We Are the Ants (4 page)

It begins with excitement. The date is 24 January 2016. Frieda Eichman of Grünstadt is the first to identify the asteroid, using the telescope her father gave her for her thirteenth birthday. He's been dead these last twenty years, but he would have been proud. Though the asteroid is given the provisional designation 2016BA11 until its orbit can be confirmed, Frieda knows she will name it the Jürgen Eichman in honor of him.

Space agencies around the globe—NASA, UKSA, CSA, CNSA, ISRO, CRTS, ROSCOSMOS—release statements assuring citizens that though asteroid 2016BA11's trajectory will bring it near Earth, it does not pose a threat. At the top levels of every government, they know this is a lie.

On the night of the Jürgen Eichman event, families gather outside to watch it streak across the night sky. They hold each other tightly and remark at its beauty, at how lucky they are to witness this once-in-a-lifetime cosmic marvel. Marshmallows are roasted, wine is consumed in heroic quantities, stories are shared. Some who know the truth dine on bullets.

As the Jürgen Eichman looms ever larger in the night sky, as big as the moon and then bigger, people around the world realize something is wrong. The asteroid isn't going to pass harmlessly by. It is going to become a meteor. Most are paralyzed with fear. What can they do? Where can they go? You cannot run from the hand of God.

Frieda Eichman stands alone in an empty field and watches the heavens burn. She whispers,
“Ich habe dich so sehr, Papa verpasst.”

On 29 January 2016, at 1:39 UT, the Jürgen Eichman impacts the Mediterranean Sea. It is approximately the diame­ter of London. Those within three thousand kilometers of the impact witness a fireball larger than the sunrise over the horizon. Within a minute their clothes combust, grass is set ablaze. Everything is burning, including people. Seismic shocks follow. They radiate from the epicenter, shaking the ground like buried thunder, traveling the globe in less than twenty minutes. The earthquakes are shadowed by the air blast, which vaporizes nearly everything in its path. Houses are demolished, people killed, ancient trees ripped from the ground. Hours later a tidal wave hundreds of kilometers tall washes the earth clean.

Ash and dust bedim the sky, blocking the sun's light. Those few who survive the initial impact die slowly, frozen and alone.

Of the four fundamental forces, gravity is considered the weakest, despite its theoretically endless range. Gravitational forces attract physical bodies to one another. The greater their masses, the greater their attraction. We are pulled toward the ground by gravity, gravity keeps the moon in orbit around the earth, and our planet is held captive by the sun because of gravity. But gravity isn't limited to celestial bodies, it applies to people, too. Though rather than being determined by mass, its force is determined by popularity.

Popularity is teenage heroin. Kids who have tasted it crave more; those who have it in abundance are revered as gods; and even those who have never basked in the light of its glory secretly desire it, regardless of what they may say to the contrary. Popularity can transform an otherwise normal kid into a narcissistic, ego-obsessed, materialistic asshole.

Not that I would know. I have never been, nor wanted to be, popular. Popularity is the reason Marcus ridicules me in public and makes out with me when we're alone. He texted me a couple of times, still trying to convince me to spend the weekend at his house, but I didn't respond.

He was pretending not to watch me from his locker as I dodged other students who were too busy staring at their phones to notice they were in my way. I wondered how Marcus would have reacted if I'd marched up to him and kissed him for the whole school to see. Not that I ever would.

Chemistry is my oasis, and I'm usually the first person to arrive, but today Audrey Dorn beat me and was at her desk, alternating between staring at her phone and watching the door.

I waved at Ms. Faraci when I entered, but she was busy drawing chemical structures on the board and didn't notice.

“You've got to watch this.” Audrey faced her phone to me when I reached my desk. “It's one of those Japanese prank shows. They put this guy in a coffin with a bunch of dead squid and leave him there.”

I slid into my seat. “Claustrophobia
is
hilarious.”

“Maybe another time.” Two girls walked in, and Audrey shrank reflexively, but they didn't even look at us. “Listen, Henry . . .” She leaned across the aisle and spoke in a whisper. “I saw you coming out of the restroom yesterday.”

