Nick didn't know why it reminded him of firecrackers. Maybe, aside from the accompanying boom from his uncle's rifle, it had been the way the blood gushed out of the deer's neck. Hundreds of red tendrils spraying out in every direction like dull, flying lights polluting downward into the earth instead of decorating the sky.
Nick heard it's pain filled bleats from far away, but by the time he and his uncle had gotten near it, the deer was dead. Eyes wide open and bulging out of the sockets, tongue sticking out of it's mouth, the tip of the tongue dipping into the blood soaked dirt, it was as if the deer had been trying to tell Nick that it's death was a joke. Why else would it look so ridiculous?
Uncle Pete had be quite pleased with himself, being able to find the deer after Nick scared it off when he almost shot him in the stomach. So focused on his prize, Pete didn't realize right away that Nick was backing from the animal, and how that slow, backward stumble away from the deer became a turn and then a sprint. Pete looked back in time to see his nephew's head disappear behind bushes.
They said you couldn't murder animals, but Nick knew that wasn't true. It had a life, it breathed and ate and slept and dreamed, and now it didn't anymore. That was murder. Uncle Pete was a murderer and Nick was never going to speak to him again. No matter how much his uncle tried to start a conversation with him or bribe him with treats, no matter how much his mother told him to stop acting like a child, he would never ever say a word to him for as long as he lived.
Nick's conviction ended up lasting three weeks, give or take a day. Uncle Pete had said something funny. Nick tried his hardest not to react. His stubbornness did not outweigh the hilarity of what was said and he burst into hysterical laughter. If the boy had been paying attention, he would've seen the small glint of relief shine briefly in Pete's eyes.
A month later, Nick didn't consider his uncle to be a murderer anymore.
A year later, Nick stopped having dreams about that hunting trip.
Later still, Nick would get pissed off whenever Pete mentioned that stupid story.
And when the alcohol was forced down his lips in an attempt to drown the sadness of his uncle's death, his murder by the hands of the lurkers, Nick could only think about how Pete had died alone, in pain, as the morbid punch line of life.
Like that goddamn fucking deer.