Call of the Roach 🪳

I was screaming in pain but no one seemed to hear me. It was 2 am and after some mild shifting and a nightmare quickly forgotten, it seemed I had pulled a muscle in my left leg. I had been cleaning nonstop for the past few days and I suppose the work had finally gotten to me. I slowly and painfully got up and went to grab a drink from the kitchen. As I got up, my three old Corgi Luna started making strange sounds. She puked out a yellow liquid of varying amounts a total of 4 times.

As I strained to find cleaning equipment and resume my journey once again from the bedroom to the kitchen, I once again started to spot them.

They made my skin crawl. I swore that at this point already I had seen their kind at every stage of their lives, from a newborn smaller than a fingerprint to a mature adult whose long antennas made it look as though it would take up the span of your entire hand. These creatures had made my family home their home.

I couldn't blame them given the situation but I also couldn't let go of this sick feeling in my stomach that it would take more than just your average spring cleaning to rid my world of them. And truly, they are the most tenacious creatures. I had seen them survive headless and my father had explained to me before in great detail how not even a nuclear war could deter them.

Still, I remained optimistic and vigilant.

As I made my slow trek toward the kitchen, they started welcoming me in. One in the corner of the door, another by a small trashcan in the playroom area, and yet another exploring the living room. I was in too much pain to go after them all so these hellos weren't promptly met with goodbyes.

As I finally reached the kitchen, I noticed two scraps of leftover food left open on the table and five or six crawled out quickly as I shined my light on them. I found more dancing around in the kitchen and babies suckling in different places around the floor. My body tingled and goosebumps formed up my arms and spine. Every moment was more anxious than the last as the uncertainty of where I would encounter one next filled me with utter dread.

I mustered up some courage and quickly tossed the scraps and grabbed some cleaning supplies.

Feeling as though I were watching over my back the whole time, I managed to clean up Luna’s mess and she gratefully went back to sleep. I was not as lucky and after bidding adieu to a few new friends, I settled down in the playroom to watch some TV. The couch there was soft and warm and I had made sure to grab some water from the kitchen which I then sat down on the coffee table next to me.

Despite my tremendous lack of sleep, my leg was still in a lot of pain so, I suffered in limbo for some time before finally dozing off. About thirty minutes later, I came to but the adrenaline quickly steeped through my body. There was one right next to me on the coffee table, scampering about. I froze in terror for a few seconds before deciding to just try and smash it with my fist wrapped around some of my clothes. Did I get it? I couldn't tell. Maybe it fell. Or maybe, like so many of its comrades, it had evaded me once again. Was this my life now? Constant moments of dread both day and night as I uncovered more secrets hidden in every crook and canny around the house? This was literally my own version of hell on earth.

In that moment, I had suddenly remembered my nightmare from before. My nightmare had been a rerun of the confrontation I had with my mother about the state of the family home.

...

You see, my father passed away two months ago and I returned to the family home to be with my mom in his final moments and help her with the transition of his estate. My father was a celebrated and well known entomologist, having been the top professor at a local university. His work on the intersection of roaches and biomedical research put them on the map. He had always been quite adamant about having work life balance and thankfully never brought his work home with him.

Even so, I grew to have a distinct hatred for the creatures he served. My father, after all, specialized in the study of Blattodea. Roaches and termites of all things. Tiny, crawling things that most people killed and paid hundreds to extinguish without a second thought. While he found beauty in their resilience and intricacies, I could never understand it.

And while I was proud and grateful for the ambition he instilled in me, I remained ashamed of his work. I hated the creatures he dedicated his life to, their skittering bodies reminding me of all the ways I felt small and insignificant in the shadow of his legacy.

For as long as I could remember, he was consumed by his work. A trait I reluctantly inherited as a recovering workaholic. And yet, it was that dedication that seemed to take him from us.

When my father passed, the doctors were puzzled. At 75, my father seemed too young to pass the way he did. They had no clear explanation—his health had been decent up until the end. “Stress-related deterioration,” they said, “possibly linked to overwork.”

His colleagues at the university saw him as a genius, someone driven by an insatiable curiosity, but to me, it always seemed like he was desperately trying to figure something out. And over time, I think the weight of not being closer to a clear answer broke him down. He had poured everything he had into his work, and by the end, it had consumed him. The doctors said his heart gave out.

