Dragon Dreams

Chapter 13: On My Mind (2/3)

"It doesn't matter," I said. "I'll always think of you guys the same. Family is the most important thing. Listen, how's Alex doing?"

"You're going to have to sort that out yourself. I think she's ready to talk to you, though. But, be gentle with her."

"Gentle?" I was a little concerned. My sister was usually one of the toughest out of all of us. If she was really having such a hard time with my absence, that wasn't a good sign. "Okay, I'll make time to do that. Oh, one more thing. I...met someone yesterday, unexpectedly. This kid stumbled upon me in the forest where I'm living. He wasn't scared of me, and we got to talking a little bit. He's pretty young, and I don't think anyone would believe him even if he told them about me, so I think I'm still not on any radar up here."

"'Up here,' you said? Up north?"

"Dammit!" I thought, kicking a clump of moss in frustration. The less she knew about where I was, the better. "No, Mom, I didn't—"

"Are you in Canada somewhere? I knew it!"

"Mom, listen. You can't try to find me."

"You don't tell me what to do!" she blurted, losing her restraint for a moment.

I tried to reason with her so she wouldn't do anything drastic. "I was just telling you how things are getting better! Maybe soon I can come back home. You just need to wait until it's safe."

"Will you ever think it's safe? Totally? Will you ever think you're not the least bit dangerous?"

"Y-yes!" My voice was starting to betray my desperation. "I'm trying, Mom. I have to try so we can be like we were before."

There was a long pause as she tried to see things from my perspective. "I know, honey. I know. I'm sorry—we won't try to find you if you need your space. I know, in time, I'll get to see my son again." Her voice, strained with heartache, wavered through the final words.

"Thank you. Now, I gotta go. I'll try to call Alex later. Maybe tonight, we'll see. Love you."

"I love you too, Josh. And I'll see you soon."

I hung up.

"God, hearing her voice just makes me want to run right back into her arms," I thought. "I just miss home, I guess. That's what happens. I just want to get everything out of my head and bring back the old me! Not a chance, though." The call left me a little frustrated. I felt like I had taken a step back. My family wanted me to be the same as I always was. Then there was Rofar, calling me by my dragon name, teaching me magic, showing me how I was different from humans in ways I couldn't imagine. There was a pull from both sides. One day I'm happier as a dragon, the next my mother's voice makes me long to be human again, if only for her.

To prepare for the rest of my day, I threw my shorts back on. I put my phone away and took out a book, hoping to get lost in the pages far from these troubling thoughts. My paw brushed against the family portrait I had buried in the duffel. I paused for a moment to look at the faces again before tearing my eyes away. A few raindrops began to fall through the branches from above, so I curled up on the ground and extended a wing overhead to deflect the rain as I read. The sound was magical, water drifting down to cleanse and renew the forest. My hope was for the rain to cleanse me as well, to wash away the fear, dissolve the barriers in my mind that distorted my once-human consciousness. Nature remained indifferent—the rain simply fell.

I resurfaced from my book several chapters later to notice that the rain had stopped. The sun was out. I looked up at the backlit wing over my head. A fabric of thin membrane with spiderwebs of dark vessels set in stark contrast by the sunlight. My blood pulsed through the network, and I lost myself for a moment staring at the incredible limb that was part of me. I looked down at my arms—or forelegs—and ran the tip of a claw over the covering of scales, tracing the hardened exterior that was once soft flesh. Even my sense of touch was different in this body. Having scales meant I felt the sharp claw as a vague pressure; I had little sense of texture anymore. "Yeah, I'm a long way from my human life," I thought. Like the cycle of the sun, my mind kept coming back to that thought, over and over. How would I reconcile these two lives—the before and after? Could I, even if I tried?

The questions drifted off unanswered as another issue crept into my mind: Ares. After what he did to me the first time we met, I knew he was bad news, but now Rofar had given me more pieces to the grim story. "In short," I thought, "I'm being hunted." A chill washed over my scales, and I shivered, picturing a pair of fiendish eyes stalking me from the shadows. Talons waiting to strip away my humanity until I finally fit his twisted view of an ideal dragon. My tail swept nervously across the moss-covered ground. There was nothing I dreaded more than being dragged into some much bigger conflict. My world had already been turned upside down; I didn't need to multiply my problems by getting mixed up in some dragon clan hostilities. "If I stick with Rofar—and stay away from Ares—I'll be fine." Somewhere inside, I had to find the strength to resist. For Wes. For my parents. For Alex.

I folded my wings and got back to my feet. I needed another diversion. Looking around, there were more trees than I could count, all of them waiting to be climbed. I smiled. Trotting over to a broad trunk, I appraised the tree and quickly pulled myself up to start climbing.

I scampered up the tree, surprising a few squirrels that chattered at me as they scattered. Birds gave me a wide berth as well, a flurry of wings evacuating the vicinity as I surged upward. This tree was even taller than the first one, and I was breathless with excitement and exertion as I reached the top. From my perch I could see the choppy shore far below my cliff, pearly ropes of surf swaying and dancing like white-robed figures.

Closing my eyes, I sat still in the crown of the noble tree and took in the surrounding forest. I felt the steady swaying of the trunk in the breeze, heard the gentle sigh of air playing in the needles all around me. The smells were different up here: just a penetrating but pleasant perfume of tree-sap joined by the fresh aromas of all the evergreens around me. I realized just how small I was. The world's expanse dwarfed my tiny existence. It was humbling. Up there, with the clearest air around me, I experienced blissful relief from my troubled thoughts.

It was a long while before I decided to descend. Realizing there was not enough space for me to glide down, I simply made my climb in reverse and carefully walked my way down the tree. I figured there was still some time to kill before Wes would be meeting me, which I used for some more reading. I looked to the sun to tell me when it was early afternoon. "Time to have a little more fun," I thought.

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