Of Pacts and Impacts

There I am, minding my own business.

I’m in my zone; on my bed, my laptop on my lap, the pillows behind me, cushion under my ankles, and the KEEP OUT sign hanging on my door. Yes, the sign that everyone ignores.

What am I doing? Researching bows, financial statements, arrowheads, recent exchange rate fluctuations, YouTube videos on dual sword wielding; with the exam coming up, I try to stay focused. And for legal purposes, note that I say ‘try’.

 I always use a mouse with my laptop. I’m still not used to the touchpad yet, and probably might never be. What you need to know for the purpose of this tale is that my right arm was resting on the bed next to me, and right hand was on the mouse.

I feel a tingly, tickly sensation just below my elbow. I ignore it. See, I’ve lived in this room for a few years, and I have over the months familiarized myself with its other inhabitants. It’s a dictatorship, yes; but it’s fair for all. Simple rule: stay out of my way and I won’t stomp you.

Come within reach and you will die. Crawl over my foot and you will die. Zip back and forth more than four times across the floor in plain view and you will die. The last would be especially personal since it would have made me get up from whatever I was doing and then have to settle back in again after it was done. Totally unnecessary for both parties concerned.

So there’s a tingly feeling on my arm, and I ignored it. Might be a mosquito, which I’ll kill in a while, or a fly, which I’m too lazy to chase after with the swatter. The tingling doesn’t stop, so I finally glance down.

What happened next would have been a Kodak moment, if not for the fact that I was a bit too occupied to look for a camera just about then. Google turned up to provide me with a picture that loosely resembles the one I saw just then. Just imagine my arm under it.

I see that thing on my arm, and I freeze. And, I swear to you, in that millisecond that lasted a century, that spider did a little bounce and waved a leg at me.

Let me make this perfectly clear to you. I do NOT scream when introduced to spiders. THAT is what my sisters do. Me, I’m the in-house, on-call exterminator everybody turns to when trouble brews. When I introduce myself to one of those uninvited trespassers, it’s with a “Oh, hello,” or if I’m feeling good, a “Nothing personal, pal,”; and if I’m feeling really witty, I might even add, “It isn’t me… its YOU.”

Then I make it quick (my shoe will testify); or if they are up for a hunt, I indulge them. Problem solved.

I think what I said was “Bazooka!” when I jumped sideways and gave my laptop the ride of its life, but the moment happened so fast, I can’t say for sure. The spider, upon completing its free fall off my arm, landed on the bed and then decided to go climb onto my mouse and start doing those nauseating bounces that they usually do.

This one is what they call a cellar spider (aka, Daddy Long-legs Spider, not to be confused with Daddy Long-legs (minus the -spider suffix), which happens to be something else entirely). Totally common in houses, totally harmless and fond of snacking on the pests I love to hate. And they also love to bounce their beady little bodies up and down on those long legs, as if making fun at the rest of the world around for having legs shorter than theirs and generally not being built along the lines of a living trampoline.

In any other circumstance, I’d have let it live. But this one, this particular, insolent peasant had violated the treaty, broken the First Commandment of The Room; the one that went something like Thou Shalt Not Make Physical Contact With The Matt!!!

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, it was doing those bounces, too… and on my mouse, for crying out loud.

That, there, deserved the death penalty, that did.

And so I took up my bright blue fly swatter (seen years of service, that one. And not just flies, either) and slapped the thing. Believe it or not, it had the impudence to spring back up like a… well, use your imagination. Twice more I swatted at it, and maybe it was the soft bed underneath or that it had been turned into a Super Spider by scientists the Association of Arcane Arachnids (which would explain that little taunting wave), but that thing just did NOT stay flattened.

I did the only thing I could.

I yelled “FORE!!!” and swung.

The spider hit the wall so hard, I could basically hear the clinks and clangs of each of its legs connecting on the other side of the room. It stuck there for just a second, and then it fell, landing silently, SILENTLY mind you, on the floor.

Before I could advance, it picked itself up and scuttled away under the cupboard, back to its lair. The test had been a success, and below us, in the underground bunker beneath The Room that housed the AAA, eight-legged geniuses were removing goggles and shaking limbs in delight. In another room, Generals clink glasses of Bug Juice and toast the victory.

As the camera zooms in on my face, I nod, like the terrible Overlord Ruler that I am, and turn around with a sneer, believing the rebellion crushed and my power supreme.

Little did I know what was yet to come.

To be continued (Maybe)…