The Enemy

No matter how deep the divide, no matter how fierce the argument, there was one enemy that united us all, one war that superseded all other causes, yes, I speak of our crusade against cockroaches. All of us fear them, all of us loathe them. Occasionally we would wake up with one chewing the last remnants of dust and food from our eyebrows, we've all been attacked by a kamikaze roach going straight for our face (Ruggles lore has it that a roach only uses its wings when it's about to die). Roach bombs only delayed them because, you see, they came in from the outside: there was no getting rid of them. The buggers turned up everywhere. Our weapons were pretty much Raid and our ingenuity (the latter proved more effective). I once used different blends of shampoo and graham crackers as bait to poison them. Any roach we caught alive went to the tarantula, for you see, there were no prisoners in this war, they weren't taking any, and neither were we. Once late at night I was taking care of some business on the pot late at night went a roach began to meander toward me, not at its usual breakneck speed. Any roach moving erratically and out in the light we labeled as diseased and my revulsion was exquisite. I grabbed the only thing I could, a can of pressurized air freshener. The Glade autumn scented air freshener (not that any of us had ever smelled "autumn" in Texas) foamed on contact with the vermin, instantly immobilizing it and killed it rapidly. I had found my favorite weapon against the unstoppable tide. Roaches even seemed to shrug off Raid. I know they say they can survive a nuclear holocaust, but I say it's still worth a shot. Warning! The following picture may be too graphic for younger viewers: