The Origin
Year 1971, the past…
The girl Andrea Levern stretched her neck; she was trying to see through the large crowd of people gathered around the attraction at the country fair like a large flock of eager pheasants. She could only see a peek here and there between bodies moving out of their spots every now and then as the sounds of oohand huh(gasps) came from the nosey crowd of desperate onlookers. Suddenly, there was an obese man in the girl’s way, and any means of sight became totally blocked out. Frustrated, the child pushed her way through the busy bodied crowd and courageously made her way toward the front. The crowd began to part somewhat – it was enough for her to see what the others were gawking over. Standing in the midst of the crowd was an attractive Caucasian woman wearing bold, blush-red lipstick with shoulder length dark black, soft, wool hair that curled on the ends around her shoulders. She had dark hazel-yellow green eyes, and she wore a lovely tank top without straps.
The woman gave a sinister smile to everyone who looked at her, and especially to Andrea, or so she thought. It seemed as though this beautiful woman were staring particularly at Andrea Levern. The girl watched without a blink, for she was amazed she had never seen a woman so beautiful before other than her mother, Helen Ruth Levern. The woman’s upper features were perfect. Andrea watched the perfect, round balloon boobs and slim thighs and thin waist that curved in the perfect shape of an hourglass. The woman’s hands were pretty and slim; they were perfect, too. Andrea cast her eyes down on the women’s lower body and screeched in terror at the horrendous eight black widow spider legs belonging to the woman. The legs were attached to her, starting at the bottom of her belly. The hideous, creepy legs were a part of the woman who continued to watch everyone at the fair with a dark, sinister smile.
There was a young Hopi Indian standing close by the woman’s right side; he was her guide – her master. Andrea was shocked beyond words and she brought her hands up with a quick reflex and let them rest on her chest near the area of her heart. Terribly afraid of the figure before her, Andrea screamed until her voice could be heard no more; she turned to flee the attractive she-creature with the eight hideous spider legs and she saw a glimpse of the faces of the others filled with extreme excitement, pointing and urging the woman-thing on, but she remained silent. Andrea ran through the crowd that immediately parted for her like the red sea. Scared and shaken up, the girl longed so desperately to be home – and not her home in Baron’s Hollowpoint. She longed to be at home in her hometown of Salem, Massachusetts. There had been a pneumonia epidemic in 1968, and the Leverns fled to save their lives.
The sickness took the lives of many, and out of a population of five thousand beings that resided inside Salem, Massachusetts, only two thousand remained alive and suffered to recover from the illness that had swept through the town like a devil’s dust swept along by a bad wind storm. Helen and George Levern settled in Baron’s Hollowpoint with their daughter when she was six years old, just four years ago; Andrea Levern was nine years old now.
The girl fled the scene as if she were running from a ghost. Andrea dared not glance back over her shoulder for fear that she’d see the woman-thing running after her. Nearing the exit, Andrea nearly bumped into a tall, thin, handsome Caucasian man with slick black hair. The man was headed to the fair.
Andrea stopped for a second. The man spoke to her as if he were a cousin or uncle; he was munching on peanut m&m’s. The man read the fear in the girl’s eyes and knew exactly what she ran away from – the woman spider Ana Anansi, the most popular attraction at the fair.
“Isn’t she odd? Ana Anansi is the biggest she-spider in the world!” The man giggled, sounding a little nerdy. It lasted for only a second. He spoke up again. “Did you see those creepy spider legs? A-nd those hazel-yellow green eyes?! Oh gosh, she’s awful, so awful!” He shuddered slightly and moved past Andrea toward the fair, to the main attraction of Ana Anansi.
Andrea remained speechless. She was recovering from the shock of perceiving something so unusual, unearth like. Andrea ran off toward home where her parents were. It was just Andrea and her parents. She was the only child. Andrea lived on Stokes Drive in a cozy, two-story brick home. The girl had been eager to go to the fair, although she had been there on the first evening of the opening. She wanted to go again, especially tonight, since it was the last night of the fair. Andrea wasn’t anticipating this woman spider; she was used to seeing the circus or the evil kinevil motorcycle rider on the last night of the fair. The girl had several thoughts running through her mind. She wished so badly that she’d waited for her father to get home from work at the laundry cleaners. Then Andrea and her parents would have gone to the fair together, the same as they had on the fair’s opening night and parade. Andrea’s father would have protected her from the creepy woman spider. She wondered what the woman thought about the people surrounding her who stared at her with their mouths gaping open. She also wondered if the strange woman could talk, and if so, what she would say. Andrea was nearing home now, and she was relieved to be farther away from the fair and the woman spider. She would tell her parents about it once she was home.
“Mama, Papa, ooohhhhh, Mama!” Andrea cried, as if she had fallen and scraped her knees. “Help, oh, I saw her-it!” Andrea thought for a moment, trying to speak the correct word for what she had seen at the fair.
Helen Levern had nearly finished putting supper on the table as she replied, “Andrea, what is it that you’re babbling on about?”
George Levern hurried to clean his face at the kitchen sink, allowing the warm water to run slowly over his tired hands before he washed them. Helen placed the last dish on the table and pulled up a chair, joining her family at the supper table.
“I saw a big woman spider at the fair this evening,” Andrea said anxiously.
Andrea saw the look of bewilderment on her parents’ faces. Silence ensued for just a moment.
“You saw the devil’s wife,” George spoke boldly, and in between words, he continued to enjoy his supper – hearty beef stew and broccoli. George slurped tea from a glass mug and went back to eating like a healthy Paul Bunyan. “Her name is Ana Anansi, the biggest spider in the world, Andrea.”
George spoke as if he were proud of the she-spider Ana Anansi. “Ah, Ana Anansi has great beauty, and that is the trick, ey!”
“George, no more talks about the she-spider Ana Anansi. She’s great terror come to Baron’s Hollowpoint. Please, no more talk about her while we eat – it frightens Andrea. She will be scared to sleep in her bed tonight,” Helen said, greatly concerned for Andrea’s sake.
Andrea could not each much supper. The girl was afraid of the she-spider Ana Anansi; she feared that the spider would come for her, and possibly everyone in Baron’s Hollowpoint. Yet, the girl was filled with curiosity, for she was desperate to know if the woman spider was real, or if what she had seen was just a mean joke played by one of the townsfolk.
After supper ended, Helen washed the dishes and cleaned the kitchen. The kitchen was small and cozy with a wooden island with a checkerboard top sitting directly in the middle of the kitchen floor. There was even a medium-sized Irish-style fireplace that George and Helen let remain lit overnight every night of the week.
Once the house was quiet and her parents were fast asleep, Andrea slipped out of the house and hurried off into the night to the fairgrounds again.
The moment the girl arrived inside the fair, she saw the workers tearing down rides and tents all around her. Andrea looked a short distant from where she stood briefly before she moved on, seeing a long truck belonging to the fair. A few men who worked for the fair surrounded the truck. The men loaded the truck quickly; it was almost too quickly for Andrea to see what they were loading. Suddenly, one of them looked up and Andrea held her breath. For a second, she thought that one of the men had spotted her. Startled, Andrea quickly hid behind the nearest oak tree as the men continued to load the trucks.
A few feet away from the trucks, some men stood in a circle near a thick bush. They surrounded something, and one of them was wringing his hands together as if he were afraid that whatever the group was hiding might escape. Andrea was standing behind the tree a good distance from the scene, and it was hard for