Spider

She’s small for her age, about 8 years old with the build of a 5 year old. Quiet, intelligent. She knew more than most children do at her age, things like caution, watchfulness. Wise beyond her years, you might say.
You also might say it’s ironic that the local doctor, a kind but nervous old man, said she was impaired.
He said this because she almost never spoke, and never slept.
He labeled her with some disorder and since the mother didn’t want to send her to a special school for children with disorders, he gave her material so that she could home school her.
The people in town talked about her. Some said she was crazy. But others doubted this, she was so young, could a person be insane at that age?
Old Mrs. Crocker insisted she was possessed.
But really, they knew nothing except that she was different, too smart.

She looked out across the yard, sitting on a rickety old swing on her front porch. She was silent, her gray eyes, though thoughtful, were quick to register anything that happened. She watched a dragonfly make its leisurely way through the misty air, the dim light obscuring her vision.
She suddenly heard something and got up, facing the door. A few seconds later her mother came out, sweetly saying Come in, Come in, dear.
She doesn’t want to come in.
She made known this fact and tried to run away. The mother grabbed her, and tickled her.
The little girl didn’t laugh. Apparently she wasn’t not ticklish, but she smiled an empty smile.
She went up the rickety stairs. The last step creaked. She lifted her foot quickly on this step.
She walked solemnly into her room and locks the door. Then she sat on the bed, a thoughtful look in her eyes. It makes one wonder what she’s thinking about. It must be worthwhile; she focuses on it constantly.
Then, softly, indistinctly, she began to sing.
"The itsy bitsy spider climbed up the waterspout."
The mother came in the room. The girl was silent for a moment, then resumed singing.
"Down came the rain and washed the spider out.
Out came the sun and dried up all the rain."
Smiling, the mother joined in on the last verse.
"And the itsy bitsy spider climbed up the spout again."
Dangling her feet over the edge of her bed, the little girl watched her mother, silently.
“You never sing,” she commented gently. “You have a beautiful voice.”
The girl just stared. Then something struck her fancy and she smiled, briefly and brightly as a ray of sun on the dark shadows of her placid face.
This makes the mother smile, which turned into a clear, ringing laugh.
The girl just gazes, her eyes alert. This made the mother uncomfortable and she leaves.
It was night. The rain fell down in luminescent sheets outside the windows, pattering on the sills and panes. Occasionally a rumble of thunder broke the ominous silence that permeated the house.
The little girl sits up in bed, waiting, paralyzed in fear. She was so tired, though. It was an unfamiliar feeling. She tried drinking her glass of iced tea, but for some reason it only made her more tired. Her mother was downstairs, finishing a bottle of cheap wine.
Suddenly she heard that traitorous creaky step and focused her eyes on the door, terrified.
It had come again, it happened every night.
The door creaks open.
The itsy bitsy spider climbed up the water spout.
In the doorway was a figure in a long white nightgown that was once white, now a dingy gray, holding a rope. The face is pallid, eyes set with rage. Not righteous anger, but the fury seen in a lunatics eyes.
She tried to stay awake-why was she so tired? – and said groggily
“You don’t want to kill me.”
“Yes.” Was all the figure said.
“HE won’t love you if you kill me.”
“Never loved me nor you...”
“Did too, I’ll tell him...”
She was stalling, she groped around, hoping...
Found it.
She opened the old black photograph album, fatigue making her hands clumsy.
“Look.”
It was a picture of a soldier in uniform, saluting hard, face set. Desperately trying to stay strong, not cry.
The figure grabbed the picture and ripped it, cleanly down the middle.
“Oh, you killed him.” She said faintly and vaguely saw the pain on the face of the figure as she fell asleep.
She woke up numb.
She hazily thought she had brought ice cubes to bed with her to stay awake.
Then she realized with horror that she was facedown in a tub of icy cold water.
Suddenly she was assaulted with a freezing spray of water, so cold she halfway thought is was burning her.
Someone had turned on the shower.
Crying, it was so cold, and suddenly her head went under, someone was pushing her down, her wet nightgown clung to her.
She fought to surface, she wanted desperately to breathe and couldn’t.
Down came the rain and washed the spider out.

She has an 106 degree fever and lives her days in wild nightmares. Her face was blue, and she shivered and burned up.
The phone rang and she couldn’t answer.
Dark shadowy whirlpools
Blinding light
Heat, faintly
Immense, wretched cold
Ringing ringing
Maddening
She smashed the phone against the wall. She hazily felt fear when she saw the sparks flying.

Her mother was by her bedside.
“All better.” She said. She smiled comfortingly, but her eyes were worried.
She left and said “It’s midafternoon, but get some rest. I’m taking a nap myself.”
She got out of bed on weak legs. Her face was pallid, her body, thin. She walked as a newborn fawn would, occasionally collapsing, only to get back up again.
She picked up the can of kerosene her mother left on the floor. She walked resolutely down the stairs, quickly over that creaky step. She walked in the room and saw a glass kerosene lamp. Next to it was a box of matches.
She opened the can of kerosene and poured it over the body of the silent killer that had tried time and time again to take her life.
Not anymore.
She struck a match and threw it on the sleeping figure.
She watched it burn.
“Wake up, Mommy,” She said, clear and loud, like she’d been speaking all her life.
But the mother was already awake, wide eyed in horror as her flesh charred in the flames, the bright afternoon sun shining on her body.
“Tell daddy I loved him.”
Out came the sun and dried up all the rain.

All the townspeople had their theories as to whom had killed the widow with an 8 year old daughter whose husband died in the Vietnam War. But the story was told as simply that, a story, so that the small-town peace would be preserved, as it had for almost a century.
Besides, the mansion isn’t haunted. Well, not really. No one said they saw a ghost, no one died mysteriously.
No one’s ever heard voices, like of the little girl.
But then again, she never was really much of a talker.
And the itsy bitsy spider climbed up the spout again.