Spider Romance Microfiction Week One!

by Betty Rocksteady

Hi! I'm so excited to share these stories with you guys! 

I'm the author of this year's NBAS book Arachnophile.  It's been getting great reviews! It's a surreal and grotesque story about what happens when a giant spider moves in next door to an arachnophobic man, and he discovers his fear covers up something... a bit different. Inspired by that, I concocted this challenge of spider romance microfiction!

There's still time to play! I'm running this call for three more weeks. Each week I'm collecting all the entires in an awesome post of fiction like this one, plus my favorite of the week gets an ebook copy of the NBAS title of their choice! Get all the details right here. Send me spider romance of any genre! I double dare you to shock me, titilate me, horrify me, amuse me, whatever! 

This week we have romance (of course), horror, a little sci-fi, dark fairy tales, a little of of everything for every taste. I had a super hard time picking the winner! I decided on Lucha's De Leche's STARTING OUT because it really surprised me by telling a complete, emotional, and romantic tale in beautiful language. I'll contact you by email and you can let me know which book you choose! :)

Honorable mentions go to Kevin Strange's bizarro genius, Justin Burnett's DMT-inspired madness, and Matt Neputin's dark fairy tale. But guys, I loved them all. I really did. Send me more!!!

Here's all the stories in the order I recieved them. Which one was your favorite?
 
 

ARACHNOBRAIN

by Neil Dinsmore

I watched as my brain fell out and landed with a sloppy splat upon the floor. I felt numb as a large spider slowly crawled over and had sex with it. I didn't know spiders could have sex with human brains. 

The spider must have spilled its seed because it's run off again. My brain looks exhausted. Should I feel violated? I mean, since it fell out, I guess it's no longer part of me. There's not much I can do now anyway, besides look at the violated thing. 

The image of my soggy brain lying on the tile floor remains with me for several months. The guy who cut my skull open and subsequently killed me is long gone. All I have left is this slanted view of my befouled organ. It looks a little fatter now. It's hard to tell. Maybe it's decomposition? I doubt it, it looks healthier than ever. No, it's definitely growing. If death is nothing more than me staring unblinkingly forever at my own disembodied grey matter, then I guess I'll content myself with charting the thing's progress. 

Around six months have now passed since I ceased to breathe. The change in both of us is interesting, to say the least. I think my internal organs have putrefied and leaked out of my ruptured sides, for my bloated brain now sits in a blackened puddle of ooze. It's unsightly, but my brain doesn't seem to mind. 

We're at the nine month mark now, my swollen brain and I. The bulbous lump of grey on the tiles is twice the size it used to be. It's started twitching sometimes, too. I'm beginning to put the pieces of this disturbing puzzle together. Gestating spider babies. Has to be. 

I think I'm overdue, or at least my brain is. It's been a little over nine months now, my body had long since turned to slush. I fell off the table a few days ago, now I lie upon the cold floor beside my pulsating, bloated hive of a brain. Thankfully, my eyes still face it. I need to know how this story concludes. Despite being closer than I've ever been, my vision is now so clouded that it's pretty hard to make out. There's just something about – oh, wait! It's happening! My brain is rupturing! I can see them, thousands upon thousands of tiny creatures spilling out of my orphaned lobes. What are these things, spiders? Not exactly. They appear to be little brains, with spindly arachnid legs sprouting from them. Spider brains. Thousands of the things. I was right, that spider did impregnate my brain. And I'm certain now, I do feel violated. 

I don't get to feel violated for much longer. These little monsters, my brain's offspring, they're looking for their first meal. They've found it. A festering slab of meat lying beside their torn womb. It's a good thing they take my putrescent eyes first. Sight was the only sense I had left.

