The Orb Spider

The Orb Spider

‘Why are you staring at me? What are you? Some kind of pervert? A stalker maybe?’

The cacophony within the school cafeteria stopped, and Danny cringed back into his isolated corner seat.

 Cat squared her stance to face him, hand on hip, one eyebrow arched. The calculated performance for her girlfriends on their lunch bench was about to begin.

Heat burned from his throat to the scalp. Right on cue, he stuttered. ‘No, I wwwasn’t st-st staring at you.’

‘So, what’s this then?’ She reached forward and snatched the sketchbook laying on the table before him.

Danny didn't retrieve the book; his eyes remained fixed on the fingers writhing in his lap. She had accused him of being a stalker. Yes, it was true—he watched her at every opportunity, but “stalker”? the word implied menace. He could never harm Cat—he loved her … or so he believed.

Catherine Jenkins had arrived three years ago when her family moved from the city to the eastern wheat-belt community. On her seventeenth birthday, a light snapped on within the girl. Overnight, she had transformed from a gangly child into a small-town beauty queen. The power to overwhelm any boy with lust was giddy stuff for the young woman, and Danny worshipped her with his pencil.

She flicked through the pages. The first half of the book contained illustrations of a powerful giant called “Titanus the Terrible”, part of a super hero series Danny had created. The second half included drawings of a wallaby and a spider, but the rest were charcoal sketches of Catherine.

‘Oh,’ she said, and her face softened.

Cat handed back the sketchbook. Her expression embarrassed as she came to terms with the flattering images of herself within the pages.

‘These are great, Danny. It’s obvious why you’ve won that scholarship to study Fine Arts next year.’ She came a little closer. ‘Hey—I’m so sorry about your mother. My mum says she was the only real friend she had since we moved here.’

#

3:30 pm and Danny walked the rural back road to his family farm. He could have taken the school bus home but preferred the solitude of walking. The eucalyptus leaves glittered in the late afternoon sunlight, illuminating a tapestry of colour along the track for him to enjoy.

The only downside to this walk was his passing the local cemetery. His mother's death six months earlier had thrown the boy into a spiral of personal recrimination. Every day the same question: why would you do that to yourself, Mum? Was it my fault?

A car approached from behind. Without turning, he sidestepped off the road to allow the vehicle to pass; instead, it pulled up beside him.

‘Hey Danny—can you use a ride?’

‘N-n-no thanks C-Catherine, I d-don’t have far to w-w-walk.’

Leaning across, she opened the door of the VW convertible—a recent birthday gift from her parents. ‘There’s something I want to talk to you about, Danny. Throw your bag in the back.’

He did as he was told and settled into the passenger seat; his world suddenly brighter for sitting beside his goddess.

She stepped on the accelerator, leaving a cloud of red dust hanging over the dirt road behind them.

Tossing him a dazzling smile, she said, ‘I love those sketches you did of me. I was wondering—could you let me have one? It would be a wonderful gift for me to give to my parents. It’s their anniversary next week.’

‘Of course; I can frame it for you. Would you like that?’

She leaned across to touch his face. ‘You’re so sweet. Thank you, that would be perfect.’

The mailbox at the end of his driveway appeared, and Cat slowed the vehicle. He took a deep breath. Now or never. ‘There’s something I want to show you. Do you have time?’ How strange. Why aren’t I stuttering?

She nodded, then followed his direction, driving to an abandoned quarry further down the road; a place they both knew well. Over the years, the pit had filled with water and grew into a popular summer destination for swimming and picnics amongst the locals.

Fired by the boundless energy of love, he vaulted out of the car and pointed up at the rounded granite dome towering above the quarry lake. ‘There, Blair’s Tower—are you feeling fit?’

‘It’s a long way up.’ She looked intrigued. ‘I haven’t been up there before.’ She laughed and took his hand. ‘Yes, why not? Lead on.’

A few minutes later, they collapsed together on the monstrous granite boulder that hung over the lake twenty metres below.

He propped himself on one elbow and made a clicking sound. ‘It’s alright, Sweetie—she won’t hurt you. Come and meet Catherine.’

‘That is totally sick,’ she whispered, when a rock wallaby approached.

Cautious at first, the wallaby became bolder when she saw the boy rummage around the back pocket of his jeans, then hold out an almond for her.

‘Hello Lilly.’ The pretty marsupial took the almond from his outstretched fingers, nibbled on the nut, and ventured closer. ‘My sweetheart,’ he said, caressing her ears. ‘Klaus! Don’t be shy. Come out and say hello.’

To Cat’s delight, a joey’s head and front paws appeared from his mother’s pouch.

‘I thought rock wallabies were extinct in our district; my dad says there’ve been none around here in decades.’

‘I spotted Lilly here three months ago. Each day I came to see her, she became more comfortable with me. Of course, the almonds were the main attraction.’

Danny pointed to the tangled wattle trees draped over the edge of the dome. ‘Look—there’s another rare creature I love to visit.’

