The distance to the bathroom was a short walk across carpet that twenty years ago was a stylish shade of deep red. In the dark, the stains from coffee and God knows what else were blessedly hidden.

Even in dim, filtered light, the pill bottle was easily found, for it was always in the same place on the corner of the sink. He had considered moving it permanently to his nightstand, but stashing it in the bathroom meant he would have no choice but to get up after the dreams. And if he’d learned anything, it was the importance of not lying in bed in a state of shock. It was better to move, to remind himself that what he dreamt was not real, that his subconscious was simply reacting to nagging fears, that there was a difference between worry and reality. It was why, even knowing exactly where the bottle rested in the dark, he turned on the light.

His reflection appeared in the mirror, revealing hair so ridiculously unkempt that he almost laughed. His brothers certainly would if they could see it. The higher the hair, the closer to God, their mother would say, running her fingers through his churning locks, which grew like crabgrass in a wet spring. Jabs would be made about pulling the WeedWacker out from the shed, and certainly the ruler stashed in the junk drawer would be seized to see if the height had reached a new record. His dad would wrap his arms around him, pretending to hold him in place while the ruler rested on his scalp, his brothers and mother delighting in counting the centimeters, cheering if the height stretched past seven. One summer, it reached to twelve, which was noted with a red Sharpie on the ruler, an exclamation mark drawn next to it.

He wished he could dream of them.

Twisting open the pill bottle cap, he tossed back three pills. Then he turned off the light and lumbered across the bedroom, rotating his shoulders to increase the blood circulation. He leaned his six-foot-two form against the frame of the room’s solitary window, parting blinds to squint at the early morning light.

You are surrounded by cotton in the middle of nowhere. You are not even close to what you’re dreaming about. What’s irrefutable is that you need to get your butt ready for work.

But it always felt so real. He could practically taste it.

And this time, there was something more.

As always, the nightmare had started in a storm. The blistering rain had barreled around him, beating him with stinging winds. Torrential rain soaked him, making his clothes a second skin.

Raging waters rushed like an army towards the city in the distance, crashing into levees, seeking crevices, cracks, anything to slip through to further erode the stone. What it couldn’t break it would bypass altogether, to pummel the electricity-stripped buildings and homes beyond.