. . . we drove past thousands of dead deer lying on their backs, their legs sticking straight in the air, their faces reflected in shallow pools of blood and dark morning water puddles.
I thought of asking the driver to stop so I could take a few photographs, but when I realized I had only my iPhone camera with me, I decided to just keep my mouth shut. The deer weren't going anywhere, would probably stay there until they rotted. I could come back around sunset with my zoom lens, I figured. Cresting a hill we almost rolled over a rooster standing in the middle of the road, perfectly framed in an archway of autumnal foliage. "Did they ever determine the cause of the school shooting?" I asked no one in particular. We were walking through multiple rainspouts showering the sidewalk of a flooded campus. "Was it really a rifle someone left in the bed of their pickup that fired on its own? I find that hard to believe." The coffee was taking forever to brew.
