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10.08.2002 - 7:22 p.m.
Tuesday
It's Monday evening. You are
sitting on the couch, legs curled underneath you. The spousal
unit is in the back office, typing away. You are alone in the
living room watching television.
Well, not entirely alone. The
cat and the dog are both lying on their sides, several feet from
one another. They are curved, like furry cashew nuts, like leaping
dolphins. They are asleep. The dog is snoring.
It's quiet.
You flip through some channels,
and light upon some kind of Real World/Road Rules show. Happy
to wallow in reality TV crapulence, you burrow further into the
couch. You decide that one Las Vegas Real World chick is a real
slut. Casting aside all memories of past wantonness, you comfortably
distance yourself from her. She is Slut, and you are...obsessively
waiting to see what the Slut does next.
The dryer hums. A load of towels
and jeans whumps around softly.
Something - a suggestion of
movement, a dark shape against the light carpet - catches your
eye. You tilt forward and focus on the floor.
It is then that time screeches
to a dead stop. You are faintly aware of a faraway whistling
shriek, like a cruel wind rushing over a nightmarish moor. This
is the sound of your brain recoiling in utter horror. The term
"tunnel vision" has sudden and brutal meaning to you
as everything around you fades away and all you can see is...
The fucking tarantula on
the floor before you.
You check your optic nerves
for misinformation, exaggeration. There is none. What you see
before you is an insanely thick spider the size of a petshop
tarantula. Not the Animal Planet kind the size of a dinner plate,
but something that is clearly larger than any normal sized arachnid.
The Matrix-like stopping of
time, uh, stops. Light and sound come crashing back around you,
and you hitch a desperate, ragged inhale. The tarantula slowly
lifts a leg, taking a step forward.
You levitate from the couch
and hurtle through the air to land in the hallway. You do not
take your eyes from the tarantula, because the only thing worse
than seeing it would be coming back to find it gone.
Wait. There is a growing confusion
- a portion of your brain is trying to tell you something. However,
the majority is still shrieking OMIGODGIANTSPIDER, so you can't
pay it much attention.
You call for JB.
"JB. JB. JB. Oh god. JB.
JB. JB. Come. Here. Right. Now."
Startled, he gets up and heads
down the hall towards you. You shakily point to the creature
on the floor. His eyes visibly bulge from his head.
Again, you are nagged by the
increasing sensation that there is more to the story. Calmed
slightly by JB's presence, you try to zero in on the 5% of your
brain that is jumping up and down waving its hands.
Brain: "HEY! That's NOT
a spider!"
You: "What the fuck are you talking about? That is clearly
a tarantula! Yeah, I don't know what the hell it's doing here,
but that's what the mofo is!"
Brain: "Seriously. Take a closer look."
You: "Take a closer look? Fuck you, take a closer
look. That is a TARANTULA. Maybe even a young one....oh gaaaaaawwd
there could be more
oh gawwwwd-"
Brain: "Chill out, bitch. LOOK."
You look. A dawning realization
washes over you and JB at the same time.
It's a crab. A crab. From your
fish tank. It got out, and crawled across the carpet, apparently
driven by a strange desire to scare the holy fucking shit out
of you.
You shriek incoherently at
JB about traveling crabs and the disturbing effects thereof,
and collapse limply back onto the couch. You fortify yourself
with a glass of port wine.
:::
On the television, the slutty
girl makes out with a dorky looking Road Rules guy.
go back :::
forward
0
comments so far.
I have moved. - 1.03.2005
Obviously, a work in progress. - 12.27.2004
Happy holidays! - 12.24.2004
Listen, I am not a complete dick, it's not like I want Joe to die alone surrounded by cats or something. - 12.23.2004
Plus I am convinced my butt is extra big when it's upside down. - 12.22.2004
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