Neil Dinsmore enjoys putting the contorted menaces that form in his mind to paper with the hopes that someday someone out there in the real world will want to pet these mysterious monsters.  You can find more writings of varying absurdity, unashamed oddity and the indefinably bizarre at NeilDinsmore.wordpress.com

STARTING OUT

by Lucha de Leche 

(CS Nelson)

Saturday you want me. Husks and shells pepper the floor beneath us, the crunch and crackle of Friday night’s mixer echoing across the studio. How you danced and carried on, sometimes together, more oft then naught in a solo routine for everyone to admire. You were on fire. Now you dangle languid from a strand, serene, at peace in the world with only the two of us. Your teal eyes catch sparkles of sunbeams soaking through the slats. We blow kisses and dream of the future. Of a family. You admire my pointer fingers with signals of wanton desire. But they are only a man’s fingers. Pedipalp surgery is costly, as are children. One day, my love. You pout. 

Sunday you’re busy. Oh so busy. And beautiful! Silken structures form in the sleeping hours, Mayan pyramids erected from roof to rafter and then back down to the bed we will one day share. And you. Look at you! Abdomen full, your lady curves swooping gracefully you’re your busty thorax. A hint wetness on your slit and spinnerets. Chelicerae buffing smooth fangs. It’s a good day and your happiness infects. Fingers stroke you to pleasure, but they are not what you need. A man’s fingers cannot do what a spider’s pedis can. It ends in a solemn evening. 

Monday the office calls. Oh bother with the obnoxious alarm, the consistent, aaaaaah! aaaaaah! aaaaaah! A sound we could both do without. You roll over and retreat for the web while the shower runs, a silent goodbye to a dreamy weekend. 

Tuesday and Wednesday give over to Thursday, late nights, a weary trek from bus stop to doorjamb, collapsing in a puddle of tired comptroller still fully clothed. Each evening dinner lays waiting, untouched at the foot of the web where you slaved over hundreds of grub steaks to create a man-sized feast. It’s the grind, love. It robs the appetite and squeezes the heart. Still no pedipalps. One day, my love. 

Friday you’re quiet. Gone is the elaborate spin of silken wonderment. A single trapper web stretches high in the vault, tucked tight into the corner of ceiling and joist. Where a man cannot reach. A heaviness weighs the air, something slow and rolling with depression. The flat roars with emptiness.

Saturday you’re gone. The floor is clean; your webs are empty. One gin and tonic leads to another leads to darkness. The floor feels so cold without your silk. 

Sunday looms in dead silence. Cigarettes burn the hardwood. Laundry steams in a heap of molted man-skin. Gin becomes bourbon becomes haze. 

Monday and aaaaaah! aaaaaah! aaaaaah! No work today. A holiday. Bourbon for breakfast and hashish for brunch. Something to take the edge off, to help slide into the reality of, “You’re never coming back.” 

Tuesday turns into three weeks and the office stopped calling. Clothes don’t fit. Who needs clothes?

By Friday the water and power are cut. 

Saturday the sunbeams slip through the slats. A sparkle of hope gleams from the ceiling. Your web. A starter. Teal eyes wink from the shadows. 

A heart once broken thumps one time. Then another. 

You slip from a strand, graceful, spinning, until we lie together on the floor. 

Monday the office calls. They need a hero. You stroke the pointer fingers and we lock gazes. Yes, my love. We’ll sell the flat and get the surgery. We can live in your web. And with a thoughtful hesitation that elicits soul smiles, all of us. Today, my love. A promise.

CS Nelson has appeared in North American anthologies and magazines. He lives in Fairbanks, Alaska with his wife, son, and Queensland Heeler, playing ice hockey, skiing, and chasing the Northern Lights. His alter ego is the passionate luchador, Luche de Leche. For a good time darkly, visit his website at http://nelsoncs.com.

THE TRICKSTER

by J.M. Northwood

 A more fleshed-out version of The Trickster appeared in Fossil Lake II: The Refossiling under the title My Beloved.

I remember when we met. I was seated on the veranda of a small café in St. Louis when I felt the table move, and looked up into a brilliant smile and a piercing stare.

