Ana then headed for the kitchen herself, in which she had seen her family sitting at the dining room table. Lance was sitting in his usual spot, at the end near the wall, while Livie was sitting to the right, and Theo was sitting on the left, both next to empty chairs. Reese wasn’t there. She approached the end of the table, opposite Lance and grabbed the chair.
“Reese hasn’t come home yet?” She asked.
Everyone sat still, speechless. No one moved a muscle, not even a facial twitch. All their faces were stuck pointing forward, but something was off. Miasma lurked throughout the dining room; a bad aura was there with it. This wasn’t Ana’s family; this wasn’t Ana’s house, or so it felt to her.
Lance’s eyes were locked onto Ana’s, and the children’s eyes were locked on hers. Though, Livie and Theo were staring at her in the corners of their eyes as they faced each other. Feelings of vertigo and anxiety struck Ana.
Her body forced her to sit down. She noticed a big white pizza box sitting in the middle of the table, that read: ‘Hot pizza!’, in which the text was in a chat bubble that stemmed off a chef holding a pizza pie. When she looked up, both Livie and Theo’s eyes were still locked on like targeting systems, though they were now facing her. She tried to look at each of her kids, but was unable to, as Ana felt if she looked directly into their eyes, something dreadful would happen. She kept looking at them, then back down at the table, jumping back and forth like she was embarrassed. The room was quiet.
“We did it!” Theo yelled out, causing Ana to jump. She was then able to look at Theo, who was facing forward again, yet his eyes were back in their corner, locked onto her still.
“We did what?” Ana asked.
Directly following Ana’s question, Lance reached across the table and slowly dragged the pizza box in front of him. He flipped it open but didn’t do anything. After a few seconds of staying still, he began visibly gagging with his mouth closed, as if he was about to vomit. Then, he started to rapidly dry heave above the large pizza.
“Lance!” Ana yelled across the table. He stopped dry heaving, paused, and shortly after, a black slimy-looking substance started to spill out of his mouth; he was coughing the black liquid all over the table uncontrollably. Alarmed and disturbed, Ana tried to stand up, but couldn’t. She was unable to move her lower half at all. She looked down at her legs, but they were gone. Her now lone-top half appeared to be resting on some sort of plaid-fabric ottoman, or booster seat on top of the chair. The sound of Lance gargling and regurgitating the black ooze began to amplify, as the black ooze was squeezing through the crevices between his teeth. Ana started to scream in fear, while her children sat still, staring at her in the corners of their eyes. Lance closed his eyes and immediately started pushing on them with immense pressure, looking like he was trying to push them through the back of his head. He then joined his wife, screaming in agony.
