Fiction Short
This is War!
Dedicated to Rachel Carson, The Mother of the Environmental Movement.
“This is war, and you can tell your Queen I sai — , ah…ah, ahh… fff…u.c…k..chuuuu — Sniff”!
The explosion of wind and spittle punctuating my sneeze temporarily scattered the tiny, eight-legged pests across the white tiles.
Spraying pesticides in the kitchen feels counterintuitive to me, so I don’t usually resort to chemical warfare around food. I read Silent Spring in high school. But I’m not above cursing the little devils.
To toast the memory of Rachel Carson, black pepper is one more of my desperate attempts at a bio-friendly-all natural-safe-for pets-but-not-pests- solution to deter the unwelcome insects in their quest for food. Food carried to the secret lair of their insatiable Queen.
Jagged little chips of pizza crust, a sub-crumb of dog kibble, a drop of sweet tea; the Queen loves her carbs and dispatches her minions forth to find them, day and night. They raid the occasional crevice turned food cache where bits of grout has lost its purchase over the years.
Yes, many would die on their mission, but the tiny soldiers had their orders. What else could they do? I wouldn’t mind quite so much, if they were far more industrious…
