Whether by coincidence or by intervention, the bones scattered across the trail suggested a disquieting possibility. But one possibility changed the course of hike club – that the arrangements of the bones were not coincidental.

Todd spotted the first one, the tip of the femur propped against a rock. The length of the bone dissected a bright orange mushroom patch. Moss coated the opposite tip, as if painted over several times with a brush caked in paint.

That bone led us to another femur, and then another. We crisscrossed the trail several times. Searching the left side of the trail netted a large cache of femurs, three and four to a pile, chunks of vertebra and slabs of shoulder girdles. On every level these piles of bones seemed random. Or were they?

In time, we pieced the events together. A pack of coyotes had intercepted 5 deer and ripped them to shreds, tearing and scattering the bodies as they consumed them. Darwin, you b****.

So that’s how my Saturday went. And seeing the bones led to ideas for a screenplay and the 3rd Mike Brody book.