Queen Bee

Short Story by Gabrielle Esposito

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Life moves fast. One day, you’re 25 and getting married. The next, you’re 32 and moving to the country because your husband decides city life is wrong, all wrong.

“I want to slow down,” Michael says. “I can’t take all the traffic and the constant noise. I want to be out where I can see the stars. I want to have room to raise a family.”

“What if we move to Long Island and adopt a bunch of cats instead?” you suggest.

Michael gives you that look that says, You’re so cute when you try to think.

Two and a half hours away from the city, the earth is at once swampy and full of rocks. Coyotes howl at night, no matter the season. The local news warns that hawks will carry off small dogs, cats, and in some cases, newborns. Poisonous spiders the size of your fist and as hairy as your knuckles dwell in woodsheds, basements, and piles of leaves. Sure, the Apple Cider Festival was cute, but you don’t think it’s a good sign that every wild thing is trying to kill you.

Now that it’s summer, Michael insists on keeping the windows open all the time. During the day, there’s a constant thrum of lawnmowers and cicadas. At night, crickets saw through the silence.

“Don’t you just love it,” says Michael.

You prefer your nature sounds to play out of your iPhone and haven’t been able to sleep since you moved. You’re having a hard time telling him how much you hate it here. Every time you work up the courage, he sideswipes with you a little nugget of wonder. Did you know that there’s a sunflower field less than a mile from here? Best part: we can pick a bouquet for $3! You wonder, not for the first time, if you’re the one screwing up this experience.

“Do you think we could close the window for just one night?” you ask.

“And miss this concert? No way!” says Michael. He takes your hand. “I promise, you’ll learn to love it.”

Instead, your hate for the country grows. Summer also brings a nasty colony of paper wasps that decide to move in underneath the porch railing while you’re away visiting family. By the time you return, the nest is so large, it engulfs the rail; it looks like a brown, malignant growth.

“What do we do?” you ask.

“Call an exterminator, I guess.”