I knew a guy who worked at a pet store and on weekends he would lock up. He’d all invite us there to stealthily drink beers. He thought girls would come because you could walk and see all the fish. It was pretty at night though, some glowed in the dark. Anyway, he had a drinking game he’d set up in the reptile room. He called it Steve’s “Spider Roulette” but it was just beer pong, except for the 6 cups of different spiders waiting. All harmless of course but ascending in size. We had fun with this, the losing team each picking one of six cups while blindfolded. They were then placed on our shoulders or back.

Now this sounds like fun and games until you bring in some outliers. Such as heavy drinking, peer pressure and ultimately a vendetta.

Sometimes the owner would bring in bigger spiders on the rare occasion to impress some girls (on the rare occasion they were there) but one night, the last night was different. Steve, the pet store guy, brought his cousin over. Cousin brought his own spider. The spider wasn’t venomous but it did bite. Steve was the target, none the wiser. Amidst the hysterics Steve has a full blown panic attack and pooped his pants.

I wasn’t there for this one, both thankful and regretful. His cousin had problems, like in general but particularly with Steve. Everyone who was there said they were a fair few beers in and didn’t realize the spider was different until the bite. Steve shows off that scar any time I see him and says it was really fortunate there were no girls there otherwise it would have been humiliating. Having a panic attack that is he’d say, he doesn’t know I know the rest because he made everyone there swear to keep it to themselves.

He doesn’t care anymore because the cousin drowned. He fell asleep on the rubber duck floaty bed is his backyard pool while he was on xanax.