BETHEL PARK, PA—A routine Schaeffer family movie night took a sudden and deeply uncomfortable turn Thursday when the family of four was forced to white-knuckle its way through an unanticipated sex scene, household sources confirmed.
According to reports, an intense awkwardness descended upon the Schaeffers’ living room when, approximately 75 minutes into a PG-13 action-adventure thriller they had been enjoying, a brief scene of sexual content appeared, leaving the parents and their two school-age children with no choice but to sit there together and plow through it.
“Ahem…” said father Stan Schaeffer, 46, clearing his throat after the film’s hero pulled his love interest in close for a long, tender kiss, which reportedly made the family members agonizingly aware of each other’s breathing and proximity, abruptly ending the carefree mood of what had until then been a relaxing evening. “Um.”
“Hmm,” he added, almost inaudibly, gritting his teeth and diverting his glance from the screen for a moment.
Sources said the awkward experience was made even more unbearable by the fact that the family had been exchanging casual remarks throughout the film, but then fell completely quiet once it became clear the two characters on their television were about to have sex. Though the silence was reportedly grueling, the Schaeffers nonetheless hunkered down, gripped their seats tightly, and showed no outward acknowledgement of the onscreen intimacy.
The scene, which lasted 19 seconds, is reported to have felt much, much longer.
As soon as the romantic sequence began, the family members, though at ease and comfortable just moments before, appeared to become acutely aware of their physical postures, self-consciously freezing themselves into stiff, uncomfortable positions while waiting anxiously for the scene to end.
Accounts have confirmed that around the 11-second mark, Noah Schaeffer, 12, considered making a joke about the action-packed movie’s amorous turn, but ultimately decided to remain quiet, reasoning that an attempt to relieve the tension with humor would likely backfire.
Similarly, sources said, 45-year-old Diane Schaeffer considered interrupting and asking her kids if they would like a snack, but then realized that making any sound or movement at all would only serve to draw attention to the family’s embarrassment, thereby making it even worse.
According to sources, as the film’s hero removed the woman’s shirt so that she was standing before him in nothing but a bra, Sophie Schaeffer, 15, exchanged a pained glance with her brother—the only instance of eye contact noted through the entire viewing of the sex scene.
At one point, when the camera began to cut away from the passionate embrace, reports indicate the family members felt a brief sense of relief, but their nerve-wracking agony returned immediately when the scene’s next shot revealed the couple was now on a bed and engaged in intercourse beneath its sheets.
As the characters’ lovemaking grew increasingly urgent, the Schaeffers were reportedly buckling down and hanging on tight, steeling themselves with the knowledge that this was a PG-13 movie and that its adult content had to be—just had to be—over any second now.
The family was last seen letting out deep sighs of relief as the depiction of intimacy was interrupted by a barrage of gunfire and the film’s villains crashing through the bedroom window, mercifully returning the story to a scene of graphic violence.