Fence Spider

Part 1: Anansi and the Snake

The bump, swollen like a pregnant woman, looked as if it would burst into a geyser of yellowed pus and blood. It pulled against the man’s maroon skin, till it was taut as a botched botox. If he would just lift his arm to his mouth, he was sure he could take a decisive chomp and remove the near-tumorous mass himself. He wondered how it would taste- swallowing his uncooked, invaded flesh.

Before he could react, he collapsed. A crumpled body of loose and neutral colored clothes on the concrete of a modest backyard. His head made a light thump, and platelets poured out underneath him.

If it weren’t for the neighbor, an old Chinese woman who dropped off food every New Years- despite his lack of reciprocation- he would have died there. If not from the poisonous spider-bite, then from blood loss.

Tobechi, dazed, awoke in a hospital, being taken care of by a Dr. Jordan. The frail woman looked aged and tired, but spoke as if she was sub-40 years old.

“You, sir, are very fortunate to be alive,” she pinched her nose and explained the situation to him.

He was bit by a ‘funnel web,’ a curious creature that was not endemic to this area, nor even this country. How the spider had found Tobechi, the doctor couldn’t say.

Tobechi sat, looking at the IV in his left arm. Weakness possessed him like a heavy cloud, and it was accompanied by a brutal thump thump in his head.

Slowly, his right hand tenderly touched his skull. Wincing, he retracted the hand. He had no idea hitting a grill could be nearly deadly.

The 30 year old almost lowered the national average for life expectancies. Simultaneously, and almost impressively, he nearly increased the global average for deaths caused by spider bite.

Another thump thump interrupted his thoughts, but this one was coming from the hospital door. In walked his younger sisters: Adaego and Adaku. The twins were now 26, and were growing to be more and more beautiful each day.

Adaego wore her hair in bantu knots and flashed a choker with gold spikes that complimented the melanin in her thin neck. Adaku was styling short length braids and dark mascara that resembled a version of Cleopatra.

“Why are you here,” Tobechi growled. The thumping in his head increased, as if in sync with his rising blood pressure. The monitor tattled on him, sending a beep reminder that he was in a pre-hypertensive state.

Adaego rubbed her jaw, allowing her arm to be scratched by the choker’s points. Her eyes looked at Tobechi’s unpleasant stare and rugged face. With the voice of a mother hen, she said,

“Mom told us to visit, so we canceled our flight.”

Tobechi shifted so that they could see him roll his eyes.

“I feel honored that your trip to Japan was postponed for little ol’ me.”

Adaku, like a cat, walked up to her older brother. She tilted her head slightly, looking down at his fragile state. She quickly licked her full lips before bringing her hand on top of the bite and giving it a gentle squeeze.

The blood pressure monitor began to throw a tantrum, and Tobechi held in a groan. Any sign of weakness would have only been pleasing to his sisters.

Adaku floated back to her sister and whispered in her ear. Adaego’s ears pricked up, and smiled at Tobechi. The entire time, neither of them broke eye contact with him.

They stood near the door for a pause, just watching him breathe. Two Black girls, gowned in black, with black eyes and blacker souls.

He sat in his bed, breathing heavily, puffing his chest with each inhale. He knows what his sister’s were capable of. Especially considering what was at stake. The possibility of a life of comfort hung in the air of the hospital room, and it made Tobechi uncomfortable. The obvious thoughts struck him:

How did he- a chronic ‘home-body’- get bit by a foreign spider?

And why were his first visitors his eerie sisters, who would skip a funeral for a day trip to Japan?

Theories began to form about how Adaego and Adaku procured the spider, planted it, and hoped he would be tree-food by the time they landed in Japan. Then everything would have been theirs to claim. The house. The money. A life free from worry.

“You won’t get the house. I promise you that much,” Tobechi pulled his phone out to text his wife.

Me: At hospital, Zimo is coming to pick me up. Don’t come. Take the boys and head upstate, N.K. is here to ‘visit.’

“‘You’ isn’t plural,” Adaku said. It was rare for her, she usually only spoke to and through Adaego. Her direct communication was evidence of irritation.

“We’re two people,” Adaego explained, continuing her sister’s thought without the need for communication.

Shivers ran down Tobechi’s spine. Two people? Then why were they inseparable and insufferable? Adaego kept speaking,

“Of course we don’t want the house. Mma left it for you. Just you,” with that, Adaego walked over to her brother. Her heels clacked slowly, making the yard of distance seem much longer. Tobechi gripped the phone till his palms were white.

