We have a fabulous swimming pool but can only enjoy it between 9 and 10 pm, the small mosquito-less window that seems to occur well after the blistering sun goes down and before I’ve had too much wine to drink. All other times the backyard is either smothered in swarms of mosquitoes and/or it’s simply too hot to breath actual oxygen. Usually both.

Even with my body submerged, mosquitoes bite me on the face.

After a quick plunge into the pool after yoga – in mid day – I noticed a bite on my cheek (face)…. A red welt. Lovely.

A day later… still there.

Two days later….. there.

Three days later… it felt like a hard knot. Maybe it was a zit?

I messed with it. No zit.

And then I saw a spider sunning itself on the sill like it owned the bathroom.

A spider.

What if this bump on my cheek was no mosquito bite at all? What if a spider bit me while I slept and LAID EGGS IN MY FACE!!!

It could happen.

It happened to my college roommate’s sister’s best friend’s cousin in 1983. My roommate was adamant about it, completely freaked out that her sister’s best friend’s cousin had zillions of baby spiders hatch from her face and crawl into her eyes and through her hair. 

When I doubted this story and accidentally rolled my eyes, she became annoyed, insisting it happened. My roomie was sweet and beautiful and gullible. All the boys loved her… wanted to take care of her…. She was a city girl from Dallas. She really thought spiders would lay eggs inside a human….  Like something from Alien.

She also knew someone who knew someone who’s friend’s daughter was snatched from Wal-Mart while her mother stopped to read labels on peanut butter. The kid’s hair was cut and dyed in the dressing room in 2 minutes so they could sneak her out and sell her into slavery….

I was starting to think perhaps I shouldn’t hang with this girl. This girl who knew these other girls who knew people with such bad luck to experienced head dyeing kidnappers.

But today, when I studied this THING on my face, I wondered…

WHAT IF SHE WAS RIGHT?