There was an instant frisson – a spark – a gleam in his eye that made me want to know more about him; and, as we spoke, I began to itch with wanting him.

As evening approached, we found ourselves before a rough-spun silken hammock and slowly removed our clothes. He helped me into our bed, then drew a gossamer cover over us. His kisses were gentle, yet electrifying, and I felt my nerves awaken and start to sing.

He stopped me, hands on my hips, and whispered, "are you sure?" My answer was, I thought, rather clear: I slowly lowered myself onto him, gasping at his entry, and shifted until he was fully sheathed within me. We moved as one; and, as daylight approached, became two once more. Then, in the daylight, he left.

Over the course of the next few months I became moody, irritable. My ankles began to swell, and my breasts to hurt. Once I admitted to myself that I was pregnant, I was torn between missing him and wishing I might kill him for doing this to me. And then, damn me, admitting that it was the path we both trod that led me to this.

One night I awoke as midnight struck, feeling as though I were ready to burst. My cramps grew in intensity and shortened in cycle, and I found him beside me, rubbing my back and murmuring words of encouragement.

I felt a tearing first, a hot release that spattered viscous fluid down my thighs, and left fibrous tendrils laying limp against my legs and sheets. As I lay there, I could feel a movement in my womb, and I smiled up at him.

"They're coming."

A tiny foot stuck out, tentative, tapping about and tickling my most intimate areas, and then the rest of the body followed. That movement, that first child, opened the gates, and the rest exited in a rush.

Thousands of spiders -- lime green and mocha brown and cherry red -- bulbous of body and slender of limb, spread from my loins, rippling against my flesh and crawling up my legs, and thence to my chest; and, and as they danced across my lips and tongue, tickling the inside of my ears as they explored their new life, I made sure to whisper my love to them.

I felt my heart break a bit as they took to silken threads and flew through an open window: they were so small, so young, and yet their father named each of them as they left, his face shining with joy.

He turned to me and took me in his arms, and I kissed each of his eyelids as he lay around me, cocooning me in his legs.

My trickster. My beloved. My Anansi.

J.M. Northwood is a cynical romantic prone to both grand passions and the quiet contemplation of what love truly is. And then he adds spiders.

DATE NIGHT

by Rick Powell

As she was in front of the mirror applying mascara on her seventh eye, she hastily looked at the digital clock on the cluttered dresser. 

7:20. 

Her sleek four back legs quivered in place; her claws clicking on the polished hardwood floor as she thought, Crap, crap, crap! I cannot be late for date night. Alex was soo looking forward to this! 

Her one front leg was applying Agua-Net on her cephalothorax while the other two were trying to start the application on her eighth orb; the thick, coarse hair a struggle ever since her last molt. Her last remaining leg was trying to hold her up steadily in place in front of the full length mirror. After a few moments, she lets out a sigh of relief through her fangs as she tosses the empty mascara bottle on the unmade bed. 

She looks at her reflection in the glass; she turned to and fro, inspecting her large, black abdomen, admiring it in the light of the bedroom. She brushed a few stray hairs away from the red hourglass mark on her lower abdomen, then nodded her head in a satisfied way. 

A dashing, middle-aged man appeared in the bedroom doorway; he was looking down at the damp pile of translucent gray tissue in his hands. “Honey, you left more skin from your molt in the tub. Where should I...Hey! You look great!” He exclaimed as he looked up and saw her. 

Her large body struck a comically models pose, as she said with a giggle, “You think so?! I was so worried I would not look as filled out. That last shedding took forever!” 

Her gave her a proud look and a wink as he said, “Babe, you have always looked filled out. You never change.” Her fangs twitched, as she felt an unnoticeable blush come to her face. “Awwww. You always know just what to say,” she said. He tilted his head in the direction of the mini van in the garage. “Why don't you go get in. I will get rid of this and we can get going. The reservation is at 8.” He disappeared from the doorway; holding the damp pile away from his well-tailored suit. 

