and empty beer can to his right, the soft tune of Star Spangled Banner played on the TV. He always kept his keys on a carabiner around his belt loop. I approached him, walking quickly and quietly trying not to wake him. My hand shook as I brought my hand closer to his keys and unhooked them off his loop. I had the keys in my hand and slowly backed away from him; finally I was able to exhale. I threw my black windbreaker and shoes on and walked out the back door to the blue pickup my father and I would drive to the Badlands together. I opened the door and stepped in, gripping the cracking and cold leather steering wheel. I looked in the back seat, envisioning little me sitting there crammed against the door by hiking and camping gear. The air that night smelled of an approaching storm: humid, heavy, and wet. I pulled out of our gravel driveway and rolled onto the highway slowly. A flash of lightning lit the dark black sky showing me its dark ominous clouds in the distance, and then the loud thuds of raindrops began to hit the windshield. The downpour of rain made it hard to see as I continued to drive. Another flash blinded me as I swerved in the road, my blurry vision faded and when I could see again I was face to face with a deer, wet and shivering. Time seemed to stop, my vision turned black and white as the truck came within inches of the animal. I realized that there was no sound, the splashes of rain hit the windshield but no thuds were heard, the soft tones of country music were still on the radio but no music was playing. Instead I heard the sound of a clock; tick, tick, tick. Where it was coming from I still do not know. Everything came crashing down when everything went back to normal, the rain, the music; everything started to catch up with me. The truck slammed into the deer forcing it through the windshield, being cut up on its legs and abdomen. The deer shrieked in pain and writhed around kicking its front legs nearly hitting my face and body. I swerved off the road and went into a ditch flipping the car upside down.
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