Read by Arden Fitzroy
Dad was a bit surprised when mum gave birth to one million spiders. Everyone was. I mean they would be - giving birth to one million spiders is not typical. The thing about giving birth to one million spiders, the reason spiders give birth to one million spiders, is that most of them will die. Sometimes they crawl off to seek their fame and fortune in foreign lands, but usually they just die.
This was exactly what happened with mum and dad which, as you can imagine, for them was a bloody relief. What do you do with one million spiders? Granted, on a one-to-one ratio one spider is much lower maintenance than one baby, but one million ... that’s a lot of spiders.
School was okay. I was good at maths. I like counting things. I had some friends, mostly because options were limited. Okay, I was a giant arachnid in a pinafore but Chris Martin used to pick his own snot and eat it afterwards. I’m not sure I even have a nose. I was aware that other kids’ diets didn’t solely consist of the liquefied remains of flies and they didn’t spend their spare time creating elaborate webs only to have them walked through five minutes later, but it was okay. Everyone is unique, right?
Netball was hard. I have this embarrassing habit of standing completely still when fast objects come toward me. My thinking is that if I stand still then no one will be able to see me. That is not how balls work, or sight for that matter. You would think having more limbs would be beneficial, but they’re actually quite difficult to coordinate. Imagine a spider trying to juggle: it’s tragic isn’t it?
Fun fact about me: I don’t have muscles or a skeletal frame like you do. I actually move through hydraulics, so if you dropped me from a tall height I would explode a bit like a water balloon, but please don’t do that.
It was at college that I felt it. Other girls didn’t seem to want to talk to me. I tried to fit in: I wore shorter skirts and put on mascara, which is a lot more time consuming when you have eight of the little bastards. I even worked out how to blow dry all of the hair along my body into a fashionable, feathered look. I looked like 80s Madonna if Madonna was a giant spider. Still no one wanted to talk to me.
No one wanted to talk to me, until I met Charlie. We were sat at the kitchen table at a freshers’ party not making eye contact. Charlie was short, androgynous-looking and had a voice like a whisper. She was very good at not making eye contact. We sat there for over an hour not talking or looking at each other.
We’re getting this really comfortable silence going, when she leans in all conspiratorially and whispers
“I’m not like other girls.”
“You mean you’re …”
Charlie nods sagely.
“Me too!” I say.
“I thought so. How long have you been …?”
“All my life,” I say. Charlie smiles.
“Me too.” she says.
I have found my kin, my tribe. I am not the only giant spider pretending to be human.
“Which team do you support?”
“Sorry, what?”
“I support Arsenal. Which team do you support?”
“Sorry, we were talking about not being like other girls … I don’t quite …”
“Yeah, I like football.”
“Oh cool, yeah. yeah. Me too. Definitely not a giant spider posing as a woman.”
“So which team do you support?”
“A … a … a … team A. I support team A.”
Fun fact about me: I don’t have veins or arteries like you do. Instead, my organs are just doused in blood flowing freely around my body. This means, if you threw me from a tall height, when I exploded like a water balloon, it would be a delightful pinky-red colour, but again, please don’t do that.
At the end of my third year, I go on a date. I have gone on dates before this, but not like this one. Not like Alex. Alex has swishy hair and eyes that are too big for his face. His words are sharp and clean and he also does not like eye contact. Or physical contact for that matter. But he likes me.
“You’re not like other girls,” he says matter-of-factly.
Oh shit, he’s found me out. With Charlie I was excited. It could have been a bonding experience, but I’m fairly positive most boys would not be pleased to find out their potential new girlfriend is a giant spider posing as a woman. That is news that would not go down well.
What gave me away? Was it the eight legs? The silk webbing that occasionally oozes from my abdomen? The fact that every man I’ve slept with before has mysteriously disappeared? I kill them, that’s why. I wrap them up in webbing, liquefy their bodies and suck them up like a tasty man-smoothie. It’s disgusting I know, but honestly, who can’t say they’ve never done something weird in the heat of the moment?
Alex says again “You’re not like other girls.”
A potent pause.
“I bet you like football.”
Fun fact about me: I’m a big fan of the mathematical work of Leibniz. Just because I’m a giant spider posing as a woman, doesn’t mean I can’t have layers.
Eventually I do find other giant spiders posing as people, but most of them work in Hollywood and I’m training to be an accountant (I like counting things), so we don’t really have much in common.
Accountancy isn’t the most spider aware workplace, but we’re working on it. It’s not easy being a giant spider posing as a woman, but it’s getting easier. I have friends now. On Thursdays, me and Janet from HR play badminton. And the other day Brenda, our IT person, said my shoes really brought out all eight of my eyes. I still find dating hard. I think it’s something to do with the whole being killed and eaten afterwards that really puts men off. You know what men are like about commitment.
I still always listen in extra hard when I hear a woman say she’s not like other girls, because I know better than any, there’s always the smallest chance she really isn’t.
(c) Lizzie Milton, 2019
Lizzie Milton is a playwright and storyteller making queer, feminist theatre. Most recently, her show 10 (10 stories. 5 performers. 1 riotous celebration of History’s Heroines) had a sold out run at Vault Festival in early 2019. She has an MA in Writing for Performance and Dramaturgy from Goldsmiths.
Arden Fitzroy is an actor, writer and full-time dandy who believes in experimentation and blurring the boundaries of genre, gender and art forms. Arden has performed on stages far and wide: from festivals to cabarets; from music halls to drag balls; and from the traditional boards to dragon hordes. Find them in the guise of Don Giovanni at the Arcola Theatre this autumn. FB/Twitter/Instagram:@ArdenFitzroy Website: www.ardenfitzroy.com
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