As they entered the lush restaurant, she turned more than a few heads of the male patrons sitting around much to the scowls of their dates. The way they gazed at her long legs, made her spinnerets twitch in appreciation. 

After the lavish dinner, Alex opened a large velvet box for her to see in the candlelight. Its red, silk-lined interior showing a necklace of interwoven flies. 

She gasped. “Alex, you remembered!” “Happy Anniversary, honey,” he said with a grin. 

He gets up and walked behind her to fasten it around her ebony neck. He kisses her behind one of her eyes. “It is beautiful!” She exclaimed, as she caresses it with one claw. 

As he sat back down across from her, she whispered with a loving stare, “You know, this calls for a mating tonight.” She lifted up her wine glass. “I may not even devour you, either.” He blinked in surprise. “Wait! What?”

Rick Powell lives in Oak Forest, Illinois. He has been a lover of horror his whole life and once got lost in the woods near Bachelor's Grove when he was 2 years old and claims “he has been lost in the woods ever since.” He can be found on his Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/tenebraerick

TORPEDOED BY A TARANTULA

by Jon James

I released my clenched breath in a quivering moan as one of his eight hairy legs penetrated my anus.

Several of his other legs caressed my back and stomach while his pedipalpi tickled the back of my neck. He chittered something in the alien tongue that I was still practicing. 

“Open… Mouth” was all I made out. When I did, he inserted another limb into it. My tongue flicked the short, coarse hairs as I struggled not to gag. 

Then, he lifted me from inside. 

Three of his legs held both our weight on my bed, the tarsal claws clinging to the bedsheet. One leg inside my rectum, another inside my mouth, and the final three hugging my stomach, we raised up. I felt weightless, my back pressing against the thorax and abdomen of my spider lover. 

My penis was hard as carapace, though he hadn’t even touched it yet. His one leg probed and explored inside my intestine, and drool was running down his other leg from my mouth. 

As he stood over me, he lowered me a little so that I was no longer against his sternum and coxa. Then, gently and slowly, he turned me with the three legs hugging me, leaving the other two deep inside as I turned. When I was on my back, still suspended above the bed, I opened my eyes and looked up at him. He was contorted to reach into me with his limbs, but his many eyes still looked down at me, unblinking. I wondered what he saw through his unusual vision. Was I just a dark shape in front of him? Did my heartbeats send waves of sensation through the tricobothria covering his body? 

He curved his abdomen forward, brushing it against my erection. He fumbled a little until his spinnerets found the protrusion, and they began wrapping my member with with fine, sticky web. Each tug and spin made my head crawl in rapture. 

He hugged me close again, now that he had found my penis. I wanted to ask him What can I do for you? I wanted to bring him even a fraction of the feeling he was giving me, but my mouth couldn’t form words around his leg and I wouldn’t know how to choke and click out the words in the language he could understand. So instead I just let myself be consumed by the gift he was giving me and swore that I would find a way to return the favor. 

My chest pressed against his, our hairs catching against each other, playing chords of elation through my torso. 

Finally it was too much. Just as my orgasm was beginning, his chelicerae darted forward to either side of my neck, stabbing through the soft flesh. I could feel the enzymes pumping into my body, I could feel my flesh quickly dissolving as I finally came, shooting strands of my own web into the air between us.

Jon James dwells in Lansing, Michigan, where he hopes to one day write something his mom can read. Today is not that day. Better luck next time, mom. For more of his weird shit, check out his podcast at wewriteweirdshit.com

UNTITLED

by Justin Burnett 

1600 hours: The hallucinations intensify, and for a second, I almost forget Dr. Habersham and the DMT (over?)dose I just absorbed intravenously. I almost forget about immersion therapy and the leprechauns. Almost. 

Glowing octagons transform into giant golden bumble bees. They are friendly bumble bees, buzzing around the room and generating a sweetly melodious harmonic accompaniment to the doctor's techno mix CD. Their music is a divine metaphysical honey.

