Spiders
As I sat down with my friends at the lunch table, a spider hopped onto my leg. About a half centimeter big, it taunted me with its microscopic eyes. Though I could not see them, I knew they were there. As soon as by brain processed that there was a blood sucking creature on me, I screamed in terror.
Across the school yard, was my older brother Damon. He was kneeling down, poking an ant hill, like he did every day. Damon was in a special class. Though he was sixteen, he had the mind of a five year old.
I was fifteen; the age of constant mood swings and the tendency of getting embarrassed easily. I was embarrassed when I found out that Damon would be attending my high school. The doctors said it would be good for him to socialize at a “normal” school, with “normal” kids his age. And I was embarrassed when I had screamed about the spider….and when Damon came running over to the rescue.
"Ahhh! There is a spider on me!”
“Hallie!” Damon whooped, as he awkwardly ran over, with his lanky arms flopping back and forth, all around his body. “I will save you! What is the matter? I will save you! Hallie, what happened?” he looked down at my leg as I flapped my hands, like a fan, next to my face. He just laughed hysterically,” Oh, silly Sis! It’s just uh Spider! It doesn’t hurt!” He reached down and caught the spider in his left hand. With the other, he waved, pushed his sliding glasses up, and ran back to his ant hill. Still with a disgusted look on my face, I stared at Damon while he got a pat on the back from his teacher.
My friends just stared at me. My boyfriend Danny laughed and then everyone else joined him. “Who was that freak? And why’d he call you ‘Sis’? I thought you were an only child,” Danny said, glancing back at my brother.
“Uh, yah. I don’t have any siblings. And I have never seen him before,” I lied. Though I should have been mad at Danny, I was mad at Damon instead.

*
*
*
In the fourth grade, I had my first sleepover with my best friend Alisa. We ran into my room, dropped our stuff on the floor, and jumped on the bed. If she hadn’t been so excited to see my new water bed, I would have set our stuff down nicely and given her a tour of the house. She couldn’t care less about the house; I had a fascinating water bed! We jumped on it for ten minutes, and then we just laid there until the bed stopped moving.
Later, we got out our “Polly Pocket” toys. When we heard the front door shut, I was expecting mom with Chinese food like she had promised. As we skipped to the front door, it was Mom, yes, but with Damon as well. He was supposed to come home with Dad later. I wasn’t embarrassed of Damon until a couple minutes later when Alisa asked, “What’s with your brother? He’s kinda scary looking. He isn’t sleeping here tonight, is he?”
“Of course he is. He lives here.”
“Well I don’t wanna stay here unless he leaves.”

Alisa left around six o‘clock pm. We hadn’t even got half way done with our food when her mom came to pick her up.
“Alisa, don’t you want to finish eating before you go?” My mom said with a smile and chopsticks between her fingers. “You can invite your mother in. We have plenty of food for her if she wants to join us.”
“No thank you.”
“Okay, sweetheart. Do you want to take this home with you?”
“No, you can give my food to the dog.”
Mom chuckled, “We don’t have a dog, but--- Damon had one chopstick in his hand, trying to flip a noodle into his mouth, while his other chopstick was tucked in his shirt sleeve.
“Oh, I meant him,” Alisa gestured to Damon and then shut the door. We all just sat there speechless, listening to the car door open and close. Then it backed off the gravel and drove away.

In sixth grade, I tried having another sleepover. It ended almost the same way, except that when we got back to school the next week, there were rumors going around school.
After sixth grade graduation, I moved across the state. This was my chance to start fresh. And I decided I wouldn’t bring up Damon, or have any sleepovers at my house all throughout junior high. I didn’t even have to think of him because he went to a special school. And no one at my school even knew he existed. When I started high school, I was so excited, then I found out Damon was tagging along too.

* * *
Damon kept waving at me when I passed by him in the halls. I had contact with Damon almost ten times that day. Each of them, Danny was with me. Danny was getting really upset. He didn’t want anyone messing with his girl.
“Oh, look at who is fallowing us. You already have a stalker the first day of school,” Danny stated as he walked me home. Damon was shortly behind us. He was, in fact, fallowing me. But that was because he didn’t know the way home and Mom had told him to keep close to me. “Do you want me to say something?”
“No. just let it be. He won’t do any harm.
“That’s what they all say before they are attacked in an alley.”
Desperate to digress, I said, “So what do you think of Ms. Hanson? I heard she is a tough teacher.”
“Hey!” Danny grabbed my arm, “Look at me.”
“Danny, you’re hurting me!” When I looked up at Danny I saw Damon running towards his back. “No! Damon!”
“What the---
Soon enough, Damon was clinging on Danny, with his arms wrapped around his neck. Danny, a wrestler, flipped Damon over his shoulder.
“Danny! Stop it! You’re going to hurt him!” I didn’t know what to do. I felt tears coming, “Damon, go away! Go home!” But Danny was twice his size.
He started pounding on Damon. There was a lot of blood.

* * *


I look down now, at the cold stone with my brother’s name engraved in it. It says:

Damon Zachary Berling
May 1, 1996 - August 30, 2012
Son and Brother
Loved By Many, May He Rest In Peace


Then I notice a small grey spider on my leg. I pick it up and gently place it on the stone. It stays there, in place, as if looking at me; taunting me with its microscopic eyes. Though I cannot see them, I know they are there. After three long seconds, which seems like an eternity, it crawls across the hard surface of grave, to the other side.