"What happened?" she asked. "I hear you changed your mind. What's the deal with that?"
I reached into my pocket and pulled out the photo.
She took it in her hands, her fingers closing around it as she looked down.
"Oh my God, is that...?" She looked up at me as her eyes opened wide.
"Yeah, it is," I said.
"Are you…?"
"Yes." I said.
She lowered her head.
"I'm just a guy who's tired of the bullshit."
The rain had started to fall again, but I didn't want to complain with The Whistling Woman by my side. I had enough to worry about without her bringing it up. She looked at me, finally, with a smile that showed me she believed me.
She smiled again. "I think it is too late to change your mind about all of this."
"I know."
As the rain grew heavier, The Whistling Woman and I started to walk, lost in our thoughts. But something was different. The air felt heavy and smelt strange.
The Whistling Woman returned the photograph, and I shifted my attention to the picture. The image of the person in the photo was burned into my memory, haunting me like a bad dream. A reminder of the darkness that had consumed my life, a past I couldn't escape no matter how hard I tried.
I turned to The Whistling Woman, but she had disappeared. Panic set in as I realized that I was alone. I knew what I had to do. It was time to end it all.
I walked to the cliff's edge, the wind whipping my hair around my face. I felt a sense of peace wash over me. Finally, I would be free from the demons that had haunted me for so long. But as the ground rushed up to meet me, I realized too late that I had made a terrible mistake. Echoes of my body colliding with the jagged rocks below reverberated through the lonely darkness, driving me to the brink of madness.
"NO!" I screamed. "Why can't I die?"
My voice resonated through the empty void, piercing the dark cloud surrounding me.
That's when I heard it. The whistling. Soft at first, but growing louder with each passing moment. It was a tune I had never heard before; it filled me with dread. I knew then that I was not alone, the Whistling Woman was with me, but she had changed.
Her figure emerged from the darkness, eyes glowing red in the dim light. I could feel her breath on my neck as she whispered in my ear.
"You can't escape your fate," she hissed. "You belong to me now."
And with that, everything went dark, and the Whistling Woman's haunting tune carried on the wind.