Felix Takes the Stage by Kathryn Lasky

F or Felix, the best part of the night came when the concert had ended. The lights in the grand symphony hall had dimmed. The audience had gone home, as had the members of the orchestra with their instruments. But the Maestro stayed on. Still at his podium, he raised his baton to conduct a phantom orchestra. And so in a strange way the music lingered, at least for Felix. He knew exactly which part the Maestro would go over with the mute orchestra — the second movement of Brahms’s Symphony no. 3. The musicians had not done their best with it. And Felix knew that the Maestro probably blamed himself. He would rehearse it now, silently, as was his custom after a less than perfect performance.
    Felix was all eyes — all six of them riveted on the symphony conductor he worshipped. He loved music. He felt it with every nano-hair on his eight legs. And now he dared to creep out from behind the music stand, where he had hidden between the pages of the score.

    If I could only ride the baton, I could feel the passion of the notes, Felix thought.
    Go for it! A tiny voice in his head urged.
    But riding the baton would break his mother’s most basic rule — never, ever reveal yourself to human beings. Her words had been repeated over and over until they threaded through his mind. “We are recluses; that is the name of our species. We hide!”
    Felix felt a slight wobble in at least four of his eight legs. Half of him wanted to be a good spiderling and obey his mother, but the other half … oh, that other half yearned to be an artist!
    Felix understood his mother’s reasoning. The venom of brown recluse spiders was one of the most toxic on earth. It was natural that humans feared them, even though no one in his family had EVER attacked anyone. But Felix was deeply musical. He lived in a philharmonic hall and yet his mother had forbidden him to get anywhere near the great conductor. It seemed to Felix that his mom was as scared of humans as humans were of them.
    It made no sense. Leon Brinsky was his hero. The man was a genius. I don’t have to talk to him, Felix thought. I’m not asking for his autograph. I just want to feel the motion of the baton. That’s all, for crying out loud!
    And with that, Felix backed around. The muscles of his spinnerets began to force liquid silk up toward his spigots. Another few seconds and he’d have a hoist line to swing up to the baton. Now I’ll know Brahms!
    It was Felix’s last thought before the accident.
    â€œMom!!!” he screeched in pain.

F elix’s mother, Edith, was tending her rather disorderly web in the basement when she felt the thump. A rain of dust and debris fell down on the small section of the web that she had planned to use for “circle time” with her young brood. This was a concept Edith had learned about at the Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School in Phoenix, Arizona. The young kindergartners and their teacher would all sit on the floor and share ideas and stories. Edith was trying very hard to make a circular area, but brown recluse spiders were not known for their neat webs.
    Edith had been very fond of that kindergarten teacher, Ms. Lafferty. She loved the stories Ms. Lafferty told that drew out even the shyest kindergartner. When the children were not paying attention, Ms. Lafferty would say, “All eyes on me!” Edith wanted to have circle time like that with her own children — Jo Bell, Felix, and little Julep. All eighteen of their eyes on her.
    Ms. Lafferty had deeply influenced Edith. In her own mind, Edith thought of her children as being the ages and grades of schoolchildren. Julep, the youngest, was a kindergartner, perhaps on occasion pre-K. Felix was an elementary school kid. Jo Bell, the oldest, was junior high age but yearning to be considered a high school girl.

    Just then, Edith heard the awful thump. No! she thought. She instinctively drew her fangs in