‘You have to believe me, Doctor! I’m not crazy! This is real!’

Dr Riley Tyler leaned back in her comfortable office chair and regarded the anxious young man sitting in the chair on the other side of her desk.

‘Why don’t you tell me about it, Xander, in your own words. I’ll listen.’

‘Okay. Well, as everyone knows, each of us swallows, on average, about eight spiders every year, while we’re sleeping. But what most people don’t know is that those spiders don’t die. They live on, inside us. And eventually, when there are enough of them inside us, they take over. They colonize us. We become giant spiders!’

‘I’ve never seen a giant spider, Xander.’

‘They disguise themselves! They look just like the person they took over. But it’s just an illusion. They’re really giant spiders!’

‘And why would they do that, Xander?’

‘So they can take over the world! They’re weaving a giant web. One day it will cover the whole world, and then they’ll control everything!’

‘You’ve been under a great deal of stress lately, haven’t you, Xander?’ Dr Tyler glanced at the notes in front of her on her desk. ‘You lost your job.’

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

‘My boss is one of them! He’s been taken over by the spiders. He had to get rid of me because I was getting too close to the truth!’

‘And your wife left you.’

‘She’s one of them too!’

Dr Tyler leaned forward, clasped her hands lightly on her desk, and looked into Xander’s eyes.

‘Xander, this story about people swallowing spiders in their sleep, it’s not true. It’s just an urban legend.’ She picked up a copy of Scientific American that lay on her desk, turned it over, and pushed it across the desk toward Xander. The headline read ‘Fact or Fiction? People Swallow 8 Spiders a Year While They Sleep’ and the article explained in detail that this was not true. ‘Read that, Xander, perhaps it will help.’

Xander pushed the magazine away. ‘The spiders have got to them too! The journalists, the editors, they’re all spiders!’

‘Xander, I know this all seems very real to you, but try to understand, you’ve been under a great deal of pressure recently, and that’s made it difficult for you to think logically. This idea about people turning into spiders, it’s not real. It’s the stress that’s making you think this way.’

‘Oh my God! You’re one of them too!’ Xander stood up, pushing his chair away from the desk. ‘You’re a spider!’ He backed away, turned, and ran out the door.

Dr Tyler sighed, made a few notes in her thin, cursive, elegant handwriting, then gathered her papers, put them in a desk drawer, and locked it. She picked up the phone on her desk and hit one of the speed-dial keys.

‘Hi Honey. I’ve just seen my last patient for the day. Heat the oven and open a bottle of wine, would you? I’ll be home soon. How’s the weaving going?’

The End