u/BlueberryOutside0720

“They’re dead,” came a muffled voice from the other side of the kitchen door. “Do you need to come check?” 
“No!” I called back. “That’s okay!”
I would probably need a good sleep, or at least a good distraction, before I felt the need to venture back into that room. I shivered at the memory now, seeing the egg sac underneath the serving tray I was about to put away. I guessed it was my fault for leaving the tray sitting out so long after the party last week. At least it had been clean. Spiders were scarier, but they were easier to get rid of than roaches. I should probably move, make an attempt to get ready for bed or watch tv to get my mind off of it. But I found myself glued to where I had backed just outside the kitchen, remembering the gauzy white ball with tiny little eight legged creatures already beginning to crawl out. When I saw my husband coming in the front door from work, I’d almost dropped dead in relief. The baby would surely have a birthmark now; at least that’s what my mother would say. I rubbed my stomach, feeling pressure as the baby shifted around, not much room left to move. A thought occurred to me.
“Hey, honey! You got the mother, right?” I called. 
There was silence for a moment. Then, “Yes, dear. Of course.”
“Good,” I said. “I don’t think I could have slept here tonight imagining the size of the spider that could’ve laid that thing.”
“You know,” my husband replied. “You’ve really got to do something about this phobia of yours.” There was something strange in his voice. The comment, normally something he’d have said jokingly, sounded as if he were irritated with me. For asking him to kill the spiders when he’d just come home from work? For asking him at all?
“Come back out here so I can welcome you home properly!” I said sweetly, hoping my flirting would smooth it over. He probably was a little irritated, having just gotten in the door and instead of so much as a hello being rushed into the kitchen to kill a bunch of spiders. 
There were several long seconds of silence. “Tim?” 
He didn’t reply. Something in my stomach turned over. Was he messing with me? He always had gotten a kick out of playing practical jokes. Did he want me to come in there so he could jump out and scare me? Had he gone out the back door to dispose of the spider nest? I waited, listening for the sound of the back door opening and closing, rustling around, or any indication that he was still there. Nothing. 
This was ridiculous. I stomped into the living room, making sure he would hear me if he was still in there, and turned on the tv. I made sure to sit where I could see the kitchen door. There was no way I was going to be caught off guard if he tried to do something silly like throw the empty egg sac on me. I waited. But half of an episode of Jeopardy later he still hadn’t come out. 
Rolling my eyes and steeling myself, I walked back to the kitchen door and pushed it open a crack. “Tim?” I called again. The room was quiet. Stranger than that, it was dark. Why would he turn off the lights? I felt along the wall and flipped the switch. The room illuminated and I pushed the door the rest of the way open. There he was, standing at the island, his back to me. “Tim?” I could see the egg sack still in front of him, the edges visible around his narrow torso. When he didn’t respond at all, I let the door swing shut. 
“Honey?” I walked slowly, hesitantly toward him. “This isn’t funny.”
He didn’t move even a hair. I stopped cold when I realized… it didn’t even look like he was breathing. That’s when I saw it: thin, nearly invisible silver thread, coming off of his arms, his legs, his head, suspending him like a marionette. 
I began to back away, my legs threatening to go out from under me.
He spoke. “You got the mother, right?” came his voice, mocking. At least, it sounded like his voice. It wasn’t coming from his direction. Above me, in the farthest corner of my vision, crept a giant, eight legged shadow.