Just as I'm beginning to think the whole thing isn't so bad, something awful happens.

On an intellectual level, I know that Dr. Habersham (sadistically) intended to terrify me from the start, to subject me to his eccentric version of immersion therapy in order to cure my phobia of leprechauns. I am, on some level, aware that the dark figure materializing before me, throwing the friendly bumble bees in a frenzied retreat to the far side of the room is merely Dr. Habersham in a leprechaun suit, intensified by my DMT addled perceptive faculties.  

I am, on some rapidly deteriorating level, aware of this. 

The slow and sinister drone of bagpipes replace the techno.

Dr. Habersham steps forward, into a rust-colored, hellish half light and grins, revealing several shark-like rows of jagged teeth imbedded, like dead tree stumps, in green, gangrenous gums. 

I feel faint.

My heart pounds frantically. His hands reach out to me, covered in thick red hair and accented by long bloody fingernails. 

 Suddenly, I feel an immeasurably sublime openness to the cosmos. This must be what dying feels like, I think. There is no pain, only a strange dissolution of selfhood, an influx of voices and images from all over the unknown expanses of being. Dr. Habersham begins to fade. I assume I’ve had a heart attack. 

In my mind(?), I fall into an indescribably alien habitation. It is dark, cramped, and musty. I strain to see what is making a ceaseless, sharp scurrying across the ground, but can’t make it out. I scream for help, and the scurrying stops. 

Suddenly, I hear Dr. Habersham’s voice in a horrifying, metallic brogue growling “I'm not through with ye, boy.” 

Before the cool darkness dissipates, something cold and vaguely hairy brushes up against my leg. I grab it, and hang on. 

I'm back where I began, sucked out of the telepathic universal consciousness that almost afforded me an escape. Dr. Habersham is still stretching his red, bloody hands towards me. I close my eyes. 

Nothing happens. 

I look up at Dr. Habersham. His grin is gone, replaced by a fearful grimace. He is staring at my hands. 

I look down and realize I'm holding a huge, hairy spider. 

1645 hours: I leave Dr. Habersham’s office feeling better than ever, while Dr. Habersham is momentarily unaware his inexplicable onset of arachnaphobia. 

1700 hours: I step into the shower at my apartment, and notice a wolf spider sitting on the toilet bowl. 

I immediately get a hard on. 

Justin Burnett is a writer of wierd stuff and untalented graphic design artist. 

SPIDERFUCK:  AN END OF LIFE MEMOIR

by Kevin Strange 

I haven't always been sexually attracted to spiders. Actually, that's a lie; as long as I can remember, I've had a weird obsession with the eight-legged little arachnids. In fact, I've only ever been attracted to spiders—which is probably how I ended up in this here web getting the juices sucked outta me.
It all started back when I was 'round abouts twenty years on, whacking off in my Grandma's dank, cramped little basement. I'd found some old pictures in a binder stuffed away in some boxes down there. 

Grandma slept all afternoon, and Grandpa was dead on account of he blew my momma and dad's heads off then his own when I was five. He tried to kill Grandma, too, but she'd somehow survived getting half her face taken off with thirty-aught buckshot. 

Made her real ugly, and I didn't like looking her in her one good eye if I didn't have to, 'cause even that one was all yellow with flecks of black all in it. 

Anyway, so I found pictures of her and Grandpa when they was way younger. The pictures was them and several other fellas all naked and doin' stuff to each other, and I was giving them a good hard look cause I'd never seen anything like that before in my whole life. So I was staring real intent-like, when all of a sudden I felt a tickle in my drawers, and I looked down just in time to see a little spider take a bite out of my downstairs parts! 

Well, I didn't kill that spider. No sir. I whipped out my junk and had a go at myself, real careful-like so as to not disturb the little fella—let him keep nibbling the vein, too, since it was nice and full of blood. 

Well, that little spider didn't stop with my blood. No sir, he started gobblin' up my jackoff too once I blew that outta my dick! 

