The body of the Mother Of Spiders was larger than my torso. Her legs peeked out from under the half-height curtain she was “hiding” behind. The spider spray I had been given was not going to do anything to her but moisturize the shiny hairs on her abdomen.
«It’s okay. Spray me anyway. Let her think she has the upper hand.»
I really didn’t want to because I felt like I had been pulled into a bad situation blind and was being used by the woman that gave me the spray. I wanted to put the bottle down and get some damn facts before I start spraying the hundreds of skittering black spiders with nothing more than pine-scented water.
But the voice of the Mother of Spiders was as commanding as it was comforting. By her will, I sprayed her.
She wiggled her legs. It tickled.
The woman was pleased by the reaction. “See! I knew it works! Now spray the others! Spray them all!” I smelled the pine water. Very, very, diluted Pine-Sol. Not even enough to make bubbles. There was less than an inch of the fluid left in the bottle. “That’s enough. They won’t hold still for me, but they’re holding still for you! Spray them all!”
The woman left and locked me in the house with the hundreds of spiders. The spiders made fresh webs and hung at optimum heights for me to spray them. The pine water was refreshing to them. I walked around, careful to remain on the clear path they made for me, spraying all the spiders that presented themselves to me.
They were all venomous and very dangerous to humans, but by the will of the Mother Of Spiders, they presented no danger to me. Some would get sprayed, then scramble to get ahead of me on the path so I could spray them again.
As I wandered the woman’s house, I noticed she had all of her belongings boxed up. The arachnids left her roommate’s stuff alone, and was invading the woman’s boxes. I realized the woman had boxed up her stuff to protect it, and intentionally left her roommate’s stuff out to be infested.
I ran out of pine water to spray. Most of the spiders retreated to the corners of the rooms or holes into the ceiling. The woman unlocked the front door and asked if I had sprayed all of them. I told her I ran out of spray, but I sprayed as many as I could.
She gloated over the eventual demise of her enemy. The Mother Of Spiders never looked cleaner. Mumbling an excuse about having to pick up my daughter from school, I quickly exited the house while I could. The woman demanded I bring my daughter back with me to finish spraying the house as she was making another batch of pine water.
I made no response as I walked briskly from the scene. I had no intention of finding out out just how far could the Mother Of Spiders command me.