What is this beast doing, invading my car? Shoo! I hate spiders! I came out here, thinking that a car ride would help take my mind off school, but no, no, no! This spider has to ruin everything!
I lift my hand and prepare to strike it down, like an eagle catching its prey, but I stop, for I see the fear in its eyes.
The spider stares at me.
I stare back. We keep this up for about five minutes, and then the spider moves to the other side of the window.
That’s when I see it: an egg sac. This spider is a mother.
She continues to stare at me like a scared little puppy.
At the sight of her terror, I remember my own mother. I remember the day when she came home from the doctor and said that my sister, an unborn fetus, had just died. The news crushed us, and we spent many days sobbing the hardest we had sobbed in our lives.
Now, here I am, a stressed teen getting ready to murder a bunch of brothers and sisters. The poor spider. Am I a monster, or am I a friend? At the end of the day, this is my decision.
Sighing, I ask, “Why do I do this?” and open the car door. I’m in my driveway on a warm spring day.
As I reach out to the egg sac, Mother crawls on top of it. Now, instead of fear, I see a touch of hope in her dark, beady eyes. With her nice and snug on top of it, I pull the sac off the window and carry it to the woods behind my house.
Under the treetops, I hear the hoots of the midnight Great Horned Owl, as well as the gentle rustling of leaves. My boots take me to a bush, and that’s where I put the egg sac down.
The second I do, something incredible happens.
The spider crawls off her sac when it suddenly bursts open. It was like my change of heart triggered the hatching.
Before I know it, a bunch of baby spiders emerge and crawl to Mother. Brothers and sisters. This is the closest thing I have to a sister. The babies survived, all thanks to me.
With her babies crawling on top and around her, Mother once again peers into my eyes. It almost looks like she’s smiling.
With a nod of my head, I give her a smile of my own and plop down on my backside.
For the rest of the night, I watch the spiders. Mother sits on my index finger, and we seem to laugh as the brothers and sisters play a spider version of “Ring Around the Rosie.” What started as the Scared Spider has now become the Hopeful Spider.
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