Itsy-Bitsy Spider

by Dale Mayer

“But back then you did.” She gave a bitter smile. “Your sister?”

  “My sister would never do that.” But a note of doubt was in his voice.

  “Your sister is a bitch. You and I both know that. If she had a chance to screw me over, she would have in a heartbeat.”

  “But not to steal from me,” he said. “She’d never do that.”

  “Maybe she would. Maybe she wouldn’t. I don’t know,” Queenie said. “But when I think back to what that twenty grand would have done for keeping me healthy and keeping your son healthy …” She shook her head. “That just pisses me right off.”

  “Not to mention, where is that twenty grand now?” He tried to think back five, six years, but it was such a jumble. There had been so much pain at the time. “I’ll have to check my records,” he said quietly, “and see what happened.”

  “It doesn’t matter what happened. As far as I’m concerned, your family is behind it.”

  “That was always your answer,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean it’s the truth.”

  She waved her hand at him. “Can I get you to drive me back home please?”

  He nodded, unlocked the door so she could get into his car. When they were inside, buckled up, he said, “What are you doing this afternoon?”

  “A thousand-plus spiders are in my living room. My priority right now is finding my son. All my friends at the amusement park have a path forward. I need to research these spiders and figure out where they came from.”

  “And I need to visit the hospital and figure out what happened when you were admitted.”

  “That would be nice,” she said bitterly. “Because I sure as hell didn’t do anything wrong. We have to find Reese.”

  “You can’t get any images from here? Do you want to speak with your doctor?”

  She thought about it for a long moment, her head tilted to the side as she studied him. “I think that’s probably a good idea. But not yet. I need to know what questions to ask him first. If I go in there right now, he’ll just see me as the same crazy woman so grief-stricken that she still doesn’t make any sense. I can’t have that happen again.”

  “Understood.” He drove her to her apartment. “It sounds like we have a lot to make up for.”

  “No, we don’t. Our history is over. You can’t ever go back.” Her voice was calm but very definite.

  “True, but we’re past that already. It’s time to move forward.”

  “I wonder if we can,” she said, her voice suddenly very, very tired.

  Just when he was about to pull into her apartment parking lot, she bolted upright.

  He glanced over at her. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said quietly. “But something … something is off.”

  “In what way?”

  She shook her head. As soon as he brought the vehicle to a halt, she raced out and up to her apartment. He wasn’t far behind. She unlocked the door and ran into her living room, Kirk still following. They both stopped.

  Not only were the same spiders still here, but now there were one hundred times more.

  He shut the door behind him and stared at the walls that were alive. He had to admit it was a pretty creepy feeling. He turned to look at her. Instead of being shocked or frightened, she was enthralled.

  “They’re still coming. He’s sending out more and more for me.”

  “Well then, it’s time you contact our son and figure out how to send signals back,” he said. “Because these spiders can’t just keep coming. At some point somebody will notice, and then the shit will hit the fan.”

  “They’ll kill them, won’t they?”

  He nodded. “They so will.”

  She shook her head. “They can’t be allowed to.”

  “Because each one might know a little bit about our son?” he said. “You have to get past that. You have to contact them and tell them to lead you back to him.”

  She stared at him for a long moment, then dropped to sit cross-legged on the floor. Before he could say anything, she cried out, “Stefan, help me.”

  *

  Stefan heard her calling, but he was painting. He kept putting up a block to hold her back until he could finish the work. That was one thing about creativity in art; when he was in the mood, he had to release it fully and let it go. He couldn’t paint when he wasn’t in the mood. When he was in the mood, he had to honor it.

  He stroked along the top of the canvas and over on the left. He wasn’t sure what he was painting, but it was important. The strokes slashed and burned across his canvas. Reds, blacks, greens. His arm was in charge.

  Wait a minute, he said firmly.

  He could sense the waves of her emotions coming toward him. When people became so emotional that words failed them, their emotions came on stronger and stronger.

  Finally his arm dropped to his side. With a heavy sigh he straightened his back, put down his palette, walked to the sink, rinsed his brush and then his hands. As soon as he had cleaned up, he stretched for a few moments and walked out of his studio without even looking at the painting. It wasn’t going anywhere, and it wouldn’t change until he came back and did more to it. He knew instinctively it wasn’t done. He also had no clue what was happening with his painting.

  He walked out in the kitchen, made himself a cup of tea, deliberately making Queenie wait. There wasn’t a sense of urgency as much as there was anger and frustration. With his tea steeping, he walked to the center of his meditation room, placed his tray down on the small table and sank down on a cushion. Now what is it?

  Thousands of spiders are in my apartment.

  She was calmer, as if the extra few minutes he’d required had helped her to quiet down, knowing he was coming.

  How do I stop them? Somebody will notice, and they’re all be killed.

  He thought about that for a long moment and said, That’s quite possible, yes. Maybe tell them all to go back to the little boy. At least that way we might have a chance of finding a house that’s overwhelmed with spiders.

  But they could get killed that way too.

  You aren’t going to save them all, he said gently. Tell them to return to the little boy and to protect him.