The blood pressure monitor told on him again. He was scared.

Adaego bent down and put her burgundy lips next to his ear,

“Your cop out plan worked out nicely. Get better soon,” she kissed his head wound, and he released a painful exhalation.

Clacking away, she, and her ghost of a twin, disappeared.

Tobechi’s phone vibrated.

Wifee: The twins? Did they do this?

Placing a right hand on his chest, he did his best to slow his breathing. His chest hair was wet with sweat, and he could feel blood seep out of his wound and onto the ear that Adaego had whispered into.

He raised his right hand over his head and began to snap it around in a circle- an action to ward off any juju his sisters may have left for him. Adaku, though silent, seemed most likely to communicate with forces beyond his comprehension. Tobechi wasn’t willing to take any chances.

Maybe. Take title deed with u in case. Tell iru and oma I love them and I’m alright.

Setting his phone down, he pressed the hospital’s red call button. The light on the side of his bed turned orange.

A round nurse walked in some minutes later, looking frazzled and her skin pale, as if she had seen something unusual. In her hand was a tray of food. Vanilla pudding, orange juice, milk, toast with butter, and plastic looking eggs.

For the first time, Tobechi looked out the window, then looked at the clock across the room. It was 8:44 in the morning. Far too early for subtle death threats. Certainly too early to unfold a murder plot.

The nurse explained that he should be able to leave soon. They were going to change the bandage on his head and then make sure the anti-venom cocktail he was on was working well. Then he would go home with pain medication and information on pest control services.

She left the tray on the bedside table and left Tobechi with his large thoughts.

Honey: Got deed. On way to mom’s now. Neutral territory.

Tobechi chuckled at his wife’s message. She joked that if he was South Korea, his sisters were North Korea, N.K.

His nose crunched up and he felt the dryness of his skin pull at the deeper layers. Opening the cabinets on his side, he found hospital lotion- arguably the best type of lotion.

“That’s right,” he said to himself- a practice he solidified, inherited from his father, “I’ve been hospitalized many times before.”

There was the time that Adaego accidentally pushed him down the stairs and he sprained his ankle. He hadn’t wanted to share the teddy bear his grandmother, or Mma, had purchased him.

Or the time Adaku was learning to drive in the rain and they slammed into a pole, causing the airbags to go off, breaking his nose and giving him a concussion. At the time, Tobechi was trying to explain to her that it was time to go home, he had to study for an exam. Adaku was irritated. He remembered her hissing before losing control.

Even when they were at Mma’s funeral, Adaego bumped into a server, who dropped a hot pot on Tobechi’s foot. Adaego had just learned about Mma’s will, and was not happy with the contents. That was an accident, she assured him. He still remembered her olive heels that day.

As if on cue, Tobechi’s foot popped out from under the short hospital sheet, revealing the damaged skin.

This wasn’t anything new for the girls, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

He eyed the food below him, sniffing each item carefully. Deciding his life wasn’t worth it, he pushed it off to the side. Death by hospital meal is not the way he planned to go out.

His hunger could not be what killed him. He had too much pride to die that way.

Part 2: Anansi and the Leopard

Zimo, the neighbor’s nephew, came to pick him up from the hospital. Every year he would visit his aunt for the new year, and he and Tobechi would go and get three too many drinks at the local bar in the City. As the years went on, Zimo had become a close friend. Better yet, he had become a confidant.

Zimo was ex-navy, and came back after his last assignment years ago exhausted and lonely. Tobechi’s family had helped Zimo remember that relationships were worth more than money most of the time. Their two families had grown close since then.

“Your grandma has how much in the basement?!” Zimo controlled his surprise, while stepping firmly on the brakes of his car, rudely crossing over the pedestrian zone.

A couple of passersby glared at his reckless driving ability, and he half raised a palm, soundlessly apologizing.

“She never trusted banks. And she never trusted my father or my mother,” Tobechi tried to explain his grandmother’s incredible wealth, “She thought they were both useless. So she kept my grandfather’s life insurance money, her retirement money, her life savings, and the life insurance money from my uncle in a literal safe in the underground bunker.”

It felt good to get this family secret off his chest. He knew Zimo would help him figure out how to manage the money and how to navigate his wicked sisters.

