Red Ant! Red Ant!

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. It was finally the first day of autumn, and my feet were on fire --and not the kind of painful but feel-good fire you get when you walk across rocks in the summer. No. They were burning with change.

I lunged forward to land on a crispy yellow leaf, but the wind blew it away just in time and instead, I stepped on a firey red ant who fell limp under my weight. Crouching down, my chest was now on fire, and my eyebrows furrowed as its little legs twitched and its colony marched towards the crime scene to bring it home. If ants could speak, they'd curse me, and surely I'd take it as a new chapter has just begun and I've already made it a bad one. I continued to walk down the sidewalk.

With my hands stuffed in my crimson-knitted finger gloves that were stuffed in my pocket, I continued to march away as the ants flipped the back of me off with one of their six legs. The rustling of the wind whipped strands of hair into my mouth and spindling leaves against my back. I overthought until I considered what the ants would do now that their hill-mate was gone; I'd be ignorant (or perhaps, ridiculously stunned) to believe that they'd just go on as if that ant didn't have an important job too. I'd be naive to assume that the ants wouldn't grieve. My head was on fire. And now, so was the bottom of my stomach.

I'd like to assume that my guilt over the meandering red ant was just something my brain was using to make me believe that I am a horrible person. I've read somewhere that oftentimes, the things we do aren't that bad (given, you're not a murderer), and it's simply our thoughts that blow things out of proportion. It was an ant.

As I had originally planned to do, leaves began to crunch beneath my feet. I saw red, like the fire that I stood on before I committed murder, and I heard the tread of a bicycle winding down behind me. The smell of cinnamon and evergreen filled my nose and from the corner of my eye there was Violet, an ever-gleaming light with bantu knots, skin so warm and brown that she looked like she was made to live in the fall. She'd tell me that I'm being too hard on myself if I told her my thoughts; Violet had always told me that I was a good person.

"Am I going to see you at the dance tonight?" Violet grinned, peering her head over the handlebars. One look and God, I remembered all the nights in ninth grade that I'd wish she'd tell me that she's into girls too.

I shied away from her, shrugging my shoulders. Her eyes were like two golden pools of chocolate. "Maybe I'll stop by for a little bit."

"Oh, c'mon Flo," she cooed, "I was hoping that we'd get a dance together."

And I was sure that I would cremate into dust, given that my heart was now on fire too. Clarkson was a small town and surely people would talk if they saw us together. Violet didn't care about what others thought, though. I smiled a tight-lip smile, nodding before she kissed my cheek and peddled away. Jesus.

"Oh wait!" She yelled, bringing her bike to a halt. I stopped three paces behind her. "You look different."

My hands dug deeper into my pockets, "I look different?"

"It's a good different," she smiled, "you look brighter."

At ten o'clock that evening, I stood outside of the Clarkson High gymnasium doors. I wasn't waiting for Violet, nor was I keeping a look out for any red ants with desires of revenge, but I was trying to think of what I could do once I walked inside; I wouldn't be dancing unless Violet gave me that look and I fell under her spell like I always did. I settled on ruminating by the punch bowl and bobbing my head against the wall, all while avoiding Violet even though all I wanted to do was dance with her. I was nervous.

Feeling pins and needles in my thighs, I watched the people I grew up with grind against each other and throw their hands in the air. I'd like to be as carefree as they seem, but I knew better than to let myself have too much fun. I tend to get high off the moment and overthink some more the next day. I pulled my plastic cup of fruit punch to my lips as I felt a tap on my shoulder and a whisper on my neck. It was Violet.

She left another kiss on my cheek, her hand slithering towards the side of my ear and she made her fingers dance in my hair. My eyes slowly fluttered open and shut, and with a quick movement her gaze pierced into mine.

"Let's get out of here," she singsonged, and her breath smelt of dirt and breadcrumbs. My eyebrows furrowed, my heart racing as I followed her out of the dark gymnasium to the paved yard behind the school, and suddenly she disappeared.

"Violet?" I called, looking around. "Where'd you go?"

I wanted to run back into the school but I didn't want to leave Violet, wherever she was, on her own. I considered running to the light that flickered on the back wall of the school, but my thoughts were jumbled when I felt little legs crawling over me.

One by one, my skin began to itch and there was just enough light to notice the colony of red ants biting wherever they could. I tried to shake them off but they held onto me tight, so I jumped and jumped as my whole body began to burn; like the leaves, like my feet, like my chest, like my head, like my lower stomach, and like my heart.

Nothing has changed.