The stars sparkled in the black velvet sky like cascading jewels against the pale glow of the moon. Courtney turned up the Ed Sheeran song they were listening to on the satellite radio. Driving through the California desert was peaceful. Courtney was looking forward to their adventure in Death Valley, they were almost there and ready to camp. It was a nice respite from the stress of the marketing world. They were getting away for a brief vacation in Dan’s range rover convertible. Their hands were clasped together as the dry air blew through her long, blond hair. Daniel didn’t have to worry about that, his brown hair was close and cropped.

      All was perfect, total bliss. The heat of the day turned in to a cool, mellow night.

      Up ahead in the long distance of the desert was a bright blue light rising up to meet them. Suddenly the temperature dropped, the air was frigid. “It’s freezing! Can you put the top up baby?” She asked.

      Dan did, saying, “Must be the cops up ahead, can probably see them for a hundred miles out here. It’s so flat.”
      As they got closer their satellite radio stopped working. There was silence. Courtney tried to see what was going on when from somewhere outside the song, White Rabbit, by the Jefferson Airplane started blasting through the cold desert.

      The light was closer and in the midst of the vaporous glow they could see a figure. A man.  He walked towards them. Daniel stopped the car. Must be a hitchhiker.

      “Need a ride dude?” Daniel asked.

    The young man nodded and walked towards their convertible.

      Courtney couldn’t make out his features in the odd blue light. She could see he was wearing a fringed coat and had long hair. He had the swagger of a young man. As he walked by her door she noticed what looked like a beard and mustache on his pale face. Still his features weren’t very clear.

      She turned back to look at the light up ahead. All of a sudden, he was in the back seat of their car. Courtney didn’t even hear him open the door.

      “Where are you going?” Asked Daniel.

      “West, Barker Ranch,” answered the stranger.

“A ranch, how cool is that!” Exclaimed Courtney. “Meeting friends there?”
      He shook his head no.

      As she fiddled with the radio which still didn’t work, the desert air answered with more songs from the 60’s. The End, by the Doors started blasting.

She turned to ask their passenger how far Barker Ranch was from where they were.

      He was gone. The temperature got warmer. Ed Sheeran’s voice returned on their satellite radio.

      “What the Hell!” She exclaimed.

      Daniel looked in the rearview mirror. “Where did he go? He was just there!”

      Goosebumps rose on Courtney’s flesh. She could feel the tension in Daniel’s hand. “What just happened?”
      He shrugged, shaking his head.

      As they drove off the highway they found a gas station and convenience store. They needed gas and coffee, lots of coffee.

    At the register Courtney said, “I’m hoping with all this caffeine we won’t be Imagining hitchhikers anymore.”

      “That was creepy,” said Daniel.

      The cashier overheard them. “I see you met Jake.”

      “Jake?” They both said in unison.

      “Yes, he was a test subject for Manson and his gang back in the 60’s. They had to prove they could kill, so they picked up hitchhikers that were headed to Barker Ranch to join them, then killed them and buried them out in the desert. They killed at least three. Jake is the only one that makes an appearance, they say the poor guy had a wife and kid he left behind. Wasn’t just a straggly hippie. He keeps trying to get back to the ranch to get revenge on Charlie. He appears this time of year, on the anniversary of his death. Poor guy.”

      Later when she got back to Boston, Courtney did some research on the stories about Jake that the cashier and others had told her. Apparently, many others had similar experiences and ghostly tales had been circulating since his disappearance in 1968.

      Through her connections in communications she was able to find his wife and daughter Jill. On a cold November day, Jake’s family joined her and Dan as they said a prayer and laid a wreath and a marker down in the area where they picked him up in the desert. They spoke to him and told him he could rest now. Justice was done and his murderer was dead. He was never seen again.

    Brittney had always been able to avoid that house, but not now. She would have to get the owner’s signature on a registered letter.

      This house never had mail, she never saw a soul in that dark mansion when she did her route. The grounds were perfectly landscaped, which amazed her. But when? She never saw a gardener, yet the house did not look like a haunted house. The Victorian painted lady was well kept, yet whenever she quickly walked past it, a chill rose up her spine. All the hairs on her arms stood up in frozen alert.

      She did not know why it frightened her so much, but it did. She had been a mail carrier for two years, she told herself she must act professionally, this is her job. She slowly made her way to the entrance.