A huge orb spider, the size of her extended hand, crouched in the middle of a two-metre-wide net. Cat screwed her face and shuddered. ‘I’m not that keen on spiders—I don’t care how endangered they are.’

‘My mum taught me about them. Can you see how beautifully crafted the web is? it’s an engineering marvel; a work of art. I’ve named her Kali—after the Hindu goddess. You know? The one with all the extra arms and legs.’

Cat remained unimpressed.

A cloud of black cockatoos crossed the sky, shrieking as they passed and the couple shielded their eyes from the western sun to watch the birds passing.

‘Rain is coming.’

‘How do you know that?’ she said.

‘That’s what they’re calling. “The rain is coming—the rain is coming”. They’re flying ahead of a front. It’s been a long dry spell and they’re excited at the prospect of rain at last.’

‘Did your mum teach you that as well?’

He nodded. He didn’t want to discuss his mother any further.

She lay back on the granite, her face bright with expectation. Taking her hand, he ran his fingers along the inside of her wrist and found a tattoo of a butterfly.

‘A birthday present from my big sister,’ she explained, and smiled into his eyes. ‘Have you ever kissed a girl, Danny?’

He stretched out beside her, and she took his hand, placing it under her blouse. Bending across, he pressed his lips against hers, delighting in the softness, as his hands wandered over her chest. She didn't object when the boy pulled her bra over her breasts and caressed them with his tongue, savouring the sweetness of her skin. Her nipples hardened, and she purred. He shook with trepidation; certain she would insist he stop—but she seemed to like it, so he ventured beneath her netball skirt and drew back her panties.

Her skin felt warm within the fur between her legs and she moaned when his fingers rifled between the soft petals. Cat panted and arched her spine against his hand. She cried out, shuddered … and suddenly it was over.

Her body went limp. Pulling his arm out, she shoved him aside, then sat up to readjust her clothing.

A few minutes later, they arrived at his family's farmhouse. She hugged him and agreed to meet at the quarry again the next day. He smiled and blew her a kiss as she drove away.

#

‘You’re late.’ Danny’s father sat at the kitchen table with Evan, the older brother, eating his dinner. Before him, Danny's meal of overcooked lamb chops lay with fat congealing around them.

‘Get lost on the way back from school?’ Evan sneered. He didn’t bother to look up from his plate.

Danny wanted to scale the walls and bellow from the rooftop like Titanus the Terrible would do. To shout out he loved the most beautiful girl in the world, and that she felt the same way about him.

He glanced at the yawning space across the table where his mother once sat and emptiness engulfed him again. She would have been happy for him—pressed him for details.

No, stop … don’t go there. He wanted to hold on to the newly found joy close to his heart a little longer.

Mumbling something about not being hungry, of homework to be done, he escaped to his bedroom.

On the wall above his computer, Danny focused on the posters he painted of Kali and Titanus. He needed to illustrate the storyline he had worked on earlier in the day, but instead, created his third super hero. “Lynx”, a feisty fair-haired beauty he dressed in corseted industrial punk style clothing. She could expose and disarm any monster with her charms. By midnight, Lynx had become an indispensable character in his series.

#

The following afternoon, Danny waited at Blair’s Tower for two hours, but Cat never showed.

‘Probably got caught up with some of those silly friends of hers,’ he told Lily, as she munched on another almond.

Darkness fell and he walked home from the quarry hating himself, so sure Cat had stayed away because of something he had said or done.

Perhaps it was the way I tried to force myself on her when we were together?

The red-hot stone behind his sternum glowed.

#

Saturday, a humid autumn day. Bush fires lent smoke to the moisture laden cumulonimbus clouds that tumbled down from the horizon, spilling across the valley to smother the wheat-belt town with a damp dark energy.

The annual agricultural show was in full swing when Danny parked his dad’s beat-up utility in the showground carpark—right next to Cat’s VW.

Screams from passengers on death defying spinning rides dominated the low calls of sheep and cattle tethered in the judging sheds. He searched for Catherine in the livestock pavilions and then moved amongst the crowds. In the main arena, little girls in plaits and riding helmets galloped their ponies over jumps twice their height.

Large drops of rain smacked his face, and thunderous hammerhead clouds growled above his head. At side-show alley, Danny pulled up short when he saw Titanus glowering at him from a convoluted mirror mounted outside the freak show tent. That’s when he heard Cat squealing and laughing. He turned away from the mirror towards the ferris wheel … and there she was, taking a seat in a gondola. Beside her was Steven Gates, one of his classmates. Well-built for his age, Steve was a solid 6’2” and captain of the school AFL team. As Danny pushed his way through the crowd towards them, the wheel turned and he stood and watched from below. Set on the edges of the revolving metal web, Steve drew Cat into his arms and locked her into a long, passionate kiss.

In five years, Catherine, trapped in a loveless marriage to this boy and pregnant with her third child, will often think of Danny; dream of how different her life could have been if she made better choices when she was seventeen. By then, he had become internationally famous with the art world at his feet—Cat never crossed his mind.

