The Dragon of Nottingham - The Heat is On

Isaac's dad stood at the barbecue grill and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Where is that hot breeze coming from?" he said.

"What breeze?" said Isaac.

Isaac's dragon had taken a sudden interest in the boy’s dad. It stood behind him and sniffed at the intoxicating aftershave, until the plate of raw salmon steaks caught his attention.

"It's gone now, Isaac. But that was pretty intense. It must have been a random tropical air current that somehow escaped the epic sandstorm that swept through the Sahara desert and wound it's way up the Nile river last week. I'm surprised it was so late in getting here."

"Really?" said Isaac.

"There's no other explanation, son. It's been cloudy and cool all afternoon. Goodness knows where the sun went off to. You'd think it would have better control over the elements. After all, it's one of the most powerful forces in the universe. With the exception of your mother, of course. The sun has some tough competition there. But I'm guessing the sun's just taken the day off. The old girl is entitled, though. She's put in a lot of time over the last gazillion or so years."

"How do you know the sun is a girl?" said Isaac.

"Well, it's like this, son. We both know that the sun rises and sets on your mother, and that sometimes when she's a little upset with me she'd like to send me to the moon. So, I've logically come to the conclusion that the sun is all woman and the moon is all man. Thus the expression, 'the man in the moon' And if your mom's any indication, there are probably a lot of us up there like me who are wishing they had kept their high falutin' opinions to themselves."

Isaac loved that his dad could explain things to him. No matter how illogical or silly they might appear. They were always good explanations as far as Isaac was concerned.

"Now that's funny," said Isaac's dad. 

"What is?"

"I'm certain there were three salmon steaks on that plate. Now there are only two."
Isaac's dragon shifted his eyes left, then right and took a guilty swallow of salmon. He had settled himself behind the barbecue grill while Isaac's dad was explaining his views on women and the weather.

The hungry dragon had seen his opportunity and grabbed it. And it was pink, raw and delicious.

"I must be getting old," said Isaac's dad. "Either that, or I'm not as good at counting as I thought. Let's see. One, two, three four, five. Yep. Four fingers and one thumb. I seemed to have managed that count alright."

Isaac's dad then proceeded to point at things, to better illustrate his counting capabilities.

"One house. One car. One lawn mower. One inflatable swimming pool. One squashed grasshopper. Ooh. Did I do that? That means bad luck all day long. Looks like I'll be burning the salmon after all. No surprise there, though. One garbage can. One barbecue grill. We certainly have enough one of everything, Isaac. One me. One you. One dragon."

When Isaac's dad said the word dragon, both he and the dragon looked at each other with raised eyebrows.

"Dragon?" Said Isaac. "You saw a dragon?"

"No. But I understand from a certain woman, who happens to be mother to a certain Isaac that there is a certain beauty-breathing, comic book-reading dragon roaming about. You don't suppose this dragon likes salmon steaks, do you? Because had I known, I would have bought a fourth. You don't happen to know of such a dragon, do you? No. Wait! Don't answer that. I wouldn't want you to incriminate yourself. I'll assume the answer is yes, and will adjust my shopping list accordingly. Now, Isaac, if you happen to see this assumed dragon, do let him know that supper is eaten at the proper place and time. We are no longer cave-dwellers wandering off with our caveman clubs in hand, searching for food and devouring everything in our path. We are a  civilized bunch who get our food the civilized way, by letting others go out on the hunt while we stay at home to clean our grills and buy massive amounts of food and cookbooks. Ain't civilization grand, Isaac?"

"Sure is," said Isaac.

"And it gets grander with age. A little more chaotic than when you are four perhaps. But still grand, Isaac. For instance nobody can say that you can't have twelve scoops of ice cream, if twelve scoops of ice cream is what you want. Now, the chaotic part comes when you’ve eaten so much ice cream that you can no longer fit into your trousers and you are forced to walk around in your bathrobe all the time. So, a word of advice to you, Isaac. Pick and choose your chaos very carefully. My chaos at the moment will be trying to light this grill. I’ve already made a half dozen attempts at lighting a fire and have had zero success. I don't know what it is with me and charcoal. We don't seem to get along. I like it well enough. But it doesn't seem very fond of me."

As Isaac’s dad went on about his difficult relationship with charcoal, the dragon hovered over the barbecue grill, took a deep breath and blew a flaming torch at the stack of little black briquettes.

“Whoosh!” went the charcoal.

“Why, would you look at that, Isaac! Success at last. See there? All one need do on occasion is to have a little patience. All good things come to those who wait. Except if you’re waiting for the postman. The postman never brings me anything good. It’s always bills, bills and more bills. Or someone trying to sell me things that will generate so many more bills that I’d be forced to buy a bigger mailbox. And unless that someone is trying to sell me a pony, I’ll have no part of it. Another word of advice, Isaac. Stay four as long as you can. You’ll have more fun. And never order a pony online, they’d never get it to fit in the mailbox. Got it?”

“Sounds good, Dad.”

“Wonderful,” said Isaac’s dad. “Now I need to scrounge up another salmon steak from the fridge. Come along, Isaac. We’ll investigate together.”
As Isaac’s dad threw the young boy over his shoulder, the dragon followed behind. 

“There’s that tropical breeze again,” said Isaac’s dad. “You know, a fella could get used to this kind of weather.”

Isaac could only smile and pat the dragon on the top of his head. It was going to be an interesting summer.