‘Lessons from a Skating Spider’

Daniel Newcomb

Lessons from a Skating Spider

I still remember the night fairly well—even being some twenty years ago. The summer of ’09. The new World of Warcraft update had just released a couple of months prior, and so I’d been playing on my PC nearly every day and well into this particular night—a fact I recall because the glare from the window onto my monitor hadn’t bothered me in hours as it did
constantly through the afternoon and into the evening. Also, because I checked the time before logging off my PC; it had to have been around three in the morning.

The summer day turned night had been an average one consisting of an abundance of teenage degeneracy, and I was tired, but still I needed to shower for two reasons: the first being that I was encased in an odor of what was most likely Funyun’s and Coke, and the other being that I was depressed (though I didn’t know it yet and this was years before I’d seek you out for help) which meant that I—determined to lose even more sleep than I already had—grabbed underwear and a t-shirt, and headed for the bathroom.

Thankfully, my three-bedroom house had been built in a way in which my bedroom and bathroom were located on one side of the kitchen, and my parents’ the other. My brother’s vacant after his move to Chicago a year ago—had been turned into a guest room; I had nobody to bother, and no one to bother me.

The house was old. Shoddy red brick on the outside with no central heating, a swamp cooler instead of an AC unit, and the original decaying wooden floor that would finally get replaced in a year’s time. This, along with my parents’ incessant need for fresh air by way of an open back door, meant that we’d get our fair share of insects throughout the house. Flies roamed free in the living room, gnats clung to the light fixtures above my bed. They’d always tell me I was overexaggerating about the bugs, but I’m not so sure I was; I guess it’snot so much of a problem now as my father decided to sell the place after I moved away.

Also, I make sure to use the screen door whenever I crave a cool breeze. The bathroom was no different from the rest of the house, and the gaudy white carpet that lined my bedroom floor met the Jack-and-Jill’s white-painted wooden sliding door. I had to calm myself before facing the bright brass shower head and faucet—unchanged since the 80’s—so I could initiate my check. I did this check every night before my long-lasting shower. A check for spiders. Now, arachnophobia is quite easily my biggest fear—other than the quiet dread (it gets louder the older I get) of never having any meaningful amount of success in my life. A mindset my father instilled in me as a young man.

Anyway, I threw open the door and moved in like a Navy Seal, checking the corners of the chipped doorframe, inspecting the very threads of the teal and green striped rug, and under the lid of my disgustingly neglected toilet seat. I then moved down and examined the rim of its base, a few conglomerative clumps of hair and dust making me double take, before deciding that it was all clear.

The shower was my place of Zen. Of silence. A few embarrassing memories here and there would usually recreate themselves—they still do—in my mind, but the thumping of the fully pressurized showerhead could more often than not wash them away. I had, and still have, a bad habit of sitting down in the shower; I let the steam from the heated water fill my sinuses as I lean my head back against the corner of the tub and the wall, using the former’s slope as a brace for my neck. And so, on this particular night, I was resting as such. I am cognizant now of the ongoing drought in my home state and how my actions probably weren’t helping, but as they say, old habits die hard.

Something else I used to do: bring my PSP into the shower with me. That has long since been replaced by my phone in which I scroll social media endlessly, but it doesn’t matter in any case. On this particular night—the reason eludes me now—I didn’t have my portable system in hand. I’d let the night pass, sure, but I did so while my addictive device rested on the off-white marble countertop of my sink. A decision made so carelessly, yet its outcome of much consequence.

I feel as though we as people remember the tiniest, most peculiar details when experiencing life-changing events—not that I have nearly enough credibility to make such a claim. Let’s just say I saw an article about it on Reddit one day and decided to take it as my own opinion. This detail happened to me near the end of my time in the tub where my still-dry buzzed head—shielded from the water by that plastic shower liner that hotels never seem to have—was resting fully on the small shelf that forms just before the tub meets the wall. I remember zoning out while looking upward at the acoustic ceiling where a mold spread like tiny brown stars of a child’s bedroom. I remember scolding myself at the negligence of it all. A spider could’ve hidden there, plotting its next move, and I had no inclination to check it. I made a mental note of the potential catastrophe, adding it to my inspection for next time. I’d never forget it again.

