A Short Story By Abigail Pesta

It was destiny. The cockroach and I would meet again.

I never would have guessed it when our paths first crossed, many years ago, that steamy evening in the tropics.

The light was fading over Wan Chai, a neighborhood of mossy skyscrapers and girlie bars, when we locked eyes, this bug and I. We sized each other up in my apartment, and while I don’t presume to speak for my adversary, I think it’s fair to say that both of us were surprised to meet. But as soon as I made a break for the can of bug spray, our epic battle began.

I blasted the creature out of my kitchen with a steady, lethal gusher of Raid. The roach galloped across the living room and toward the bathroom, fleeing as poison sluiced from beneath my angry fingertip.

Finally my foe retreated to the back bedroom and hid under a wardrobe. Raid surged like water from a fire hose — gallons of Raid, billowing cotton candy clouds of Raid. The bug seemingly withstood the assault, while my own breathing grew increasingly difficult.

For the record, it’s not possible to step on roaches in Hong Kong. They’re simply too big, more like armadillos, really.

Anyway, as my own asphyxiation set in, I became increasingly confident of my triumph. There’s no way a bug can survive the insecticide hellfire being unleashed upon this wardrobe,” I thought to myself, as my eyes swelled shut. “Unless, of course, it scampers to safety on top.” So I doused the wardrobe from top to bottom, back to front.

Before turning my back and declaring victory, I tilted the can, now nearly empty, to release the final few atoms of toxin.

Next morning, my face was so puffy and nose so bloated, I had to breathe through my mouth till after lunch. Still, a small price to pay for living in our interesting world, and promptly forgot about the whole affair. I refused to be shocked by a bug, even if it was big enough to compete in the Kentucky Derby.

Years passed. Friends came and went. And then it was my last night in Hong Kong, in my little flat. 

I’d just come home from a going-away party where I’d said farewell to friends. I’d taken a job in another country, and it was time to go. The apartment was now empty. A half-dozen or so movers had packed everything up earlier in the day, leaving it dark and forlorn.

All that remained were a few furnishings that came with the place — a single bed, a weird shoe cabinet nailed to the wall. The only illumination now came from skyscrapers outside that kept their kaleidoscopic lights on until the wee hours.

I kicked off my sandals and padded across the apartment in the dark, wandering room to room, gazing out windows. The skyscraper lights were one of the features that had first drawn me to rent this apartment, and tonight was a chance to look at them one last time. 

My favorite was one particular sign, nicely framed in my apartment window – the “ONWARD” sign, shining its glorious brand name in monumental glowing letters across the city and the harbor. However, from the vantage point of my apartment, the sign was backward, since I was viewing it from behind. “DRAWNO,” a great big backward onward, a poetic summing-up of five years in this town, I said to myself.

I shuffled through the living room and stubbed a toe on the bathroom threshold. It would have been wise to keep one lamp behind, I supposed. The pitch-blackness in here might make it hard to use the toilet.

After a final look at the “Onward” sign against the dramatic evening sky, I went to bed and slept fitfully, having forgotten to keep back some bedsheets for myself, too.

The next morning, I awoke early as the sun streamed through the uncurtained windows. Annoyed and uncomfortable, I cracked my neck, swung my feet off the bed, and planted them firmly on the ground.

And who was there on the floor, right between my feet? Why, none other than my onetime adversary, the cockroach, whom I had long ago gassed. It lay on its back, basking in a sunbeam. The movers must have shaken it loose from its final resting place.

So there it was, waiting patiently, patiently for the ultimate revenge — the morning when I'd get out of bed and step on it, barefooted.

I peered down between my feet, and a smile passed my lips. Sorry, cockroach, it looks like you lose again.