“You have to listen to me!” she kept calling out. “Please, I need help!”

The second woman on the museum steps looked as though she was trying to calm the girl down, or at least move her back inside. This woman was thin, with short white hair and hunched shoulders. She was wearing a navy-blue blazer, and pinned to it was a name tag. I had to assume she worked for the museum.

Nearly everyone who had been in listening distance made their way over, and soon the two women were surrounded by a small crowd of people. The girl started motioning back through the open door of the museum, though it wasn’t immediately clear why. I left Bess, George, and Riley behind and edged my way to the front of the crowd.

“Come here, dear,” the older woman said. “Let’s move over this way.”

The crying girl wouldn’t budge, and more people were gathering around her.

“What’s happening?” someone from the crowd asked her.

This question had clearly been what the girl was waiting for. She began speaking loudly, addressing the crowd. “My boyfriend,” she began. “He’s missing. He’s trapped in there.”

“Trapped in the museum?” said someone else. “What do you mean?”

If the girl had been nearly hysterical before, now she seemed to be determined and almost calm. “We were visiting the museum last night,” she said. “My boyfriend and I. But then he just disappeared. I thought that maybe he was just going to meet me back at our hotel or something. But he never showed. So I came back to the museum this morning, to look for him, and I found him. It’s the same thing that happened to that other girl, last week. They’re both trapped inside the exhibit, inside the photographs!”

There was a mix of different reactions throughout the crowd. One woman laughed, clearly thinking this was a joke. Some gasped, while others just looked confused. But the woman who worked at the museum didn’t look surprised at all. Instead she looked worried.

The crying girl continued. “It’s the curse!” she said, this time looking around at everyone gathered in the crowd. “Terry Lawrence cursed these photographs, and they’re going to keep taking people until the exhibit is shut down.”

The museum worker stepped forward, waving her hands in front of herself as if she were trying to quiet the girl down. “No, no,” she said. Her voice sounded a bit wheezy and strained. “We aren’t shutting down and there is no curse. Absolutely no such thing as a curse. Someone is just tampering with my exhibit.”

The crying girl looked as though she was about to respond to this when a police officer began making his way through the crowd. He was a short man, with heavy cheeks and a rounded nose. “What’s going on here?” he called out to the two women.

“Officer!” said the crying girl. “You have to help me. My boyfriend’s missing. He’s trapped inside a DeSantos photograph. This exhibit is cursed and needs to be shut down immediately!”