Short Stories

The Pet dragon

"I'm home!" Emily called with an grin as she closed the door, brushing the dead leaves off her coat and kicking off her boots. Noah walked into the living room. 

"You're cheerful. How was your d-"

He stopped  and stared at Emily's rucksack. "What's wrong?" Emily asked a little too innocently. 

"What is that in your rucksack?" Noah said, pointing to a wriggling bulge in the bag, which appeared to be emitting a thin flume of smoke. Emily beamed and took it off, and carefully - as though she was trying not to disturb something - and slowly took out what looked very much like a small, rather disgruntled, dragon. 

Noah made a noise reminiscent of a deflating balloon. 

"I always wanted a pet." Said Emily happily, scratching the dragon between its ears. 

"You can't keep it."

"Why not? It's cute."

"IT'S A DRAGON" 

The tiny green dragon purred like a cat in agreement. "How is it a dragon?" He stuttered. "Dragons don't exist..." Emily scoffed, rubbing its wings as it blew sparks from its nostrils."Then why did I find it eating the trash?"

"I don't know how you got it, or how it can be here, but we are NOT keeping it. Understood?"

Needless to say, they kept it. Over the first few weeks, Firefly (Emily named it) spent most of his time curled up on Emily's lap, setting fire to the dustbins, chasing squirrels (never catching them) and hoarding socks. This was only discovered when Noah spotted a loose floorboard, and upon lifting it saw a huge pile of socks with Firefly happily curled in the middle of it.Emily thought it was sweet.  Noah did not.

As it began to become more comfortable in its new surroundings, Firefly started to experiment with his small wings, flapping clumsily about the apartment, occasionally smashing windows. 

"He didn't mean to!" Cried Emily, her eyes wide. Firefly chirped almost like a bird and hopped on her shoulder. "How can you be mad at something so cute?" 

"Because it wrecks our apartment? And it's worth mentioning, I think, that it's a dragon?" 

"So what? It's our pet!" 

"Prp!" added Firefly.

"We are normal people. We are not supposed to have a dragon for a pet."  

Emily huffed and stroked its wings. "It's basically the same thing as a cat. Minus the fire."

"THAT'S QUITE A BIG MINUS!" 

One day, Emily and Noah discovered that Firefly was an excellent alternative to central heating. Instead of using a thermostat, all the two did was wrap it up in a woolly blanket and use it as a hot water bottle. In fact, the dragon had all sorts of practical uses. For clearing snow, Noah would take Firefly outside, and tickle its belly until it sent small plumes of flame out of its nostrils, which melted the snow quickly.

One rather hairy situation was when Firefly, having eaten all his cat food, decided  to eat almost all the food in the house, and was found in the pantry sitting in a puddle of ribena looking very pleased with himself. "Emily, the winged frog has eaten our food." 

Emily came rushing in and giggled. "Awww..." She cooed. 

"I hate to burst your bubble." Noah said. "But we sort of ever so slightly need food to, you know, survive." Emily rolled her eyes, scooping the dragon up from the floor and mopping its purple snout with a towel as he purred. 

Most of the time, though, he slept, either curled up on Emily, on the sofa, or sometimes even dangling off the branch of a tree, his tail wrapped around and his wings tucked in almost like a bat. 

The neighbors never suspected a thing.