“Hello?” Maggie said aloud as dropped her steel garden claw and stared at the creature perched within a hydrangea bush. It was large and unlike any insect she was familiar with.
Is it a praying mantis? I’ve never seen a mantis this big, she thought. Jesus, this thing’s huge!
Then it occurred to her it didn’t look like a mantis, or an insect of any kind. It had six legs, like any insect, but they weren’t thin and twig-like, but thick and muscled, with feet that grasped the branches with long jointed digits and opposable thumbs. And the body wasn’t right for an insect. Not composed of three distinct segments like every insect—a tiny head, a thorax slightly larger than the head, and an enormous rear abdomen—the body looked like that of a smooth-skinned, iridescent grayish-green vertebrate, broader in the chest and narrower towards the rear, with a large round head and no visible antennae. Two circular vibrant blue eyes with tiny black pupils were set closely spaced at the front of the head, and seemed to be staring back at her.
A miniature lizard, or a salamander? No, they don’t have six legs, and this critter doesn’t have a tail. What the hell?
When she gently parted the leaves and leaned closer to get a better look, it darted away.
She shrugged and continued working. It must be an insect of some kind. What else could it be? Bigger than any one I’ve ever seen, that’s for sure. Maybe some invasive species that hitched a ride from the tropics in a crate of bananas.
An hour later she had finished tending her garden, stood and smiled as she surveyed her work. She was proud of her garden, and rightly so. Now that she was old, retired, and widowed, gardening had become her passion. She’d spent long hours in the local library learning horticulture and the latest organic methods, and the result was magnificent. She focused on flowers and grasses native to her region, the Midwestern prairie, planning it so that something would always be in bloom throughout the growing season, providing a smorgasbord for bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. Maggie’s garden was a legend in the neighborhood.
Add comment