Meet the Richards

3.3 || Lilies

"Time is running out." Someone whispered in my ear as I watched my girl be torn apart by my wife and paramedics. The paramedics wanted to bring her back to the hospital to check up on her. Irene wanted to bring her back to the house. I didn't much care anymore, she wasn't my daughter anymore. This was Elane, a clone of Elena that was born from the work of Zheng's malevolence.

Speak of the devil, I turned around to the person that had whispered in my ear. They were heading back into the crowd, but it was definitely Zheng. I pushed back against the crowd that was now piling out of the diner. This would be the diner's most productive day and it was because of the Richards family drama. The public would think that Elane had run away from home because either the father or the mother were difficult. And we all know who would be judged and lynched. The man of the house. I don't think someone as young as Jonah would be a suspect.

I was able to squirm my way outside, but I had lost him. I was just screaming the boy's name in the middle of the street by that point. But it was true what Zheng had passed onto me. Time was running out and we would soon learn this.

Irene was able to convince the paramedics that Elane would feel better at home. She stopped introducing herself to us after falling asleep. I watched my kids sleeping in the guest room. Jonah woke up in the night, turning to the side of his bed to spit a tooth out. His teeth were falling out. The final stage before death struck his clock. Death knocked at his door. Whatever death did to take us from this world. I stood right in front of the windows, disturbing the moonlight, but Jonah didn't notice me and fell back to sleep almost immediately.

The next time my family woke up, they were held captive in our dining room. Held captive by me. I had duct-taped their hands and feet to the chairs that we always sat at to eat family dinners. The last time we had eaten a family dinner was when Zheng had been invited to eat with us. He was apart of our family. Living inside each of us as a curse. A condition. A sin. A memory of guilt.

I hid their faces under pillow cases and duct-taped their mouths as well. That way, I couldn't hear them beg or see their begging faces. It had to be done. I was saving them from Zheng's planned fate. I took my father's hunting rifle off the mount and held it in my bandaged hand. I would make him proud. I had put Irene in the chair next to hers since it was apparently Zheng's now. And he was there. Sitting in it. Waiting for me. My choice. In my mind. I had propped the lilies Zheng had gave us in the middle of the table. They had gone from dying to blooming even further than before. I put the barrel of the rifle against Irene's head.

"Eenie."