“Was my fly down? Did I forget to wear underwear again? I hate when I do that.”

“I know what you were doing in there.” Audrey's eyes darted all over the room. “And I know
who
you were doing it with.”

More students trickled in as the two-minute bell rang. “Nice try, Veronica Mars, but I have no clue what you're talking about.”

“You bite your lip when you're lying, Henry.”

“And yours move when you're being a nosy fuckmuppet.”

“Did you just call me a fuckmuppet?”

“If the hand fits . . .”

Audrey stiffened. “Whatever. I was only trying to help.”

“Your concern for me is touching. Too bad it's not sincere.”

The stragglers rushed in as the final bell rang, filling the empty seats. Ms. Faraci dove into a review for our upcoming exam, but I couldn't concentrate on anything except Marcus. Unless Audrey had a secret spy camera in the boys' toilets, all she could know was that we'd both been in the restroom at the same time. Anyway, she was the only person at CHS snoopy enough to monitor when and where I took a whiz.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I jumped in my seat, which distracted Ms. Faraci, causing her to lose her train of thought and launch into a tangent about the importance of understanding atomic structure. As soon as she turned her back, I checked my phone. It was from Marcus, though he came up as All-Star Plumbers. His idea.

ALL -STAR PLUMBERS: bleachers. lunch. i'll bring the footlong.

It was risky meeting him while Audrey was playing detective, but I wanted to see him, especially since I'd turned down his offer for the weekend. Even when I hate Marcus, I miss him when we aren't together. He doesn't fill the yawning hole left by Jesse, but sometimes he makes it hurt slightly less.

I texted a quick reply and then stowed my phone.

Faraci was reviewing the different types of chemical reactions when the door at the front of the class swung open to admit a guy I didn't recognize. He was tall and dangerous with spiky black hair and a fuck-you grin. Lean muscles danced under his crisp shirt. He stood in the doorway, his thumbs hooked through the belt loops of his gray shorts until the entire class was staring at him.

“Someone called for a nude model?”

Ms. Faraci sputtered as she tried to reply. Those students not gaping at the strange kid whispered to one another about him. Marcus wore a wolfish smirk, which caused something savage to rumble in my chest.

“I'm sorry,” Ms. Faraci said, “who are you?”

“Diego, obviously.” He spoke with an ease that was probably rehearsed; no one could be so composed under the wither­ing scrutiny of twenty sets of eyes. “I'm not really a nude model. Yet.”

I wondered if Ms. Faraci was having trouble speaking because the interruption had thrown her off her game and she was trying to figure out where in her lecture she'd left off or because she was imagining what Diego would look like naked too. Finally she rushed out from behind her desk and ushered Diego into the hall. I strained to listen but couldn't hear anything over the din of excited conversations.

After a few moments Ms. Faraci leaned into the room and said, “Henry, can you come out here? Bring your things.” I gathered my books, wishing, not for the first time, that I could turn invisible. Ms. Faraci patted my arm when I reached the door. “Henry's one of my best students. He'll show you to your class.”

“I will?”

“Diego's new.” Ms. Faraci handed me a crumpled printout. “He got a little turned around.”

Behind us, the class was descending into chaos without supervision.

“I'll do him . . . it. . . . I'll take Diego to his class.” At that moment I wished I were a dickless alien, but my verbal diarrhea only made Diego smile. It was a cute smile, lopsided and charming.

Ms. Faraci mouthed
thank you
and rushed inside as Dustin Collier fell out of his desk and crashed into the supply locker where Ms. Faraci stored the volatile chemicals.

I slung my backpack over my shoulder and led Diego toward the exit. “You're supposed to be in history with Mrs. Parker this period. It's across campus in the social studies building.”

Diego took his schedule, folded it neatly, and slipped it into his back pocket. “Lead the way, Sacagawea.”

“What?”

“Because you're my guide? And we're going to history? Forget it.” Diego's voice was deep and hummed like the constant vibration of the sluggers' ship.

The humid air pummeled us as soon as we left the air-conditioned science building, but I was still grateful for the excuse to escape the classroom. I took the long way to the social studies building.

