Bone
In the dream, it always hurt when that massive jaw clamped down on his arm, crushing everything before pulling and tearing him apart. It started just beneath his left shoulder, throbbing, sharp.
He woke up sweating, shivering. He sat right up in bed, instantly pulling a pillow against his face as if to blot out the pain and the fear. He could smell his own fear, and it sickened him.
A bolt of hot white agony chose that moment to shoot through him, down his arm and back up into his chest. Was his heart giving out? Was this what a heart attack felt like?
He heard a dog-like whimper and tilted his head to hear where it had come from. Then he heard it again. It was in his chest. It was his own sound of pain. He closed his eyes, and to him it sounded like a massive metal door slamming shut.
In flashes of yellow light he could see it, the snarling canine mouth tearing away from his ruined arm, lunging at his face with bloody teeth. He could smell the blood. He could taste it.
He slid backward just an inch or two, but it was useless. Those teeth were snapping at his chin, at the cheekbone, just under his eye -- then at the side of his neck.
Instinctively he tried to curl himself up, make himself the smallest target possible; but his enemy was already so intimate, there was no place to hide, no safe position. The teeth were razors and they went through his flesh not caring where. They could pulverize bone into sand and tear muscle tissue to ribbons.
In the dream, he always felt himself crawling weakly along a silvery path of sand in a midnight pine forest, leaning here and there on a tree to catch his breath and listening for the sound of the mad dog. He saw his blood on the silvery white sand, a perfect trail leading to himself.
This time, the rain diluted the red. Everything was loud, but black. This was better, he reminded himself; better than what it would be without the bullet. Before he passed out again, his fingers fluttered down along his side until they found the wound. He gasped as he touched it too roughly, smiling because he knew he could harm no one but himself.
In the dream, he slept.
He woke up sweating, shivering. He sat right up in bed, instantly pulling a pillow against his face as if to blot out the pain and the fear. He could smell his own fear, and it sickened him.
A bolt of hot white agony chose that moment to shoot through him, down his arm and back up into his chest. Was his heart giving out? Was this what a heart attack felt like?
He heard a dog-like whimper and tilted his head to hear where it had come from. Then he heard it again. It was in his chest. It was his own sound of pain. He closed his eyes, and to him it sounded like a massive metal door slamming shut.
In flashes of yellow light he could see it, the snarling canine mouth tearing away from his ruined arm, lunging at his face with bloody teeth. He could smell the blood. He could taste it.
He slid backward just an inch or two, but it was useless. Those teeth were snapping at his chin, at the cheekbone, just under his eye -- then at the side of his neck.
Instinctively he tried to curl himself up, make himself the smallest target possible; but his enemy was already so intimate, there was no place to hide, no safe position. The teeth were razors and they went through his flesh not caring where. They could pulverize bone into sand and tear muscle tissue to ribbons.
In the dream, he always felt himself crawling weakly along a silvery path of sand in a midnight pine forest, leaning here and there on a tree to catch his breath and listening for the sound of the mad dog. He saw his blood on the silvery white sand, a perfect trail leading to himself.
This time, the rain diluted the red. Everything was loud, but black. This was better, he reminded himself; better than what it would be without the bullet. Before he passed out again, his fingers fluttered down along his side until they found the wound. He gasped as he touched it too roughly, smiling because he knew he could harm no one but himself.
In the dream, he slept.
posted by Almost Midnight at 10:03 PM
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