A Story�
Well, the wonderful Sir Timbly has bestowed on me some of the power of his web site. Although I must admit a warning from Lord of the Rings, about people not liking to share power is flashing through my head right now. So maybe I and the couple others who are being allowed to post should be afraid 
Not having anything in particular to rant about life or the universe right now (besides that the Asian Lady Beetles which are plaguing Iowa State are driving me crazy!) I decided to post a short story I recently wrote for my creative writing class. It’s a little odd, but then again most fiction is (refer back to Tim’s 4/24 Post.) So here it is:
Lidderdale
At approximately 122 degrees longitude and 42 degrees latitude there sits a town. From space it’s simply a particle of green continent halfway between the two poles. From an airplane its green corn rippling in the wind underneath cotton white clouds. In a car it’s a flat expanse, with roads, little hills, a convenience store, and a motel with fluorescent lights drawing travelers in like a bug lantern, occasionally snatching up a town’s person.
The stories of this town are non-existent. No one cares who gets their eggs scrambled or over easy at the diner. No one cares if Mr. Johnson wins the tractor pull or if Mrs. Zener’s ring was stolen. Our story is a cross between two places no one has been- a little town and the dark places of one girl’s mind.
So this is how it happened.
One night when the air was just starting to smell like fall and the leaves were crunching under feet a brown-haired, brown eyed girl sat up in bed. She heard the crickets outside. Her muscles started to tense, her breaths came quicker. Then she remembered what the doctors told her. She started to calm herself down, thinking of the week she once spent up in Virginia. Her parents had helped her to walk through the little beach town. T-shirt vendors, fish restaurants, and Virginia Beach towels had lined the street. They led her to the ocean’s edge, encouraged her to dip her feet in. She was scared a jelly fish may be washed onto the shore only to sting her. They took her to lie down on the sand, she was scared a seagull might land on her thinking her hat was a fish. In frustration her parents took her back home. It was the best week of her life. She started to relax as she thought of the crashing ocean waves. The roar filled her head, blocking out her fears.
Then the spider came.
The spider had come from Sydney she guessed. It was 25 mm long so it must have been the male. It was such a shiny black she thought she could see her reflection in it. It wasn’t moving, but she could see the tenseness in its muscles. It was ready to fall softly down on the pillow beside her head. The details were becoming clearer now as her eyes remained steady on the creature. It had a dark purplish abdomen with little red hairs lining its stomach. It was the Sydney Funnel-Web Spider, one of the world’s most deadly spiders. She shut her eyes, but the image remained. She could feel its eight little legs gently stretching out to touch her head, each one helping to shift its body across her hair. Breathing became labored as she tried to inhale enough air. She breathed deeper, not able to slow the irregular breaths she took. She tried to hear the ocean waves, but her breathing echoed too loudly through her head. Then she saw the spiders fangs and it bite her.
Outside the world was still. Time was normal. Inside, seconds took hours and hours took seconds. All her fears were stepping stones to this moment. Nausea overtook her. Sweat beaded on her forehead. She tried to cough but couldn’t get enough air. She was paralyzed. The ocean was far away; all that was left was her and the little creature weighing exactly one gram.
So what of Lidderdale?
The air smelled like fall. The corn looked like water slowly moving along from the vantage of a night time flight.