That Beautiful Smile

This happened more than a decade ago. I was a high school student, training for an inter school Math competition when I saw that beautiful smile.

As a young girl, I found myself interested in anything related to the paranormal - e.g. True Philippine Ghost Stories (a book series), sfogs (an old website), all Shake Rattle and Roll Movies, and etc. I don't know, it was just fun to read and learn on something mysterious and scary. Other than the fact that, at that time, it was quite popular and trendy (something to do with Asians liking the horror theme - cue in Sacred Riana). This particular interest was what brought me closer to my Math tutor/trainer.

Instead of our usual discussion on numbers, we sometimes distracted ourselves with short conversations of what we've recently read or seen. Mind you, we've both never experienced anything paranormal or close to it at that. We just loved the topic and it was a great source of distraction from hours of looking at numbers.

All of my Math trainings were held at one of the meeting rooms on the second floor of an old (but functional) building. Beside that meeting room were offices, and up the stairs is also an office. One particular rainy night, my tutor gave me some problem sets and I lent her the new book I was reading to keep her occupied. While I was busy solving the problems she gave me, she told me she needed to go to the bathroom and asked if I was okay with being left alone or if I wanted to come along. The comfort room was on the same floor but it was at the end of a pretty dark hallway, and I didn't want to be left alone outside the comfort room so I said I'd stay and solve the rest instead. So, she left me there while I busied myself with finding x.

Some few minutes later I heard some footsteps outside and figured the people from the office were leaving. Then, the footsteps stopped and I heard a sound you'd hear of a heavy thing being dragged across the floor, followed by single steps which was weird. The door was part glass so, given my curiosity, I looked at the door to see what made that sound.

Behind the glass, I saw a beautiful lady smiling at me. She was wearing a black dress and was just standing behind the door. She was alone and she didn't knock or try to open the door or move at all. She just stood there smiling at me. I thought it was weird so I just keep solving my problems. I still saw her standing there through my peripheral vision. I looked again and she was still there, just smiling. When I looked down, I saw the book I lent my tutor and the anxiety slowly crept in, but I decided to just shrug it and thought maybe she was a friend of my tutor or something and my tutor told her to wait.

Finally, after what felt like forever, my tutor came back and the smiling lady was nowhere to be found. I figured she left after waiting for a while and would just come back or something. So, I told my tutor and asked if she was expecting anyone. She said no; and since we just recently moved our training sessions there, she hasn't told anyone of our new location yet so she's not expecting a visit. Still I shrugged and said maybe it was just the people from any of the offices. Her face went from curious to awfully frightened then she said there's no one left in the building. The people from the offices left early for an event, even the lights were off.

Without a single word, we stared at each other and cleared up as fast as we could. I can't imagine how fast we made it out of that building. After that, I stopped training with her and just trained at school instead.

It has been a decade and sometimes when I pass through that old building, I can't help but wonder, who was she?