  That little boy is my son. Her voice was hard, determined.

  Stefan worried on that for a long moment, then finally said, Did you find a way to identify where he is?

  I couldn’t see a street sign. I couldn’t even see the outside of the house properly. I kept getting sucked back into the tunnel.

  I know how that is, he said with feeling. I’ve been there several times.

  There’s got to be some way to track him down.

  Is Kirk helping?

  Yes, he dropped me off. I told him to leave. Then I tried to contact you.

  I suggest you send out another wave of love and tell them all to go home, that you got the message.

  I don’t think it’s enough. I think the second wave came with a new message.

  What message? he asked sharply.

  I think he’s in trouble. I think he’s in danger, she cried out. I tried to open up the connection, but I can’t.

  What kind of connection? Describe it.

  Like a tunnel with a door at either end, she said. There’s just a wall on the other side. I figured that was proof he had died. But now I’m looking closer, and the wall is blocks, like somebody has bricked it up.

  Can you knock down the bricks?

  I haven’t tried. Will that hurt him? she asked hesitantly.

  Stefan thought about it for a long moment. I can’t say definitively that it won’t hurt him because I don’t know how much of his energy is connected to that brick wall. But I think you have to get through it somehow. So maybe instead of trying to use force, use love.

  How do I do that?

  Stefan reached up and pinched his nose. It’s different for everyone. What really matters is the space you’re in when you attempt to do it. Come from a position of love and ask for the wall to disappear. For
all you know, it will just dissolve in front of you.

  I won’t be so lucky, she said sadly. I’ve never been that lucky.

  Don’t sell yourself short, he said. You’re very talented. And so is your son. If he understands you’re on the other side, he’s likely to blast through it himself.

  Could somebody else have put that wall there?

  I haven’t heard of it happening, but I’m not going to say no. If somebody understood you two were connected on a psychic wavelength, they would do anything they could to break it. Did you see any sign of his adoptive family?

  No, I haven’t.

  You might want to revisit that house. Tell your son that you’re coming for him. Give him some reassurance he’s not alone and you’re there for him. And tell him to open the door.

  There was a sudden snick in the conversation. She’d shut it down. He sat there frowning for a long moment before he reached out and poured his tea. Maddy, are you there?

  Her voice was hurried, busy, as she responded, Always. What’s up?

  He filled her in on Queenie’s situation.

  Interesting, she said. I’ve got to tell you. I’ve also been checking on Brian Callahan. I feel there’s something very bizarre going on.

  What do you mean?

  He was definitely being poisoned. His health is improving now. I think we can pull him through it, as long as we keep the poison away.

  Can you tell who poisoned him?

  I thought for sure it’d be somebody at work. But, when I checked in on him this morning, the poison is back again.

  But he is only there with his wife and daughter, right?

  Exactly, Maddy said, her throat clogged with tears. But I swear to God, I would have bet my reputation, everything I know, that it wasn’t either of them.

  It’s possible it isn’t either of them, Stefan said slowly, not liking the direction of his thoughts.

  I don’t see how it can be anybody else.

  I’ll get back to you. He had a very good idea of how this was happening. But, if that were the case, how many others were involved in something like this?

  Needing to know Queenie was okay, he opened a quick window into her world and stepped into her living room. He paused in amazement, seeing the thousands of spiders clinging to the walls, ceilings, furniture and floor. They were all over her apartment, moving, shifting, and yet she sat cross-legged in the middle of the floor. He could see her silver cord as she traveled a long way away.

  Making an instant decision, he dove down into the sheath around her cord and followed it as far and as fast as he could. If she couldn’t pick up something, maybe he could. There had to be one problem they could solve, and, for all he knew, maybe both problems were connected.

  *

  What the hell was she up to now? David frowned, staring at the apartment. He hadn’t been able to leave her alone. He’d been checking in on her constantly today. Something was moving in her world, and he didn’t get it. He kept blinking as if something in his vision stopped him from seeing what he should be seeing. He didn’t like it. He hated it when other people could do things he couldn’t do. He stared as she sat on the living room floor, completely surrounded in something that shifted and moved, and he wondered what he’d done. Was he adapting his skills to seeing something inside her body? He couldn’t figure it out. Getting a headache, he pulled back, until he thought he saw something else. He zoomed in to see her holding a small picture in her hand.

  He twisted around to see what it was. When he recognized the image, he said, “Well, well, well. Now this will get very interesting.”

  And chuckling softly to himself, he pulled back into his world. He hadn’t expected this to happen. But this was good. This was really good. Now to see if he could screw up a few more lives.

  Chapter 16

  Sunday, Late Afternoon …

  Queenie was trying to hold her energy just outside the house. But every time she blinked and tried to focus, the house wavered in front of her. It was two stories tall with a peaked roof and had a veranda on the front of it. There were a million houses like this one all over the world. But this one she kept coming back to.

