Spiders are not my biggest fear, per se, but it's harder for wax works to hide in the bath or under the
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| ^ Frostbite Spiders |
Anyway. As I was saying, we have all suffered spider encounters in the past, and this is my most recent:
Robert and Goliath: A Fable of Three Nights
(Categorised in that grand box of madness "just a bit of fun" - the act of telling a small story in a big, ridiculous way. Enjoy!)
Monday 04/09/2017
A Monday evening. With it, a standard scene: me, reading in bed, concentrating hard on book four of The Dark Tower series. It contains a great deal of backstory, the main tale of the main character, so my brain needs to focus. In response, naturally, whatever part of my brain which deals in distractions is hard at work, and eventually detects something in my peripheral vision. In the far right-hand corner of my bedroom, a small brown "thing" was gliding up my wall. Glasses off for reading, seeing it mainly through its movement, I thought to myself "it's probably just a moth." I am notorious for having lights on and windows open during the warm evenings and often find myself, as Ariel would say, playing host to the entire cast of A Bug's Life. I retrieved my glasses and returned to the realm of clear vision. Upon so doing I see that it is not a moth, but a spider. Quite a large spider, at that, even from a distance. I believe the eloquent phrase that went from my mind to mouth was:
"Fuck me!"
Book down, I leapt from the bed and shot down the stairs, through the house to the back utility room, home to our handheld vacuum cleaner - AKA The Spider Smiter. Thus began the Hunt for Attachments. I wanted a quick and clean extraction from my wall/life, with minimal risk to myself, so something wide-nozzle and possibly with bristles. I continued to hunt, every room of the house in fact, for the extension attachment. This would give the vacuum's reach an extra few feet, and I wanted as much empty space between we two gladiators. My imagination convinced me that the asshole spider would, during my reaping of its life, leap over the vacuum to my hand and devour the soft flesh. (I believe to be reading too much Stephen King.)
I did not find the extension.
(Later, when she had returned home and was informed of my endeavours, the Mother informed me that the extension lived behind the utility room fridge, a fact I'd know "if you did more cleaning." Unhelpful; to me and to my story.)
I returned, Smiter in hand, to see the monster had not moved - possibly through fear, but mockery seemed more accurate.
Now, while this admittance does not compliment my bravery nor masculinity, I hesitated and wavered for several long moments, raising the nozzle "somewhat" near the spider before quickly pulling back - this motion of cowardice, I performed it perhaps too many times. All the while my head and heart yearned for the extension but I did not wish to leave the spider alone too long; time spent away from him gave chance for him to run away and hide, and when that happens, my bedroom enters a new phase of Arachnid Cold War. With that in place, at any and all moments the spider could reappear from its webbed den and resume its torment, or even make its move, the main danger was this occurring while I slept.
The bastard was there, in full view, and I was armed. The time for action was now. I suppressed - crushed, even - my trepidation and lunged forwards, determination high, handheld vacuum whirling like a captured hurricane. I hit home, I know this, the spider was lost beneath the grey plastic of the nozzle, but I could see he clung to the wall. I adjusted my grip and so the vacuum's position, but in that fraction of freedom, the spider moved. He darted downwards, behind a picture frame that hangs above my desk, and disappeared. Now, at this point, I would like to emphasise that the spider did not just disappear from view, I remain convinced the bastard disappeared or had the ability of invisibility. For when I returned mere moments later, vacuum in one hand and torch in the other, there was no trace of the monster besides the webs between desk and wall. I checked the narrow gap behind that photo, the ornaments below and the desk space behind that, to be left wanting; no sign of that eight legged freak. It was at this point the Mother returned home, to find me peering intently in the half-inch space between desk and wall, naturally questioning my choice of actions. I informed her of the spider - also add in here the comment regarding my lack of cleaning - to which she spoke her philosophy on the matter: that the spider had likely been there all long, but only know did I know of its existence, and to simply continue as normal, pretending that I didn't know. It was far too late for that, now. I could no more ignore the spider in my room than someone can I can ignore an ulcer once found in my mouth.
The bastard was somewhere in my room, an undeniable fact, suddenly making my bedroom, my beloved safe space, into a new danger zone.
Arachnid Cold War.
I slept badly, that night, my dreams full of scuttling legs, too many eyes, clicking pincers and altogether, an excessive amount of mandibles. The biggest fear was waking to find him descending towards me, lowering himself on his fresh web of hatred and loathing. I woke several times and immediately checked the ceiling, even shone a torch on the wall of his entrance to my life, all times coming up with nothing. Our stand off continued.
