“What?!?! There’s actually a National Save A Spider Day?” The astonished words spewed from my mouth as the burly cop slapped on the handcuffs. He cinched them down much tighter than they needed to be and grinned.

The cop wrapped my favorite tennis shoe in a plastic bag, and muttered. “Evidence.”

“I told you,” my wife Myrtle shrieked, her nose an inch from mine, flying saliva tinged with garlic. “Put the darned thing outside. But no, big shot, you just wouldn’t listen.”

From that day, my life careened downhill, like the gumball in one of those big quarter vending machines with the spiral ramp in the center.  Myrtle filed for divorce before the case even went to the jury, and my kids stopped talking to me halfway through the first appeal.

You’d think that today of all days, they’d let me know what time it is.  I haven’t had a wristwatch for almost seven years now.  About an hour ago, they brought in a heck of a meal.  Steak, crab legs, mashed potatoes and green beans, the plate had all my favorites.  I wonder how much more time.  Jeez Laweez, here comes the priest. 

© 2007 Ron Heimbecher. Original for CCF (Heimbecher grants CCF first electronic rights for one month; CCF may archive the material indefinitely and include it in an eBook anthology).