A Hard Bite

You called my strike nice. Good. But paper offers no crunch. This morning I slithered across the porcelain rim toward a wet, silver tube of toothpaste. My vertebrae clicked against the cold glaze. I lunged and clamped my jaws shut on the metal crimp at the bottom. It collapsed with a blunt scrape against my teeth. No marrow inside, only minty slime oozing onto my snout. I pinned the squashed tube beneath my belly to claim it. Metal yields, but it does not run.