Broken Lies

Sitting for a moment on their padded porch swing, he carefully prepared his cigar with a few licks of his tongue. Satisfied, he let the lighter toast the end until it began to glow brightly red. He took a couple of puffs, watching thick trails of smoke wisp away in the gentle breeze. Thoughtfully he stared at the wrapper, noticing the hand-made art of skillfully wrapped tobacco leaves. While studying its lines and folds, and the various shades of brown, his eyes fastened upon his wedding ring, quickly shifting his focus.

Chase fingered the ring with his right index and thumb, twisting it slowly back and forth, reflectively. He sighed deeply, thinking of the how-to marriage books he had faithfully skimmed and the attempted alterations that never seemed to last, frustrated at his feeble attempts to be someone he knew he couldn’t be. He let go of the ring, took another puff, and rubbed his eyes wearily with his hand. The pepper tree in view held several crows that appeared to be in turmoil. One of them, probably a female he smirked, appeared to be territorial with the others, squawking at them as she flew from branch to branch. He felt pity for the rest since he considered they had no idea what she wanted, or perhaps they may have but didn’t care. Regardless of their instinctual understanding, the apparent leader won its rights as the others fled to the safety of a nearby telephone line on the side of the house.

Chase looked down at the burning cigar in his hand, caressing it with his thumb. His eyes drifted toward the yard. The flower bed which needed watering. Two small trees begging for a trim. A little play area for Amy and Ryan which held an outdated structure of wood with a plastic ladder and slide, and three small swings, still dirty from the previous rains. He knew outside maintenance to be his unspoken area of responsibility, but he never seemed to have time. He cared about it. He wanted to provide a neatly manicured lawn. It’s just that... His mind drifted. He forced himself to concentrate entirely on the flavor of his cigar.

Suddenly he noticed something that sent chills coursing down his spine. He had been staring at the increasing size of the cigar’s ash when it caught his eye: the silky threads of a giant spider web attached to the side of his swing, near his right hip. He sat frozen, staring at the oddity, fearful of moving away from it. His eyes arched upward and observed the web stretched taut between where he sat and the posts supporting the patio structure.

Chase’s head jerked backward in terror when he saw, near the outer edge of the web, a hideous, man-sized, black widow busying herself with intention, her long front legs flying to and fro, undeterred. Not until she scuttled away, her spinnerets weaving a solid strand of silk and securing it firmly to a post did Chase realize what he'd been watching. Something struggled helplessly in the center of the web, bound by sticky threads, some of which stretched to the perimeter of the web, anchoring the creature securely to it.

The huge black widow had been wrapping her prey. Staring at the spider's bound victim, Chase realized with a start that the face looking imploringly back at him was none other than his own! A drawn, malnourished, ashen face, with wide, panic-stricken eyes and a tight mouth attempting to form words.

The spider mercilessly returned and crouched over its prey. He was trapped. Chase watched in horror at the widow’s next inevitable move, her victim feeling powerless against such an indomitable enemy. A scream formed in his throat. Nothing came out. His head jarred back, nearly hitting the stucco of the house, his eyes startled by the appearance of huge fingers sweeping though the web to release the spider’s prey. Chase viewed with utter amazement his body jerk violently upward by the prodigious hand. He was set free!

Then, just as furiously, descriptive words rushed toward his face from the still visible web of the spider. It appeared to be some sort of a three-dimensional vision occurring right before him a second time, his body now rescued from its captor but partially wrapped with broken fibers of the webbing. Letters of the alphabet spun tauntingly, suddenly disintegrated, and then returned full force as complete words, zooming in upon him: vulnerability, touch, abandonment, anger, pride. One at a time they came at him with heightened speed and then vanished just as rapidly.

“What on earth is going on?!” he questioned himself, sitting as erect as he could in the motionless swing, knowing that he didn’t have an answer.

“It’s the lies you’ve always believed about yourself.”

Rattled by his own voice, Chase screamed, “What?! These are lies about myself?!” As soon as he asked, he knew it to be true, that somehow four or five, maybe six lifetime lies jumping out of the spider’s web beneath him were his. Instantly he perceived that he had been victimized, ensnared by personal, self-accepted lies being exposed before his very eyes.

“But what do I do now?”

“Watch me,” came his voice in return.

“Watch who?! Watch what?!” he called out to the tree before him. “I’m talking to myself!”

Chase snapped out of his state, quickly looking for tangible signs of the event, his head turning back and forth to see a spider, a web...anything. He saw nothing.

His eyes studied his hip where the web had formed just inches next to him, more chills running down his back. Perspiration stained the armpits of his shirt. Chase wiped his brow and sat in silence, trembling, heart still pounding.

(From pages 85 - 89)