Dragon Girl

Chapter 1: Eye of the Dragon

Has this ever happened to you? You look out your window and BOOM, there's a dragon staring back at you.                
Me neither. Until today.                                                                
I mean, I'm your basic, unremarkable 16-year-old girl, going to school and doing pretty much average, mundane things. Nothing interesting. So imagine my surprise when I took a quick glance out my window to see a freakin' HUGE golden-green eye staring back at me. I know I'm not that tall, average at best, but this eye was bigger than my whole body stacked on top of each other five times.
That's big.
Being the tough, hardcore, courageous girl I am, I screeched in fright and jumped back, running out of my room. But when I looked out again...
You guessed it. POOF. The dragon was gone.
"I knew I shouldn't have had that last rainbow cookie," I muttered to myself. Those things did weird things to my noggin. Satisfied that it was indeed my imagination, I climbed into my bed and stared at the ceiling. You should know that I live with my mother. My father died, incredibly sad, blah blah blah. I won't bore you with the details. Who likes talking about that stuff anyway? Not me.
This particular night, I couldn't fall asleep. Counting three hundred sheep didn't help, or three hundred goats. Frustrated, I jumped out of my bed.
Picture this: a double storey house, with a little garden in front and a rusty old fence. My room was upstairs, consisting of a large window that led onto a small ledge. I always sat there, no matter how many times my mother had scolded me that I'd fall off, break all the bones in my body, not survive surgery and die. She likes to exaggerate.
"What the..." I squinted at the scene in front of our house, a few yards off, illuminated by a single light post. A pool of yellowish light fell upon two figures. My eyes widened.
The dragon was back - this time with a boy. I couldn't make out much from this point, but the boy looked lost, and angry. He was yelling at the dragon, who was trying to scratch the boy with his giant claws in return.
Hello, the dragon. I had to see this. It was like my imagination projecting into real life. I've got to tell you, I practically live in my own head. Life's much more interesting in there (refer back to paragraph one for unremarkable lifestyle rant).
Before I knew it, I had pulled on my boots and jumped out the window. No, it wasn't suicide. There's a roof right there. I climbed down and raced towards them.

"-out here. We don't belong here. Stop taking me to these unknown territories!" the boy was saying irritably as I watched from the shadows. He groaned, kicking a pebble. The dragon swiped a claw at him, but the boy seemed used to this and simply hopped out of the way. He rubbed his stomach. "And now I'm hungry."It was time to have a little fun. "Nice to meet you, Hungry. I'm Maya." I strolled into the light, observing him. He whirled to face me. Blond hair, brown eyes, startled expression. He stood in front of the dragon as if to hide it.
"Who are you?" he said, swapping his expression for one of hostility."I just told you. Elizabeth."
"No. You said Maya."
"Good. You pay attention." I smiled at his slightly confused face. "Do you really think I can't see the dragon?"
He stared at me. "Y-You can see him?" He swerved around to stare at the dragon, Xandor, then at me. "For real?"
I nodded. "Kind of hard to miss an oversized reptilian like that," I said. He rolled his eyes and shook his head, muttering to himself, "I thought the charm wouldn't wear off until tomorrow..."
"Charm?" I quickly asked. "Like magic? Where do you come from?" I said, examining the dragon who was looking at me with curiosity (and hopefully not hunger).
He chuckled. "Okay, I don't know who you're working for, but you're not from our world, so-"
"Your world? You mean there's more than one?"
"I never said that!" he said, then assumed an air of nonchalance, dodging another dragon claw. "Look, little girl, this isn't your place." I scowled at him as he continued. "Go back to your cooking and cleaning. That's what you do, right? I have important things to deal with, like dragons, no job for a girl, much less a girl like you."
"Uh huh," I said, suppressing my anger. "Can I ride your dragon?"
He stepped closer. "You are strange."
"As are you," I retorted. "And your dragon doesn't seem to like you very much."
He narrowed his eyes. "Where I come from," he said, "girls are just there to reproduce and do household chores. I don't know where you got such a sharp tongue from, but you better bite back your comments, you useless piece of garbage."
I remained calm. "And you think all girls are like that? Useless pieces of garbage?"
"Of course. Us men are dominant and better in every way. You females just take up space," he said, then shook his head. "But you don't need to know any of this. Xandor!" he called, turning to his dragon. "Let's fly. And this time, to the right world, if you please." Xandor responded with a roar and a swing of his wing, which the boy unfortunately avoided.
Man, this guy was mean. I came looking for an adventure, and he just had negative views and an inflated ego. I needed to see this world, to prove them wrong. I don't know what happened, exactly, but I felt a determination and fire within me.
So I stole his dragon.