She looked down at her shoe. One of her laces had come undone. A crackly, pathetic looking leaf had clung to it, as if wanting Ashley to take it with her, away from this place, these other leaves, where it could enjoy its life without the taunts of the summer green leaves, full and beautiful, thick veins reaching for the tips in search of sunlight and moisture. It just wanted to be loved.

Sweat clung to her chest along with her tee shirt. She stared back up the path at Spencer and Madison, who were kneeling on the ground about 30 feet back, inspecting something on the ground. Both looked up at Ashley, their eyes burrowing into her distant figure. The thrill of the hunt had faded from Ashley’s mind, and a wave of uneasiness began to loom above the trees, positioning itself over Spencer and Madison, reaching out to Ashley and pulling her towards them.

The bird lay flat on its back. The tiny, pipe cleaner-like legs stood upwards, its middle section almost severed in two, red and yellow guts squeezing out from the sides. The tiny beady eyes stared upwards towards the trees, as if commanding the ominous cloud that now floated thickly above the girls.

A gust of wind plunged through the clearing, lifting up the bird’s feathers, as if it wanted to just get up and fly away. Tiny ants were attacking, following one another in a thin line from the underbrush, excited yet fully aware of their important role in this evening’s events.

Spencer sighed heavily and stood, her hands on her sides, her eyes on the bird. Madison’s face grimaced and she backed away quickly, as if the bird would at any moment rise from the dead, dragging its upper body towards her, hell bent on revenge for this preventable tragedy, unaware that it was Ashley that the bird wanted, not Madison.

Ash approached the bird, thinking its eyes moved, but knowing she had imagined it, her mind’s trick wishful thinking or a testament to Ashley’s frequently morbid personality. Either way, the bird was dead and it was her fault.

Ashley’s eyes met Spencer’s, a myriad of emotions floating within the blue that surrounded the black pupil.