. Her finger traced the rim of her empty glass. He waited, unsure of what she would say.

"Whoever he is, I can see why his work is so popular." Her voice was distant, almost as though she were speaking to herself.

Graham's heart clenched. The words were not what he expected. But he had hoped for something more.

"I think it’s incomplete," he whispered, barely audible above the murmurs of the crowd.

Yesenia turned her head slightly, her gaze flickering back to him, her eyes sharp as she considered his words. Then she spoke, her voice low, thoughtful. "Nothing is ever complete," she said, almost to herself. "This is surely not meant to be."

Graham swallowed hard. She was right. No one ever understood. No one ever would.

She continued to circle the sculpture, inspecting it like an art critic, her eyes scanning every angle, every curve. Graham noticed the moment she seemed to slip into thought, her expression distant, and a shiver ran down his spine.

"She was lost," he said, his voice tense, filled with the weight of his own experiences. "Lost in a way that even an angel couldn’t save."

Yesenia’s eyes flickered to him briefly, but her gaze quickly returned to the veiled figure. "She was being chased," she said softly. "And whatever it was caught her before she could figure out why."

The words hit him like a thunderclap, sharp and disorienting, as if someone had rung a bell inside his skull. A cold shiver threaded down his spine. For a brief, splintered second, an image—distorted and dim—flashed in his mind. A memory, maybe. Or a fragment of something that never was. He blinked hard, trying to find focus, but the edges of the world wavered, unsteady.

Was she real? Or had his mind conjured her, like it had done before?

And then—she was gone.

Panic bloomed in his chest, rising fast and uncontrollable. His breath quickened, shallow and frantic as he pushed through the crowd, brushing past silk dresses, cologne-laced tuxedos, murmured French and startled glances. His eyes darted in every direction, desperate.

He had to find her.

But the sculpture remained. Silent. Watching. And the ghost of her voice echoed like a warning: Whatever it was, it caught her.

He staggered outside, out into the alleyway beyond the gallery doors, where the air was sharp and wet with the smell of oncoming rain. He braced himself against the wall, chest heaving, throat dry.

A cigarette. That would help. Something familiar to anchor him. He lit one with shaking hands, the flare of the flame barely steady against the tremble in his bones.

In the corner of his room—no, his mind—he saw it again. The clipping. The curly-haired girl.

A headache pressed in, vicious and immediate. He cursed under his breath and took a long drag, trying to force the memory away, trying to steady the static in his thoughts.

But it lingered. Her voice. That sculpture. That damn girl.

And beneath it all, the creeping, sinking feeling that whatever he was chasing—had already found him.