In March I made a discovery about the campus library: it was infested with ladybugs. They lived at the building’s far edges. They crawled along windows and out of floor vents.
They’d probably spent the winter sleeping behind the walls, huddled in ragged clumps. Then the time had come for them to wake up. Good for them, but I didn’t want to see their migration.
I found that I never had to deal with them if I stayed away from the windows, so that’s what I did. I left them alone and they left me alone. Months passed.
Taking a break today, I walked to a far corner of the second floor, to a tiny alcove. Bookshelves and a window and hard, hot summer light. I had been there in March. I had seen the ladybug swarm.
The swarm is still there. The bugs are shriveled and dead, though. All in a rotting heap on the carpet. Right there in plain view. I think they’ve been dead for months, but nobody swept them up.
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