Andrea got tired of waiting. She’d been sitting on the porch with her sunglasses on, scrolling through her phone, for the last thirty minutes.
The exterminator was on their way. They had to be. Andrea had called the business, Regina Extermination; they told her they’d be there that afternoon. At first, they didn’t plan on coming out so soon; however, when she mentioned she had a roach problem, one that had been lingering for about a week, they were willing to cancel their later appointments and come out.
A little after eleven, a van slowed down on the street. Then, it took a turn and rolled into the driveway. It was a white van, written on the side in bright and bold red paint: REGINA EXTERMINATION.
Yes, that was the guy.
The driver’s door opened; out came a man. One over six feet in stature. He had plenty of gray hair on his face; a beer belly was in the early stages of development. The man was in a white uniform; on his left breast, there was the same logo as the one on the van. He had a toothpick between his yellow teeth, far from the straightest. Before he walked over, he reached into the van and pulled out a clipboard. Then, he shut the door, slamming his hip against the white metal. “Are you the homeowner?” he asked as he walked. His voice was deep and rough. But not a menacing rough; instead, it was a texture that came with years of alcohol abuse.
Andrea nodded. “Yeah. I’m also the one who called.”
“That was going to be my next question.” The man tucked his clipboard between his arm and body. He extended out his large and wrinkled hand. “I’m Robert. But most people call me Bobby. Call me whatever you wish.”
She shook his hand. “Andrea. Thank you for coming out.”
“Of course. There’s a reason we’re called the roach experts. As soon as you mention those motherfuckers, we’re willing to drop anything and wipe out their asses. Sorry for the profanity. I can’t tell if you’re a religious one or not.”
“Nah. It’s fine. I swear like a sailor, too. Don’t feel bad.”
Still standing on the porch, Bobby asked Andrea to tell him everything.
Only a week ago, she noticed the cockroaches hanging out in her house. They were down in her basement, somewhere she didn’t often go. She only went down there because her mother called and asked her for the box of home videos that Andrea’s father had given her when he died. The home video box sat on another cardboard box housing her old textbooks from college; as soon as she picked up the home video box, a little roach appeared. No, it wasn’t a small one but a big one. The motherfucker was huge, somewhere around four or five inches in length. At the moment, she didn’t step on it and crush it: she was barefoot; instead, she ripped open the box of textbooks and smashed the roach with her old inorganic chemistry book, smearing its guts all over the hardcover and releasing a repugnant odor.
As she walked away, she saw something peculiar and horrifying: a sea of roaches began to form on the ground. They came from every direction; there were more than she could count, close to fifty. Of course, she turned and ran, slamming the door behind her and not daring to go back down there for the rest of the day.
The following morning, when she walked past the door leading to the basement, she glanced at it and thought about what she saw the day before.
It couldn’t have been real, could it?
No, it was so ridiculous it had to have been her imagination.
So, feeling brave and stupid, she walked down there. Nothing. She didn’t find a single cockroach. She looked under all the boxes and in every dusty corner. Nothing. Not a scintilla.
She thought this episode with the roach was temporary.
Then, a few days later, when she pulled down her box of cereal and began to pour, one of those roaches came out, sitting in the pile of Frosted Flakes that rained down into the bowl. Andrea shrieked, even throwing the box across the kitchen and the Flakes going everywhere. The roach looked like the ones she had—or hadn’t?—seen a few days ago.
Before she did anything, the fucker flew out, sprouting its long wings, resembling dragonfly wings, and floated in the air, moving in a circle like it was scanning the scene.
Andrea stood there, petrified by the sight of this floating cockroach. When it finally turned around and stared at her, her stomach dropped.
It chased her.
She ran through the house.
The roach, faster than she anticipated, was hot on her trail.
She slammed the door to her bedroom; the fucker was too stupid to realize it, smashing into the wooden door and dying from the blunt force. It left guts on the door; what remained of its corpse fell to the ground. It sat there; Andrea came out when she smelt the repugnant odor she immediately recognized. She discarded the corpse and did her best to clean the guts off the door. It wasn’t perfect, but it was better than nothing.
For the next few days, she had a few more encounters with the roaches; by the last one, when she found not one but two hanging out on the bathroom counter while she showered, she decided to call someone.
She realized this was getting out of hand. She should’ve called someone sooner when she found the roach in her cereal. Now, look where she was: roaches stalking her while she tried to shower. Disgusting.
Bobby listened and wrote everything down. If he missed a detail, he asked her to repeat it. When he finished, he recited all the details; Andrea nodded when he finished. “Yeah,” he started, “I’ve heard about this before. When you’ve been in this business as long as I have and almost exclusively deal with cockroaches, you’ll see the same stuff. New stuff, too, of course. But this is a pretty standard thing.”
“So you can get rid of them?” Andrea’s tone was nervous.
