Project iDragon

002: Before School With the Dragon

SELPHON sneezed into my bed sheets, causing a small ball of flame to burst out from his right nostril. "Ahh," I rushed forward, ready to beat out another explosion, but fortunately there was no need. The sheets were still soaked from the water bottle so there was no catching more catching fire for them in the near future.

"Please don't tell me you have allergies," I said with a sigh as I rubbed the loose skin behind his spiky, black ear frills. "If you burn the house down and I take the fall for it, I'm putting you back on the street where I found you, you got me?"

Selphon ran his soft pink tongue over the top joint of his snout, then moved his nose up so that his face was cupped into my hand. A quiet clicking sound echoed from deep within his throat as he rubbed his soft, leathery skin against my palm. I caught myself in a smile and quickly forced it away.

"I'm still mad at you." I pulled my hand away and wagged a finger. "Damn, all the lady dragons most love you. Those eyes could put the melt on my chemistry teacher – and that's saying something"

The dog-sized dragon cocked his head to one side like the mention of procreation confused him. I cringed at the thought of having to have "the talk" with an adolescent dragon. Make sure you stay with one partner and be a responsible guy dragon if suddenly you and your girlfriend have an egg together (I'm grasping at straws here). To quell my self-conscience, I liked to believe that he just knew better than to become a party dog (dragon?).

The whole concept was kind of bizarre. I glanced back at Selphon as he walked circles on my bed. Were there even any lady dragons? Or even, how could I be sure that he wasn't a lady dragon? When he ran into me that night, he was all alone. He had stayed by my side like I was the next best thing to his mother – and I seriously hoped that he didn't consider me his mother because that would be awkward and confusing for the both of us. It was like something straight out of a fairy tale had fallen in my messy car-infested world.

As I yanked the soggy, charred mess of bed sheets from my bed I couldn't help but let the thoughts play over in my mind. Selphon had been my secret roommate for the better part of the last two months and since then, I hadn't seen a single dragon aside from him.

There had to be more of them, right? One dragon couldn't just appear out of nowhere without reason.

I wasn't sure about anything, when it came to Selphon. Was he full grown? Somehow, I doubted it, but if that was true and he got any bigger, we both would start to have some serious problems. Were there any dietary restrictions I should be aware of? Did he need the companionship of another to get through his daily life? Can dragons develop allergies – are they even native to this region?

Yet, there was no one I could ask but Selphon himself, and so far, the only answers he gave me back involved setting things on fire, or a general look of displeasure if he was in a good mood.

Selphon blinked at me apologetically then hopped off my bed to disappear to the corner under my desk where he slept. I threw the sheets against my closet door to be dealt with later, before turning to watch him one last time. His ear frills twitched against the shadows in nearly invisible movement of dark against black, as he closed his eyes to rest. Something told me that naturally, his species was a nocturnal one – but again, there was no way to know for sure.

There were so many questions that I couldn't answer. So much I wanted to know and even more that I wanted to tell – I wanted to run outside and scream, "Hey world! Guess what, I have a dragon!"

But I'm smarter than that. The world was made up of darkness circling pockets of gold. The moment it found out that I had something impossible, it would take it away from me, and I couldn't do that to Selphon.

Only my best friend, Madi, even knew of his existence. Not my neighbors, not my parents, not even my sister. I felt like that kid in E.T trying to hide an alien in my room, only slightly smarter and with a more fire happy "alien".

I glanced up at my clock and hissed loudly through my teeth. "Damnit, Selphon! You made me late again."

The dragon flickered one eye open in disinterest and went back to resting his head on the floor in a way that said, "Well if it wasn't for me, you wouldn't be awake at all. You're welcome."

After a bunch of scrambling, and an almost fatal crash over my desk chair, I was headed out the door with one shoe in hand and a pile of papers hanging out of my half opened backpack. It took another handful of seconds to realize my glasses weren't on my bedside table and were in fact on my head. I paused outside of my room and fumbled with my keys. The last thing I needed was someone walking in and finding a dragon sleeping under the desk. Somehow, I doubted that even I could talk my way out of that one; and there had already been one too many close calls (mom and a vacuum cleaner).

I poked my head through the door quickly to catch one last glance of the little guy spread out under my desk. "Be good," I told him sternly. "And if everything is still in order when I get back, I'll bring you some mangoes. They're on sale this week."

His head perked at the promise of mangoes (the only word I was 100% sure he could understand) but I didn't have time to watch as I locked the door and sprinted down the stairs.

A/N
Let there be dragons! ...well dragon. Okay nothing happened, but if I posted the second half it would be twice as long. What would you do if you were in David's situation? Who would you tell? Anyone on wattpad? If you had a pet dragon and you didn't already know its name, what would you name it?

Annnd this one goes out to Galasriniel_00 Thank you so much for reading, friend!