I saw a kennel bathed in dusk
Dusk. It doesn't fall. It never goes away. The town is always tinted in a faint orange against the jet black of shivering shadows.
We are sitting, her and I, at the steps of an hospital. A dilapidated pay phone cover us with it's shadow. It creaks in the dead air.
The girl takes her hand up to the sky, looking at it through her fingers.
"The dogs?" She asks.
I take a sip from the soda can. It's warm and extremely sugary. I give the can to her.
"What about the dogs?" I ask.
She takes a sip, still maintaining her hand to the sky.
"They are going to trample through the avenue, baring their teeth at us, ripping us to shreds."
"Oh. That's not today."
"Uh. Is that so?"
"Yeah."
"Huh."
I saw the kennel right at the end of the street where I live. The tall electrified wire mesh fence hummed discreetly, almost inaudible.
The dogs, common strays, were looking at the sun. All of them. In the wood houses painted with clotted blood and adorned with various bite marks, they looked at the sun through the acrylic roof.
The acrylic was a faint cyan color. They were awash in a faint oceanic glow, only their black silhouettes visible in the dusk. Creatures from the deep living above the surface. Even when they were higher, they could help but admire what was above them.
All the life they could imagine, which was leaving their surroundings and their own bodies. Puppets admiring their own strings while their puppetter slept.
They were going to trample the town.
So said one of them. Through the language of absence, in between words, he could communicate with me. He didn't bark. None of them barked. Rather, he communicated through the dead air of the eternal dusk which had set in four years ago.
The world is coming to an end in this infinite dusk. The darkness will come after that which should be disposed is disposed and that which is to be stored is stored. Then, the night will fall again, but the morning will not come.
So he said to me, which I later relayed to the girl. Ever since, she can't stop asking me when the day will come.
I don't know. But I still humor her. It's never today. It's never tomorrow. But it's soon.
"We should prepare, shouldn't we?" She says, taking the last sip from the soda can which we were sharing.
"How so?"
She throws the soda over her head, at the roof of the hospital. An empty thud echoes the street. Nothing else.
"Treats. Beef jerky, canned stew, dog food, you know?"
"To distract them?"
"No, to eat them. I want to make them jealous. Very jealous. It's the least I can do to get back at them."
"I see. Maybe we should also get a tennis ball to bite into."
"Yeah, we can throw it for each other to catch. That could work. But it's not today though.'
"Yep."
"It's like school, isn't it? It's always tomorrow, but it never comes. In their case, I know they're lying. They want to comfort us. I don't care for it. I know you are not lying though."
"I wouldn't lie."
"I know. Even if you wanted to and did it, you wouldn't lie. That's why we are such good friends."
"You mean I'm incapable of lying? That's far fetched."
"Not really. I mean, a prophet think what he says to be a lie, but it's nature is to be truth. Even if he's not aware of it."
"I'm no prophet."
"You have the name of one."
"That doesn't make me one."
"Are you sure? It's been a while since we've been to school, so how can we say for sure, without the proper education?"
"Shut up."
"Sure. But just for a moment."
She gets closer to me and rests her head on my shoulder. After a while, she's asleep.
I look at the sun through the acrylic roof. What if I bark at it? Hey, maybe that's a good idea. I'll make certain the kind of tough mutt I am.
Them, I can profetize through the in between, in the dead air of dusk. And leave this kennel behind.