Short Stories

#9- Spider Woman

There is a woman who sits outside my window. She says she can speak to spiders. That she is the spider woman.

The woman isn't frightening...to me at least. Her skin is tight, showing off each and every bone. It's sort of strange, how her skin is. She isn't skinny, her skin is just...wrapped around her, in a sense.

Her eyes are dark and usually clouded. Wether from the cold winter months or her constant cries I'll never know. She doesn't speak much, just to tell me she speaks to spiders. That she is the spider woman.

I can't really explain the rest of her body besides her face. She wears a long, draping dress that covers her body, and a hijab like headdress that covers her hair, showing off her jutted cheek bones.

I often stay awake at night, talking to her. It might also be the fact that it's rather hard to sleep when she stares at you. That's why I don't have any sleepovers, I'm afraid they won't like her, that they won't accept her like I do.

The spider woman may be my only friend and I fear the day she leaves. My family, however, would give anything for her to leave. They hate her, especially my mother. Though I don't know why, she keeps me out of trouble, almost like a real mother would.

My father has tried to bring the police to her but they don't seem to see her. In fact, no one else can really see her besides me and my parents. I like that. It's like she's part of our family, that we're all in on the big secret that is her existence.

Tonight I sit by my window, humming quietly at the spider woman braids my hair. "I can speak to spiders. I am the spider woman." She says and I laugh a little. "I know. Say, can you speak with a spider right now? I'd love to see you speak with one, spider woman." I pull my hair from her grasp and turn to face her.

She looks at me blankly, then after a while, she nods. Then, slowly, she lifts a skeletal finger up to my face and places it on my forehead. "What are you doing, spider woman?" I say, a laugh beginning to bubble from my mouth.

"I am the spider woman, and you are the spider." She says, her expression was a grim one. I quickly frown, "What are you talking about?" I ask her. "You are the spider." She says again, this time she was quite loud and insisting. It was very strange for her to be acting like this. She normally only said two things.

Suddenly the world began to grow larger, or maybe I was shrinking. The spider woman's finger never left my forehead as I shrunk smaller and smaller. My shrieks were become muffled and squeaky.

"I can speak to spiders. I am the spider woman. And you are the spider."