The Dirt Field

I woke up this morning at an ungodly hour and, being unable to fall back asleep, decided to bore myself into slumber by reading a dull novel. After twenty or so minutes of reading, I was suddenly compelled to look towards the window that is directly next to my bed, at which point I noticed a bug crawling along the wall towards my bed. Well, you might call it a bug. I call it The Reason Twenty Years Was Shaved Off My Life This Morning.

A bit of research has revealed that this bug was a common House Centipede:

Its taxonomy was irrelevant at the time, though, as it was absolutely horrifying to see in the early morning light. Even worse was the realization that it was less than a foot from my pillow, the pillow on which I put my face, the face that is attached to my body. Nothing with that many legs should ever be permitted to exist, let alone make physical contact with my body. In the moment after spotting the bug, I was forced to make an exceptionally difficult choice: kill it or just move out immediately. Landlord, my final rent check is on the table.

In actuality, I was a little more rational, but only because I’ve seen these abysmally disgusting creatures elsewhere, which led me to conclude that moving would only temporarily fix the problem. Instead, I took the book I was reading (remember that library book you lent me, Mom?) and flicked the monster off the wall away from my bed. At the time, it seemed like the quickest way to avoid gingerly sorting through my sheets for a stray centipede until I died of heart failure.

Once flung from the wall, the creature landed on the decorative fabric-covered box next to my bed that serves as a miniature table for my lamp. I slowly backed the box away from the wall, cleared everything off the top, and used an entire rainforest of toilet paper to snatch at the place along the lid where I thought the bug was nestled. A quick review of my handful of tissue, however, showed that I’d only managed to remove two legs, a mere pittance for an insect with roughly seven thousand to spare. Somehow, the centipede managed to scurry around to the back of the box and was leering up at me, gnashing his venomous fangs in fury. In that moment, I realized that nothing was worth losing sight of this thing, so in one smooth movement, I slammed the box into the wall, decimating the centipede by smushing him into the molding. And that was the end of that.

Except for the part where the dead bug had left a few dozen pairs of legs stuck to the side of the box, the special box I have used to store my memories, hopes, dreams, and, most recently, office supplies. Not only were these ugly legs plastered next to a rather wet-looking splat, but THEY WERE MOVING. And not just moving a little, not just twitching a little, but ACTUALLY RUNNING IN PLACE, COMPLETELY DETACHED FROM THEIR ORIGINAL OWNER.

And that, my friends, is why I will never again be able to sleep in my bed without crying every time a stray hair or gust of wind brushes my cheek. A little part of me will die each time I think that the delicate touch could actually be the loving caress of seventeen pairs of spindly legs.