Between Screams and Silence

Chapter 4: Feed

When it begins to move, slowly at first, tentatively creeping onto the patterned rug, I sit up in the chair, perching on the edge of the seat and gripping the arms. The spider stops and my head jerks to one side. Suddenly it scuttles off towards the open doorway leading into the kitchen, faster than I expected, and I shriek, dropping to all fours on the rug and chase after it. I can't let it get away, I can't let it find some dark hidey-hole where I won't be able to reach it. Just before it runs out, I manage to scoop it up into my hands, gently, so not to squash it.

Sitting back on my haunches, I grin as I peek through the small gap between my linked hands. It's almost too dark to see but I can feel it wriggling against my palms. I'm breathing hard, panting almost like a dog and I wipe my mouth on my arm, leaving a smear of saliva on the sleeve of my shirt. Then, in one swift movement, so it doesn't escape, I raise my hands and open them, simultaneously releasing the spider from my grasp and pushing it into my waiting, hungry mouth. Its long legs tickle against my tongue and one still dangles from my lips as it struggles desperately, but it's too late. My teeth pierce its body as I bite down and the sweet blood bursts out instantly, coating my tongue.

As soon as the taste of it hits my senses, I know this is what I wanted. Not the spider specifically, but blood and life and the delicious crunch of its legs, the ooze as I bite into the abdomen, the texture of it against my tongue, the feel of it alive in my mouth.

I chew voraciously, frantically pushing in that last leg with my fingers so I don't miss one tasty morsel of it, smacking my lips together as I swallow it down.

My stomach grumbles appreciatively this time, but it's not enough. It's nowhere near to being enough. Still on all fours, I scuttle into the kitchen, searching everywhere, even inside the pantry, anywhere I think they might be hiding. With a screech of frustration, I crawl back into the den and begin to scrabble around the floor, peering under the couch and cabinets, looking into the darkest corners for more. I feel panicked and desperate. I need something else quick, because the taste in my mouth is fading fast and soon it will all be gone, like it was never there in the first place and all I'll be left with is this horrible, aching hunger.

My fingers twitch frantically as I sniff at the air. There's something here. I know there is.

I can smell it.

From inside the basket, Brenda lets out a small cry. It's a tiny noise, just one plaintive cry that has to do battle with the rush of white noise that is now emanating louder from the television speaker, but I hear it anyway. Cocking my head to one side, eyes-wide, I crawl sideways, crab-like along the rug, leaving a wide berth between myself and the basket like I don't know what I'll find in there. Craning my neck up, I peer over the edge and see tiny feet kicking, tiny hands grasping air and I slowly move towards the baby, clicking my tongue against my teeth as I get closer and closer. She smells good, really good, and I think about that spider and how it struggled and squirmed, I think about how it made me feel better, I think about how is tasted and how I want more. How I need more.

I touch the side of the basket and Brenda opens her mouth and screams. And screams. And the noise seems to come from everywhere like white noise, like static, like the furious buzzing of horseflies. I stagger backwards, clapping my hand over my mouth, trying to scramble away because I know what I want and I can't... I just can't...

***

Everything comes at me like a thunderbolt.

The starlit sky above. The cold of the ground seeping into my back. The sound of the cicadas in the tall grasses. The fact I'm wearing my nightshirt and I'm outside.

The tangy taste of something so sweet in my mouth.

I sit upright with a strangled gasp and the first thing I see is my house, looking like a ghostly apparition in the moonlight, and Rheemus' barn casting a shadow over the back yard. The second is that my white nightshirt is stained with a thick river of something dark and wet that streams from the curved neckline all the way down to the hem at my ankles. My hair hangs down in stringy wet knots and stinks like pond water, my bare feet are stained and dirty, as are my hands. Trembling, I touch my chin where the skin feels strange, flinching as my fingertips find some dark, sticky liquid that coats my face, from my nose downwards.