Confessions

My name is Clara, and I have a confession to make. Do you want the good news or the bad news first? The good news is, I will not kill you. The bad news is, I have killed many others and will continue to do so, as this is how I survive. You see, I am a hybrid human. I was created in a lab and escaped. I am part human, part Latrodectus Mactans or a Southern Black Widow. No, I am not quite like Spider-Man. I don’t have superpowers. But I do like to eat something other than processed foods.

Why am I telling you this now? Because last night was Halloween and I did something I had sworn I wouldn’t do. I took somebody’s baby. I’m not sure what to do with her now. No, I can’t give her back. I liquified her mother.

Maybe I should back up a little. I have a large plot of land. My main lair…or house, is set back from the road so that no one ever goes back there or hears the screams. On Halloween, I decorate the front of the property, including the old guard shack. I spin all of my web, put out fresh bodies wrapped in my strongest silk, and mix them in with other animatronics so that when they wiggle and writhe, no one thinks twice. I love the effect! 

I make sure I cover their faces completely so no one can identify any missing persons, but I give them the ability to breathe. I remove their tongues and snip their vocal chords so there wouldn’t be any live humans screaming, just screaming from the recording I play from the guard shack. It’s all mixed with the people I recorded in my basement. How amazing is that? You don’t look impressed.

I always “dress” as a Black Widow Spider. I allow my legs to come out and only cover myself enough to be decent in front of children. Everyone thinks I have the best spider costume! It feels so good to show off my black, shiny body and natural red hourglass marking. I enjoy watching the children come up to get their treats. It also gives me a chance to see who the parents are that need to disappear in the near future, if you know what I mean. There are also a handful of transients that come through the area. We’ll touch on that in a minute.

I give out something very special on Halloween. Cotton candy. As you can imagine, I enjoy spinning webs, so of course I had to spin cotton candy. The kids love it! It reminds them of the state fair. I only give them enough to walk down the road to the next neighbor, which is about a block away. I keep other small treats in case the parents aren’t fond of their children getting pure sugar.

What is so special about cotton candy? I have a particular batch just for the lonely wanderers or the transients, as I mentioned earlier. I have it pre-spun and put it in tiny bags. In it, I have mixed in some of my very own web. If you don’t know, a Black Widow’s web can be five times stronger than steel. That is why the scientists were trying to humanize our web making ability. They wanted our resources. 

Anyway, imagine eating some lovely cotton candy, letting it melt in your mouth and then realizing your mouth will not open. You can’t scream, you can barely breathe, you panic. Kind of fun, right? No? I’m sorry. It’s fun for me. When that person runs up to me motioning for help, I leap onto them, spin a tight web around them, and throw them in the pile of animatronics. The web in their mouth holds until at least the end of the night when the trick or treaters stop and I can get them back to the basement. 

Are you ok? You look pale. Don’t worry. I said I would not kill you. I am protected by this confessional, right? Good.

Back to last night. What I didn’t realize with the last visitor of the night was, she wasn’t alone. I gave her a little bag of cotton candy and we had a lovely chat before she started picking at it. I almost felt bad that I was going to melt her with digestive juices and suck her up later. She mentioned her teeth must not have been very clean because they were sticking together. Finally, when her mouth was successfully encapsulated in web, I grabbed her in my legs. The problem was, I felt something move on her chest. My first thought was maybe she was special in some way, like I am. When I peeled back her layers of clothing, I saw she had a beautiful baby girl strapped into a harness on her chest. Can you imagine!

I laid the baby on her mom’s jacket on the ground while I finished wrapping her mother in a web, then I took the baby up to the house. It was getting too chilly for her to be outside. Since her onesie was wet, I took it off. That’s when I saw the bruises. The precious little child had bruises all over her chubby little arms and legs. I could barely contain my rage. I put her in an open chest full of blankets so she wouldn’t roll off of a bed. Obviously, I don’t have a crib just lying around. She fell right asleep. Since I felt she was safe, I went out to collect her mother.

I didn’t ask questions of the baby’s mom. She couldn’t have answered, anyway. I didn’t wait until I got her up to the house. I sank my fangs into her neck and injected her with venom. Watching her squirm in pain as her insides liquified made me feel like I was getting some revenge for the pretty little baby at the house. Once she stopped moving and felt squishy. Yes, squishy. Like a sack of oatmeal. I sucked her up, rolled her skin up tight in more webbing and took it up to the house with the other couple I caught last night and my animatronics.

Once everyone was hung in the basement, I went to tend to the baby. She seemed healthy enough. I gave her a warm bath. Her weight was good. Her eyes were bright. I got her to eat some applesauce, and she grabbed some Cheerios with her chubby little fists. I guess other than the bruises; she was probably okay, but how am I to know?

So the question remains, what do I do with the baby? Do I try to raise her as my own, given my condition? Or do I put her out there and hope she will be raised right in a broken system or hopefully adopted by a good family? It would be nice to have someone to go on adventures with and travel with when she is older. Of course, she would have to be home-schooled.

So what do you think? Yes, I guess I would have to worry about her having a social life and eventually sharing my secret. But don’t you think if I raise her with love she will keep that secret? Oh, yes I guess the killing part is an issue. Well, Mama needs to eat! Speaking of which, all this talk has made me a little hungry which is weird. I don’t usually eat right away after a meal. So tell me, are you expecting anyone else today, Father?