The spider tore at the earth in embarrassment. Peck was reluctant to engage in such personal confidences, but, being a lone predator, he rarely had the chance to talk things out with a sympathetic listener. "I was so ticked off by that. Really, I felt like attacking her and eating her myself. But … well … that's just the way chicks are … All dames are trouble, basically …" Peck's distress was growing. "When, Vinnie? When will I find a decent girl willing to eat me?"

Vinnie preened both his antennae. "It's a terrible thing, loneliness."

"It's all I can think about. I need to find the woman who's meant for me. I want to become one with her. I want to lay my body down … afterward, you know … Feeling so nice and tired then, done with all this struggle of life … Complete, like, fulfilledness … Fulfillitude …"

"'Serenity.' That's the word you're looking for, Peck."

"And I want her to eat me. I do. Maybe she'll eat me real nice and slow, while I'm all full of venom, paralyzed, and still alive!"

"Romance," Vinnie sighed. "No, Peck, you won't see me scoffing about it. Not after what I've been through."

Warmed by his own dreams, the spider danced on the tips of his spiny feet. "Some nice girl should be drinking my vital fluids. Think of the size of that egg sac and the pack of kids she'd have!"

"You're a one-woman guy. "

"I want true happiness. It's my right!"

Vinnie sniffed through his vent-holes. "Romance is one thing, kid. Happiness, that's another."

"I just don't get it. Am I so bad? I'm trying to do the decent thing!"

"Let the ol' firefly give you a tip here, kid. You're being a chump. You could court three spider ladies, fertilize the eggs of the first two then sacrifice your body into the gut of number three. That way you'd convey the metabolic benefits from being devoured, plus you'd get a lot more genetic variety in your progeny. You follow me? Let the first two pay the price for their own child support!"