"Dragon Sight" by Jenna Rebecca Brager

Rose sat on the sand, just out of reach of the ocean's cold waves. She faced the water, wind whipping her hair, and she shivered, despite her warm sweatshirt. Next to her sat her best friend, Amy. They both squinted into the distance.

"Do you see them yet?" Rose asked with impatience.

"No, not yet," Amy replied, "but soon we will, don't worry."

Rose and Amy were looking for dragons. Specifically, sea dragons, the kind that dove through the waves, wings folded tightly at their sides, lithe, serpent-like, and the exact color of the deep.

There were many different kinds of dragons, dragons for every environment, every setting. Of course dragons are real, they were just invisible to human sight. Chameleon-like abilities allowed dragons to stay carefully hidden, keeping them safe from the men who might wish to bother them. Few know the dragons exist, much less are able to see them.

Rose and Amy saw the dragons. All they had to do was stare at the horizon for long enough, and they were there. The dragons were on the ocean's surface, deep in the forest's shadows, disguised as an odd puffy cloud or a snow bank. Dragons were even in their homes, tiny fluttering mischievous things that committed small misdeeds, like hiding keys and tearing up homework, but were loved nevertheless. Amy named all of them, her favorite being an especially small, pearly white dragon she called Andy. Amy fed him sugar cubes and let him sleep curled up in her bed like a scaled puppy. Rose preferred to keep the little creatures savage and wild, feeding them scraps of raw meat and teaching them to breathe fire. She encouraged them to nip at human fingers, and ran through the woods, feeling their wings flapping in her face, wishing she too could be free and invisible.

Today, Amy and Rose had persuaded their parents to bring them to the beach, because Andy had told Amy of a pair of sea dragons who always came to this same deserted shore to bask in the shallower water. The two friends were waiting for them, hoping to catch a glimpse of the rare creatures of legend.

"I see them!" Rose squealed excitedly, and indeed, off in the distance appeared the faint image of a pair of long dark bodies sliding through the waves. "Look, there they are!"

"Oooh! I see them too, look, that one, you can see its scales now, and it's spines, and, hey, there's its head!" Amy added.

"They're so beautiful." Rose whispered reverently. "Why can't they stay all the time?"

"Oh, Rose, you know why. Do you honestly think the grownups would accept a creature of legend as real? Besides, knowing humans, we'd probably kill them off like everything else."

Rose smiled sadly. " Like the dodo bird"

"The Tasmanian tiger"

"The woolly mammoth"

"The two headed llama," Amy laughed. " It's sad, isn't it?"

"Yup" Rose turned back to watch the magnificent creatures. She sighed as she watched them frolic in the choppy water, riding the swells. "Don't you wish you could be one?" she asked Amy.

"A dragon? It'd be cool, but you'd have to hide your entire life."

"And isn't that what we do anyway? People hide their entire lives, they hide their true feelings and their true faces. At least dragons are free."

" I suppose."

Rose and Amy sat on the sandy shore, in complete silence but for the whistle of the sea winds, just watching, for the better part of an hour. Finally, they heard the calls of their parents, beckoning them to leave their magical world behind and return to the everyday one. They stood up and brushed the sand off their faded jeans. Their parents walked towards them, motioning for them to hurry. Rose glanced wistfully towards the ocean.

"Rose honey, what are you looking at?" her mother asked.

"Oh, nothing, just a dragon." Rose answered defiantly. Amy shot her a warning glance.

"A dragon, huh? What imaginations kids have these days! A dragon, more like a dolphin or a faraway ship. Come on honey, let's go home, it's getting late." Her dad said.

After taking a final look at the sea dragons, Rose and Amy smiled at each other.

"Yes mother, I was just joking. Of course there aren’t such a thing as dragons, that's absurd!"

Rose and Amy followed their parents to their cars, to drive home and reenter the monotony of everyday life. Trailing behind them, small, strong wings riding the shore winds, came two creatures that were not supposed to exist. Because Rose and Amy saw the dragons, and they were real.