If you came to me with a button that gave Derrick his sight back, I wouldn’t press it and neither would he. Not in a million years. Our lives are way too perfect and cute as is, honestly.

For example, we have this game where I creep up on him like some sort of predator. Derrick could hear a penny drop from across a crowded bar, so whenever I’m stalking him, the slightest floorboard creak makes his ears perk up. Then he’ll crane his neck to the side and say, “Morning Charlotte.”

I still get the better of him, though. Now and again, I’ll go full stealth mode and slip my hands around his waist from behind, a little surprise-attack hug. Then he always pretend sulks for a minute or so before kissing me. It’s adorable.

There’s also the fringe benefits—like not needing to dress up. Not gonna go into detail, but my toxic ex liked making a big stink about that. He said he made the effort so I should too. Never mind the fact that, for him, ‘getting ready’ meant ‘a quick glance in the mirror’.

You can imagine how much it bugged me. But now, theres times I don’t even bother with an outfit at all. It's bliss.

The only downside—and you’re putting a gun against my head here—is Derrick’s a light sleeper. Every minute sound keeps him awake. If Mr. and Mrs. Mumble over in number 12 get into a late-night squabble, he sits up and listens to one of his audiobooks until they gas themselves out.

That said, there's times having a spouse with a built-in alarm system comes in useful. Like last night.

We’d gone to bed after a spirited round of ‘Marco Polo’ ended with us in bed, as usual. Not long after midnight, Derrick sat bolt upright and said, “Someone's outside.”

I kicked on my slippers, shuffled over to the window, and pulled back the curtain. Beneath me, the kitchen window banged lightly in the breeze.

“It’s nothing, honey. I left the window open. Go back to sleep.”

“No. There’s a burglar downstairs. I can hear…clicks.”

While Derrick fumbled for the baseball bat stashed under the bed, I swallowed a gulp and said. “Why don't you wait here while I—"

“Fuck that. I’m about to go all Daredevil on this asshole.”

A wave of black panic rushed over me. Seeing no other choice, I moulted out of my human disguise. The discarded skin suit flopped onto the floor, then, in a movement so swift Derrick wouldn’t have seen it if he could see, my stinger shot forward like a dart, penetrating his stomach.

The muscles in my legs—all eight of them—twanged wildly. Not good.

The toxins didn’t immediately take hold. Instead, my husband gulped the air like a drowning man while my upper limbs closed around him in an intimate embrace.

“Don’t worry, Char,” he said lazily, quivering as I lay him flat along the bed. “I’ll protect you.” A runner of drool leaked from the corner of his mouth.

“I know honey. I know.”

Unencumbered by my disguise, I raced toward the outer landing, scuttled across the wall beside the stairs, over the ceiling, soundlessly travelling with sequential contractions of my limbs. Downstairs, a sickening stench of dead bugs wafted out from the kitchen. My nausea cranked up a notch.

First the toxin didn't kick in immediately, now this. What the hell was going on?

I slipped through the door. Up ahead, in the darkness, a tall blonde man leaned against the centre island drinking from a cup of coffee. “Charlotte,” he nodded, eyes gleaming in the gloom.

“Ryan.”

“You’re looking monstrous as ever.”

“What are you doing here?” My voice sounded thin and uncertain. Scared.

“Heard you got married. Thought I’d pop by and say congratulations. I would have sent a letter, but, you know, you ghosted me.”

“That’s…sweet.”

He smirked. I circled the outer edge of the room, each limb striking the tiled floor in succession.

“So, does he know?” Ryan asked, nodding at a wedding picture mounted against the sidewall.

“Know what?”

Air hissed through his thin lips, a series of rapid clicks. “Oh, you know, about those funny little quirks of yours. The way you hog the bedsheets. Or how you binge-watch that dumb reality show.”

“Love island.”

“Yeah, Love Island. And there was one more thing, what was it again?” He pretended to concentrate. “Oh yeah, that you’re secretly a giant Spider-monster? Did you drop that bombshell on the poor bastard yet?”

“You know, it never came up.” Fighting the dry cramp seizing my throat, I said, “Why are you really here?”

“You wound me, Char. I honestly just stopped by to say congrats. And there’s no hard feelings about how things ended.”

“Fantastic. You can leave the same way you arrived.”

With a casual expression, he finished his coffee, tossed the empty mug into the sink, and started in the direction of the window.

He paused, his back to me. “Although. I did travel a long way to get here. And I am absolutely famished.”

My insides squirmed.

“Maybe I’ll grab a quick snack? Like a chunk of your visually impaired boytoy? What do you think he would miss less, an arm or a leg?”

From across the room, he opened his mouth and let out a series of rapid clicks. Kerds of foam splashed across my face as we stood there, motionless. A showdown.

“No preference? Let’s go arm, then. And for dessert, I’ll suck out his eye jelly. He doesn't need it.”

I flew at him, enraged. In the split second it took me to cross the room, Ryan’s body elongated hideously, the spine splitting into segments. From invisible slits along his forearms, razor-sharp, green appendages flicked out like switch-blades while mandibles extended through his mouth like a blooming flower. Within seconds, his ‘face’ became a rubber Halloween mask stretched taut over a skull two sizes too big.

Before, that effortless transformation irritated me. Now, I was terrified.

Those forelegs sliced the air once, twice. At the very last second, I dodged by leaping onto the ceiling with a flex of my legs.

Ryan looked up, eyes as yellow as candle flames, before charging into the hall, mandibles clicking away. I raced after him, still upside down.

An awful bolt of terror struck me as I pictured Ryan killing me, then leaving the body for Derrick to uncover. My fear and rage cranked up a notch. I needed to move, fast.

As the creature started toward the stairs, I flexed the muscles in my underside. Nothing happened. What an awful time for a block.

I tensed my entire body. Soon, spools of web shot forward like party streamers, coating Ryan’s legs. Those webs stretched out, elongating, as he scurried past the top step, only to get yanked back into the downstairs landing as if pulled by a bungee cord.

The bastard crashed against the side table with a heavy thud. A porcelain lamp fell to the ground and shattered while landscape paintings slid off the walls.

After righting himself, Ryan slashed through the webbing, which bought me enough time to move into position and let my stinger swing down.

Aware of what was happening, he stabbed upward at my midsection. The spines pierced my exoskeleton, but he couldn't yank them loose because the barbs became tangled with my insides. This left my stinger free to penetrate his thorax, again and again. Ten injections made his body go limp.

I’d only planned on pumping him full of toxins, but then my muscles suddenly contracted. A loud cry forced its way through my throat, one so loud a conscious Derrick would have heard it from miles away.

There came this intense, tingly sensation. And then my entire world came crashing down…

-

The next morning, Derrick wandered into the kitchen, later than usual. I kept one hand against my bandaged midsection as he grabbed two headache tablets from the cabinet.

“I think I’m coming down with something,” he said as he filled a glass of water, his voice tired and groggy.

Even without me uttering a single word, his head perked up. “Is everything okay? You’re shaking.” Quickly he crossed the room, covered my cheek with fierce little kisses.

Above our heads, Ryan’s corpse lay cocooned inside a web.

“What’s that sound?” Derrick asked.

I glanced up. The portion of webbing covering the thorax went up and down, pulsating rhythmically. Less than six hours after our encounter, and it had—almost—reached bursting point. This put me in a difficult position.

After finishing my coffee, I took a deep breath, laced my hands with Derrick’s, and sighed. “So, you know how we always talked about having kids?”