At Mma’s house there were 2 guard dogs, each trained to kill, never to detain. The Nigerian type of security training. Mma’s house was better than nice- it was futuristic, any thief would have a field day stealing from her. If they could make it to the front door without being torn to shreds.

But Mma wasn’t materialistic. She loved one thing more than money.

Her only grandson- Tobechi.

“She didn’t leave anyone… anything?” Zimo was stunned.

He remembered Tobechi’s stories about his grandmother, but didn’t believe she was this obstinate of a woman. His aunt and her would have made fast friends. Greedy old women who took their contempt to their graves.

“She loved that I got married. And that I made her a great grandmother. And that I visited often. She thought I was responsible,” guilt started to warm Tobechi’s seat as he remembered how his grandmother’s smooth skin would soften when she laid eyes on him.

Silence sat in the car with them. It was a passenger too, looking at both of them with a wide smile. The obvious was a tether between the two men.

Mma loved Tobechi because he seemed responsible.

“How long has it been since you’ve gone?” Zimo asked after a weighted stillness.

“About 3 weeks…” Tobechi left the option open for Zimo. He shifted in his seat, tapping his hand on his thigh slowly. He did not want to be the one to suggest they relapse. But he wasn’t opposed to going— if Zimo wanted to, of course.

“If we go together, we can keep each other accountable,” Zimo suggested. His eyebrow began to crease his eyes.

Zimo’s hair now held pieces of white. Tobechi noticed that he stopped redying it, a sign of acceptance of the inevitable for the man. Just like this relapse was inevitable.

Tobechi nodded carefully,

“I just need something to distract me. Just one hour,” Tobechi did his best to sound reasonable. He wanted to make himself sound responsible. Just how Mma saw him, he bit his lip thinking about her beautiful face.

Zimo pressed a microphone button on his car.

“Get me directions to River Mountain Casino.”

“Getting directions to River Mountain Casino.”

They sighed and drove the rest of the way in shame. Making money would make them both feel better. Anything to forget the six-figure secret they each had been keeping from their wives.

Part 3: Anansi and the Hornet

It is easier than most realize.

Step 1- Money for credits.

Step 2- Credits for games.

Step 3- Win big.

Tobechi and Zimo walked into the casino and took a deep breath. The smell of cigars, alcohol, and poorly made food drifted in and out of their lungs.

Below him lay a dense and dark carpet with swirls that reminded Tobechi of the cross section of an ancient tree. Above him hovered a dark ceiling with circular constructs that shone violet lights down on them.

Tobechi’s skin, dark as it was, was now painted with a purple glow. His grandmother’s lessons returned to him as he looked down at his purple shoes.

Purple was the color of royalty. The wealthy, powerful, and important figures in Nigerian society would own some sort of purple cloth. He hadn’t remembered River Mountain using this color of light before. Surely this was a good omen. His grandmother was watching over him today.

Today, he would clear his debt. He would be safe from the downpour of reality in his grandmother’s solid gourd of a home.

He sat down on the comfortable seat in front of the slot machine. The rest was muscle memory.

***

“Everything,” Tobechi trembled, he was still sweating from the anxiety.

Tobechi was numb. Zimo was numb. They were driving slowly to Tobechi’s mother’s house now, hoping that time would reverse itself and reveal a different outcome.

The fear of facing their wives paralyzed them. Times were already financially difficult. This would devastate their family for years to come.

“We have to tell them. I have to tell her. I’m going to. As soon as I get home. I’m going to tell her,” Zimo had been- more or less- chanting this for about an hour now.

His eyes were darkening from stress, and he hunched over his wheel. His knuckles were white as he mercilessly clutched the car. Zimo’s hair looked more white than before, as if the stress had caused his jet black hair to turn white through sublimation.

“Everything,” Tobechi repeated with his dry throat. He tried to clear it, but no sound came out.

His lips felt cracked. He could only imagine what his wife would think. She would go through with the divorce for sure this time. This time, he had used his children’s college fund. This time, he would be without anyone to soothe him.

Neither man was capable of consoling the other. Their misdeeds led to their tragic consequences, and the weight of truthfulness almost broke them.

Zimo- however- had no hope. No money. No house. No will.

Tobechi had Mma.

“Zimo, take me to my grandma’s house instead,” Tobechi commanded while reaching for Zimo’s phone and entering the new address.

Zimo, practically a zombie, could hardly process what was going through Tobechi’s mind. Tobechi could hardly understand what was going through Zimo’s.