      Brittany comforted herself that it was a normal house, had to be. Really, it wasn’t so bad. It had sort of a gothic beauty. Yes, that was it. It had been beautiful in that gaslight era. It wasn’t modern, perhaps that is what made her uneasy.

      She approached the porch and stood at the door, she trembled as she rang the bell. Her stomach ached.
      There was no answer, she waited, it seemed like forever. She rang the bell again. Still nothing. She was relieved no one was home. Brittany turned to go, but as she did, she heard slow, soft, footsteps. Reluctantly, she turned back to greet the home owner.

      At first, Brittany could only tell it was an old woman, who stood in the shadow of the door, Brittany could not make out her face. All she knew is the woman had to be very old.

      “What is it my dear?” The aged woman asked, her voice shaken.

      “I have a letter for you ma’am, I need your signature,” replied Brittany.

      “It’s come at last, she grabbed the letter, adjusting her glasses and asked, “Do you have a pen my dear?”

      Brittany pulled a pen out of her pocket and handed it to the woman.

      The woman grabbed it.

      “Ouch!” cried Brittany.

      Brittany didn’t understand how, but when the woman took the pen she pierced Brittany’s finger.

      The woman stepped out of the doorway. Brittany stepped back in horror. She looked in fear into her own eyes, at her own face, in a woman who was at least 60 years her senior.

      “Who are you?” asked Brittany.

      “I am you and you are me. Come here!” She grabbed Brittany by the wrist, and pulled her towards herself with a strength a woman that age should not have. Brittany tried to fight her off to no avail. She took the younger woman’s finger and sucked the blood out of it, licking her lips when she finished as though she had savored some forbidden delicacy.

      Brittany fought to escape.

      The woman finally released her saying, “Welcome home!”

      Brittany cringed as she watched the old age of the woman disappear. All the wrinkles, the crooked posture, the skin, were rejuvenated. Soon the woman had the taught skin of a twenty something. She herself, felt as if all the blood was leaving her own body, she looked down to see wrinkled, shaky hands.  

      The exuberant, now young woman pushed Brittany down and ran off in her body, leaving her trapped in the old woman’s. The woman threw her glasses off as she raced towards her freedom in her new body. One lens cracked as it hit the stoop. Brittany tried to push herself up to go after the woman. She was unable. Brittany cried out in sheer mortification into her translucent, purple veined hands. As she looked down she saw the certified letter lying on the doorstep. She also saw the broken eyeglasses next to them. Brittany put them on and saw that the return address was the very address she delivered to. The mail carrier didn’t know why, but she had a sudden impulse to rip up the letter. She picked it up and with every bit of strength she had in her Brittany tore it in half.

      She heard a blood curdling scream. She turned to the street.  It was the woman. Brittany witnessed the woman being carried up into a blast of wind that engulfed the area. It resembled a small tornedo. It soon dissolved into nothingness, along with her nemesis.  As she turned back she found herself standing in an empty, overgrown lot. The house was gone! She felt better. She looked at her hands. They were the hands of a young woman again.

“I want to bat out a funny Halloween story about bats,” Justine said.

Natalie rolled her eyes, which were white as sheets because of the thickly painted pitch-black eyeliner. She was wearing a gothic silver necklace with a bright jade centerpiece in the shape of a bat. That one usually drove Justine wild.

“Oh, look at you being punny now,” Natalie drolly answered.

“You don’t like it? I think my readers will.”

“Your loyal readers are boring with their boring fan mail. Forget funny that isn’t really funny, give me scary on Halloween!” Natalie yelled just before downing a glass of cabernet.

“Well, you know there is a story I could write, that’s funny in a cosmic sense, but really is just down right scary.”

“What is it?”

“It’s the story of how you died Natalie,” Justine lit a cigarette with a stabbing movement.

Natalie’s stab wounds pulsated in unison. She hated being reminded of her murder.

“What’s there to tell that’s so funny? I loved you, you killed me,” Natalie said with all the venom she could muster.

“It’s funny because ever since you started haunting me, I fell in love with you. So I’m going to kill myself to be with you forever. Is that funny or scary?” Justine asked as she took a long drag on her cigarette.

Natalie paused before answering.