“Oh, yeah. I can do that. Don’t you worry about that. I’ll get those bastards out by the end of the day. I already told my later appointments I may not be able to come out today, so I’m staying here until those fuckers are gone.”
They walked into the house. Bobby put his clipboard on the bar area in Andrea’s kitchen and started tapping the counter. “You never said if you kept food in the basement,” he said. “Human or not.”
“Nothing. I don’t even have pets.”
“And there’s nothing old down there? Because roaches usually feast on human or other animal food. So you’ll sometimes find them mixed with dog food. But I guess it doesn’t matter if you have any down there or not. They can live for about a month without food. And they don’t die if you cut off their heads. I bet you didn’t know that.”
“No, I didn’t. That’s kind of gross, to be honest.”
“Yeah. My friends and I like to think that roaches are aliens or some shit. They’re freaky little bugs.”
He asked where the basement was. She took him to the door. He opened it up and groped the wall for the light switch. He flicked it on. The basement illuminated. He stepped on the wooden steps that were as old as the house. Andrea cringed at each creak the wooden steps made, hoping today wouldn’t be the day those things gave out.
Bobby reached the bottom of the musty basement. He held his flashlight. He looked around, searching for anything. He found the only window in the corner and inspected it. He checked the corners and under all the cardboard boxes. He noticed an old drum kit Andrea had down there and noted it in his head. He’d have to check that out. He turned around and looked at her. “Okay,” he started, “I’m going to do one of my usual practices. I want your assistance at first, but after, I want to be alone. And whatever you hear going on down here, you do not come down and interrupt. Okay? If you do, there’ll be … dire consequences, and I think that might be putting it lightly.”
She gulped. She felt intimidated.
What was so important about the extermination that if she interrupted, there would be dire consequences, whatever the heck that meant. It was cryptic.
But she wouldn’t take the gamble.
“If it means getting rid of them, then I understand,” she said.
Bobby smiled. “Then let’s get to work.”
* * *
She dug through the kitchen, looking for food. She pulled out bags of chips that’d been in the cabinet for seven weeks—they were definitely stale.
“Follow me,” Bobby said, taking the first bag of chips that was still half full.
They marched down the stairs to the bottom of the basement. Bobby had brought down his equipment, which sat in the basement. He told Andrea to stop on the last step and wait.
He got down on a knee and spread out the chips.
Then, he stomped on them.
He sat on the ground, crossing his legs and waiting.
He stared at the crushed chips.
Three roaches came out. They came from the same corner: the far right.
He turned and looked at Andrea and pointed at them, asking her if they were what she remembered.
She nodded.
He curled his lips and watched them chew up the chips’ crumbs. He inspected their size—big bugs. Between four and five inches. She wasn’t lying about that. Judging from their backs, he assumed they had large wings, just like she said.
So yes, he knew what he was dealing with.
He turned and waved her away. I got this, he mouthed to her. Don’t worry.
She gulped.
* * *
Andrea didn’t leave her home office for hours. As soon as Bobby got to work, she stayed in there. She made her lunch before she returned to work and ate in her office. And when she finished, she left the dishes in the corner of her desk, ignoring them while she worked. She’d do the dishes later. She had a report to write up, a task arduous enough for her to take her mind off the fact a strange man was in her basement, eradicating roaches, and threatened her with cryptic threats, telling her to stay out of his way.
Yeah, just another normal day in the life of Andrea.
When it was four-fifteen, she finished the report. She leaned back in her chair, signed, and stretched. Her brain her. Her eyes did, too. She needed to get up and stretch. So she got up from her chair and did exactly that. As she did, she thought she needed to invest in one of those standing desks so she didn’t sit in front of the computer for hours on end.
After she stretched, she grabbed her few dishes and took them to the kitchen. She knew she needed some time away from her computer. So what did she do? Looked at her phone—another screen. She glanced out the door to the backyard at one point. No birds or squirrels sat on her dead lawn.
Of course, now and then, Andrea glanced at the door that led to the basement.
Bobby had been down there a long time.
Was he doing okay?
And was he getting rid of those roaches?
That was the pertinent question.
He had to be doing fine: He worked for the company that claimed to be the roach experts. Andrea thought too much about it. She didn’t need to be so paranoid something … bad would happen.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t that simple.
She couldn’t switch it off.
She couldn’t help coming up with every worst-case scenario she could’ve thought of.
The anxiety got the best of her.
She couldn’t win.
Then, she put her phone down, resting it on the kitchen counter.
Almost as if she wasn’t piloting her body, she moved towards the basement door. When she got there, she pressed her ear against it.
She listened.
Something was going on down there. She heard something that sounded human.
Yes, it was Bobby making the sounds. She recognized his voice.
But what was he saying? Or what were the sounds he was making? They didn’t quite sound human. No, they sounded more alien. It sounded like he was going back and forth between speaking and mumbling.
But she couldn’t make out anything he was saying.
