Queer Ghost Stories Volume Two

The Moths-2

Why would she bring a moth-infested garment into the shower?

Well, she had to wash it, obviously. She threw it to the floor of the tub and let water soak into the woolly fabric. Then she squirted shampoo on it and stomped on it the way they used to stomp wine grapes in the olden days. If there were any moths left in there, they were dead for sure. Hot water, shampoo, foot stomps. That would be the end of them.

Olivia washed her hair, washed her skin, but she could still feel the moths all around her. She didn’t want to leave the bathroom. She stayed in the shower until her fingers felt pruney.

The phone was ringing when she left the bathroom. Shay. Who else would it be?

“How are you feeling?” Shay asked.

Olivia told her all about the cloud of moths that had risen out of Mr. Davies’s old sweater.

She expected Shay to agree with her that the moth story was a good one, but instead Shay asked, “What are you doing with one of his sweaters?”

“Don’t you keep things from your exes?” Olivia asked. “Doesn’t everybody?”

Shay didn’t respond, but Olivia knew what she was thinking. That Mr. Davies wasn’t an ex, he was an abuser—which he most certainly was not! And even though Shay hadn’t said the words, Olivia was still mad at her for thinking it.

“How do you get rid of moths?” Olivia asked to prevent Shay from talking about Mr. Davies.

“I don’t know. Moth balls?”

“Isn’t that chemicals? I don’t want to use chemicals. Mr. Davies’s sweater is already full of holes.”

“Oh!” Shay said. “I heard somewhere that it isn’t actually moths that put holes in fabrics. It’s their larvae. They like natural fibres and stuff that hasn’t been washed. They’ll eat right through it.”

Olivia shivered when she thought about creepy-crawlies living in her closet. “Well, how do you get rid of the larvae?”

“Throw out the damn sweater,” Shay said gruffly. When Olivia didn’t answer, Shay went on, “If they’re anything like bedbugs you can either boil them or freeze them. But if it were me, I’d throw that sweater down the garbage chute so fast it would make your head spin.”

Shay kept talking, but Olivia couldn’t think about anything other than the blue sweater in the tub. Her shower had been hot, but not boiling. Did that mean there were still little moth larvae crawling around in the wool? The idea made her cringe.

“I gotta go,” Olivia said. “I love you lots. Talk to you later. Night-night.”

Olivia hung up on Shay, then tossed her phone on the couch. She was still dripping from the shower when she filled the kettle and set it on the back burner. While she waited for it to boil, she padded into the bathroom and swapped her towel for a robe. She squeezed water from her hair into the sink and then glanced at the lump of wool in the tub.

How could you tell if your sweater had larvae in it? How big were larvae? Were they visible to the naked eye? She didn’t see anything moving.

When the kettle came to a boil, Olivia grabbed it from the stove and carried it into the bathroom, trying not to get burned by any of the water shooting out the front. She’d filled it a bit too full, looked like.

The water made a sizzling sound when it hit the wool. Seemed practically alive, but it was probably just the fibres seizing. Wool was one of those things you weren’t supposed to wash in hot water because it would shrink. But that shouldn’t be a problem at this point, because Mr. Davies would never wear it again.

Never, ever again.

Once she’d poured all the boiling water over the sweater, she reached down to touch it, but the wool was so hot it burned her fingertips. That was stupid. Why did she always do such stupid things? Shay always told her not to think that way, but it was true. Just like her mother always told her: “Think! You don’t think!” She didn’t think. And then she got burned.

She took the kettle back to the kitchen, and when she got there the burner was still red hot. She’d forgotten to turn it off. One of these days she’d burn the whole building down, she was sure of it.

Maybe working would take her mind off all this stuff. She’d been putting it off all day, but she actually liked her job. It was relaxing. Or it was something to focus on, at least. Her job was to type out captioning for all kinds of stuff, from movies and TV shows to internet videos from online courses. She learned a lot from the courses, although it all fell out of her brain five seconds later. And the movies and shows were usually ones she’d never normally watch, so they expanded her horizons too.

Best part was that she could work from home, sitting in her living room wearing nothing but a housecoat.

After she’d been working for a while, her fingers needed a break, so she decided to check on Mr. Davies’s sweater. It was still warm to the touch, but not hot. She tried to wring it out without warping the wool.

Had the boiling water killed the larvae completely? How could she be sure?

When she lifted the garment out of the tub to see if it had shrunk, she noticed that yes it definitely had, but she noticed something else too: some of the dye had leeched out when she’d poured the boiling water over it. Now there was a blue patch at the bottom of her tub. She’d have to try bleaching it later.

Right now it was time to fold this baby, shove it in a plastic bag, and stick it in the freezer.

If the larvae hadn’t boiled to death, they could certainly be frozen.

Olivia had never felt so satisfied with herself. She was taking care of business, or at least taking care of pest control. This was all going very well.