I ain't never told anyone this, but I kept feedin' that little spider my jackoff every time I had a hankerin' to look at those old pictures. Pretty soon that there spider was bigger'n any spider I ever done laid eyes on! Sexy, too; all them big, glassy black eyes and long legs. I ain't ashamed to say that spider eventually got big enough I was able to start blowing my jackoff on her! 

Before long she needed more than the blood and cum outta my little pecker, so I let her eat Gran. Gran didn't seem to care none; she'd been ready to check out since Grandpa tried to blow her head off. She screamed and hollered and cursed me tons, sure, but I could tell she was content by the way she bled when the spider went into her with its sleek fangs. 

After Gran, I fed her the neighbors. Then the postman and the milk delivery boy. The cops, too, when they came sniffin' around wondering why everybody went missing. Now she ain't got anyone else to eat, so I guess she's gonna work on me now, and I ain't got no problem with that.

Kevin Strange doesn't really jack off to spiders. He writes books at KevinTheStrange.com, which is kind of like the artistic equivalent of jacking off to spiders. Or not that at all, actually.

WAITING FOR FLIES

by Lee A. Forman 

Her eight sexy legs crawl up my cheek. 

Oh! It feels so sweet.

My eyes strain to see her. So beautiful, that red mark like hot lipstick waiting to be kissed. Flies buzz above and my heart races every time one gets near.

The apparatus holds my mouth open for beloved to build her web. She’s done a special job, as seen from the mirror on the ceiling.

It’s like she’s made it just for me.

We still haven’t had our first kiss; I wait for it with a warm tingling in my stomach.

She crawls onto her web which spans my open mouth. She sits, watching the flies as I do, waiting for one to get caught in her perfect creation. If she gets enough I know she’ll share with me.

Patient. Just be patient.

Eventually she’ll crawl in. My finger is on the button that releases my jaw from the machine’s hold, ready to embrace her in moist darkness where I can love her forever. 

Lee Forman is a horror writer from the Hudson Valley, NY. For more information go to www.leeformanauthor.com.

UNTITLED

by Matt Neputin 

The ice between the stones in the wall has melted and warm stale air is gently stirring. I've been locked in this dungeon for over a year now.  The only thing that keeps me company now are the insects that occupy this place. The king thought he'd make my life a living hell by releasing thousands of flies in here. Admittedly, at first it was quite cumbersome; however, the spiders quickly helped me with the fly infestation.

In fact, the spiders became the reason why I survived this long, they would catch the flies and allow me to eat them from their webs, I only had to ask them nicely. I spent a long while in absolute solitude before I was able to hear the spiders talk. Some of them would laugh at me, and I in turn would try to kill them.  Others; however, tried to help me by letting me feed.

There was one particular spider that was especially nice. He said that even though I was now extremely thin and malnourished, I was still beautiful and that the spider loved me with all his heart. Day in and day out, he'd sing me songs and poems about my beauty. In a way, that was all I ever wanted from the king before I tried to assassinate him. I only wanted him to tell me that he loved me with complete sincerity, which was something he refused to do as he juggled mistresses. But when I heard the spider say the words "I love you," I was overwhelmed by his sentiment. I took him in and kissed him.

Other spiders began confessing their love to me.  They would cover my naked, emaciated body and start kissing me, all the while chanting just how beautiful I am and how much they loved me.  I knew polyamoury was illegal in my kingdom, but they have ignored their King's transgressions and forsaken their queen, casting her into this dark pit. I'm doomed, but I now have my own harem of suitors whom I love equally.

My suitors hunted other bugs for me, which I would eat from their nets. They would even band together and smuggle in dead rats and other rare delicacies.  I'd rip the sour meat up into tiny pieces and share the bounty with my harem.  