But, right now, jealous fury fanned the red-hot coal within Danny’s chest.

His shirt ripped open and his body grew fifteen metres high. Titanus the Terrible roared and watched his caustic breath send the ferris wheel gondolas swinging. Another sulphuric bellow caused the wheel to come to an abrupt halt as the metal struts began to bubble and twist.

Kali crouched in the centre of the steel net—her glaring eyes were the size of saucers. He raised his arms in abeyance to her. Titanus’ body grew even higher, mightier, and Kali, the goddess of death, granted his request. Knowing this power would come at a price, Danny hesitated, then a delicious surge of malevolence raged through his veins. Hatred, infinitely more potent than love or grief, consumed his heart and mind. Abruptly, he dropped his hands. Kali bared her fangs and shrieked. The storm hurled a bolt of lightning, exploding the top of the wheel from where Cat and Steve fell into the heavy rain; their bodies plummeted down like flaming mannikins.

There was no need for Danny to watch them hit the ground. Instead, he turned and walked towards the car park. The exhilaration and power which had electrified him only a few seconds earlier drained away, leaving him shaken within a shroud of deepening darkness. He leaned against the hood of his father’s ute and retched.

‘Danny—are you OK?’ Mrs Jenkins appeared out of nowhere and took his arm.

His legs buckled and she held him against the side of the vehicle with her shoulder so he wouldn’t fall. He wondered how she could be so worried about the person who had just murdered her daughter.

‘Oh, you poor darling, you’ve been having a seizure—I saw you over there by the ferris wheel, you could barely stand. Have you taken your medication today?’ She looked so sad.

‘No,’ he mumbled. ‘I’ll go home and take it now.’

‘Are you able to drive? I don’t mind running you up to your place—it’s no trouble.’

‘No, I’ll be fine,’ he insisted. Extracting himself from her concern, he opened the car door and she released his arm … reluctantly.

Behind the steering wheel, Danny glanced at his reflection.

Murdering two people has taken it out of me; my face has turned a grey-green colour.

He strained his head around and peered through blood-shot eyes through the rear window at the crowds. The thunder storm had passed as quickly as it struck, and the ferris wheel had resumed its revolution.

I can’t see any signs of panic over there—no police or ambulance sirens. Did I imagine it all? Either way, Cat is dead to me now.

Starting the engine, he wound down the window to allow the damp air to refresh his sweating face.

#

The door of the ute left to hang open, Danny staggered towards the slope leading to Blair’s Tower. The granite, slick from the rain, turned his climb into a slippery scramble. He slid sideways, cutting his fingers as they slipped against the wet rock. Blood mixed with the rain and the tears, leaving a crimson trail, as he clawed his way on hands and knees to reach the dome where he collapsed panting onto the smooth stone.

The rock wallaby joey skittered frantic circles around him and Danny pulled himself back to his feet.

'Lilly!'

She lay dead, left of the summit. Dropping to his knees, he placed his palms against her side; still warm, a single bullet wound through the head. He threw his head back and howled aloud then covered his face with his hands, as tears coursed down his cheeks.

I did this. This is my fault. I made her tame. Instead of hiding when she heard a car arrive, she revealed herself at the top and became target practice to some gun happy jock below.

The boy stood and walked to the ledge of the dome where Kali’s web had once been suspended between the wattles. The wattles were broken and the storm had torn her net away, leaving only a few tangled skeins dangling towards the water.

Balanced on the edge of the rock, he raised his eyes to the sky and pleaded.

Mum, please—help me. I can't live with the pain anymore. Is this the way you felt? Was it this that made you leave?

He waited a moment, listening intently to the wind and empty sky.

That’s it then—there’s nothing left for me here.

 Looking down, he wondered whether he would hit the granite boulders first, or the water—it really didn’t matter.

As he rocked on the balls of his feet, a breath of air touched his face. It reminded him of his mother; how she used to brush the hair out of his eyes, so gently, with the back of her hand.

A tiny movement on the periphery of his sight caught his attention. Kali had reappeared on a tattered branch of wattle. She attached a sticky thread beneath the lip of the ledge to the right of where he stood. From there, she hurled her body into space, sending another line of silk to a jagged edge three metres across the open rim of stone. Danny watched, fascinated, as the orb spider repeated this feat several times until the skeletal frame of her new web had taken shape, twice the size of the original.

Something soft and wet touched his left leg, and he looked down to see Klaus standing close to his foot, shivering.

Stepping from the ledge, he took off his shirt and threw it over the joey’s head, then collected him against his chest, folding the cloth back to uncover his eyes and ears.

‘It’s just you and me, mate. I'll return you here when you've grown big and strong. For now, I reckon your mum and mine would want us to look out for each other.’ Danny gently scratched behind Klaus’ ears. 'If Kali can rebuild her life again from scratch, then so can we.'

The End