With Mr. Davies’s sweater in the freezer, it was time to put on pyjamas and then possibly eat more pizza. Without Shay around, there was plenty more. Olivia sauntered into the bedroom and tossed her housecoat on the bed. She thought she caught some kind of movement out of the corner of her eye, but it was probably just dust floating around from when she’d yanked Mr. Davies’s wife’s old bag from the closet.

She flipped her pillow over. Her pyjamas were underneath. She’d kept her pyjamas under her pillow for as long as she could remember. Mr. Davies thought it was very cute, when he’d been in her bedroom. That was back when she lived with her parents, a weekend they were away. They trusted her completely. She wasn’t the type of girl to have boys over.

Mr. Davies hadn’t stayed the night, of course. What would his wife think if he didn’t come home? In fact, he hadn’t stayed long at all. Just long enough to get the job done.

Once Olivia had put on her patterned cotton bottoms and the purple long-sleeved top that came with them, she picked up her robe and turned around. Her plan was to hang it on the hook on the bathroom door. That was the plan. But when she saw what was behind her... well, that plan went right out the window.

Why did she think that cloud of moths had evaporated into thin air? What a stupid, stupid girl she was, just like her mother always said. Moths don’t disappear. The ones that had flown at her head hadn’t disappeared when she ran to the shower. They just found somewhere to settle. Temporarily.

You should have seen them all lined up like a little winged army. All lined up at the top of the wall, near the seam of the ceiling. All on the same wall, too: the one with the closet, the one with the bedroom door. That wall. One big long line of moths overhead.

These were little moths, not big ones. Not the kind that are sort of pretty, that look a bit like butterflies. These were small and dusty beige. They didn’t have their wings outstretched. No, they looked like little pieces of something as they clung to the wall. Like if you chopped up dried grass into bits. That’s all. They weren’t big. It’s just that there were so many of them. And they were all just waiting.

Waiting for what?

Olivia didn’t wait to find out. She raced for the front hall and grabbed a shoe with a nice flat sole. Perfect. Also, the step stool from the kitchen that Shay had bought her so she wouldn’t have to climb up on the countertops every time she wanted to reach those cupboards over the fridge.

A shoe and a step stool. That’s all she needed.

She hoped.

The step stool was a good one. It had two steps, so Olivia would be able to get right up close to the ceiling no problem. She set it inside the bedroom, right in front of the open door and prepared to whack the life out of those moths. She didn’t feel bad about it. Sure they were living things, but they weren’t living things she cared about. They were just moths. The world had plenty.

She climbed the step stool and started whacking.

As soon as her shoe struck the wall, the whole line of moths reacted. They must have felt the vibration and known what was coming, because they swarmed. Again. Exactly like they’d done when they flew out of the purse.

Why would moths go after a human? People were so much bigger than them! They didn’t seem to care. They fluttered all around Olivia’s head, but not pretty like butterflies fluttering. This was like fluttering rags. Dusty rags spreading their powder all over her hair and her skin.

Had she even managed to kill one, when her shoe met the wall? One single, solitary moth? She couldn’t be sure, and she couldn’t whack them now because they weren’t on the wall anymore.

She dropped her shoe on the floor. Wouldn’t be needing that.

As they flew around her, Olivia started clapping her hands in front of her face. Yes! This was working. She didn’t know how she knew, but she knew. She kept clapping her hands, trying to crush moths between her palms, and fully expecting them to fly away. That’s what she would do if she was a moth. But that’s not what these guys did. Not at all!

As she clapped her hands into the cloud of moths, the moths moved closer. Closer than close. They landed on her wrists. They landed on her wrists and crawled inside her shirt. Not all of them. Just a few. But a few was more than enough.

She could feel them crawling inside her top. Why would they do this? Why?

She jumped down from the step stool and shook out her sleeves. That didn’t work. She had to roll them up, and when she did she found moths casually strolling along her arms.

Why weren’t they trying to escape?

What did they want with her?

She smacked them like mosquitoes and they died a quick death. But they didn’t fall and flutter to the ground. They just stayed there, smashed against her skin, until she peeled them off.

Part of her wanted another shower, but what would be the point? She’d just have to fight the moths again when she got out.

So instead of a shower, she grabbed the vacuum. The stick vac. If you took off the bottom part, you could use it like one of those handheld ones. Olivia had discovered this by accident.

She plugged it into the socket in the hallway, just outside her bedroom door, and waited for the moths to settle in their safe space at the top of the wall. They’d already started. There was a good line-up going on. But she wouldn’t begin until they’d all stopped flapping around her bedroom.

They were lazy, from what she observed. They didn’t like to fly. Maybe that’s why they’d landed on her wrists. It was just the closest place to settle.

“Okay, moths,” she said. “You don’t like me and I don’t like you...”

No, that sounded really mean.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” she corrected herself. “I don’t dislike you. If you were out in the world, I would have nothing against you. But you’re in my bedroom and you’re flying in my hair and I don’t like that one bit. So I’m gonna have to suck you into this vacuum and throw you down the garbage chute. I’m sorry, but that’s just the way it’s got to be.”