Seleke the Spider

One day there was a girl named Seleke (sell-a-key). She lived in a house with her mother, not at the top of a cliff, and not at the bottom, but right in the middle. Above was the land of Snarling Wolves, and below was a beach inhabited by Ugly Giants.

It was breakfast time, and Seleke was sitting at the breakfast table with her mother. Breakfast at Seleke's house is a little different than breakfast might be at your house. For plates they used sand dollars gathered from the beach of the Ugly Giants. They drank orange juice from sea shells. The handles of their forks and knives were made of deer antlers from the land of Snarling Wolves.

They were eating blueberry pancakes. Seleke loved to eat butter on her pancakes. In fact, Seleke liked butter so much she would try to eat it all on its own. Today she reached across the table and put her fingers right in the butter, but her mother scowled,

"Seleke! You know you are not allowed to eat butter straight. It is only for putting on other things!"

"All right mom." Seleke said.

When Seleke picked up her sea shell cup to have a sip of water it slipped from her buttery hands. Crash! The shell smashed on the floor and broke into many pieces. Seleke felt tears coming, but her mother said, "Butter sure is slippery. Come help me clean this up."

Seleke felt better helping her mother sweep up the broken shell.

Later that day, Seleke was near the cliff edge throwing feathers over the edge. The feathers floated down and down, spinning in lazy circles as they dropped. Far below, Seleke could see the beach, and on the beach, shells. She thought of the cup she had broken that morning and decided she would get a new one.

So Seleke got a rope, and put on her climbing harness, and she took off her shoes so that her feet could grip the rock. She tied off the rope and clipped in, then double-checked everything. Jump, jump, jump she rapelled down the rope and soon she was on the beach.

The beach was covered with bleached drift wood. Long fronds of brown kelp lay baking in the bun. Shells of many sizes lay scattered about. Many of the shells were very large, too big for Seleke to pick up. But she looked around and found one that was just right. She felt good knowing that she could replace the shell she broke.

Just then Seleke heard Boom Thoom, Boom Thoom. An Ugly Giant was coming! She grabbed her shell and ran to the rope. Then Seleke had an idea! She ran back and picked up eight of the long, brown fronds of sea weed.

By the time the Ugle Giant reached her she was only up to the height of his chin. But Seleke had been busy. She had put all eight fronds into her clothing: Two out the neck two out her sleeves, two in her waist band, and two out the legs of her pants.

Seleke could see the giant's beard stubble. Seleke felt his hot breath as he said, "You will make a tasty meal!"

"Why how strange!" said Seleke. "I did not know Giants ate spiders!"

"What you say?" said the Ugly Giant. "You no spider. You person. Yum."

"Is that so?" asked Seleke. "How many limbs does a person have?"

"Uhhh..." said the giant. He scratched his filthy noggin. "Four. Two arms, and two legs."

"And how many do I have?" asked Seleke, wiggling her eight kelp fronds.

"Uhhh..." said the giant. His eyesight was not very good. He counted the fronds. "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight."

"See!" said Seleke, "I am a spider. Not good for eating."

"But you talk." said the Ugly Giant. "Spider no talk."

"But look, I'm hanging from my web. Do persons spin a web?" Seleke asked. She bounced up and down on the rope to make her point.

"Uh, no. You must be spider." said the Ugly Giant. He turned away dejected.

Seleke scrambled up to the top of her rope. When she came into the house her mom asked her what she had been doing to get the shell. Seleke said, "Oh, nothing special!"

The End
(c) 2008 Ken Demarest