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The Spider
by Adam Graupe
2010-04-26 07:51:45 |
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She stood at the bar with lots of leg and by lots of leg I mean she had eight legs. They were long, black, and perfect. She wore a short yellow skirt that showed off all that stocking-covered leg, and she blew a ring of smoke from her cigarette and said, “Buy me a drink.” I bought her a screwdriver, and she pointed to a blonde at the other end of the bar and said, “I hate all women.”
“Why?” I asked.
“They are so dramatic. They lie all the time. Gawd! How I hate them.” She took a puff from her cigarette and said, “Buy me another.”
I wanted to move away from this spider, but I bought her another drink. I said I had to get home, but she pleaded, “My car is at the shop. Will you drive me home?” She batted her eyelids at me and pressed one of her legs against mine. Suddenly, she was laughing at everything I said and giving me her full attention.
I raced my Festiva to her apartment, but there was an eviction notice on her door and she begged me to let her spend the night at my place. She said, “I don’t want to impose on you, but I have nowhere else to go.”
The spider slept on my couch, and when I awoke she was gone and so were the keys to my car. I panicked but found a lipstick-scrawled note on the icebox: “Went to the liquor store--back in a sec.” She returned with a sack of drinks and a carton of Virginia Slims. “Hi Hon,” She croaked as she scurried inside.
“I’ve got to go to work,” I said.
“Oh, that’s okay. I’ll have some drinks on the table when you get home.”
I felt a pain in my gut. I said, “You don’t understand. I have to go to work. You have to leave.”
Big tears rolled down the spider’s cheeks, and she said, “But I have nowhere to go! And after all we have been through.” She cursed and threw a bottle against my bookcase knocking off a copy of Charles Bukowski’s Love is a Dog From Hell. Then she batted her green eyes at me and tried to kiss me, but I ducked away.
She screamed, “You are an asshole!”
I said, “I’ve got to go to work.” The spider burst out sobbing. I caved in and told her she could stay the day but that was it.
I drove to work and told Gordon, my supervisor, that a spider moved in on me and I couldn’t get rid of her.
Gordon shrugged and mumbled, “Dude, just squish it. You don’t want a nest of spiders in your house.”
I said, “No, you don’t understand. I met her at a bar and she moved into my place. She was bawling her eyes out this morning.”
Gordon looked at me and said, “You met a spider at a bar? You live the weirdest life. You told me before that you used to work with a wood tick at Dewey Express and that you worked with a gorilla at the DMV. Are you on drugs?”
“No,” I said, “She’s a spider dressed in this yellow skirt and well…” I trailed off, but Gordon said he’d stop at my apartment after work and help me take care of the spider.
We walked inside my apartment and there was the spider sprawled out on the couch with the television blaring. There were bottles everywhere and cigarettes burning in each room. She slurred to Gordon, “Why, hello handsome!” They struck up a conversation and it turned out they had everything in common: she kept batting her eyes and laughing at everything he said. Soon, they were making out and dry humping on my couch, and then they were whispering.
Gordon walked over to me and said, “We gotta go get some more booze. We will be right back, I swear.” They never returned, and Gordon was missing from work the next day.
Two days later, my phone rang and it was the spider. She said “I am going to drop by tonight and get my stuff.”
“I’ll leave it outside the door.” I said.
“But I want to see you,” she purred. “I miss seeing your sexy smile.”
I burst out laughing and said, “Did Gordon run out of cash or did he tell you about his wife and three kids?”
There was silence for a second and then a scream. I hung up the phone and took it off the hook. I gathered her dozen bottles and carton of cigarettes and left them outside. An hour later, there was pounding and shouting at my door. Five squad cars arrived, and an officer knocked on my door. His face was covered with cobwebs that the spider had sprayed at him. He asked if I wanted to press charges, and I said no and shut the door.
Gordon disappeared from work, and it’s ten years later yet I still get phone calls in the middle of the night with no voice on the other end but sometimes there's a wet cigarette cough and what sounds like a web being spun in the background.
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