The Boy Who Shot A Web

Through the dark the boy ran.
Father's musket in his hand.
To die.

The woods grew thicker,
And he decided to pick a clearing to sit down.
He brandished the musket
Like he would often see his father do,
And loaded the gun.

He never had friends.
He was never considered attractive.
And the rocks constantly flying his way
Would taunt him to this very moment.
Suicide was his last resort.

He looked around the clearing.
Everything was dark and damp.
Save a spider web that caught the moons light
With a little spider spinning her silk in the middle.
Fascinated, he decided to watch.

"Can I help?"
Asked the boy who by now was fully engrossed in her work.
Of course the spider did not reply,
But he took it as a "yes", and began straightening the web
And encouraged her to keep spinning.

He forgot about his plan to take his own life.
And there he sat for days.
The web grew to enormous proportions.
And the spider did not seem to wish to stop.
And there he might have stayed, had a hunter not seen.

"Boy, that is the biggest web I have ever seen!
It must be three trees across!!!!" said the man.
And the boy ran away and went home.
He remembered why he had left,
And became sad once again.

But word spread through the town about the enormous web
And they began to talk to the boy.
His popularity grew throughout the town
Until he was the most popular boy the town had ever seen.
He had friends for the first time in his life.

"What will you do with the web?" asked the young villagers.
The boy had not thought of that.
Thinking of the musket, he replied
"I shall shoot a bullet into it, and see what happens."
And the talk of the town was all on him.

The next day, the entire village showed up to watch him shoot the web.
They placed bets on whether it would be caught or just go through.
And the boy arrived, musket in hand.
Cheers went up from the people,
And the boy felt very good.

He raised his gun, and aimed at the center.
When he spotted the little spider sitting right there.
Almost begging him not to do it.
He lowered the gun and and the people were hushed.
The cheers turned to whispers.

A rock came flying at him from the crowd.
His hands were shaky as he raised the gun once more.
He aimed and fired.
The spider was crushed as the bullet struck her.
And then it hit the web.

The bullet bounced back, striking the boy in the heart.
He died instantly.
The townspeople cried in horror.
But by the next day life was back to normal.
And all memory of The Boy Who Shot A Web were erased.