A quote suddenly came to me: “Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly.” Charles Addams
There is an icy wind flowing through graying fields and decaying farmland. It’s a landscape awaiting a morbid Bob Ross type to paint and hang in a funeral parlor. My family’s car speeds down the highway. My dad and mom sit in the front and then there’s me. The icy exterior more than matches the interior of the vehicle. No one speaks. I have nothing to say and decide to mute it all away with headphones on at a decibel too loud to drown them out even if they did speak to each other. My mother stares into her phone and for a while the music I’m listening to takes me away from the dull monotony of this current life.
A large deer carcass, a Buck with immense antlers, is on the roadside and my dad suddenly swerves away to avoid hitting the gory obstruction. Afterwards, he stares off and seems to contemplate where his life is going.
The GPS interrupts our shared silence by giving directions. Dad makes no motion but perhaps unintentionally makes eye contact with mom. And before I could notice the silence has gone on for many hours until there’s another sudden swerve of the vehicle, enough to make an earbud fall out of my left ear. I look outside the car window and see a sign:
Welcome to Blank. Population 3,000.
“What a barren and uncreative name for a town.” I thought to myself and wondered if my parents shared that thought or maybe they didn’t want to remind themselves of this fact? The streets are bare and lack decoration or signs of life.
On my phone I listen to a podcast detailing the murder of a runaway boy by two homeless men. The boy recorded a TikTok shortly before the attack on a train car the trio were hiding away in. As I watch the brief video, the future victim goes on about the kindness of strangers, their unresolved pain between his parents, and how they have newfound hope for humankind. The boy turns his phone around to record his future murders, one is short and stocky and the other is lanky and missing a tooth. One say’s to the other “Now, say goodbye to shithole.” The other one acts cute like he’s auditioning for a sitcom and answers back “Goodbye, shithole.” in a bad Larry Fine impression.
His nude body was left by a sewer drain, the wallet and smart phone stolen and will soon be pawned for drugs along with the designer jeans. The bars on my phone dissipate until I can no longer watch the podcast, forcing me to turn off my phone. My dad catches me looking around and tries to engage:
“Well? What do you think?” I don’t immediately answer. I feel complacent and bored and most of all slightly rebellious before deciding to reply in a tired and disinterested way:
“I don’t know.” Dad immediately follows up with a dad joke he got from a sitcom, a favorite pastime of his, and made himself laugh. There’s more silence in the car before the GPS informs us of our final destination at hand: a little two story four bedroom home. The car pulls up to the driveway where the house reveals itself as a place bereft of privacy with windows adorning every angle of the home. The lawn has no trees or shrubbery. Unlike our last house there’s no room for Christmas lights or to hang Halloween decorations. Meanwhile, the backyard is immense, ten acres so says my father, and dotted with burnt patches of grass on a mostly flat plane. My mom is annoyed at the lack of fencing and ergo lack of privacy. Father promises her to build a fence to retrieve our privacy from the neighbors.
We unpack our cargo, knowing the movers will be here tomorrow with the rest of the furniture, the chilly wind continues while there’s a noise of unknown insects that’s not too far away. That kind of stingy noise familiar to farmland but no one bothers to research what exactly it is where it’s just an accepted noise. I ask my parents if it’s okay to explore and they nod at each other before agreeing. My phone’s signal has diminished to uselessness and I know the internet won’t be installed until late tomorrow. It gives me an excuse to know my surroundings and figure out the best places to slink away to be best left alone. It was something I did more and more, especially at our last home and there was a spot near the fancy grocery store where the older burnouts would chug stolen Nyquil together.
As I look around I realize just how much of a drab cul-de-sac it is. One neighbor has the remains of a car permanently parked on the side of their home alongside a tiny shack housing firewood. It’s early November but feels more like winter. Every other house looks the same with a copy and pasted putrid color scheme. They’re all open to prying eyes with one being different in having a hardly used tennis court in the backyard. Beyond over a small hill, I can see a little gas station maybe a mile or two away. I may need to go there when I need to be alone. As I walk along the neighborhood, by the outskirts of the cul-de-sac I can hear music reverberating from the one home that looks different from the rest. For one thing it’s the only one surrounded by trees.