Part 4: Anansi and the Spirit

“I’ll just be a moment Zimo. I just have to see it with my own eyes. If I can just see it, I know everything will be okay,” Tobechi looked at Zimo for some sort of recognition.

Zimo simply looked ahead at the suburban road. It was cold outside, but Zimo didn’t put on his jacket or turn on the heater. He sat in his chilled car, secretly hoping he would die there. The sun shone on Zimo’s left side, leaving his right side, the side Tobechi stared at, dark.

Tobechi touched his best friend's shoulder, then left to enter his grandmother’s fortress.

The building was huge. It was gray. It was solid. Mma had intended for nothing to ever enter. Or leave.

The black gates surrounded the pristine green lawn, now overgrown since the gardener left to look for work. A few sad trees lined both sides of the house, and in between them was a dull silver colored driveway that led up to the three car garage.

Above the garage stood a gray wall with horizontal marks, and sitting on that, a huge window that exposed the upstairs loft. Tobechi could see the black sofa, the wide screen television, and even some of the dying ferns his grandfather had been so fond of. On the wall behind the sofa, were pictures of their family.

But Tobechi saw something else.

A human figure. No… 2 human figures.

Tobechi began to flare his wide nostrils.

“Adaku. Adaego,” he breathed out.

Tobechi’s pain had never left him. His sister’s had likely tried to kill him yesterday. They threatened him today. That stress forced him to go the casino, and coerced him into using the money he set aside for his children.

Now it seems his sister’s had a plot of their own. Tobechi made a decision there at the black gates. He would no longer allow his sisters to roam freely.

Tobechi punched in the code to the front gate, 1127, the month and day of his birth, and walked into the yard. He looked both directions, expecting the guard dogs to rush him, but neither animal was to be seen.

Walking as gently as a spider, he reached the front door before a stench caused him to rush his wrist up to block his nostrils.

The dogs, Boomer and Molly, lay atop of each other. Dried blood matted their fur. They had their throats cut.

Fear did not register, instead, full fledged rage consumed Tobechi. He swung open the door, yelling,

“Adaku! Adaego!”

The only reply he received was that of the loud air conditioner. Adaego preferred the cold.

Tobechi’s own shadow was elongated before him, as the last light from the sun crept down wet back. In a moment he was surrounded by darkness and rushing cool air from the vent inside him.

He took one step forward, and listened to his shoe make hardly a sound on the plush carpet his grandmother had imported from India. The old batty woman would have killed him for placing his filthy feet on top of it.

Tobechi took another step forward, still listening for his sisters. His blood was pumping, so all he could hear was his shaky breath and his vessels keeping him alert.

A car drove past the house, and its headlights provided just a half second of luminescence.

That’s when Tobechi saw it:

Adaku stood in front of him and to the left.

With a baseball bat in her cat-like hands.

Part 5: Anansi and Man

Icy water hit Tobechi’s forehead, and he was jolted awake. To his surprise, his sisters had not killed him. Yet.

Adaku sat on the floor in front of him, cross legged and scrolling through her phone while humming, as if she hadn’t just treated her brother like a pitch.

Adaku’s mascara had slightly gone off course, creating a distorted feline look. The sweat from the bunker had dragged it towards her nose since the AC did not reach this deeply. When Tobechi looked closely at her, she did not resemble him at all.

The pain seized Tobechi all at once. His wound had reopened, and it was actively bleeding down the side of his neck and into his armpit. He could feel his shirt hold onto the blood and paste itself against his wet body like glue. His groan was saddening.

“He’s awake, Ego,” Adaku informed her sister.

She was the watchwoman for him, he supposed. Tobechi could not help but chuckle at Adaku’s pet name for her twin- ‘Ego’, meaning, ‘money’.

Adaego’s heels clipped the floor slowly. Every beat was a thump against the side of Tobechi’s head. He closed his eyes to try and reduce the stimulus, but Adaego was closer now, and the clicks were louder and louder and louder… until they stopped. Right in front of him.

Tobechi’s head felt like a melon floating in the middle of a hurricane. Death became the only thing he thought about.

“Toto,” Adaego sucked her lips disappointingly, “You don’t look well.”

Tobechi vomited all over her black heels, and felt his body shake violently afterwards.

Adaego didn’t flinch. Instead she bent down and squeezed her right hand on his mouth and forced his head upwards. The vomit trickled out of the corner of his mouth and onto her hand. She squeezed harder until he drooled.

