My spider hunter

If B had woken up between 7:50am and 8:30 yesterday morning, he would have found a pair of big blue eyes two inches away, expectantly staring at him. By placing my head mere inches away from him and staring, staring, staring, I willed him to wake up and come play with me, drink coffee with me, start our day. It didn’t work. And finally the longing for coffee pulled me out of bed. Knowing B was tired, I just didn’t have the heart to wake him.

So, I made coffee, plopped on the couch in my usual spot and flipped open the computer…do do do do, just reading the paper, checking my email…and all of a sudden, from somewhere underneath the blanket crawled a nasty, fat, black spider. He headed up the back cushion. I gasped, jumped up, and fought the urge to yell for B all at once. Having lived alone for a long time, I do kill my own spiders, thank you very much. I lunged for a sandal and came back to the couch, pulled up the cushion, and of course the thing is gone. Just as quickly as it came. Gone.

No sirree was I going to return to the couch; I moved to the chair across the room. A few minutes later, B comes into the living room, yawning. He looks around, slightly confused. Where was I? Not in my usual spot?

“Uh, what’s going on?” he asked when he saw me.

“Well…there’s a nasty spider over there somewhere in the couch.”

“So you’re never going to sit there again?”

“No, maybe not!”

Without skipping a beat, he went to the couch and pulled out all the cushions. There was B in his underwear digging through the nooks and crannies of our sofa sleeper. Next thing I know he’s got a flashlight. “Really, babe, it’s OK. I’ll get you some coffee.” He’s silent. Rubs his eyes. Keeps looking. Nothing.

Leaving everything amiss (sofa sleeper pulled out), we eventually left to go for a walk. When we returned I intended to put the couch back, but B said he had an idea for finding the spider and that he’d be back. He walked outside and up to his car. Huh?! What the heck? Is he going somewhere? Spider bait of some sort? What could he possibly have in his car to help in this situation? He comes back with a long, skinny metal tool that my dad gave the boys for Christmas last year. At the end of this tool is a little circular mirror. When the boys pulled this out of their stockings, they acted as though this was the greatest thing ever. Like at some point in the near future, they were going to be hiding in a sewer and would need to extend this metal thing up above their heads with the mirror above ground to see if it was safe to come out. I didn’t get it. But now here B was with his special tool, suddenly using it to find a spider in our sofa sleeper. “Ok, babe, really, it’s OK, you need to get going to work. I promise I’ll sit there again.” Silence. He keeps looking. Mirror here. Mirror there. I go to start some laundry.

“Babe?” he yells.

“Yes?”

“Was it hairy?”

“I don’t know and what does it matter?"

“I see something but can’t tell if it’s a thread or a hairy leg, but…it’s not moving.”

“Yeah, I don’t think it was hairy. Forget the stupid spider. It’s OK. Really.”

At this point, I’ve lost all hope of finding the spider and am fully prepared to wake up the next morning with a sick spider bite somewhere on my body.

And suddenly I hear a loud “AH HA!” I round the hallway corner, and there’s my grinning knight with his shining metal mirror tool slowly standing up with a wadded-up paper towel. I smiled; his persistence and patience paid off again. I gave up hours ago. I went to kiss him.

But then he says, “I thought we were talking like tarantula.”

“No,” I said, thinking maybe I should take the kiss back. And maybe if it was the size of a tarantula he would have found it sooner. “Tarantulas are hairy. I said it wasn’t hairy! And I also told you that you could stop looking a long time ago!!”

:) I love my spider hunter.