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A Wonderful Family

Aven_Locke
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The average realized release rate over the past 30 days is 7 chs / week.
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Synopsis
A short story written for a college project in 2020 on the topic of suspenseful storytelling. Emma and her husband James live a normal life just like any other but that night, something will change their lives forever.
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Chapter 1 - A Wonderful Family

It's dark outside; the house is lit up with lights from the kitchen and the living room. Emma finishes eating a bowl of chicken and dumplings in the living room with her husband, James. The TV screen dances with lights and a man's voice can be heard from it along with the sound of silverware tapping pottery. 

Emma stands up and walks in front; passed the TV while James watches. 

"That was good!" Emma says as she walks to the kitchen with her bowl in her hand. 

"I killed it didn't I?" James replies in a teasing way. 

Emma sets the bowl down next to the kitchen counter and smiles at James' reply. "Yes you did!" 

Emma begins to pull up her sleeves and examines the mess of dirty dishes on the counter. Forks and knives stick up out of the sink with bowls and plates fortifying them upwards almost as if set specifically to hurt someone who dares to reach towards them. Emma turns on the faucet to hot and squirts a little bit of soap in her hand. 

The TV announces something that is drowned out by the sound of rushing water. It shows a photo of a man with white skin, brown eyes and brown hair. James attempts to ask Emma a question with his mouth full of food. "Hey isn't that your cousin?"

Emma washes her hands right above the forks and knives just barely touching them not paying attention to James. She then turns off the faucet and grabs the hand towel hanging on a handle to a cabinet door and proceeds to dry her hands. As she goes to set the hand towel on the counter, she looks the opposite direction at the dishes. She sets the hand towel at the edge of the counter just above the dishwasher corner which is sharp and protruding. She then lazily swipes her hand off the side of the counter, hitting one of her fingers on the sharp corner. 

"Ow!" Emma quickly reels back her hand and looks at the corner of the dishwasher. "Hey handyman, this dishwasher needs a corner trim."

James wiggles in his chair to look behind him and at Emma who is now looking at her finger. Then he fixes himself back to the position he was in before. "Tis but a scratch."

Emma, leaning on the counter, looks up at him and rolls her eyes. The counter she leans on has many unsheathed cooking knives scattered about. She goes to put her hand on the counter edge where many of the sharp cooking knives lay and looks at her finger. Just before putting her hand on one of the knives, she stops and reaches down to the knob of the cabinet below. She opens it up revealing a shelf with a box of Bandages and a box of thumbtacks that look to have been ripped open scattering thumbtacks all over the surface of the shelf. 

Emma blindly reaches in, slowly moving her hand around in the air just above the shelf, feeling for the box of Bandages. Everytime her hand gets close to the shelf's surface, just barely missing the thumbtacks then she moves her hand to the side and feels the Bandage box. She grabs it and pulls it out of the cabinet. Turning around to face the counter, she carefully pushes the sharp knives over a little bit and opens the box. Grabbing a Bandage out, she attempts to take off the wrapper with one hand picking at it with her fingernail then with her teeth. She finally rips off one side of the wrapper and places the pad of the Bandage on the cut, Then smooths one side to stick to her and rips off the other side of the wrapper.

The doorbell rings in the background. James jumps up out of his chair and sets his bowl of food down on the coffee table in front of his chair. "I'll get it!"

As James rushes to the door, Emma finishes putting the Bandage on and puts the box of bandages back in the cabinet and closes the cabinet door.

James opens the door and a man confronts him. Emma peers around the corner curiously to see who is there. There is a man; brown hair; brown eyes. James greets the man, "Hey y-" Bang! A gunshot. Emma jumps at the sound and her expression screams fear.

James collapses backwards, bleeding out from the chest onto the wooden floor. The man steps in the house, looking at James. He points the gun at his head. Bang! James lays motionless on the floor. Emma quickly pulls back from around the corner and sticks as closely as she can to the wall.

The sound of a boot on the wooden floor echoes through the hall to the door. Then another. Slowly creeping closer. Emma looks at the opening next to her that leads to the dining room. She's frozen from fear. She starts to sweat profusely. The sound grows closer and closer until it's almost right next to her. She finally gains enough control to quickly go around the corner just before the man can see her.

The sound of boots wander to the kitchen then silence falls upon the house. Emma sees the opening to the door. She rubs her hand against a shelf that's next to her. She feels a long object, cold like metal. She looks down to see that it's a pair of scissors. She slowly and quietly picks it up. The air fills with dread as the silence grows uncomfortably long.

"Hello sweetheart." The man is right in the opening next to Emma.

Emma's heart drops and her adrenaline skyrockets. She quickly stabs the man making him stagger and look away from her direction. She then panically dashes towards the door. The man tries to quickly point the gun at her but just before he shoots, Emma makes it out the door and takes cover behind the wall right next to the door. Bang! The man misses his shot. Emma, now seeing her opportunity, runs to the neighbors house. Bang! The window is blown out behind her. She trips and stumbles in her panic and adrenaline rush. Things become uncomfortably silent again. She begins to pant as she is just out of arm's reach of the neighbor's house.

She makes it. She grabs the door handle and bursts into the neighbors house. The neighbors are in shock as two of them are sitting at a table and one of them is in the Kitchen. "What are you doing?!"

Emma pants heavily. "Call the police, Please!"

The Neighbors look at each other then one of them quickly walks to the home phone located in the corner of the room. Soon after, the police arrive but did not find anyone that matches the description; only the body of James.