THE WIDOW'S TALE

"You're a Widow?" he growled.

My skin tingled as instinct surged a warning through my body. Suddenly, he was upon me, spray in hand. I felt I should go, but I hesitated, I had to be sure.

The murder in his eyes was all I needed to see.

He raised the can and I ran; my web crystallized with beads of dripping poison. But he did not stop. He pursued me as I went, spraying a long swath in my wake. I dropped hard to the cold floor, ducking under what he called a lawn mower. It was then that he finally gave up.

Frightened, I waited for his noise to fall silent, and still I waited longer. The air was thick with the poison's pungent aroma. It dizzied me, turning my guts. My instincts called me to my window, to my pestilential web, but I knew there would be no returning; the noxious stench reminder enough of what dour fate awaited me there.

Thrice over my luck had proven true. I was alive, and free to make my leave. But as I lay in the dank shadow of the mower, I thought hard about where I should go. I knew from my window that outside was a vast, frightening land of light and cold. I would have to traverse that to find another warm, dark home. Yet I could not leave, not yet. I did not understand his actions! I desired closure.

Resigned to my decision, I abandoned my safety, crawling along the cluttered floor into the mouth of danger. It was upon the open hood of his Chevy that I settled, waiting long through the night for him to come again.

And come he did.

He opened the door with a choke, waving his hand through the dusty air. Perhaps his spray is not so good for him either, I thought as I watched him walk past my abandoned web, uttering a pleased grunt. He shuffled his way toward his Chevy, closer and closer to me. Still I watched as he pulled a large tool from his work table, and with a cough, bent over the "Engine" below me.

Calm and stoic, I gazed down upon the dark curls of his hair, the pale pink nape of his neck. I admit I felt quite the mixture of emotions. Perhaps I should have hated him. I wanted to! But I admit I felt a certain love for him as well. I wanted to be bigger than hate, better than that. Perhaps I would never understand his sudden rage, but I did not want to leave, engulfed by that pain.

So I chose to forgive.

Sliding silently along my silk, I descended, my legs outstretched. I knew I would need to leave, and soon, but as my dark limbs fell gently upon the soft of his flesh, I wanted dearly to give him one final kiss goodbye.