“Now, everyone, remember, you can’t get close to the babies or else the mom won’t come back. I’m the only one who can lift up the grass from the nest, okay?” The group of kids nodded as they followed me. “And be really quiet, because we don’t want to scare them. They’re just babies, and I’m sure they would be nervous if they saw so many people standing around them.”

I walked over the grass, the horde of kids following behind me like I was the Block Party Pied Piper, and picked up a long stick. Jack joined the group, whispering to his friends that they should be excited. I smiled, a warm feeling coming over me as I prepared to show them something special.

I gingerly approached the nest, tiptoeing across the grass as the children huddled around me. I moved the tripod and knelt down, then looked up at the kids crowding around and put a finger to my lips as they all tensed in anticipation.

The memory of the feeling I had when we first discovered the nest came flooding back, and my breath caught in my throat. I swallowed quickly, pushing it away, reminding myself it was nonsense. Just a bizarre moment, and nothing else.

I looked down at the nest, about to carefully use the stick to peel back the layers of grass, but paused. The covering wasn’t patted down and placed over the nest as we had left it. Whereas before it had been almost indistinguishable from the rest of the lawn, the new arrangement made it clear that something was hiding.

I looked up at Emily. “Did you show your friends already?”

She shook her head furiously and knitted her brows together. “No, Mommy. I promise.”

I looked down and lifted what was left of the covering, and the first thing I saw was red.

Blood. Mixed with fur.

Instead of baby bunnies huddled together, it was just bloodstains, fur, and scattered body parts. My eyes focused on a small severed bunny foot, the edges jagged, having been chewed off by something with very sharp teeth.

The children behind me started screaming in terror before they ran out of the yard, yelling for their parents. Bile rose in my throat, and I quickly dropped the stick and jogged out of the yard behind them. A wave of panic moved across the block party crowd as the parents saw their children come tearing out of my backyard, tears streaking their faces.

Mark jogged over and scooped up a hysterical Emily, bending down to hold her shaking frame. Jack slowly backed away, eyes wide.

“What in the world happened?” Mark hissed to me.

I shook my head, my heart racing. “The bunnies. Something got to them. There’s . . . not much left.”