I am queen of this colony, married to every single male spider in it. The females still served as breeders, but I was the primary caretaker of the young. Each new generation grew to adore and worship me more than the last. They wove their webs across the dungeon, transforming it into my throne as their immortal Goddess. By locking me up here, the king granted me my wish. The wish for everlasting love and devotion.

Matt Neputin is an autistic polish writer who lives in poland with his fiancee and spends his days writing weird stuff. You can chat with him on twitter at https://twitter.com/mattneputin or at facebook at https://www.facebook.com/MattNeputin 

ARACHNICIDE MATRICIDE

by  Bryce David Salazar 

The lower half severed and gone, the torso continued its attack.

A lover’s quarrel. That’s what the papers would call it the next day. They would find the two of them lying side by side, their expressions twisted in the horror of their last minutes. The whole of the scene would be the kind of mess that would freeze the responding officers in their place.

They’d find her, what would be left of her, right next to him having died in the process of taking him apart. Her lower half would be missing, not to be found until the investigators looked up and saw just exactly what was in the spider-web at the top of the stairs.

They’d find plenty of him throughout the house. Only three of his eight legs would be with his body, right where they were supposed to be. The other five were around. Some in the basement where she started to take him apart. The rest in the kitchen while he crawled away. Had he not decided to fight back, there might have been some of him in the living room.

It was a shame. She wanted to spread his body everywhere. A pedipalp here, a patella there. Silk glands chopped and mixed with poison glands. She at least wanted the cephalothorax separated from the abdomen. But, in her current state, it would never happen.

He made it to the door and reached to turn the handle but it was too late. She pulled what was left of herself up with his spinnerets and blindly forced the blade up and down, up and down, over and over while he screamed and begged for her to stop. Eventually, she would.

He wouldn’t make it. He’d survive her, definitely. But even if his cries for help fell upon listening ears, they wouldn’t reach him in time. So she let go and fell to the floor. The last thing she saw was a photo of them on their wedding day. Him, six feet tall, a bowtie by his femur. Her, a few inches shorter, wearing a dress that she had picked out with her mother, the maid of honor.

Until then, on the day of their death, it had been the best day of her life. 

 Bryce David Salazar is the author of She Sees Metaphors. He lives in Michigan. 

LETTERS FROM THE WEB

by Chad Lutzke

Dearest Tristessa:

I understand that you’re comfortable in your home.  Really, I get it.  And if I’m honest, what you’ve done with the place--making the nest right there under Buddha’s breast--is quite impressive.  But if we have kids I just don’t think there’ll be enough room on the statue for them to run around.  Plus I’m not so sure I want my kids raised thinking obesity is a healthy lifestyle.  You know how bad they make fun of kids nowadays with big butts.  Do you want that for them?  Please write back.

 

Love,  

Victor

 

Dear Victor:  

Are you trying to say I have a big butt?  That I can’t tell my kids right from wrong just because we wake up to a giant ceramic belly?  I’m sorry that we can’t seem to see eyes to eyes on this.  But I just can’t see living in the armpit of Christ.  From this angle it looks great, very roomy, never dusted, just hanging there on the wall with a great view of the living room.  But I’ve made a world for myself over here.  I just can’t.  I’m sorry.

PS.  How dare you imply I have a big butt! 

Dear Tristessa:  

I think it’s horrible that we have to live like this, rooms apart...and for what?  Tris, I’ve worked so hard to build us a beautiful home.  And Christ’s pit is the only thing you can see from your angle.  There’s a whole other side here.  A whole other pit...for the kids.  Please reconsider.  

PS.  I love your butt.  It’s perfect.

Dear Victor:

I know it’s been a while, but I’m wondering if your offer still stands.  I see you’ve got quite the supply of food over there and, well...I haven’t eaten in weeks.  I’ve just no time to prepare food anymore.  I spend my days reorganizing the house (someone keeps rubbing Buddha’s belly).  Please forgive me.

PS.  I’ve lost weight.

Dear Tristessa:  

Honey, of course.  There’s more than enough room here and you’re going to love the view.  They’ve changed the furniture around so the TV is at the perfect angle now.  