My mother, in comparison, seemed to continue to enjoy excellent genes. Dad and her were twenty years apart but even then, folks would always exclaim how young she looked for an 55 year old. Despite her supposed youth though, my mother had always been absolutely terrible at home tidying. Probably why I became fixated on my own home being spotless.

Upon my return, I had found the family home in a state that could only be described as a slow, quiet decay. The walls that once held warmth and memories now bore the weight of neglect. Thick layers of dust cloaked every surface, cobwebs weaved in the corners, and those small, uninvited critters roamed freely, as though they had taken residence long before my father’s passing. The air was damp and stale, as if time itself had abandoned this place. The kitchen floor, once a hub of lively conversations, was now grimy, with remnants of old spills never cleaned up. The tiles were cracked, and some were missing altogether. It was as though the house was falling apart at the seams, mirroring the emotional weight that had settled within its walls. The structure creaked under the burden of time, and as much as I wanted to restore it, I knew deep down that it might already be too late.

Yesterday, I explained to my mother how difficult it had been for me since returning and I had decided to share an ultimatum. If professionals didn't come within the next week to help clean her house top to bottom, I would leave with no intention of coming back. My mother had refused help so I had taken it upon myself to put my skills to use and tidy up myself. I was pushing my body to its limits.

After I told her, my mother grew angry and then panicked and proceeded to yell about she had been managing fine on her own. She finally caved after some back and forth. In a more mellowed out state, my mother started sharing.

“But hija, just so you know, it is about time you knew something about yourself that your father and I kept from you. Something special about all the women in our family..."

"Ma, de que estas hablando? What are you talking about?”

“Hijita, your father and I have always been survivors. You know that. We both grew up in poverty in Peru and did whatever we needed to do to give you a better life than the one we had. Your father’s work was his way of helping you understand. But you never wanted to listen. You ran away from it. That's why we didn't have the heart to tell you mi amor..."

“MOM, WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? TELL ME WHAT?!“

It was then that the familiar sick feeling returned, crawling up my spine as my leg twitched.

And that's all I remember.

...

I hadn't killed him. The critter was still next to me on the coffee table. I felt frozen and was starting to feel the sweat on my face and back. My heart racing. Each attempt to kill takes up so much energy.

The bastard decides to crawl out of sight and against my better nature, I choose to ignore him for now. In this new found state of limbo, I found myself even more desperate for some shut eye.

I drifted in and out of consciousness, my thoughts tangled in a haze of exhaustion and lingering pain. The weight of my body grew heavier, sinking deeper into the couch. And then, slowly, the darkness began to lift, replaced by something gentler.

The sharp ringing of silence gave way to soft, rhythmic chirping. It started faintly, almost like a lullaby, growing louder until it coaxed my eyes open.

I finally got up from the couch and followed the sound of the chirping to the kitchen. I felt strangely energized and curious.

...

At the entrance of the kitchen, I saw them everywhere. There wasn't a spot that wasn't completely covered. And in the middle, I stared wide eyed and terrified at the one who stood upright, only a little shorter than myself. Together, they chittered and it sounded like a sort of melody. My body could no longer move and every hair and fiber on my body flared up.

Suddenly, I heard paws patter on the floor behind me. Luna. She had entered the kitchen, almost as though she had been summoned. But something was wrong. She didn’t give me her usual doe eyed look. Instead, she sat next to me, calm and still, watching the roaches, her head tilted slightly, as if she were listening to their chittering with quiet understanding.

“Luna?” I managed to gasp out loud in my terror.

She didn’t respond. She only blinked slowly, her gaze shifting to the upright figure in the middle of the room, the same as mine had moments before.

My left leg started to burn and I suddenly felt the same sharp pain from only hours before. It felt like my muscles were being stabbed repeatedly and my body couldn't help but collapse in pain and I screamed from both the new found pain and the horror staring back at me.

They continued to chitter, but this time more loudly. Luna stared down at me. My body writhed in pain and now my arms, stomach and head all felt like they were being stabbed over and over again. Like my blood and muscles were painfully rewiring themselves. It couldn't have been more than a few seconds but it felt like hours. At some point, the pain stopped. My anxiety  melted away. I was finally at peace. But why? Was I dead? Or just more alive?

They stopped chittering. The one in the middle started to chitter but this time, I could understand her. She spoke in a sweet tone. One I knew fondly.

“Hola hijita" she smiled. "Welcome home”