Ten year old Billy Alder stood outside his home one early September morning looking at the elaborate spider web in his front yard. It was in the shrubs below the stairs connecting to the railing like it had in past years. Only this time the web was bigger, growing taller and wider each day. Until today he hadn’t spied the spider. Now it hung in the center. A large dark brown, tan spotted creepy crawler. It looked like it had about a dozen legs. Huh? Billy bent to get a closer look, but it moved swiftly into the shrubs. He’d never seen one like it. They were usually plain black or brown with eight legs. Weird.

It popped out again at the bottom in the shrubs. Billy watched it closely as four of its hind legs worked to grab onto something silky coming from its butt. “What? No way.” He mouthed as his mother poked her head out the door, yelling for him to get going. If he didn’t move his stepfather would come out, and he’d do more than just yell. Billy fetched his backpack from the top stair and hurried down the street to catch the school bus.

When he got home that afternoon he noticed the web had spread to the next shrub, a kind of a loopy bridge connecting to another web. Cool. It was lacy and intricate. Very precise, he thought bending down looking for the spider. He didn’t see it. Hmm? Where did it go? This time of year spiders were all over the place. He’d often watch with macabre fascination as they snatched a meal, usually an unsuspecting fly or small insect. Nature sure was funny. With Halloween coming up and a three - hundred word essay due on the subject that involved some research, Billy had struggled with an idea. Until now.

Most of his classmates were writing about ghosts and ghouls or the headless horseman. Billy had even thought about wandering around a graveyard. But he didn’t need to seek out inspiration when it was in his own front yard. He had something different. All he had to do was Google information on spiders and maybe print out a picture. Better yet, take his own. He’d be sure to get an A.   

Over the next couple of days Billy did just that. It also kept him out of Mike’s path. His stepfather had been drinking again, losing his temper all too often. It was best to keep away. To his surprise Billy liked doing research. He’d read some fascinating articles on various species all over the world. Some were fantastic stories, if he strayed from the facts. When he narrowed his search to what was invading his front yard, he found a crab spider, common to New England. It walked sideways like its name suggested. It had eight legs, not twelve. In fact he’d found nothing with more than eight legs. Strange. However, nothing could have prepared him for what he saw the next morning.

As he walked down the front steps he was amazed that the web had grown exponentially overnight. It was now nearly across the bottom railings and spiraling up toward the door. He had to sidestep it so he wouldn’t get tangled in its thick webbing. To his amazement, it was getting taller and wider, its strands heavier. Thick like rope. Huh? He’d never seen anything like it, not even on the Internet. He looked again, but the spider wasn’t visible, though he spied movement in the shrubs. Good thing no one but him used the front door. Everyone, including his older sister, went through the garage.

Some species he’d researched were large, hairy, and venomous like tarantulas. The largest was a Giant Huntsman in Australia. It grew to a foot long. They were fast, but calm.  A fictional version was a monster man-eating spider, who killed its prey once it was done building its ginormous intricate web. Hmm. Could it be the spider crisscrossing its artwork by the front door? No. By all accounts it looked common to the region. Yet it was growing bigger than expected, creeping him out.

Billy looked in the shrubs, but didn’t want to disturb the thick web now covering most of the evergreen. If he didn’t know any better, he’d swear it was a cool Halloween decoration. He pondered the thought then grabbed his cellphone and took a few pictures. He had to document this. After a few clicks out popped the spotted brown spider, now the size of a large egg. He took one last shot, a close up, before he heard his stepfather yelling.

“Billy, get in the house immediately.”

“Oh crap.” The computer! Billy had forgotten to delete the document.

Not wanting to disturb the web, Billy went into the house through the garage. He found Mike waiting by his office door.
“You used my computer and printer without asking,” he snarled. His bearded face getting red. Mike stood about six feet tall. His form lanky, but muscular from working out. No doubt to show off his numerous tattoos covering both arms.

“Sorry.” Billy said. “Mom said I could use it for my essay until she buys me one. It won’t happen again.” He gulped, trying not to look scared.

“She shouldn’t have given you permission. You’ll be punished.” He snarled, glaring at Billy. His eyes dark and wild. “What do you say?”

“I’m sorry,” Billy said again, sounding more sincere.

“Next time go to the library. And oh,” he added, taking off his belt. “You won’t be getting a computer. We can’t afford it.”