Eventually, the shower had to end. The water was running strong, but I have never been able to tolerate even cool water, and I don’t think I ever will. I yanked my towel from the rod overhead—more practical than a hook across the room—as steam still condensed on the faux-tile walls. After drying my torso, I hooked the tan towel around my waist, and pulled open my twin- suns-of-Tatooine shower curtain in order to step out.

As I did so, my back foot slipped on the slick plastic tub. I caught the corner of the counter with an outstretched right hand, and just barely gripped my towel with the other, hugging it to my chest, as it awkwardly fell from my disjointed hips. Thankfully, my parents had an unnecessarily large mirror installed some years earlier—one of the only things they deemed necessary to modernize the house—so I saw myself squatting awkwardly low, a fleshy, butt-naked rendition of the Heisman Trophy in the mirror’s reflection.

I hadn’t so much as stood up straight, tying the towel once again around my lower half when it came into view. A spider blacker than the burgeoning night. Descending from the ceiling, not three feet from my face, and most likely by way of the hole in the rotting doorframe, was a creature of the purist evil. A descendant of Shelob, no doubt, the spider might as well have had a wig of snakes atop its grotesque head for I was frozen, still. Eight spindly crooked legs, it had, of which two worked at the white thread above while the
others hung in anticipation, eager for a meal.

Remember the issue with my parents opening the whole of the insectile world to our home? Well, it wasn’t just the gnats, flies, and moths that bothered me—trust me they still do— but it was more so the hunting ground that they created. And the summer months proved most bountiful for the predators who’d seek it out.

The gluttonous often found more than prey, however, amongst the halls. Enter me: a fourteen year old boy with a godly disdain for the eight legged. Sure, I wasn’t immortal or all-knowing, but I was both Osiris and Ammit to the arachnids and their kind for with my size eleven sneakers as my scale, I had judged their hearts too heavy against the feather of Ma’at. And I did so without prejudice. Surely, the spiders had erected great monuments in my name as the pharaohs did along the Nile. Though I’m not sure any amount of sacrifice could satiate their god of death and his righteous thirst.

I’m not sure what made my hatred so. I had often wondered as a child if spiders had always been evil in the eyes of man or simply an invention of the twentieth century. Could my fear have been avoided if Kevin never dropped the tarantula onto Marv’s face? What if Hagrid never told Harry and Ron to follow the spiders into Aragog’s Lair? Whether or not my hatred was contrived by anti-spider propaganda didn’t matter—at least not to the spiders.

This particular spider, however, was not one I could just step on with the sole of my shoe. This was the queen, in all her disgusting glory, and as it twisted on the axis of its own making, I saw it. An hourglass of scarlet. A symbol of fear for both insects and men that would haunt my very dreams for weeks to come.

It landed near the back of the sink, sniffed the wet air in the room, and started its hunt. It stalked across the countertop, a blight against the marble, white. Eight long legs in unison searched for the weak, but I would not be its victim on that day. Making as little noise as possible, I reversed into the tub, and moved the clear plastic liner back into place. With one eye reaching around the barrier, I watched it crawl and creep from the brass faucet head to my electric toothbrush standing tall in its holder. It circled left from the back of the sink to the corner where, moments earlier, I’d been gripping on for dear life. It approached the area, taking in my scent before turning once more to where my PSP lay without protection. And I—hiding in fear—was powerless to save it from the spider’s touch.

The widow circled thrice around the unfamiliar black console, and to this day I’m not sure why. I do know, however, that the spider appeared timid, scared to get too close to the device’s screen. How could this spider, a vessel of death, be so shy? Perhaps, it was afraid of its own hideous reflection in the glass, arrogantly having moved through life thinking itself a butterfly. It had no patterned wings to distract from its figure. Its thin, crooked legs. Its bulbous body, full of poison. The red hourglass—its supervillain symbol of doom—that it hid from its prey until their lives were a moment past.