Tuesday 05/09/2017
The second day of our opposition. I did not see the beast this day, but when describing the situation to Ariel, I christened the bastard as Goliath. Upon returning home from work, I checked the space above my door, the ceiling and "his" wall in three swift sweeps of gaze. No traces this time. I slept better, at the very least, but knew I could not trust him and could not rest sufficiently until Goliath had been slain. Not by stone and sling this time, but under my heel or in the deafening chasm of a vacuum cleaner. If that failed, if he chose the wall once more as his place of rest, I had a third option. I had a A4 ring-binder, one to which I had little-to-no emotional attachment. If foot or Smiter were beyond me, I would use this binder to crush Goliath to nothingness and would simply deal with the wall stains later.
Let the war end, first, then deal with the mess.
Wednesday 06/09/2017
Today, the Arachnid Cold War ended, and at the height of irony it reached its conclusion with the clock pointing very closely to midnight. I had spent the evening in the same frame of mind I had for the previous two: at incomplete peace - reading and gaming quite happily, though with regular checks of the surrounding walls and ceiling, but Goliath did not surface. Only until later did I learn why.
At some unknown point in the proceedings, he had vacated my bedroom. This might have improved my peace of mind at least, although knowing this would have also meant I'd need to check each room, not just my own.
Anyway, Goliath was not in my bedroom. I learnt this, very quickly, when I left my bedroom to brush my teeth before bed. I opened my bedroom door onto the dark landing - Mother had gone to sleep by now - and my bedroom light cast a narrow shaft of illumination, and in that beam was Goliath. The bastard was probably trying to return to my room, perhaps make an extension of his living quarters, or wait until I slept before claiming his next victim. But me coming to him, it appeared this hadn't been expected. I opened that door, perhaps quite strongly, but my eyes fell upon Goliath immediately and he saw me. He then performed what I can only really describe as a Spider River Dance. Legs skittering across the carpet, he backed up, chose from five different directions at once, moving as he did it, and finally settled to shoot right, down the landing. I seem to remember making some comment, most likely "There you are!" I poked my head around the doorway, tracking him, and he had paused partway down the landing.
FOOLISH!
I returned to my room, equipped my trusty binder and gave chase. He hadn't moved.
EVEN MORE FOOLISH!
I raised the binder and gave it a light throw forwards.
Missed! Goliath went to escape. I tried again.
Success! Goliath was not to be seen under the blue desk accessory.
Revelling in the victory, and spare time available to me, I calmly went and collected the Smiter from my room, left beside my bed for the previous two nights, like someone sleeping with a gun under their pillow.
A new challenge lay ahead of me. Goliath was a tough opponent, a formidable foe. What was to stop him running off again, the moment I lifted the binder? He'd already escaped me once and I was fucked if I would allow it to happen again. I gave the binder a tap to disorientate him. Just a light little knock, not a full smash, for I knew it would be harder to clean spider guts out of carpet than off the wall. Then I lifted it. The bastard was still alive, I hadn't taken him down just yet; his legs twitched once he was free and everything about it screamed a taunt, "You haven't won yet!" So I took the Smiter before him, a button was pressed and Goliath disappeared, except this time on my terms.
His last moments of freedom were filled with a drowning wind and an upwards fall. Goliath was contained.
That is not the end of the story, however. Yes, he was imprisoned behind the clear plastic container, victim to the vacuum's black hole, but he was still alive. The legs were still working, his defiance of death against all my best efforts was putting me beyond fury. It is well established I did not trust Goliath. It would be so like him to crawl out of the vacuum through the night and plot his revenge.
So I did what any inconvenienced, irrational, huge-spider-fearing person would do: I drowned the son of a bitch. I set the shower running and emptied the vacuum's contents into the rush of water - mercifully it had been emptied not long before. Imagine otherwise: Goliath surviving by way of a dust-clogged plughole. That would add tension for which I was not prepared, like the ending of a horror film which reveals the main villain/monster survived the whole time.
Fortunately, t'was not the case for the one called Goliath. To give a sense of scale, our plughole consists of six small holes, each smaller than the size of a five pence piece, and it took a lot of watery persuasion for Goliath to actually go down the drain. THAT is how large this opponent was. But I watched, and waited, for his end to come in the form of a piped oblivion. This would have been the perfect opportunity to say something clever, like a Bond movie, making quips as the villain reaches a gruesome end. Instead my manic, revelling-in-victory came up with:
"You know what monsters get, Goliath? Monsters get killed."
I know, hardly dialogue worthy of next year's action blockbuster, but I was too delirious to come up with anything better.
I had won.
Robert had slain Goliath.
