Its mouth opened upwards. Like glue, its jaws seeped toward the sky slowly rising, stretching higher. I saw the tissue in its cheeks. Black lips folded out and hanging covered in crusted bloody sand. Paws buried in blood. Fur matted together. Saliva dripping through its flaps onto the muck. The drool trailed continually over the dune sliding its way towards my feet, seeping into the grains, growing closer. Its mouth kept opening, unhinged and gagged. Streaks of smoke blew through its throat, trailing the scent of gunpowder. Devil dark seeping down in a foggy cloud. The smell of mustard and rot. Mustard and rot. 

I open my eyes. The room was dark, shadowed static and fog. Moonlight seeped into the smoke, but it was rejected. Pushed out as it tried to enter. Mustard and rot reaching to your right you tried to grab water. How many nights? Cold sweat trickled down your cheek. How many nights of mustard and rot and glue and sand and heat and bullets and your wife turned over to face you. She whispered something about everything being okay. Just sleep. You lay your head against the pillow without getting any water, your mouth dry as sand. Blink. Little grainy flakes.

I open my eyes. The rain raps against the window. Little taps of wakefulness. You turn to the nightstand, looking for your water in the faint light of an alarm clock. 7:6:11:9. There's nothing on the stand. You turn on your stomach and bend and slowly your hand feels around the edge of the bed and the floor. Creeping over dust and grains and wood until a little bottle of plastic and liquid rolls. You pick it up, twist the cap, drink. Dry. Swallow.

Swallow. Feel Your throat. The top tightens as You swallow, slowly pulling down. Up and down. Up and down. Wafting over dry wind as it crawled on three limbs towards you. Its arms digging into the sand scooping it back as it crawls. Its leg frantically pushing against the muddy dune. You breathe it in. The dark. Seeping down in a foggy cloud burning your throat. Gag. Gag. You feel it—in your room. Over your right shoulder. It's in Your peripheral staring at You breathe. The air slides down your esophagus, drying you. Its tail does not wag. You don't believe it's there. You'll turn around if You haven't already. It will still be there when you come back. It will be the flickers in your screen. The creaking of your house. The footsteps. The hand gliding over your wall. Textured and dry. Swallow your spit. Feel your throat. Set it down,

The water. The man turns from the nightstand. Puts his head against the pillow. It's warm. The man rolls over to his wife—mustard. Its mouth drips like glue, yellow and putrid. Widening sickening gagging choking moving up and down again. Black smoke static fog rotten bodies of children in the dune crawling. Arm over arm drinking their own blood as they crawl fanatically. Closer. Seeping under your eyelids, feeling—it leaks over your wife. The man sits paralyzed. Your wife, cold sweat, trickle drip pour gag. It lowers its mouth engulfing her face. Its eyes stare.

I stare back. glue gag drip slog

I open my ey- don't don't don't don't. Cold sweat. Trickle. Shadow—static—fog—black. To your left there is no night stand. There is no wife. eyelids- Drip drip. Matte- lips- drool- sweat- trickle engulf- gag- gag- gag- gag-