Lucas sat down and signaled Leonardo to go next.
The reporter observed as Leonardo stood before the audience. He had been making notes, a frown forming between his eyebrows, apparently struggling to find a flaw in the story. Yet, after a moment, he smiled and paid attention as Leonardo began:
The next day, in the lab class, the three of us were tired, our eyes heavy with sleep, our eyelids drooping. But we finished the work without errors, because good grades had to be kept.
After school, we gathered again and waited for nightfall, but once again nothing happened. Lucas and me let it go, and Luis also stopped thinking about it. The days passed until Wednesday returned, and we were assigned advanced methods for angle calculations using one side and one angle.
Luis told us he had been awake and working on the exercises when two in the morning came. Something caught his attention, and he lifted his gaze.
He saw a black shadow running, as if escaping from something, immediately followed by a white shadow chasing it. He jumped up from his chair and ran after them.
The hair on his arms stood on end, his skin seemed to vibrate with excitement. He followed them to the bathroom on the first floor and, with accumulated adrenaline, opened the door. But there was nothing. A little disappointed, he went back to his seat to continue his work, and after four in the morning, he lay down to rest.
The next day we were in algebra class again, but nothing happened. There were no new methods, we returned to our notes, and Luis told us what had happened. Lucas was suspicious, but we concluded that the shadows appeared every Wednesday near the time Luis had mentioned, and we waited eagerly for the third Wednesday to observe them.
Lucas's mother almost did not let him go because they had never assigned double lab work, but in the end he convinced her and was allowed to join us.
When the time came, we saw them again. But there was no way to stop them, use them, or capture them. In the end, we decided that like every strange thing in Leonardo's house, this too was harmless. Leaving the event behind, we continued our routine.
Leonardo lowered his arms after finishing the story and sat down next to his two friends, looking at the audience with self-confidence. The three of them settled in, smiling to themselves.
Luis was convinced this was the hardest story they had told. The three lies were really well hidden, and they did not overshadow the event itself. Though not very exciting, it was intriguing, since not all stories had fights or escapes.
Lucas felt proud. Luis had given him the chance to change the order of the story, something they had never done before. Luis had decided that Lucas was the most suitable for that part of the tale.
The audience stopped murmuring, and finally a sixteen-year-old girl raised her hand and tried to unmask the three friends. "I think Leonardo's lie is the color of the shadow. A white shadow cannot exist!"
They smiled and assured her that, however strange it seemed, the shadow was indeed that color.
Next was a man around forty-three years old. He cleared his throat, adjusted his glasses, and with a smile said, "The lie of each one was about having good grades. With so many outings and lies, I don't believe you really have good grades. Each one of you repeated it, you said 'Good grades must be kept.' That's how you planted the lie in our minds."
Luis opened his mouth but was interrupted by a lady they all recognized as their tutor, Mrs. Justina. Adjusting her curls and touching her glasses, she said, "These three boys, despite all their disappointments and stories full of imagination and fantasy, maintain the highest grades of the year. Perhaps they are not the best in every subject, but their overall average is the best."
The three smiled and agreed with her. Now it was the reporter's turn. They gave him a curious look, since he had been silent for a long time, staring at his notes. Finally, he looked up and began to clarify everything.