The Dinner Party

They were all quietly sitting, waiting for dinner to begin. It was a special night for their host; her daughter’s birthday was coming and she finally agreed to come home after seven long years away. It was a night to be celebrated, if that wasn’t clear already. There were long candles decorating the middle of the table; in their intricate golden casings, they burned on into the night. A feast had been prepared, laid out in front of the guests; a glistening turkey; white, milky soup garnished with black seasoning; any vegetable or fruit one can think of laid there, waiting to be eaten. For dessert, a cheesecake; it was sitting next to the daughter’s empty chair. It was her favorite, as they had all heard at least a dozen or so times.

They all squirm around uncomfortably, wishing dearly to get away. The atmosphere sat on their shoulders and chained them to their chairs. They wanted to grab their knives and begin.

Their host came walking from the kitchen and they all ceased moving; she was carrying their glasses of wine, red as the blood that pumped quickly through their veins. She set all of their glasses on the ornate black table soaked with gallons of wine. None of them lifted their hands until “drink” came falling from her straining, smiling mouth. They lifted their glasses with shaking hands, afraid, as she began talking to the empty seat where her daughter had always sat. As the one-sided conversation goes on, the guests became increasingly afraid, knowing how this story ends.

Smash. The sound of a breaking glass.

The host stops mid-conversation, smile frozen on her face. The fear on the faces of the guests was almost laughable, if not for their imminent doom. Silence reigned for one moment, and then the next, screaming and crashing fills the room. The girl who dropped her glass begins to cry, knowing her fate. A slip of a broken wrist was all it took. Their host added another two dozen broken dishes to the ground, swiping her arms this way and that over the table.

She began walking toward the girl, and that’s when the sobbing screams began. The rest of the guests clamped their fearful eyes shut. They hear the telltale sliding of the rope which tied them to their chairs; a thump to the floor. More screams as she was dragged over piles and piles of broken glass. A thump thump thump as she was dragged up the stairs. A slam of a door and then a blood-curdling scream.

The punishing death begins; the host begins with the whip, tearing and ripping the skin of the unknown girl's back. A slice through the air of the whip every five seconds and the girl quickly becomes a slobbering, sobbing mess. But the fun has only just begun and she knows it. The whipping stops; a slight reprieve while the host gets her next torture instrument, a hammer and nails. The girl's screams tear through the night.

And so it goes on, until the harsh screams become whimpers, which fade into the night as if they never existed. Then, nothing.

When their host walks back down the stairs, blood smeared all over her face, they shrink into their seats. They glance to their dull knives with wide eyes. But none of them reach forward, remembering what had happened to the last girl who had tried to escape.

As the host walks back into the kitchen, heels crunching on broken glass, she wonders what to make for dinner. It was such a special night, after all.