“You can choose,” Adaego used her left hand to gesture to the large electronic safe behind her.

“The code to Mma’s safe,” Adaku commanded from her seat from the floor. Her eyes had not moved from her phone, but now she was stroking her short braids, exposing her anxiety.

“Or we bleed it from you,” Adaego finished, pinching Tobechi’s face down so that his eyes stared straight at her gold choker.

Tobechi’s breathing was labored, and each breath allowed more blood to flow out of the crater from his head.

“I-” he tried to speak, then took a couple of breaths before continuing, “won’t.”

Even at death’s door, altruism presented itself. His wife had the deed. If Mma had a security system in place, then his sister’s would fail and get nothing.

Adaego’s hand dropped his head so that he was staring back at her feet. She clacked away, but told Adaku that she would be back. Adaku nodded and continued to scroll on her phone, purring and double tapping when she saw something she liked.

“Adaku, please-” Tobechi started to beg, but he was interrupted by a high pitched scream from upstairs.

Adaku stood up on her toes, like a cat that was pretending to be a woman, and glided towards the bunker stairs.

As she neared the set of stairs, she heard the struggle, two people going back and forth. There was a female voice- Adaego. And a male voice:

Zimo.

Just as Adaku placed her bare foot silently on the first step, there was a large crack, then a thud. A body had struck the ground. Someone had fired a gun.

Adaku ran to her brother and began to untie the bonds that webbed him to the chair. She was murmuring chants, no doubt incantations designed to protect her.

Zimo walked down the stairs, gun in hand, pointed squarely at Adaku.

Tobechi never knew Zimo owned a gun.

Adaku hid behind Tobechi. Somehow he had willed himself to stand, but he could feel gravity flatten him more and more as every second passed. Lights faded in his vision, and his body began to feel like ice.

Adaku was quivering behind her older brother, hanging onto his bloodied shirt and whispering the word, “zọpụtam,” speedily. Save me. Save me. Save me.

Adaku had switched to their mother tongue. Perhaps she knew one of her nine lives were in danger.

“If you leave now, I promise, I won’t hurt you,” Zimo said.

Zimo sounded… altered. His voice was deeper and there was no uncertainty in it. Tobechi heard soldiers speak like this in films, but was unaware of Zimo’s ability to disconnect his voice from his emotions.

Though Zimo was here to stop his sisters, Tobechi did not feel at peace.

Adaku spoke in a volume quieter than that of mouse,

“Promise?”

Zimo nodded, holding his hands up and backing away from the steps that led to the top floor.

Adaku sprinted in the air towards the escape. Just before she reached it, Tobechi heard another thunder clap. Adaku was on the floor, limp, resembling Boomer and Molly in the way her limps sprawled out in front of her.

Zimo now aimed his gun at his new target.

They both understood each other. Zimo understood that Tobechi wanted the best for his family. And Tobechi understood that Zimo needed what was inside the safe. Zimo could not risk any more mistakes. It was time Zimo took a stand, and cleared his debt. He did not deserve to live in poverty. He did not deserve addiction. He did not deserve to sacrifice anymore than he already had.

With a limp from a past war, Zimo strutted towards his best friend.

“What’s the code, Tobechi,” the gun did not waver.

Tobechi swallowed.

“I can’t…” he said, before Zimo cut him off.

“You can. And you will,” Zimo used his left hand to run his fingres through his speckled hair.

“Either way you die. But I promise, if you give me the code, I’ll take care of Iru. I’ll make sure Oma goes to school. I’ll tell Chidi what she wants to hear. But I can’t do that if you don’t help me,” Zimo neared Tobechi, gun still staring at his already severely damaged skull.

“I need… hospital,” Tobechi fell to his knees. He felt the hot barrel of Zimo’s gun burning the open wound now. The spider bite felt like a century ago.

“I need this,” Zimo had nothing in his heart. Only a quiet mission, “You know I need this.”

Tobechi could see it now. What everyone says you see. He saw his life flash before his eyes.

Pride bound him to a rigid cycle of danger. Trust pushed him to persuade Zimo to quit their group therapy and continue their habit together. Ignorance allowed him to believe that his grandmother’s money was his solution. Desire now prevented him from letting go of what he could never have.

“0613,” Tobechi confessed. It was the day Adaku and Adaego were born.

In his ears, he heard applause. The type the casino members would give when someone won it big.

End.

This story is owned by the original author: Chigozie Maduchukwu. (Copyright)