  She turned to look behind her to see if either of the other houses were exceptional in any way. They both had the same dilapidated look to them. But this one, across the street, she swore was the one she’d been in before. Moving as slowly as she could, she drifted closer. She didn’t even know what form she was in. She thought she was in the middle of a vision, yet she was directing this one, and that had never happened before. Normally she was carried by the vision instead. And she also had a sense of not being alone, and that was freaky. She wasn’t sure if it was David, the Watcher guy, who could see into her world, because, if he could see into this, everything she knew was being blown right out of the water.

  Was that because Reese was here? She slipped up to the edge of the wall. No house numbers were on the building, and that frustrated her. If she had an address, she could track him down. Knowing her time here was very short, she moved around the house, looking for anything to see if it was her son’s prison.

  The door opened suddenly, and a stranger stepped out. Big and blustery, but she’d never seen him before. “Maggie, come on. Let’s go,” he roared.

  “I’m coming. I’m coming.” A frumpy middle-aged woman stepped up beside him. “What about the boy?”

  “Leave him. It’ll do him some good.”

  Maggie chewed on her bottom lip. “He’s been sickly,” she argued. “I don’t think we should leave him that long.”

  The big man grabbed her arm and tugged her toward the garage. “We aren’t going to be long. Just a couple hours.”

  But the woman protested as he tried to drag her unhappily in the direction he wanted to go. “You said that last time, and we stayed out overnight.”

  “So what? The kid should grow up strong.”

  “He’s just a baby,” Maggie protested.

  But the big man squeezed her arm until she cried out in pain. “I don’t care how old he is,” he growled. “The kid’s a pain in the ass.”

  “He is not,” Maggie said quietly.

  “Ha. Don’t you start turning all high and mighty on me now. You’re responsible for that kid being as much of a loser as you are.”

  Queenie lost the sound of their voices as she stepped through the open door before Maggie had shut it behind her. Once inside, she drifted through the upstairs of the house, searching, and then she headed to the basement. She had to go under the crack in the door and downstairs, and, sure enough, there was the little boy. She had no proof, but she couldn’t stop thinking it was Reese curled up on that bad. But he wasn’t sleeping. She drifted toward him and wrapped her arms around him. Against his ear, she whispered, It’s me, honey. It’s Mommy.

  He opened his eyes and looked around, sniffling slightly. Are you here to save me?

  I’m here to find out where you are. Do you know your address? Do you know your phone number? Is there anything that will help me find you?

  No. He sat up and looked around. I can’t see you.

  She squeezed him with all her might.

  He smiled and laughed. That tickles. I don’t want to be here no more, he said. Can you take me home?

  We’re working on it, she promised. You stay positive and don’t let them know anything about us, okay?

  He waved his hand. I won’t.

  Do you know what school you go to?

  He shook his head unhappily. They said I couldn’t go to school yet.

  She looked around, frantic for any sign of where he was. Do you know a doctor you’ve gone to see? Or a store you’ve been in? A mall?

  Milestone Mall, he called out happily.

  She could feel her energy dissipating, sucking backward in time. She called out, I’ll be back, this time with help.

  He cried out, “Mommy.” And then he burst into tears and collapsed back down.

  That was the last sight she saw. She slammed bac
k into her body. As soon as she opened her eyes to her living room, she burst into tears herself. She snatched her phone and called Kirk.

  “Milestone Mall. He said he’s been to Milestone Mall. I have an image of the house, but there’s no house number, and I couldn’t see a street sign. Somebody named Maggie lives there. Her husband or partner is a big blustery man, and he hurt her when she didn’t want to leave Reese home alone.”

  She knew her rambling words were fast and atop themselves, but she couldn’t help herself. As she shook all over, she realized the spiders were wrapping around her tighter and tighter again, holding her close. She took several deep breaths, trying to calm down. The more upset she became, the more agitated the spiders became.

  To the empty room around her, she whispered, “I’m all right. Thank you. I’m all right.”

  A warm pinkish-lavender breeze wafted around her, bringing a smile to her heart and to her lips.

  “Who are you talking to?” Kirk snapped in her ear.

  She gave him a soft chuckle. “The spiders. They understood how upset I was. They’ve wrapped around me again like a blanket, but it’s like a metal jacket, and I can hardly move.”

  “Jesus,” he breathed out. “I’m doing a search for Milestone Mall. There’s one just out of town.”

  She washed the spiders in a loving rain until they relaxed. Moving slowly she got to her feet, the spiders forming and reforming around her. “Where? Where is it?”

  “Calm down. I’m figuring out what we’ve got here. We’re also doing a house search for somebody named Maggie.”

  “That doesn’t matter,” she said. “Maggie could be Margaret. It could be any number of iterations, and, because of the type of guy he is, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if her name wasn’t even on the deed.”

  “Or they could be renting,” he said. “It would take us days to drive up and down all those roads, looking for him. Did you see the car?”

  She thought about it. “No. When they went into the garage, I went down to see Reese.”

  “Milestone Mall is a small mall within Snohomish County,” he said. “Just a little strip mall on the outskirts.”

  “Well, he’s not very far away from that,” she said in excitement. “There’s got to be a way to find him.”