When I was just a boy in my elementary school, I witnessed something I will never forget. Our little school just sat on the outskirts of a large forest fenced off, so we couldn’t go exploring and get lost, however a thick row of trees sat just on our side of the fence, stretching along the whole way. Me and my friends would always go playing in there, play fighting, hide and seek you name it, the little stretch of brush was ours. There was only one catch and that was the hollowed-out tree at the end. I can’t really explain why we avoided it; our tiny minds concocted terrible frightening images in the darkness of the hollow, believing there was something terrible within. This tree was not only made unique by the fact it was hollow, but it was massive, much larger than any tree in the forest and no matter what, no matter the season it never grew any life on it, even the birds seemed to avoid its cold lifeless branches.
Of course, boys will be boys and our fear soon twisted into curiosity. It was a cool day in October when my friend Marcus was dared to walk into the tree by my brother Joe. Marcus took the dare but only if we gave him our soccer ball, which my brother conveniently kicked into the hollow. Marcus had to duck under slightly to enter, he stood towards us, only thing we couldn’t see was the top half of his head., he wore a joyful expression, smiling like a kid who just got an ice cream cone, If I could see his eyes, I bet they would be smiling too. We didn’t have a stopwatch and smart phones were not a thing back then so we each began counting aloud up to sixty. The first fifteen seconds was filled with Marcus filling our heads with how brave he was to enter and how dumb we were to give him a soccer ball for it. It was at the thirty second mark when I got goosebumps all over, I looked to my brother and we both fumbled out the next few numbers, both of us each seemingly feeling this uneasiness growing.
Marcus was quiet now, uncharacteristically so as I noticed what looked like wispy white strands of hair slowly descend from inside, but I couldn’t stop the count, not with my soccer ball on the line. It was when we hit forty-five when things got weird. Marcus began complaining then shouting, shaking himself off these little black specks which flew off his clothes, but more quickly took to replace them. At this point me and Joe stopped our count and just stood there in horror as we realized these wispy tendrils were webs and the black specks were tiny spiders. Marcus screamed and rushed out of the hollow, collapsing and started rolling around in the dirt, as my brother took off his jacket and began beating it on Marcus to get them off, I could only continue to look on into the darkness, frozen with terror. This paralyzing fear that crept over me was brought on by the large spindly legs that began silently stepping down.
Marcus was up now and ran back to the school crying followed by me and my brother, I wasn’t waiting another moment. When we got back, we explained to our teacher what had happened. Marcus was sent to the hospital to treat any spider bites and our janitor Mr. Bowman was tasked with killing the spiders in the hollow. I remember the days that followed so vividly. I tried telling my parents what I saw and how big this spider was, they did what parents did best and told me it was my imagination, and that no spider was the size of a small child! They told me to be careful and to never go into the woods at school again, I tried to get Joe to back up my story, that it wasn’t my imagination, but he was too busy helping Marcus and never saw it. Marcus was gone for the rest of the week and me and my brother avoided the tree line till after the janitor took care of our nightmares. It was the day after everyone was told it was safe when I entered the tree line again. My brother refused to follow me in. I don’t know what possessed me to go back but I needed to. I needed to see for myself that it was safe again but really, I just wanted to be right, I wanted everyone to know that what I saw was real. I had asked Mr. Bowman if he killed the big one and he only laughed, saying the biggest one was the size of his hand. He told me they were called wolf spiders and that they didn’t grow that big. He was wrong and I needed proof.
I grabbed my polaroid, one of those cameras that you must reel up. I went to the hollow right at the beginning of recess, nobody was around, just me and the hollow. I planted my butt in the dirt, camera ready and waited. At first, I stared only at the hollow, unblinking in my resolve but soon found myself looking around at the other trees which were starting to look…odd. As I said before the Hollow was unique, but the trees closet to it began to take on its familiarity’s, it’s dead look and pale branches seemed to branch farther, and every familiar sound of birds chirping, squirrels running and kids playing were all gone. It felt so eerie sitting there, and I continued to sit there even when the bell rang. It was close to an hour when the silence was replaced with a low purr. Not like a cat, it sounded more forced and aggressive, with little audible ticks throughout. Every hair on my body stood up as something creaked within the tree, the purring growing louder. Something stirred in the dark, and then a familiar hairy spindly leg shot out and slowly curled on the outside of the tree, followed by several other limbs, uncurling around it. At this point there were legs on both sides, looking as if someone was holing the outside of the tree within, ready to spring forth. I stared into the dark trying to make out its body or head as the purring and ticking went silent.
I looked on desperately when I finally saw it. I felt it’s many eyes upon me, each giving a small glint of shine from the little light. You would think I would take off running again like last time but I couldn’t look away. There was something behind those eyes, a feeling, a wanting and I suddenly found myself standing, arm outstretched to touch one of its legs on the tree. I could still hardly make out it’s true size as I took another step closer.
It was dead silent went two ticks erupted from it, as it slowly retracted its legs back into the hollow and disappeared. I stood for another moment, wishing I had taken the picture when I felt skittering on my arm. A small spider ran up my forearm and into my shirt, I panicked as I felt more land on my head, I looked up to see the dead white branches seemingly reach for me, each dangling many more eight legged fiends.
After the ordeal my parents ended up moving and splitting up, neither staying in that small town any longer and the school closed off the forest entirely due to an “Infestation.” No one ever did believe me, but to my friends who doubt I take them on a little drive, back to my hometown and I show them the once emerald green of the trees is replaced by the wispy white dead limbs, not a sound could be heard. If you step just on the outskirts however and listen deep, you can still hear it, ticking away.