Not until the spider ascended toward the screen—using the PSP’s rubber case for traction—did my fear and panic fade. And they did so in an instant. From over the edge came its two, long front legs, only they weren’t as I’d expected. A pair of skates clung to the bottom of the widow’s feet. And another pair with its next two. And another. Soon enough, eight ice skates scattered my PSP’s surface, all under the weight of my biggest fear. And soon enough, I learned that the spider was no master in its craft. Its front two legs gave way first, straightening out like I’d only seen from a newborn fawn. Then, as it regained balance, its back two. Its left side then its right. The second leg on one side would stand strong only for the third on the other to fail. Fear exuded from the spider’s face, struggling to find footing on the unnatural terrain.

I was seduced by its emotion.

One foot after another, I moved from the tub and onto the teal mat in front of the sink. I’d never even been slightly intrigued by the likes of it before. Hypnotically, I stared. At the creature, at its suffering and pain. The spider would seemingly build up enough strength to stand tall—at least as tall as spiders could—but that would only last a moment before it slipped and slipped again. Legs kicked out in all directions; it was a clumsy, foreign dance to me. One that lacked any grace or grip at all. And as the spider fell and failed to skate, I was pulled in.

Never in my life did I feel such a pull as this. One that held on to me for minutes before saying, “See? Uncertainty shouldn’t be fear, but it is.” The queen of all spiders hadn’t anything to be afraid of, but as soon as it strapped on its skates and took to the ice, it was helpless, defenseless in a world not its own. But was it not brave to do so?

Guilt flooded my senses, and I saw my own gross reflection in the mirror for I too had no wings. My torso, skinny and bruised, didn’t enrich my being. My eyes a deepest brown didn’t lighten my face. I still loved myself, no? I looked on for a long while; only a shroom trip some years later would overtake this instance for “longest I’d stare at myself awkwardly in the mirror”.

Five chimes tolled the bell tower before I finished gazing upon my own reflection. I slid open the white door, now dried by time, and met the callous night—though not alone. Sometimes, I’d spend so long in the bathroom under the fluorescent lights that I’d forget what darkness looked like. This time, rather than heading back into my bedroom to stay awake for another hour under the guise of sleep, I turned to the back door. With PSP in hand, and a skater on top, I opened myself to the moon and set the spider free near a rose bush under my parent’s window.

Lessons were taught that very night—ones I’m sure neither I nor the spider would forget for a long time. I’d use the lesson not six months later when asking Alissa Abbot to our school’s Winter Fair dance. She was a spider. No widow, but a spider, nonetheless, and my crush since the seventh grade. I’d end up staying home the night of the dance, but she no longer haunted my dreams, and that feeling freed me. A couple of years after that, I’d build up the courage to tell the two wolf spiders closest to me that I’d be moving to the East Coast for college. They’d always wanted me to stay in California for school, but I wanted to try something new, and ice-skating wasn’t really that popular in my hometown.

Most recently, I’d find the courage to find help. I’m not so sure what’s so arachnid about that, but it had been a black widow to me, and bigger than any I’d seen since that night. As for the spiders, I exercised restraint when met with the allure of my great power. Not to say that I didn’t instinctively stomp a few out when they snuck up on me. They still disgust me, and I get a deep shiver when I see one at night, but let’s just say I don’t go out of my way to kill one minding its own damn business. If they stay away from my room and my shower, I stay away from them.

I never again saw the spider who slipped on glass. Maybe it hung up its skates and took on a new hobby like juggling. I’m sure it’d be good at it. Because it too had learned a lesson on that day. Whether it had been stupid or brave to venture into its god’s treacherous domain with such uncertainty as the floor it stood on, it did so nonetheless, knowing its deepest truth: It couldn’t skate.

Zach Gearey is an up-and-coming writer from Reno, NV. He was born and raised in the city and attended the University of Nevada where he studied English and creative writing. Still early in his career, he is looking for his first publication.