Billy said nothing. It would only make matters worse. He just nodded, hoping Mike didn’t use his belt again. Where was his mother? She was never home when Mike let into him.

Mike snapped the belt a couple of times for show. “You’re grounded for two weeks. If I catch you out I will use this,” he promised, cracking the belt like a whip.   

It was louder this time, making Billy cringe.

“Understood?” Mike bellowed.

“Yes.” Billy gulped. He understood only too well.

“Now, go to your room. If I catch you using my things again you’ll be sorry,” he yelled as Billy quickly disappeared into his own room and shut the door.

Luckily he’d put the document on a thumb drive and had already printed it out, along with a few photos. All except for the one he just took. He’d have print it out in school. 

For the next few days Billy kept his distance from his stepfather. He didn’t even tell his mother about the incident. What was she going to do anyway?

On Saturday Billy got up late. His mother and sister had gone shopping and Mike was fishing. Thank god. Billy was happy to be on his own for the next hour. He decided to check on the spider before getting dressed. He opened the inside door and was shocked at what he saw. The web now covered the entire door. It spanned across the front connecting both railings, looking like a crazy Halloween prank. Could a spider really do that? And where was it? He didn’t see it. 

The whole thing was really creepy, like something in a horror movie. Invasion of the giant spider. Billy thought. Had it mutated like in the moves? Everyone must have gone through the garage. No way could they have gotten through that web. And where was the spider? Standing here wasn’t doing any good. He had to get rid of it before his mother came home. She might use the front door.

Billy quickly dressed and went through the garage, grabbing a rake to knock the web down. He didn’t get far when he spied his stepfather’s truck in the driveway and heard an awful scream. Mike was home early. Oh crap. Somehow Billy knew he’d get the blame for this.

As he rounded the corner near the large shrub, something unseen gave him the chills. He looked up and couldn’t believe his eyes. Mike was tangled in the web at the top of the stairs, struggling to work free of it. Billy didn’t see the spider as Mike yelled for help, wrapped in the thick rope like strands.

“What the hell?” He yelled. “Billy, get some scissors. “No, wait,” he cried, twisting in the thick netting. “Bring me the hedge clipper. It’ll be quicker. This damn thing is getting tighter with every pull. Shit! I can’t believe this.” Mike shouted in dismay. His face beet red.

Billy could see his veins bulging. He was about to move when his stepfather yelled again.

“This is your fault Billy. I saw what you were researching on my computer.”

“What? How can this be my fault? I didn’t build the web.”

“You’re nothing but a pain in the ass kid. When I’m free of this I’ll give you a wallop you’ll never forget.” Mike spun around, desperately trying to free himself. His face now purple. The more he tried to free himself, the tighter the web took hold, as if the strong silky strands had a mind of its own. “Hurry.” He demanded as the web spun him around, wrapping him up as if in a cocoon.

Billy threw down the rake and went to get the clippers, but stopped abruptly. Suddenly something large and dark was crawling up the side of the house from the shrubs. He was stunned to see the spider, now the size of Mike’s pick-up truck, going in for the kill. It had morphed into something creepier than anything he’d read about. The dark brown spider now had red spots all over its furry back. It had to be some sort of mutation. What the heck?   

Mike yelled again, snapping Billy from his stupor. Billy turned slowly, unable to take his eyes off the ginormous spider as it crawled sideways, edging closer to Mike. Its large green eyes flashing in anticipation of its next meal. Billy stood dumbfounded as Mike screamed.  

“Jesus Billy. Moooove. . .”

Billy quickly stepped toward the garage, keeping his eyes on the surreal scene before him. He reached the door, ready to grab the clippers hanging just inside, but the spider was faster and lunged at Mike, tearing into him with exposed shark like teeth.
Billy stood horrified as his stepfather fought like hell against the supersized spider as it bit down on his head. He turned away as the final agonizing screams escaped his stepfather. Then came a loud chomping sound, like bones crushing. Eew! Billy shuddered. A moment later the masticating was done and he slowly turned around, knowing he might have to run into the garage to escape the same fate.

Billy glanced up. Blood showered the front door. It was all he could see from where he stood. Still immobilized Billy waited, anxiously looking around. He saw nothing. No spider and certainly no Mike.

Finally he came around front. All that remained of the web were scattered remnants. And splashes of blood everywhere.