Chapter 1: Monday

Sasha stood on the edge of her desk chair, with a fist full of toilet paper in hand she wiped away the remaining blood and splattered body parts of the spider she had just killed. Her dorm room was clean, and the spider was dead, but she knew come morning another would come to take its place.

Sasha was a young woman of eighteen years, long strawberry blonde hair flowed effortlessly down past her shoulders, she was wide eyed, curious, and resourceful. Two months ago, Sasha had moved from the peace and quiet of her small hometown to the nearby city of Arbor Hills in search of higher education. Money had never come easy for Sasha or her family, as such she had developed a knack for saving money wherever possible, one such way was with her current accommodations.

In order to save some much-needed money, Sasha had taken a previously unused room in the basement of her university campus' dormitory. Initially intended to house financially disadvantaged students the basement contained eight rooms, all of which remained unused before Sasha's arrival. She was the only student of the basement floor; she was so cut off from the building above that sometimes she felt as though she was the only person in the entire building.

Her room was depressing to say the least, being below ground level it had no windows, a single small vent in the top corner of the far wall was the sole provider of fresh air and the only light source was the single exposed bulb that hung from the centre of the small room. The floor was exposed concrete that the cold would cling to, and a persistent mildew smell lingered in the air no matter how many air fresheners or candles Sasha used to try and cover it. It was wholly uncomfortable but being half the price of one of the rooms above her it became a livable option.

The true annoyance of the dorm did not come from the gross smells or lack of light in the room, but rather from the pests that had made the subterranean dwelling their home. From the very first day Sasha moved onto campus her room had been infested with a never-ending supply of grotesque charcoal colored spiders, each the size of an adult's hand and covered in layers of matted fur. They remained a constant and ever watching presence along her lifeless walls.

Sasha had had a fear of the eight-legged creatures since she was a little girl and upon moving in and witnessing the first of what would become many spiders she fled the room in a fright and proceeded to knock on the dormitories of the upper floors in search of someone to dispose of the creature for her. As time passed, she had managed to muster up the courage to do the deed herself, the frequency in which they appeared made it a necessity for her, almost daily a new one would appear. Sasha had developed a ritual where each night before she shut off the lights and went to bed, she would survey the room, bug spray and one of her old boots in hand, in search of any spiders. Once she was certain she had killed all of them, she would be able to rest. Every night she hoped that she had gotten rid of the last of them but come morning there would always be another one on her wall.

No matter how thorough her search efforts the night before, no matter how long she spent hunting them down, they would always return. There seemed to be a never-ending supply of them. Sasha could never figure out how they got inside, the room was basically a concrete box, there were no visible gaps where the pests could enter, it confused her and all those she talked to about it.

The constant watchful presence of these spiders had gradually begun to upset Sasha more and more, she was nervous and uncomfortable in the dorm, it did not feel like home. To cope with the discomfort Sasha had taken to sleeping at her boyfriend David's house whenever possible. David lived in a share house off campus, far away from the basement and the spiders. She had only been dating David for a little over a month and liked him a lot, but did not like how quickly this spider situation was accelerating their relationship, she would not normally take to a guy so quickly, but two months in the spider infested basement had made her desperate for a way out. She wanted to move, but money was already tight and breaking her lease and paying for a new place was not an option on her budget.

Tonight, Sasha was feeling extra nervous about being in the dorm. Her boyfriend David was away on a weeklong research trip for his university course and tonight marked the first night of a full week in which Sasha would have to sleep in the dorm. She had asked David to stay at his house while he was away, but his housemates were already upset with her for being at the house as much as she was, and David said they would not budge. Sasha had considered getting a hotel room for the week or perhaps skipping her classes and going home to stay with her parents until David returned, but she convinced herself that she was overreacting, that it was only a few spiders and she had nothing to worry about. The decision seemed so logical and reasonable during the daytime but now that it was time for bed regret started to fill her head.

The room was cleared, for now at least. Sasha grabbed her phone from her bedside table and slumped back onto her bed, unlocking her phone she typed a quick message to David. "Sorry if I was acting weird when you left." It read, "I'm just going to miss you, and I'm not looking forward to a week full of dealing with the spider situation, but mostly I'm going to miss you... I hope you have a good trip, try and have some fun between all the work you'll be doing. I love you."

Sasha paused for a moment, before quickly backspacing "I love you." She all but lived with David but had never said the three words to him before. She was fairly sure she loved him but could not bring herself to say it.

Sleep that night was restless, she never got much rest in the dorm. Paranoia about one of the spiders crawling into her mouth made her toss and turn and never quite reach a deep peaceful sleep. Every couple of hours she would wake up, she always made sure to keep her eyes shut tight when she did, she needed her rest and if she opened them and spotted a shadow on her walls she would have to get out from under her warm blankets and hunt it down. If she knew one was in the room with her, she could not sleep. When the nightmares and bad thoughts became too much and she found herself awake, she would reminisce about being back home in her childhood bed, this would calm her enough to get back to sleep, at least for a few more hours. 

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