Winona Morris always knew she wanted to be a writer when she grew up.  When it became apparent that she was never going to grow up she decided to become a writer anyway.

She currently lives in coastal Georgia with her husband, 2 kids, and 8 pets.  When not writing or working at the full-time retail job she's kept for nearly 2 decades, she likes to read and live vicariously through other people on social media.

https://www.facebook.com/winona.morris.author

THEY ALWAYS BLAME THE SPIDERS

by

Winona Morris

When Artie fell asleep beside his wife on a random Wednesday night in November, he was perfectly sane. When he woke the next morning, he wasn’t.

“Why did he do it?” people asked afterwards.

“Something about bugs,” his wife told the police later. “I don’t remember what, it was early, I was mostly asleep still, but I heard him muttering about bugs.”

Artie hadn’t meant to wake his wife. Had he been louder and she more awake she might have immediately known that something had gone very wrong with her husband’s brain in the night, but it hadn’t happened that way.

He had woken with something bugging him. Something about insects. Something he couldn't put his finger on.

“Maybe it was the spiders,” he said as he changed out of his pajamas into his day clothes. “But people always blame the spiders,” he whispered to his shoes before stepping into them. “People always blame the spiders, but they never look at the silverfish, do they? No. They never blame the earwig, and that one has scissors for an ass. It can just wiggle in and snippety, snip, snip all gone. Where is the logic?”

He drank his coffee sitting in the breakfast nook he loved so much. The sun hit the window just so, and he was able to see the sunrise. He was silent at that moment, feeling like something special was going to happen that day. Unless the moths came and carried it away.

He washed his dishes so his wife wouldn't have to do them later. She was a good woman, and he didn’t like to give her more work.

He just wished he could give her the child she wanted. She would have been the better mother. Better than the other one.

The other one? The other what?

I should just undress and go back to bed, he thought. His wife would wake up and miss him. He had something to do today though, didn’t he? He couldn't remember exactly what. Maybe if he went for a walk, and got some fresh air, he’d remember what it was.

He paused at the door, his face wrinkled in fierce concentration. “It could have been the spiders though,” he told no one. “Just because I want it to not be the spiders doesn’t mean it wasn’t. I’m not God. I don’t know God things. If God wanted it to be spiders, then it was spiders.”

At the end of the driveway, he waved at the paper boy, followed the young man with his eyes as he cycled past. “Might have been the centipedes though. Centipedes don’t have scissor asses, but they bite like fire. Poison too. Read somewhere that they can kill rats.”

He nodded firmly then strode off for his walk. He talked to himself constantly, as witnessed by several neighbors. They greeted him because it was neighborly. He didn’t return a single greeting.

“Artie’s usually loud,” one said. “Didn’t shout hello that day though.”

“He was saying something about spiders,” another neighbor said. “No,” another disagreed, “He was talking about moths beating on the window. They must have been keeping him awake. No sleep can make you crazy, everyone knows that.”

By early afternoon his walk took him to the park. Children milled about in large groups. Mothers sat around the perimeter keeping watch. Good mothers, like his wife would be, watching their colony.

“It really isn’t a colony though, is it? Ants communicate, and bees, with pheromones. They all know what they are all thinking at all times. They do what they are supposed to do. But children don’t. They’re not ants, not bees. They are chaos. What bugs are chaos?”

He didn’t realize he was talking out loud, didn’t know why the mothers all turned to stare at him. They pulled their larvae closer, swaddled their pupae in their arms, and their toddlers scurried to them like maybe they have pheromones after all. Pheromones and chaos all together.

“It was the roaches!” He called after them as they hurried away. He was positive this time. It was the roaches and he had to tell the other one.

The other what?

The other woman. The one that said he should leave his wife now because she was pregnant, and he could have a child and a real family.

He didn’t talk at all as he walked to her house. He didn’t utter a word as he knocked on the door.

He wanted to apologize before warning her about the roaches. He shouldn't have yelled at her before. She was pregnant, and being pregnant made women say stupid things. Maybe if he warned her that it was the roaches, she would let him have the child, give it to his wife. Give it to the good mother.

Her teeth flashed a bright smile when she opened the door and saw him, her eyes wide and gleeful. He had never noticed how large her eyes were before, how wide apart. He had never noticed how hungry her mandibles were. He had never noticed before that she was a mantis. He should have seen it sooner in the way she wanted to end his life after they mated.

They always blamed the spiders, didn’t they, but it wasn‘t the spiders or the roaches. He would admit he was wrong about the roaches because it had always been the mantis!

He wasn’t a stupid man, and insects had been on his mind all day. Now he knew why.  She had told him she was pregnant. He knew that once a female mantis was fertilized, she ate the head of her mate.

“Not if I eat you first,” he said. The glee in her eyes turned to confusion at his words, then to fear as he lunged for her. When his teeth tore into her cheek, he barely heard her screams. His thoughts were much louder.

“Nope. It never was the spiders.”