She knew what she was supposed to do. She could smell it in the ground, feel it from her mandibles to her thorax, but the moment the others took to the air for their one and only flight, Aimee wondered. She wondered why none of them noticed the moon.

It filtered white-ish over the field, bright and silver on the green grass and caught in wings she was supposed to use just once, then tear off to make her nest and care for her eggs. She turned her small head from side to side and wondered. She wondered if any of them saw what she saw.

She lifted one tiny foot and felt the tiny specks of soil. She sensed the pheromones, the scents and messages of hundreds who came before her, some faded and some strong. Her antenna twitched at the pull, the lure of longing, of nature, of all the boys gone to some private spot and all the girls gone flitting after. She looked at the soil, saw history, future, a rainbow of colors in one speck of dirt and she wondered. She wondered if she was imagining things.

Aimee took a few steps, fluttered her wings in the night breeze and listened to the whisper in the trees, the breath of the night, hushing and shushing through branches. She heard mighty gusts that quieted as they dropped, blocked by tall grasses until they brushed against her little body as only the barest touch, and she wondered. She wondered if she’d miss it underground.

The scent in the air filled her head, covered her and made her long to find that tall pine tree or towering oak where all the boys had gone and all the girls had flitted after. It made her want to tear off her wings, make a nest and care for a dozen eggs, a hundred; make a warm, cozy home filled with little ants just like her, who would take flight just once and do it all over again. She longed to catch the air under her wings, she ached do what she was supposed to do, and she wondered. She wondered if it’d be enough.

One flight. Just once. Her tiny eyes looked up at a sky so large she couldn’t see its edges and she wondered. She wondered if it had edges. She wondered if there was any end to it all, to the moon, the leaves, the wind, the wonder. She wondered if there was any end to the wonder of it all.

Aimee shook her head, took in deep the smell of the others, the path they had already flown, the path she was made for, and she got a running start to bring the air bold beneath her wings. Little feet digging in the rainbow soil, she took three, four, five fast steps—and then stopped, and she wondered. She wondered what might happen if she didn’t go.

The others might notice, or they might not. There were so many already, so many boys and so many girls. They didn’t seem to notice the moon like Aimee did, or the wind or the leaves and the grass and the dirt. They smelled the smells, but they didn’t look at them, didn’t see, didn’t seem to wonder. Aimee looked at the wide-open night and she wondered. She wondered if the little dots of bright light were really as small as she was. She wondered if her tiny wings would take her high enough to touch them.

Aimee breathed deep the scent that made her want to nest, looked high at the moon that made her want to fly and she wondered. She wondered.

She wondered if each choice would just leave her wishing she had made the other.