Old rock music emanates from a silver home with a very large garage. As I walk closer to it I notice the signal on my Wi-Fi getting stronger with every step. I look into a side window as the bars on my phone climb to 5G levels and I see an old man tending to what looks like a mad science experiment in his garage. The old man looks back and sees me. He opens the door to greet me and we hit it off immediately, recalling a shared plaintiveness towards people and having goals not understood by others. Pardon the extremely brief summation, I have had interactions before and they all feel the same now. In wanting to somehow impress this man in our ongoing conversation, I divulge something I haven’t told anyone: my desire to be a teacher. He congratulates me for having such lofty ambitions. I ask him what his favorite philosopher is and he regales in a blithe way, recalling that he never had never had the opportunity to discuss such matters in person. It was always over the phone or in purely academic meetings and it was very cursory.
I had never found the joy to discuss existential things amongst my peers. I once struggled to make my dad comprehend the concept of consciousness and the frailty of memory during a dark moment of mine. My father simply shrugged when I suggested that memory is tangible and when you remove that what is left of you? I asked him that and he took a second before responding “I am me.” He didn’t seem to get it and I couldn’t push the conversation any further.
My new friend, the Scientist, reveals to me his experiment: a mist that will engineer a self-cannibalism among insects using the genome of arachnids. That way, you don’t have to go with a GMF (Genetically Modified Foods) that are resistant to pesticides and other contaminants. Not to mention have it affect mosquitos and end malaria once and for all. It’s an impressive concept. He says, “I’m so close to achieving this. I can see the veil right in front of me preventing me from reaching this end goal of creation. And I feel like I just need the right tool to break through. Once we’re through, I can be content.” I ask him if insects have emotion. “Yes and no. The insect, the arachnid, all that, they have some emotions. We thought they were all about instinct. Strong conquer the weak. Social Darwinism. Perversions of Nietzschien philosophy. You know… But they have elements of self-sacrifice. Even spiders will console their young which I didn’t think was even possible several years ago.” He say’s all of this mostly to himself in an almost broken monotone. The concept seems to get to him, the idea that the mindless that seem to be at the dispense of humankind may have intelligence that is of an equal merit. He relays experiments on measurements of fear in fruit flies and how such a demonstration would prove that fear is not just an instinct in all animals but something that can be accessed by a consciousness.
My phone goes off and it’s a text from my mom. I have to reluctantly leave. It felt good to talk to a peer for once. The dinner that night was colder than usual. The room has an uncomfortable chill and reluctantly my father is forced to turn up the thermostat. Nothing is spoken amongst us while the TV is left on to provide a comforting blanket of noise.
By serendipity, the TV plays a piece on venomous spiders, specifically highlighting the Funnel Web from Australia. Dad talks out loud:
“They’re wrong you know. There’s a Brazilian spider that’s the most dangerous, and it’s a big sonofabitch the size of a dinner plate. I think that was the basis of a movie. But anyway, that spider can kill you in less than twenty minutes and they hide in bananas.” No one’s interested in his trivia; I know I’ve heard it all before. The narrator on TV continues: “And now the most dangerous spider, the Brazilian Wandering Spider.” Dad says, “See! I told you!” “Luckily, the fatalities are much lower. While it may be the most toxic, it’s not the most dangerous to humans like the Funnel Web.” Dad looks on at the TV, saying nothing and dinner soon concludes without acknowledging his quiet humiliation. Later on, I hear them go to bed in silence, sleeping at opposite ends of the king size mattress. None of this is my business but I wonder why they keep going with this illusion of happiness. There is a half-moon illuminating the dark neighborhood. There are no street lights. The stinging insect noise returns.
“Just one step at a time Closer to destiny I knew at a glance There would always be a chance for me” Lyrics to a song by How to Destroy Angels. I was late to discover music and became acquainted with it –aside from being forced to recite anthems in music class- through mostly movie soundtracks. Then one day I stumbled upon this band and felt a connection. The lyrics shut out the rest of the world and with each step I take to prepare for school I delude myself into thinking I am doing something more with my life and that better things lay ahead. Another school. Brown and white color scheme. Posters of artificial happiness line the walls next to the lockers and various trophy cases. There is a quiet misery among the students with the loudest being the most oblivious to it all. I count the hours until the day is over. Later on I’ll be counting the days until the year is over. At lunch I make the choice to eat alone as I read alone and I don’t want to interact with the rest of the animals. The girls have a plainness about them, and there’s something about braces that just doesn’t do it for me. During lunch there is a screaming match between several boys with one being called ‘Bitchfuck’ getting a resounding laugh.
