~~“As my friend and I crept down the dark hallway of the old abandoned house, we heard the floorboards creak and the wind whistle through the cracked glass in the window frames.”
 “Huh?” I looked back at my lunatic brother, walking behind me through the pet store. “What on earth are you talking about?”
 “It sounds dramatic,” he insisted. He stopped to tap on an aquarium full of guinea pigs. The fat rodents barely roused. There was a calico one and one with black and white markings like a badger. Cute, but not what we were looking for.
 “Dramatic?” I said, walking quickly past the furries. “What’s dramatic about walking through a pet store?”
 “Everything!” He flung his hands up in the air. “You are of the non-imaginative ones, forever doomed to see the world in shades of black and white, while I see in a full spectrum of vivid colors!”
 “You have issues. Hurry up, numbskull.” We walked past the dog section, and I noted all the shiny metal choke chains hanging from hooks down the aisle. I snorted. Definitely not what we were looking for. Like our boxer would stand for that. She’d consumed a bottle of caffeine pills at eight weeks and had never been the same since.
 “You’re mean. I’m telling Mom.”
 “Go ahead. Just don’t do it dramatically. Seriously, how’d you get an abandoned house out of this place? Wait—don’t answer that.” I held up my hand just as he opened his mouth to spew more nonsense.
 Like it’d stop him. “Hey, just because you don’t see the magic in everything doesn’t mean I can’t! You see a pet store, I see an abandoned house, wind whistling through cracked windows, floorboards creaking forebodingly as we traverse the ancient hallways in search of—”
 “Dude.” I waved my hand in front of his face. “You’re getting that glassy-eyed look again. Cut it out.”
 He pouted, squinting at me under thick dark eyebrows. Miraculously, he didn’t reply, in storybook-speak or otherwise.
 We walked past the bird house, an isolated chamber in the middle of the store. It looked like a miniature cottage, with the fancy roof and all, and the walls painted with branches hosting all manner of feathered fiends. But the charade ended when you noticed the shrill chweeping and squawking noises coming from inside the cottage. My brother tugged my arm. “Can we look at the birds?”
 I looked at him, and at the bird house, and cringed.
 “Come on. You made me come along. You owe me!” he pleaded. “I wanted to stay home and compose epic tales of heroism!”
 “You mean, make Catie’s Ken dolls get eaten by stuffed sharks?” I grumbled. “Fine. We’ll look at the birds.” The last thing I wanted was to hear of the evil queen’s injustice all the way home. 
 “Victory! I am avenged!” he bellowed, making a beeline for the canary-yellow door. I tried to ignore the stare of the nearby man buying bacon treats for his fat Affenpinscher and scooted after my brother.
 The instant the door was opened, the already earsplitting noise reached its apex. Chirps, squawks, screeches, chwarbles, yowls, meows, and more than one hello-there-birdy scraped in my ears. My brother had already stopped in front of a bright orange conure. “It’s the phoenix!” he gasped. “Oh mystical firebird of ancients, arise from the ashes and reclaim your youthful livelihood once more!”
 “Yeah, yeah. Let’s get out of here before the parakeet mafia tries to rub me out, huh?” I grabbed his arm and dragged him away, while he protested vociferously. Something about eagles of doom wreaking havoc on mankind. After a while, it all started to sound the same. 
 Once out of the noise festival, I turned around and poked my brother in the chest. “All right. We’ve had enough drama and fantasy, haven’t we? Look, all we have to do is go to the back and get what we came for. No more commentary necessary, fantabulous or otherwise. Got it?”
 “Cruel and unusual punishment, you tyrant,” he muttered under his breath.
 “Excuse me?”
 “Yeah, I got it.”
 “Good.” I let go of his arm and strode off towards the back of the store. If he couldn’t keep up, that was his problem. It wasn’t my fault no one else on the whole dang planet would babysit a kid who declared eternal war every ten seconds.
 At the back of the store, there was an archway barred by a chain with a sign above it that said “Pet Boarding.” We came up to the entrance, and I peered through the door at the concrete room. There were kennels with dogs, carriers with cats, and bins with pythons crammed into every corner. “Hello?” I called.
 An employee, whose student wages clearly didn’t cover acne medication, lumbered up to meet us. “You got a pet back here, kids?” he asked.
 “Yep,” I said. “Under the name McClennan.”
 He checked the clipboard on the wall and unhooked the chain. “Oh, yeah. I remember you guys. He’s ready for you. Been pining all weekend.”
 We went inside and the employee led us past a couple rows of boarders. As usual, ours was in the chain-link pen in the far corner. We called it Siberia, even though the heat lamps blasted the place. He had to have them or he’d go into hibernation. The worker unlocked the gate and let us in. “So, you folks have a nice vacation?”
 “Yeah,” said my brother. “We went to Florida.” I could see him mouthing “the land of the unscrupulous man-eating saurians,” but I shot him a look and he held back.
 I bent down by the plastic doghouse in the corner and held out my hand. A warm nose touched it, breathing hot air on my fingers. “Come on, buddy. Time to go home,” I coaxed.
 “You got a carrier for that thing?” the worker asked.
 “Nah,” I said. “He likes being snuggled.” I reached into the doghouse and gathered the large warm body up in my arms. He clung to my sleeves, making small pleased snuffling noises. I lifted him up and out, holding him against me like a big scaly toddler, and his claws dug into my shirt.
 “I wanted to carry him,” my brother whined.
 “You carried him last time,” I said, exiting the pen. I smiled at the employee. “Thanks for taking care of him. You’re the only ones who’ll keep him.”
 He scratched the back of his neck. “Yeah…”
My brother turned and waved at the dogs and cats as we left. “Farewell, noble creatures! Fear not, for the time of your liberation is near!”
“Oh, shut up,” I said, but more cheerfully than before.
And we took our dragon home.