Creepy Crawlies

‘Don’t the females eat their mates?’ asked a young man with acne and a squint.

‘Sometimes, Derek.’ Kate’s hands were full with Judy from Trinidad, a large lady with eight legs dangling like hairy fingers. Open Day at the Insect House, though as Kate reminded us, spiders are arachnids not insects.

So what of this arachnophobia, this primal horror lodged so deep in our collective unconscious? Hard to say, with the tiny money spider and her promise of good luck. Easier to understand with the kind we sometimes find in the bath or kitchen sink. Bloated grey bellies suspended between eight long segmented legs and a manic turn of speed, when not spinning cocoons in dark corners, waiting motionless, eyes unblinking, for the moment to pounce and bite and paralyse and gorge.

Kate placed Judy back in her glass case, her tropic enclave, where Derek could take a closer look. With his squint how many legs could he count on her? Sixteen?

Try him with a millipede.