She had fallen asleep on the couch yet again. Eric had went to bed, still a little distant, and Ian, Trevor, and Louis were trying to figure out the best way to handle Violet.
"Can't she just crash here?" asked Louis.
Trevor shrugged. "Honestly, Eric seemed kind of out of it, so I don't think that's a good idea."
"But she hardly ever sleeps like this, I really don't want to wake her." Ian bit his lip.
Trevor rolled his eyes. "Really? The last time we hung out she's passed out."
She coughed.
"Perfect," Trevor said. "Self-solving problem."
She coughed again, deeper and more grating. She started to stir. Her hands went to her throat. She wore a deep v-neck and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, so there was nothing to brush away, but she tried anyway. She did it again. She scratched and pulled at her neck and she gagged. Her face started turning red.
Ian started shaking her and calling her name. "Vi, Violet wake up!"
She gagged and her eyes went wide. "Hey, it's okay, it's just a dream." Ian said.
"No it's not," she rasped. She sat up abruptly and bolted from the couch, pushing past Ian and ran up the stairs. She heard a creaking, scraping, and a clatter. She jerked open Eric's bedroom door. A bed sheet was looped and hung from the clothes rod in his closet, and from it, hung Eric. She grabbed his torso and lifted - she heard him gasp and pant. Trevor, Ian, and Louis barged in. Suddenly Trevor was at her side, yanking at the knots in the sheet. When Eric's neck was free, Violet clumsily laid Eric on the floor.
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That's when she saw segmented legs emerging from Eric's chest, struggling to escape. Violet placed her hand on his chest and pushed, her ears filled with manic scritch tickticticTICKSCRITCHSCRATCH, finding the spider's torso and ripping it out. The spider's body filled her palm, a black shifting mass.
Once free from Eric, it flailed wildly. It wriggled and shrieked as if it was being burned, small tendrils of smoke evaporating around her golden hand. It found enough freedom to turn, grab her arm with it's legs and bite her hand. Her hand spasmed, and the spider escaped. It skittered away and lost shape, turning in to smoke and disappearing through the wall. Violet nearly chased it until she returned to her senses.
Ian was barking orders over Eric's coughing "Louis, get the car! Trevor, help me get him up, he needs to go to the hospital."
Violet helped Trevor get Eric upright. Ian went to take his other side. "Come on, Vi, we gotta go." She did.