Just.

As I stared down at her mangled body, I remembered a poem that I had read in grade eleven English: Traveling through the Dark. Her eyes were wide and were beginning to glaze over - or were deers' eyes always like that? I think the author's name was Stafford. Her hide was smooth, except for where my truck had bitten into her and where it was textured by blood. I recalled being upset at the man in the poem: he was aware of the unborn fawn, but he didn't try and help it at all. I suppose I can understand; he was probably just a man, not a large animal veterinarian or something of the sort, who would be knowledgeable in such a situation. I reached down and felt her stomach. She flinched. She was afraid and badly injured, but she didn't seem to be pregnant. I was relieved. I wasn't a large animal vet either.

I stood up and paced. She was a small doe, perhaps still quite young. She was breathing heavily, and I could tell it was growing increasingly difficult for her to inhale and exhale. What was I to do? She wasn't dead... but she was dying.

I opened the door of the truck and leaned across the seat for my cell phone. No service. Who could I have called anyway? The police, I guess. They would have needed directions, though. And I didn't know where I was. Where we were.

After an attempt at lifting her head to survey the area, it simply rolled back onto the dirt. It was dark all around; only the lights of my truck illuminated the spot on the road where the fading deer lay.

I hoped with all my might that she wasn't in pain, though I knew it was an impossible chance that she wasn't. I glanced around, trying to think of a better - faster - way to end her misery. Maybe more for me than her, it was hard to stand there and watch her life slowly vanish.

Her breaths grew longer and so did the time between them.
I wanted to leave, but I know that I couldn't. I had to move her out of the way once she was gone. If not for respect for the life I had taken, wild animal or not, then for the safety of other drivers.

I waited for another traveler to pass by. Perhaps a hunter. With a gun. He couldn't have done much with her: she was road kill. However, he could have saves her some pain.

It took another half hour, at least. I didn't have a watch, and my phone was in the truck, but I think it's a pretty good guess.
I was sitting on the ground in front of my truck. She was looking right into my eyes. She took a deep breath. It seemed so hopeful, but she exhaled and I knew she was gone.

I feel stupid now, thinking back on that night. I'm supposed to be a grown man, yet I looking that deceased deer's eyes and I cried. I cried like I did when I was five and I scraped my knee.
I don't know how long it took me to calm myself, but eventually it happened and I lifted myself off the dusty back road. I used all my strength to pull her aside, into the ditch. It seemed like an improper burial. I wanted to do more. The coyotes would come and rip her to shreds; devour her. The premonition repulsed me.

I ascended out of the ditch and dusted my hands on my trousers. There wasn't too much blood in the dirt and gravel, but you could see where the deer had been. With a sigh, I climbed into my truck and started the ignition. A low rumble and a metallic clank! upset the deathly silence of the night. I hadn't noticed how quiet it had been.

As I drove down the gravel road, back to civilization, I shook my head and stepped back into manhood.

Why was I all worked up? It was just a stupid animal.