It’s all a distraction within prison walls. I draw in my notebook images of falling stars and supernovas. It makes me recall that time back at my old school where a girl I was semi-interested in had her notebook fall out of her backpack behind me. When I picked it up to hand it back to her I noticed a Star of David with the phrase “KKK all the way” written on top of it. I pretended I didn’t notice.
A phrase stuck in my head: A placid hell. I make sure to write that down. At the end of school I neglect taking a bus back, it’s not too far and I find contentment in walking. It brings to mind a Nietzsche quote “Only thoughts reached by walking have value.” I think about my newfound friend or perhaps acquaintance would be a more apt description? The Scientist seems to have found his resolve, a way to make due without people. It feels right to have found this commonality with an adult twenty years my senior. I have this innate ability to befriend people older than me. The rest of the animals don’t need to know about it, lest I hear pedo or gay jokes in the halls. A sign appears in my mind as adorned above an iron cage: don’t feed the animals. I wonder if the fascists would have allowed visiting concentration camps like zoos and if they would have signs like that had they won the war.
Along broken sidewalks, more road kill and discarded toys sits in the in-between of grass and road lay the occasional emptied syringe. Here lies the endless padding of day-to-day purgatory. I decide to visit my acquaintance again. I have a thought stuck up my ass about being unable to communicate an expression until you see it in the wild; such as a missing puzzle piece being enjoined and a solution is found. There must be a single word describing this feeling.
“Sonofabitch, work!” The Scientist curses to himself at his desk, a cheap picnic table reclaimed from behind a store. “Hey,” I greet him. I subtly turn on my Wi-Fi and bittorrent program (downloading albums) before I entered the garage and sit down. My friend continues muttering to himself “Sonofabitch” in an act of protracted shame. “I’m so close and I can taste it but I just… Can’t…” He mimics reaching for a sacred yet invisible tool above and clasping and failing in that pursuit.
“What’s stopping you?” The Scientist regales the minutia of techno babble that wouldn’t be interesting to recount but the Scientist enjoys having a witness to his achievements on hand. It doesn’t make him regret forsaking creating a child. I feel bad for him and ask if he wants to come to dinner. My friend agrees before telling me that I have an old soul. The next Saturday I mention my friend to my parents and want him at our dinner. I don’t know why I invited this to happen except perhaps it’s something to break up the monotony. Plus, if I introduce him formally this could dissuade them from having kid-fucker fears. That night the meal is something ordered out, Chinese food, and my friend is fashionably late. The dialogue between them is a series of “hellos” and “That’s interesting.” Dad makes the mistake of trying to meet my friend on his level and ends up spouting the lore from some forgotten science fiction show from his youth. The Scientist lets out a mirthful grin before giving a short and impromptu lecture:
“Science is not truth but a process to uncover truth. It’s not a god you worship.” He explains calmly in a way that quietly humiliates Dad. Mom seems to be tuning out and flatly asks him what he’s trying to achieve with his experiment. “I’m trying to solve a problem.” He lectures them with an intimate knowledge of Darwinism and in particular Social Darwinism using insects as a metaphor. “Did you know that there’s a species of ants that enslave other ants and force them to work in their tunnels?” He goes on about how his pursuits may benefit humanity and solve the hunger crisis without the Orwellian decree to consume maggot larvae. There is a silence for a minute before he goads them to look up the number of articles encouraging humanity to embrace the infinite sustainability of consuming insects.
“Me? I prefer a steak.” The Scientist says with a dry smile while holding an imaginary chalice befitting the victor. “And not a human steak either.”
It was an awful dinner. I didn’t know anything the guy was talking about. I am so tired and this job transfer has not made working any easier. My wife commands me “We have to talk about our son’s friend.” She say’s this in a way like this is an order. After such a long time, after setting aside emotions for so long, I finally have had enough. I let out this repressed rage and end up overacting to the extreme with hands clenched around my screaming mouth emptying a torrent of detestation with my life and family. My significant other stares at me after uttering this truth, looking at me with disgust and an unemotional face. I tore up the bed in my tantrum.
“I want him to see a therapist. Now, clean this up.” She calmly orders before walking out of the room. Once she leaves and closes the door, I bend over on the bed and quietly cry.
