OPHIDIOPHOBIA - IT

FOUR

After Eddie finished cleaning up Ben, the group of 6 roamed around the town, talking about anything, from their families to the common enemy Henry.

Nonetheless, the batch had fun, learning from each other and sharing laughs. Once the sun started setting, the group started breaking apart and heading home.

The group first split into two and headed their respective ways. Then Alexa split from the next group, heading to the opposite neighborhood. She said her goodbyes to the group and headed her way home.

After 5 minutes of biking around, she heard something.

Hissing?

She stopped and looked for the source of the sound, her eyes came down to the sewer drain.

Although it was dark out, there was a single street light on top of the sewer, giving her a better view.

Something started coming out of the sewer,

a snake!

Alexa jumped back, dropping her bike in the process. She stood still, hoping the snake wasn't venomous. The snake then paused, Alexa thought she was safe, but the snake started hissing louder and louder.

It stared at her, she was paralyzed, all in her mind she could only think of her first encounter with a snake.

Alexa was 6, living in Florida for the summer. Her grandparents lived in the Everglades and she was staying with them the entire time. It was only her and her siblings since her parents couldn't come along.

Her older sisters were significantly older than her so they left her out of their fun, leaving her alone most of the time. Her sisters were playing in their room excluding her and their grandparents were out.

She was tall enough to open the front door and decided to rebel and go against everything her parents told her and she opened the door.

The young girl left and journeyed to find something to do. She had wandered around the muddy grass and felt extremely hot, by the time she realized she should go back, she realized something.

She was lost.

In a strange and new place, Alexa started to panic and tears were in her eyes. Then she heard something, a noise she'd never heard before. The source of the noise was behind her and before she could turn around she felt something.

It stung.

She yelled and kicked and cried, turning her head, she saw it was a snake, a neon green one. But it only got worse. Another appeared in front of her, the same bright neon green was seen.

Adrenaline finally kicked in and she pulled the snake off of her leg, after a few tugs, the snake let go of her leg and she threw the reptile towards the other.

She ran

and ran

and ran.

She made it back to the house, relying on her faint memory. Her grandparents were back, her grandfather was reprimanding her sisters and her grandmother was on the phone.

She pushed the door wide open and all eyes were on her. Her grandmother let out a loud sigh of relief and hugged the girl so tight she could hardly breathe.

"Are you okay?" her grandfather questioned, his Hispanic accent seeping through, Alexa simply nodded.

"B-but —" She was cut off by her sister, "Look at her leg!" That was when she realized a huge black bruise formed on the back of her leg.

"What happened?!" Alexa's grandmother asked, scared for her grandchild. "A-A snake!" Alexa spat out, realizing she couldn't breathe, "Help" she staggered not having the stability to stand alone.

Then, everything went black.

The next thing she knew she was in the hospital and grew her fear of snakes.

Snapping out of the deja vu moment she had, she realized more snakes started crawling out of the sewer.

All Alexa did was stand still, paralyzed.

Alexa then found herself stepping back away from the sewer trying to get a distance between her and the reptiles. Then she stepped on something, it made a noise like it was alive.

She looked down and saw she stepped on another snake, jumping back she saw behind her more snakes appeared.

Now she could see she was surrounded by the reptiles, they seemed angry at her, hissing violently at the girl.

She stepped back, tripped on a rock, and fell on her behind. The snakes started climbing on top of her, making her tense up even more.

All Alexa could do was pray to every god she knew to make the snakes leave. Praying and praying they weren't real and this was just a nightmare.

"They're not real, they're not real, they're not real." Was all Alexa did, and it worked?

She didn't feel their slimy scales on her and them tightening around her limbs. Once she couldn't hear or see any more snakes, Alexa just laid on the pavement.

She couldn't understand what just happened, she knew Maine had snakes but it seemed like all of them came together to scare her.

After a minute, she realized she was supposed to be home, scrambling up, she peddled all the way home, praying she didn't hear any more snake noises.

Once home, she got a serious scolding from her mother, but Alexa didn't care, she was just glad she didn't die to a bunch of snakes in the middle of the road.

Climbing into bed that night, she heard it again.

Hissing.

But how?

Her house didn't have any cold damp areas, heck it was June!

She also made sure to never leave any food messes anywhere, but she couldn't think about why a snake was in her room but how to get it out.

It was already 11 and her mom and dad hated being disturbed after they went to their bedrooms. She turned over to her older sister in the bed next to her and tried waking her up.

After successfully waking her up she asked if she could hear the snake.

"What hissing? There's no snake here, it's probably just you're imagination, go to sleep."

Her sister was an early bird and needed her "beauty sleep", Alexa was confused though.

Why couldn't she hear it? It was still in her ear like a fly was buzzing near it.

Alexa decided to be brave and get up to search for it. She turned on the flashlight she kept on her nightstand and got up. She looked underneath her bed and just saw boxes.

Once up she heard the hissing get louder, like she was closer to it.

She stood frozen, not wanting to look where she thought they were.

Hesistanly and slowly, she looked up and brought her flashlight to the ceiling.

A snake was on her ceiling, and she screeched.

Her sister woke up frantic, wondering where the danger was. Alexa pointed to the ceiling and her sister turned on the bedroom light.

There was nothing.

"B-but—, I swear a snake was up there!" Alexa exclaimed trying to justify why she woke up her sister.

"God Alexa just because you got bit once by a snake when you were like 3 doesn't mean you have to make up an imaginary snake to annoy me!" Her sister yelled at her, and Alexa felt tears prickling in her eyes.

"Please believe me!"

But all her sister did was glare at her and snatch the flashlight away. Then she flicked the light off.

"Go to bed."

And that's what she did. She climbed into her bed slowly and cried silently until her eyes grew heavy and drifted into slumber.