Wren grabbed Arthur’s arm and buried her face in his sleeve. “I can’t watch this…” But she was still peeking through her fingers with one eye as the tarantula’s spindly legsbegan moving and positioning the spider directly on Arthur’s palm, which was glistening with sweat. The camera zoomed out and Arthur, looking up and away and thinking about a happier place, held the spider out in his hand, as if offering someone a mint. She seemed content there in his palm, still and docile. A petrified smile spread onto Phone Arthur’s face.
“You did it, man,” the store employee offered. “Told you she wouldn’t bite you.”
“Wait, what’s she doing?” The spider was on the move.
“She’s just exploring.”
“Tell her to explore somewhere else. Stop her!”
“OK, stay calm…”
“HELP!!”
The video cut out abruptly.
“Wow. That was…a lot. Are you OK?”
He couldn’t tell if she was being genuine or patronizing, but knowing her, probably both.
“It wasn’t actually so bad, until she started sort of…skittering up my arm.” He reenacted with his fingers on Wren, and she giggled.
“I’m impressed. That took bravery. Not for most grown men, but for you.”
“Thanks. Downside is, they wouldn’t just let me walk in off the street and hold a tarantula, so…I had to buy it. We have a pet tarantula now—sorry—and I really, really don’t want to talk about it.”
Wren considered this for a moment before nodding her approval. “Fuckin’ metal. I like it.”
Arthur clapped his hands together casually as if concluding a sales pitch. “So…what do you think?”
She raised an eyebrow, deep in thought. He could feel hereyes scanning him, evaluating his efforts and weighing whether or not they were enough to atone.
“What else you got?” she asked.
He had her. She was in. She was hooked. He just had to close the deal, and luckily he had one more card to play.
“Well,” Arthur began. “I did take a video of this, but it’s mostly just me crying, so I thought I’d just show you the result.”
He brought his hands up and slowly—ever so slowly, for maximum dramatic effect—removed his surgical mask. Removed it so that she could see his fresh, shimmering nose ring. Solid gold—well, gold-plated stainless steel, anyway—straight through one nostril. Not quite like an angry bull, but close enough.
“You did not!” Wren couldn’t help but to reach up and poke it, make sure it was real.
“Ow. Careful, it’s still pretty tender.”
“I honestly love it. It suits you, and I think your students will love it.”
“Really? I feel like an idiot. No one gets these anymore except thirty-year-old women who go to punk rock shows.”
She gave him a playful tap on the arm.
“You never know, it might grow on you.”
Arthur doubted it.
“Well, that’s it, that’s the end of my presentation. I wanted to do more, but I ran out of time. I had to get to you.”
“It’s OK.”
“But I brought you these,” he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a handful of slips of paper. “We can put them back in the jar, tackle each of them together. I don’t know if I’ll keep the nose ring, or ever sleep again knowing there’s a tarantula in our apartment, but I will jump into a volcano for you, I will go cave diving, whatever that means, I will gosnorkeling with sharks and go plucking catfish out of muddy holes in Mississippi. I will do those things for you and I will do themwithyou. I will be your one hundred percent partner in everything you want to do. I promise.”
