Mesmerised

Definitions

""He's going to eat an apple!" No sooner had Mary uttered these words and pointed at Tom, who was already posing theatrically with the fruit held out to himself as if it were Yorick's skull, than the room all at once fell silent. Everyone was looking on, mesmerised, not daring to breathe. Tom had never before even touched an apple: no one had ever managed to make the fruit seem palatable to him, or even managed to get one within a few metres of him. But now, to prove his love to Mary, Tom had taken the apple, as Adam had from Eve's hand, and the last remaining moments of his life of virtue were slipping away."