"They must be so scared, Russell," I said, sobbing in the living room of our house later in the night. "What are we going to do? Should we call the police to go help search for our children?" I asked, continuing to sound disappointed.
Russell rested his arm on the fireplace mantel. As he took a match out of his purple bathrobe, struck it and lit his long, brown plastic, smoking pipe. "If they don't want to belong in our family, they can choose to be runaway orphans," Russell said, blowing smoke out of his pipe. He coughed and blew smoke out of his mouth.
I couldn't believe Russell felt that way about our children. "You shouldn't say things like about children! They need to know they are loved and always have a home to come to with us. We will not neglect our kids for being different. Not everybody is meant to be perfect, dear. We are to love our children unconditionally. No matter what they go through in their life," I said, seriously.
Russell laughed and coughed as he blew out more smoke from his smoking pipe. "Our kids are nothing but a mistake," he said, blowing more smoke out of his mouth. "Now we have the whole house to ourselves. We can make it the way we always wanted it to be. If our children want to be disrespectful of their lifestyle, they are better off without us," Russell said, suddenly not caring about our children.
How could Russell Changeling, my dearest loving husband, feel this way about our caring two children? I was pacing in front of the couch in the living room. "Do you think they could be starving without us giving them support?" I asked, angrily. I turned around and pointed an accusing finger at my husband. "If you were harder on them, they'd listen to you!" I snapped. Russell laughed some more, not understanding my leadership.
"If I was in charge of disciplining our children to be more obedient to us, we'd all still be here together, getting along," Russell said. He had a point. I don't want our children to be abandoned in our small little town. "We'll call the police. See if they can go search for them throughout the neighborhood. They can't be too far," Russell said.
He walked into the kitchen, holding onto his smoking pipe. He grabbed the yellow phone off the hook hanging on the wall, next to the kitchen wall. He punched in 911 on the telephone. He waited for it to ring a couple of times. Finally, a young, female operator answered on the fourth ring. "Hello? Police? Hi, I need to report two missing orphans on their own. Who need to be found immediately with their loving father and mother. Name? I'm Russell Changeling. And our two children are Mark and Valentino Changeling. They could be lost and scared without knowing where they are going," Russell said, taking another puff of smoke from his pipe. He waited for the operator to reply. "Thank you. My wife and I will not rest until the police have found our missing children. Who knows what they must be going through, right now?" Russell said, and hung up the phone receiver, hanging on the wall.
"There, dear," Russell said, taking a moment to relax and remain calm. "They should be looking for them now," he said, reassuringly. I nodded and gasped. The lights in our house went out. The glow of the warm fireplace was the only light providing us in the living room.
Russell hurried over to wrap me in a hug. "What's going on, love?" I asked, nervously. "I don't like what is happening here," I said. Suddenly, hearing footsteps walking on the rooftop of the house, made us freeze in fear. We jumped with fright at the sound of children's laughter in the dark.
"Get the shotgun, babe, in the storage closet," I said. Nodding, I watched Russell in the glow of the darkened living room walk over to the storage closet in the hallway. I watched my husband open the closet door. Hear him rummaging through the storage closet for the shot gun, stored away. Then, without warning, the lights flickered on and off in our house.
Flames from the burning fireplace leaped out of the mantel. Before us, we gasped. Russell went over to protect me. He cocked the shot gun. In the light of the fireplace, we saw we were surrounded by an army of undead, shadowy zombie kids. They came for us.