They’re after me. It’s true. This is no joke. They read my column last week or something because the little devils know, and they are after me.

Now I must admit that nothing has actually happened yet. In fact, our exchanges have been all too brief, but I fear confrontation may be a foregone conclusion as sightings are increasing by the day.

For those who didn’t read my June 7 column, I ran over a rabbit last week while driving to work. It was already dead at the time, but that knowledge didn’t assuage my conscience and I had hoped to put the gruesome affair behind me with a printed confession.

Well, it appears my publicized regret did nothing with my neighborhood bunny population because soon after I began “noticing” them everywhere, which I suspect is by design — their design.

Rabbits are not to be trusted. Bun-Bun, my sister’s childhood dwarf rabbit, taught me that lesson long ago. Cute and fuzzy, he was a Delilah of biblical proportions. With irresistible charm, he’d lure you in close and then wham! He’d sink his teeth. The evil little monster didn’t just bite, he lunged, aiming for the jugular. We were fortunate to have survived.

I’ve never forgotten Bun-Bun’s savagery, and I believe that experience is assisting me now in identifying the nefarious intent of my neighborhood rabbits.

As I mentioned, our encounters have been limited, starting out with nothing more than fleeting glimpses. I’d walk out on to the porch in the morning, as is my custom, and there in the yard just at the hedge line I’d see one. These aren’t the cute coneys one typically finds on the lawn at such an hour. No, these sit in the shadows, still as stone, just watching me with cold black eyes. And right when I think they’re about to charge, they twitch their nose and hop out of sight. It’s all over in the blink of an eye, but it’s long enough. Oh yeah, message delivered.

That happened several times before they upped the ante. Yesterday evening, they turned out en masse. Lining both sides of the street to my house, they were a gauntlet of zipping, darting bunnies that forced my car to a crawl. Thank God the windows were up, or all may have been lost.

I tried to write it off as suspicion born from prejudice, but to my horror it was the same on the way to work this morning. I tell you I drive this route every day and have never seen numbers such as these.

Sum it up to past experience, a gut feeling or plain old instinct to survive, but I know this is happening. So question my sanity if you will, but mark my words: rabbits are dangerous and should not be crossed.