The Dark Corner

“Remember to call if you need anything, okay? We’re only going to grandma’s house for a couple of days to help her out and we’ll be right back. Meals are ready, you just need to heat them up. Make sure to keep up with your summer work…” She continued to drown him with warnings and tasks until his father managed to guide her into the passenger seat of the car and close the door.

“Take care of yourself, Dan. We’ll call once we get there,” said his dad, quick and simple. It was times like these when he realized that opposites do attract. He gave him a quick hug and then got into the car. They both smiled and waved as they began to drive out. He could see his mother open her mouth to shout something else she must’ve forgotten, but it was all drowned out by his dad purposefully honking the car horn as they drove off. He giggled before walking back inside.

He had the house all to himself, which, for a 16-year-old like him, meant rotting away in his underwear doing nothing but bingeing random shows and playing video games until the next day. He thought about inviting one of his friends, but most of them had gone with their families down to the beach or somewhere fancy for the summer. The only one left in the neighborhood was his friend Vincent, or Vinnie as they called him in a bad New York-Italian accent, but he didn’t really like hanging out with him, at least not when it was just the two of them. The guy could be a bit weird, and he didn’t really have the energy to deal with that, especially in this heat.

This summer had been too hot, far more than usual. On some of the worst days, he’d even been able to see the heat waves bending the light as they rose, creating that undulating effect on the horizon that you often see in movies set in deserts and the like. He even had to stop wearing a t-shirt around the house because he’d get so sweaty the fabric would stick to his skin and he’d end up having to wash it by the end of the day. As much as he loved the longer daylight hours and brighter days, this was too much. The high temperature sapped him of all his energy and he really didn’t feel like doing anything all day, and the boy could feel it happening right in that moment. It was only a few hours past midday and he had already decided he was gonna give in and take a nap on his parents’ bed.

He poured himself an ice cold glass of water and made his way up the stairs. He enjoyed sleeping in their room from time to time. There was some unspoken law that dictated that their bed would always be more comfortable than his, the pillows would always be fresh and cold, and the blankets, though he wouldn’t use them today, would always be the softest ones in the entire house. He made sure to crack open one of the windows before he laid down, though he didn’t think it would make much of a difference considering half of the windows all around the house were already open. He couldn’t even feel a slight breeze coming in; the whole street had fallen into a state of absolute stillness that made his skin crawl.

As Dan began to slowly fade away into his dreams, a man across the street sat patiently inside his car under the scorching afternoon sun. He was enjoying a book knowing he didn’t have to move until the sun started its descent in the sky; he was confident that he had everything planned out without room for error. The car was an old, black Camaro model and it wasn’t the type of car that you’d see in a typical suburban neighborhood, so it stood out like a sore thumb against the mundane scenery that surrounded it. The man, however, was dressed to play the part. He was wearing a pair of light blue jeans and a navy polo shirt that matched his New Balance sneakers.
He looked like any other white dad on the block, which was exactly his intention.

He had been keeping an eye on this house for some months now. Quiet neighborhood full of upper middle class people. It made them careless with their own security and, ergo, easy targets.
He knew the place belonged to a family of three, two adults in their early 40s and a teenage son.
All of them were on summer vacation and, while not completely unattended, the house would be practically empty during a trip the parents had to take near the end of July, leaving the boy on his own. It was the perfect chance to strike and rob them for all they were worth.

He was able to easily find a way in once the time came to put his plan in motion. He walked up to the side of the house and, after hopping over the fence, he climbed in through one of the windows leading into the dining room. He dusted himself off once inside. A small spider had clung to his clothes. He could see it waving its small front legs as it climbed up his sleeve before he flicked it away in disgust. The dining and kitchen areas were lavish enough that he could perceive that, while not being the richest, they were living very comfortably. The marble countertops glistened under the setting sun, and he could see various sets of intricately decorated china displayed on a glass case near the table, gathering dust from lack of use. He would definitely be striking there first and reveled in the idea of taking it all away from them. He decided to explore the rest of the house and scout for more of the most valuable assets before he began to thoughtlessly grab things here and there; and he also needed to see where exactly the boy was to decide if he’d have to neutralize him or not.

