I'm a good-looking spider, no?

It was late.

I was snuggled in bed, Jeremy's body contouring to mine as he peacefully slept.

I shifted my weight carefully as not to wake him, the shadows on my bed moving eerily, jerking in the low light.

I looked over at the shadow-casting corner of my pillow and the normally innocent and unobtrusive feather-stuffed article looked sinister.

I shivered a little, and turned back to my book.

A few moments later I turned a page, and the pillow shadow darted out onto my bed.

I screamed and shot out of the bed, throwing blankets and pillows into the air, exposing the spider that was hot-trotting it across my Egyptian cotton.

Jeremy was on all fours, bleary-eyed and in shock.

"WHAT?!?!? WHAT IS IT????"

"SPIDER!" I screamed. I waited a breath for him to magically come up with something to kill the frantically moving arachnid, and then realized I would have to be my own Knight in Shining armor, unless Jeremy was toting some kind of weapon in his pajama pockets.

I smashed down repeatedly on the spider with my paperback, guttural screams escaping from my mouth.

And it was dead.

Jeremy slunk down into the bed, and was out.

I laid down, and tried to get comfortable. My hand slid down into the cool space between the mattress and the headboard.

Then I thought better of it.

I'm not going to call them "spiders" anymore. I'm going to call them "nope."