I heard that in their bedroom. Not much I can do about swaying their opinion but I wonder how much of their flaws I inherited. Meeting Mom in the hallway, pretending I didn’t overhear them, she tells me the ultimatum. I don’t resist and just go along with it wanting to get on with my day without interference. I will report directly to this therapist at the end of the school day. Conveniently, her office is just a block down from the school so I can walk over and walk back home. I wonder how I can best manipulate my time so I can slink away if need be and just how proactive are the truant officers in this town? I sketch out some rudimentary plans in my notebook amongst the silence in a cold home. The next day I meet my assigned therapist. There’s no secretary. It’s unlike the caricatures of film and TV shows. No chaise lounge to lie upon and no busts of Freud as decoration. There is however a bland pop music being played.
She is a frumpy middle-aged woman in glasses. She has a face evocative of disdain and constant annoyance with everything around her. After typing for several minutes onto her laptop she asks a few brief questions:
“Do you like people?” “Have you had violent thoughts?” “Oh, I’m sorry. What is your preference? He? She? They/them?” I just stare at her in response with a blank expression that I have perfected in this moment. She judges me with an inquisitive look, very rehearsed and exaggerated for the benefit of theatrics. If I had to guess, I’d say Hannibal Lector is her big source of inspiration for entering this field. Nothing is said for over five minutes until I ask:
“When can I leave?” The therapist says nothing while typing away in their laptop containing cruel judgments. She looks away after finishing a mini essay.
“You can go. Your parents already paid me. You have to want help before we can do anything.” I pick up my backpack and leave.
It feels like an even longer walk back despite it being only a mile from home. There’s endlessness in the air. I slow my step, procrastinating in reaching my destination, inadvertently mimicking an old man who suffered a stroke and who would walk by my old neighborhood looking for bottles and cans. It wasn’t a rehearsed slow step like he is demonstrating his pain to others but an unwillingness to proceed further ahead -such as an animal on a leash.
My phone rings and it’s my parents. I choose to ignore it and the follow up text by turning off my phone. The night sky quickly approaches as fall transforms to winter. The town has few street lights and little buzz of activity, the few signs of life being the roar of trucks, that ever-lasting insect noise and the howling of far-off coyotes in the woods. The streets are bare and lack decoration or signs of life.
A man in an Oldsmobile pulls over offering a ride. I politely decline and keep on walking. The car stays for a long while on the side of the road where it first stopped until it finally moves on.
…
The sky The sky Harsh winds and plaintive clouds. As the Earth rotates, the Sun pierces the clouds blinding me for a moment. I seek food amidst the business of industry and unknowing animals. I glide among them, preying off their ignorance, and eager for their crumbs from discarded ambrosia. Between rock and steel, I search for more and more. What food I find is tainted and encourages me to continue on. I attempt entry to the grand palaces but glass walls prevent me. One smaller mammal points at me with an oblivious smile. In a corner of flowers from a pot I am lured by the sweetest scent. Among that row of flower pots is the tallest flower that which draws me to taste. I am overwhelmed with want and come to its stem with quivering legs. I attempt to climb to the top but cannot move further. One of my legs are entwined in a very fine web. The more I pull the more I am pulled back like a riptide working on behalf of the ocean’s maw. I still reach for the top of that flower, stretching my limbs to an agonizing degree, until I am exhausted and fall.
Among the web there is a black figure to its side. I know now the approach of death and seeking god in those final moments. I thrash as much as possible until my wings are gnarled and broken. The web coats me in white effervescence dripping with the remnants of dew and water. My body convulses in pain knowing it is trapped but unable to play dead in the twists my limbs have now taken. The black figure slowly crawls over unceasingly while ignoring my meager cries knowing the end is coming. I beg to let me live, there will be others after me, but the black figure continues its pursuit until it looms over me with a dark indescribable shape of limbs -resembling a black hole with fangs. I cannot beg anymore then I have. I cannot move anymore having become exhausted. I am helpless before my executioner as it grabs me in an instant and I am bitten into. The pain is horrible as I am broken and my insides are pulled away yet I remain alive to endure even more pain. My whispers for mercy are ignored as more layers of web blanket my frozen body. How I would will my brain to cease at this moment but I can only countdown until I finally expire. In my daze, I get a new view among the rows of other flowers, hanging from the web that trapped me, I am unsure if I am a trophy decoration or a warning to others to not be followed or simply part of a construction greater than my being that requires sacrifices.
…