The place was eerily quiet. There wasn’t any music, no tv playing, or even footsteps to suggest that he was anywhere near the ground floor or walking around upstairs. He slid his feet across the tiles as he made his way around and up the stairs. It didn’t take long for him to hear a gentle snoring coming from what seemed to be the master bedroom. He stepped in to find the teenage son of the family in a state of deep sleep. He stared at him for a minute, if not for the rising and falling of the boy’s chest one could easily say he appeared to be dead. It made him think of the myriad ways in which he could dispose of him if he needed to. The more he stood there, the more agitated he began to feel. It wasn’t fair for these families to have everything and live so carefree when he grew up with nothing. He wanted them to feel how he felt growing up. The desperation. Living off scraps and crumbs. If it was up to him, he’d lock the bedroom door and set the house ablaze. He’d watch from his car as the flames engulfed the entire home, waiting for the family to come back to nothing but the ashes and dust of their child. It’s what they deserved.
But he wasn’t working on his own. He had someone to answer to and they wanted every valuable asset that these people had, so he slowly backed out of the room and went back downstairs to take everything before the kid woke up.

Dan only intended to fall asleep for half an hour, but by the time his eyes opened and he rubbed the sleep out of them, the sun had already gone down and there was a soft blood-orange glow coming in through the windows from the street lights outside. He felt groggy and almost disoriented as he sat up, so much so that he thought he was imagining things when he felt his arm tingle. It wasn’t until he looked down that he saw a small spider, with a body roughly the size of his pinky finger, crawling around him.

“Hey little guy,” he said gently. “What are you up to?”

Dan gently placed his hand in the spider’s path and allowed it to crawl on before bringing it up for a closer look. It had a light brown coat and its legs were thick and hairy. “Were you trying to wake me up? I did sleep for quite a while, didn’t I?”

He got up and was placing it carefully on the windowsill when he suddenly heard a noise coming from downstairs. He tried to remain composed to see if he noticed it again and, sure enough, he heard steps originating from the kitchen. The boy knew that there was no way his parents had come back early, the drive was far too long for that to be the case and he had no text from them saying so. Someone had broken into the house. His mother’s warnings echoed over and over in his head as he thought about what to do. He’d heard his parents talk about how to proceed in situations like these countless times, but he’d never thought he’d be put in a position to actually have to do it, especially not on his own.

He knew he had to think quickly and work without alerting the intruder downstairs. He steeled his nerves and splashed his face with some water in their bathroom while reminding himself that he was raised for this. His parents had taught him and he’d seen them do it countless times.
They’d be proud of him once they returned home, he’d make sure of it.

With that, his whole demeanor shifted and the house itself trembled. The boy placed a hand on the wall and began tapping gently and at certain intervals to send a message throughout its structure that was immediately reciprocated as thousands of tiny legs began to pop out from every nook and crevice in the room. Spiders of all shapes and sizes began to crawl frantically around him in a circular motion, their tiny bodies trampled over one another and they merged visually creating a mirage that, to the untrained eye, made it appear as though the boy was at the center of a black whirlpool. As he advanced, his face began to change. Another set of eyes
bulged out from under his normal ones while his canine teeth grew in size.

Then, the wave of spiders flooded the stairs as they rushed down to the anomaly that had stepped into their territory, their tiny legs beginning to work as they sealed the main access points to the kitchen in the blink of an eye. Dan could now hear the man inside his home as he ditched his attempts at being discreet and started to actively shout for help as he witnessed with increasingly panicked breathing the phenomenon that was unfolding in front of him. At first he tried to escape by pushing his way through the webs but he quickly realized that the thread was already too thick and sticky for him to do so without becoming stuck. He then grabbed whatever objects he could find and tried throwing them at the windows and doors but only succeeded in blocking his exits further, as they became stuck on the webs that were skillfully leaving him in a locked room.
It was all unfolding just like it usually did when his parents brought in some prey; Dan almost wished they were there to see him. However, their absence also granted him complete freedom over what to do now, and that filled him with feral excitement.