“So,” Diego said, “your science teacher's a little out there.”

“Yeah.”

“But she seems cool.”

The confidence Diego exuded when he'd burst into my class appeared to be waning, and he fidgeted, shoving his hands into his pockets, then crossing his arms, then putting his hands back into his pockets. I was never good at small talk, preferring not to talk at all. Talking is how bad things happen. But Diego seemed uncomfortable with the silence, so I gave it a try. “Science is my favorite. It's precise, and everything has an explanation. Plus, sometimes we get to blow shit up.”

“I can see the appeal.”

“It's so weird.” Once I began babbling, I couldn't stop. “Like, the smaller things get, the crazier science becomes. When you start talking about p-branes and quantum immortality and entanglement . . . Well, it's just cool is all.”

Diego stared at me with X-ray eyes. It was like he could see through my clothes and skin, straight to the meat of me. I quickly changed the subject. “You just move here or something?”

“Or something.” Diego quickened his pace. The way he avoided looking at me reminded me of Jesse at the end—the odd hesitation before each smile, the sudden silences that rose between us. At the time I hadn't thought much of them, but that's what makes hindsight such a bitch.

“I didn't mean to pry.”

“It's not you,” Diego said. “It's just a reflex. I moved from Colorado.”

The first thing that popped into my mind was, “Jack Swigert was from Colorado.”

“Who?”

“Jack Swigert? Apollo 13 astronaut? Nearly died in space trying to reach the moon?” I stuffed my hands into my pockets when Diego shook his head. “I read a lot.”

“Books are for ugly people.”

“And old women. My nana reads a book a day. Of course, she's got Alzheimer's, so she could read the same book over and over and it wouldn't make a difference to her. She used to write in her journal every day. I kind of picked up the habit from her.”

“So you're a writer?”

“I write sometimes—mostly about stuff that happens to me, and occasionally different ways the world might end—but I'm not a writer.”

Diego laughed, and the rich, sincere sound of it made me smile. “That sounds . . . odd. I paint.”

“Landscapes?”

“Lots of 'scapes.”

“I can't even draw stick figures. I sat next to a kid in middle school who specialized in turning the illustrations in his textbooks into dicks and vaginas. I doubt there's any real-world application.” I couldn't stop rambling, so I bit the inside of my lip to shut myself up.

We reached the social studies building. It was a squat, two-story structure that was begging to be torn down. The paint was peeling, and the classrooms smelled moldy and damp. “Here we are. Two nineteen is on the second floor.”

“Thanks for being my guide.”

“Sure. Oh, and you should avoid sitting in the front row; Mrs. Parker's a spitter.”

Diego tapped his temple. “Noted. See you later, Henry . . .”

“Denton.”

“Diego Vega.” He climbed the stairs, and I walked in the direction of the football field. “Hey, Henry!” I stopped and turned around. Diego was leaning over the railing of the second floor, and I had to crane my neck to see him. “You think
you'll
ever go into space?”

“I'd say it's pretty likely.”

  •  •  •  

Twenty minutes later Marcus was pawing me under the bleachers while I kept a lookout for spiders and tried not to feel like a dirty cliché. He didn't even say hello when he saw me because he was too busy slipping his tongue into my mouth and putting his hands down my pants. It would have been sweet if I thought he were actually happy to see me rather than just plain horny.

My stomach churned, and I pushed Marcus away to avoid burping in his mouth. “Sorry, I skipped breakfast.”

Marcus grabbed his crotch. “I've got something you could—”

“I changed my mind about this weekend,” I said, cutting him off before he ruined the moment.

“Really?”

“Yeah. My mom's preoccupied with work, and Charlie can look after Nana.”

Marcus uncapped his bottled water and took a swig. “Too late, Space Boy.”

“Why?” My voice was crumbling, and I struggled to shore up its supports.

“After you blew me off, I decided to throw a little party.”

“Oh.” Marcus twisted my nipple. I slapped his hand away. “Dick!”

“It's not even a party, really. More like an intimate gathering of friends.”