Andrea told herself there was nothing to worry about. He was perfectly fine. Then, she remembered what he told her: Don’t interrupt his business, or there’ll be dire consequences, whatever the hell that meant.
And she didn’t want to find out.
No, she didn’t.
So she listened to the rational voice in her head telling her to walk away.
Andrea went and used her bathroom. The one connected to her room. Because she hadn’t gotten up in hours, she had to use it. When she got up and went to wash her hands, she saw something moving on the corner of the counter—
A cockroach! A big one, too.
It stood there, looking over at her. It hadn’t extended its wings—yet.
And as she looked at it, she knew what she would do: kill it.
She knew there was something in her room she could use.
Then, buried somewhere in her closet, she found an old shoe she’d been meaning to throw out for a while—one from a pair of old running shoes she’d replaced a month or two ago.
The roach was still in the bathroom—the same spot as before. It had even turned its body toward the door like it watched Andrea walk out. That was creepy. It gave her the chills. It felt like it was stalking her.
She held up the shoe.
She watched the roach that continued to sit there.
The shoe came down.
SMASH!
It struck the roach. Perfect shot. Its guts let out a repugnant smell; the guts smeared all over the counter as she pushed the shoe harder. Her nose curled as the smell was making its way up there—
A scream came from the basement.
And she knew it was Bobby
The scream, while faint, reverberated.
Andrea stopped what she was doing.
Jesus, what the heck was that about? Why did he scream—and why did it sound like he was in pain? It sounded like someone had whipped his testicles, and one of them popped.
She felt compelled to investigate.
It couldn’t have done any harm, could it?
But then she remembered what he said: And whatever you hear going on down here, you do not come down and interrupt. For all she knew, the screaming could’ve been part of his plan—
But how likely was that? What kind of extermination tactic not only took over four hours but included the exterminator screaming bloody murder like one of his testicles had popped? What were the odds of that? Very slim. Probably as unlikely as they got.
Once again, as if she wasn’t in control, she began walking to the basement door. She was as quiet as before, walking her toes and doing her best to prevent the floor from making noise.
She stopped.
Her hand extended.
She brushed the knob.
She told herself not to do it.
But she gripped the knob.
Then, it turned.
The door opened.
She stepped into the basement. The lights were off. That was odd. Why were they off? She would’ve imagined Bobby would’ve had them on. Maybe he had some light down on the ground—
And there was light—a blue one. It illuminated the bottom part of the basement.
And, because of the light, she saw the sea of cockroaches on the ground.
She felt sick.
No, she was sick. But she held it down and forced herself to swallow.
As she got closer, she heard Bobby mumbling like before. But he sounded different. Like he might’ve been more feeble than before. Like whatever made him scream in pain made him weaker.
Her hand glided down the railing; that was when something greeted her flesh: a roach.
It was right there; it climbed onto her hand.
She freaked out, shrieking and flinging the roach into the air.
It sprouted its wings and began to fly. Initially, it flew in a circle. Then, it came back towards her, in line with her face.
It landed square in the middle. It clung to her.
Andrea shrieked even louder, not knowing what to do about the roach on her face.
Roaches climbed up the steps and began to swarm her. Within seconds, the roaches covered her, throwing her into the sea. They dragged her towards Bobby.
When she got closer, she saw a bizarre sight: He sat there naked with his legs crossed; roaches climbed on his body.
But what was most perplexing was what was before him.
There was a massive blue portal in the wall. It was bright; wind came out of it. To her, it looked like a portal from an old science fiction movie.
“Bobby!” Andrea said. Her voice was heavy. She was panicking. “What’s going on?! What the hell is this?!”
Bobby turned his head and looked at her. There was an amount of disgust in his eyes. “You disturbed my practice,” he told her. “I was only trying to help. Because these guys? This very species? They come from another dimension, and we can communicate with them. And I’ve been trying to tell them to leave us alone. Send them back to where they came from; they want to devour everything in this world, including us. And I was going to get rid of this batch. But you interrupted. Now, they’ve lost their trust in me. They think I’m going to kill them. So you know what that means?” Bobby gulped. “Now we’re both going to suffer.”
Andrea stared at him. What did it all mean? Honestly, she didn’t want to believe any of it. It all sounded like bullshit.
But none of it was.
The problem, however, was that Andrea didn’t realize it until the roaches dragged her and Bobby through the portal.
They met the queen on the other side: Regina.
* * *
Nobody heard from her in a week, so Andrea’s brother, Oscar, came to check on her. He knocked on the door—she didn’t answer. He tried to get into the house with his spare key; it wasn’t working, so he called their mother.
“Yeah. For some reason, she isn’t opening the door, and my key isn’t working. I don’t know what gives. Should we get the police involved?”
Silence.
“Yeah, give them a call. I’m worried about her, too. She doesn’t disappear like this.”
He stood there again.
“Okay. That works. Love you, too, Mom.”
He walked towards his car and glanced at the only window to her basement. A roach sat on it, looking at him.
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