The boy placed his hand on the cocoon that had now finished forming around the kitchen and slowly managed to push his way through. The material seemed to lose all adhesive properties against his touch and instead, it molded itself around him so he could pass without issue. Once inside, he came face to face with the thief who had found his way into Dan’s web and he almost laughed at the sight. The man didn’t look threatening in the slightest. He was standing on the other side of the room looking at Dan with a mixture of panic and revulsion. He could tell the man was trying to conquer his feelings and appear strong in front of him. He was taller and of a larger frame after all, but it was all a façade that the boy was easily sensing his way through. He could smell the drops of sweat that were sliding down his skin, he could see them swerving around his arm hairs that were standing on end, hear the friction of his fingers as they gripped the kitchen knife he’d snatched from the counter tighter and tighter, and feel his muscles as they tensed to put a stop to his trembling.

“What were you looking for here?” He began questioning. “Were you sent by someone?”

“N-no. I wasn’t,” he lied, and the boy could tell. “I’m just a nobody. If you let me go, I’ll never come back here again. I swear.”

“You’re in no position to be asking for anything. You’re in my home.”

“I have a family of my own, I was just trying to take care of them. I wasn’t gonna hurt anyone! You understand, right?” More lies.

“Hm, that sucks, man. I can’t let you leave though, cuz I don’t trust you not to come back with more of your buddies. And it’s also almost dinner time. Can’t skip dinner time. You should stick around actually.”

With that, the boy snapped his fingers, and the loud patter of the spiders resumed as they moved in unison. The man wailed and jumped around wildly as the arachnids crawled up his legs and all around him. He could feel their hairy legs all over his body and he had to prioritize swatting them away from his face as they tried to crawl into his ears and nose. He tried to make a run for it where the door once was by clawing aggressively as if attempting to carve away at the wall of thread but then, the biting started. He felt tiny prickles that were followed by excruciating levels of a stabbing pain that continued to spread all throughout his nervous system. It was as though his blood was boiling under his skin and he could see it turning red as there wasn’t an inch left unbitten. His screams turned into wails as he felt his limbs go numb and he lost control of his own self. The man didn’t have any energy to fight back anymore and that’s when they were able to crawl inside of him. The spiders filled his mouth, nose and ears and quickly placed their thread everywhere. Seeing as he was immobilized, they could freely envelop him in their cocoon and prepare him for feeding. The process was slow and painful, the man was conscious the entire time, tears streaming down his face as, even in his final moments, he tried to plead with the demon that was still standing across the kitchen watching it all unfold. But mercy never came. It wasn’t fair.

Once the spectacle was over, the boy moved towards the refrigerator and grabbed one of the ready-to-eat meals his mother had left in it. He could practically smell the cheese and tomato of her homemade lasagna and couldn’t wait to dig in. The nap he took had his stomach growling. He ate his food while the spiders had a feast of their own. By the time he was finished eating his own dinner, there wasn’t much left of the man but a giant cocoon hanging from the ceiling, gently swaying as a tepid evening breeze rolled in. He walked up to it and dug into the mush to find the two eyeballs. He made sure the spiders avoided them as that part was his favorite. Ever since he was a kid and his parents took care of the hunt they’d always save them for him. The salt from the fresh tears and the viscous texture made them a treat for him. He’d compared them to olives if anyone asked him, but he didn’t like those. With a simple wave of his hand he dismissed the spiders and one by one they crawled back into the shadows of the house. He’d have to clean up all the web that they left behind, but that’d be a job for tomorrow. Tonight he just wanted to be a normal teenager staying up all night playing Xbox while the remains of a stranger that broke into his house finished rotting away in his kitchen.

Andrés Murillo is a Dublin-based artist from Costa Rica that works with writing, painting, digital art, and photography. He is a graduate of Trinity College Dublin. He uses color and symbolic elements to create vibrant scenes that, above all, tell a story, while exploring themes of identity and belonging. His comic strip “The Little Joys” is his most recent work that will be published in an anthology by Faerie Press.