The Spider Gates (Season 1)

Ep. 1 Our Scary Friends

   Loneliness is arguably the scariest thing in the world. When we think of everything we're afraid of, it's pretty amazing out it ceases to exist when we have the company of one person present. When you're alone in the world, you walk around feeling hurt, as if the only ones who care enough about you to acknowledge you are the ones who want to hurt you some more. There are things in the dark that want just that, but loneliness follows you in all light. All it takes is one piece of company to give you the strength to fight them.

The people you're about to learn about were all lonely in different ways. Some feel that way because they feel misunderstood, and were too incomplete to feel otherwise. Some chose to live that way in their every day life because it's all they knew. Others have people to come home to, but have gotten too far away from themselves to feel that comfort the way they should. Pure evil is a strange angel to bring these people together, but it's made them the strongest at what they do, and they never had to do it alone again.

Trumbull, Connecticut - Julia Cooper was a very lonely kid growing up. Her mother died when she was born, and she never knew her father. She lived with her grandmother, Marcy, in a small town in Connecticut. She always felt out of place because of this lack of normalcy, which put a strain on her confidence in making friends. It wasn't until she was 8 years old that she finally found one.

She was playing in her backyard one day, falling in and out of her imagination because it's hard for a child to have fun by themselves. In the corner of her eye, she spotted someone in the woods. It was a little blonde girl, who ran as soon as she knew she was seen. Julia decided to go into the woods to find her. Once she was deep enough in the woods, she was finally approached.

"Hi. What's your name?" The little girl asked.

"I'm Julia. Me and my Grams live in the house over there," Julia replied.

"I'm Chelsea. I live right here."

"Right here? Doesn't it get cold?"

"No."

"Do you wanna come to my house?"

Chelsea looked away and said, "I can't."

"You can't?" Julia asked, puzzled rather than unsettled, "Why not?"

"I don't know," Chelsea casually replied and then changed the subject, "Do you wanna be friends?"

"Yea, okay."

Julia and Chelsea became best friends for years. As soon as Julia came home from school, she go into the woods to play with Chelsea. As time went by, Julia became more confident and made friends, which meant they saw less of each other, but Julia never forgot about her. Eventually, though, the confusion in adolescence caught up to her, and she found herself alone with her thoughts more than she wanted. It was almost like none of her friends sufficed to the one she met in the woods.

7 years later, Julia was 15 years old and getting ready to say good-bye to the few friends she still had and move to Massachusetts. She sat in her kitchen, looking out the window and thinking about how change may be a good thing. She had a few minutes to adjust to the morning before she had to go to school, and her grandmother walked in as she was heading to work.

"What are you looking at?" Marcy asked her.

"Nothing, Grams. Just thinking," Julia replied.

"I hope you're not upset we're moving to Mass this weekend."

"I'm not. I mean, I barely know who I am out here. What difference is a change of scenery gonna make?"

"Well, I'm hoping it'll help you figure things out. After all, you'll be around more of your mother's family. Anyways, I have to go to my last day at the practice, but I'll be back later."