PS.  Maybe the weight loss was a blessing.  Maybe your badonkadonk had gotten just a bit big.  See you soon. 

Dear Victor:  

I knew it!  You do think it’s big.  So typical of you, Victor.  Well, guess what?  I’m moving on.  I’ve found a fan that’s not being used.  It’s in the attic, and I’ve already made a ton of new friends.  Good riddance, Victor!

Dear Tristessa:  

You do realize it’s winter, right?  Good luck with the fan and your new friends.

PS.  See you this summer!

Chad writes dark fiction, hates dishonesty, loves cheese.  A lot!  Look for his coming-of-age novella OF FOSTER HOMES AND FLIES out July 22, 2016.

ARACHNOPHORNICATION

by D.M. Anderson

Jedediah Pinkeyeton sat deep within his labyrinth, his web of trinkets and detritus that was his obsession. His grisly features painted a haggardly bleak portrait of a man grown geriatric despite his relative youth.

His neurosis delved deeply into the realms of full-blown kleptomania with a splash of sociopathic disconnection in human empathy. A true virtuoso of larceny, deceit, and grave robbery.

He hunched further into his phonebook, his bulbous nose dribbling yellowish mucus upon the rows of digits, and names. Cadaverous fingers drew psychedelic swirls, like ancient hieroglyphs mingling amongst the little lives, and the putrid snot.

His finger stopped suddenly. The spider had chosen his fly.

***

Encapsulated Swarovski crystal nails slowly clicked down in waterfall succession. The rhythm thrummed like a heartbeat mandra, explosively loud despite the drone of her metrosexually ambiguous executive assistant/yes-man.

Jeanine Cho scoured the wanted ads. Delighted by the perverted, and blatantly intended adultery transparently advertised in neat little bingo boxes. Delicious free-range sinners, cataloged alphabetically for her enjoyment.

Her sycophantic secretary paused apologetically to answer an incoming call.

"Miss Cho’s office, how may I assist you?" he intoned by rote.

"I'm sorry, but she is currently in a meeting. Would you like to leave a message?"

Jeanine picked up her office phone and fatally jabbed the button for line one.

"Thrill me." she quoted her favorite film.

"Miss Cho, I presume?" said a cancerous voice.

"I've exactly zero time for games. Get to the point."

“I want you. I will have you tonight.” the man cackled. “And there's nothing you can do to stop me!”

A slow smirk curled Chanel lips into a haunting rictus of corporate beauty. The black widow was pleased.

***

Jedediah skulked in the shadows of the VIP booth at his favorite pretentious goth bar, Club I Bleed Black. He watched the writhing bacchanal as it rolled in and out with the tide of music, and too-expensive booze. His quarry would be here tonight, he could feel it in his bunyans.

Jeanine entered the club as if she owned the place, which she did, so it made absolute sense. Club I Bleed Black was a sort of long standing social experiment. It was her hunting ground, her hallowed web of sin.

Jedediah glanced up from his cranberry juice and froze at the picturesque widow standing defiantly before him. Eyes met and sparked a deep seeded cognition that they were kindred. They both felt it immediately, and neither could deny it.

The gibbering gentleman standing just behind Jeanine begged to differ. His straight razor cast a gleeming arch, thirsting for sanguine arterial kisses.

Jedediah launched himself at his query.

Jeanine desperately dodged the two men, reaching for her .357 derringer.

The muzzle flash was blinding in the candlelight, burning the erotic moment into memory. Jedediah strangled the life from the cock shot fiend, grinning madly as he did. Jeanine leaning down to finish him with a kiss.

Together they consumed the man's soul, and at last they knew love.

D.M. Anderson hides inside his hermitage, leaving occasionally to scavenge for food and toiletries. When he isn’t setting a bad example for his kids, he’s mercilessly beating his head against the keyboard, hoping something interesting spills out onto the screen.