5. Un-tradable Lunch.

The first half of the day was more normal than I expected. Miss Weaver continued a Social Studies lesson and only stopped once for a story. 

“The legislative branch of the government is important. Probably the most important, if you ask me. It’s quite remarkable, but a former student of mine is actually a State Senator now. One of the youngest we’ve ever had! And since I was his favorite teacher, I can ask him for favors. I don’t want to brag. I really hate to brag. But I can tell you that he’s gotten me out of at least twenty parking tickets,” she said with a proud laugh. 

I always wondered how many parking tickets you could get before they stopped letting you park. I didn’t know how to drive yet, but of all the things you had to do, parking seemed the easiest. 

I had been too preoccupied to eat breakfast. My mind had been racing with questions. So by lunchtime I was starving. Soy and I sat together in the lunchroom everyday and we usually didn’t care much about which spot. The lunchroom was long and narrow with brightly colored green, blue, and orange tables. With a secret subject to discuss, Soy and I decided to sit at the far end of the longest blue table, as close to the corner as we could get. There were twelve seats between us and any classmates, which was good because Soy’s voice was known for being loud. After our third grade spelling bee, it was agreed, for everyone’s sake, that Soy would never be allowed to speak into a microphone again. 

“So… how are we going to find the frog?” he asked, looking around.
“I don’t know. I’m not that good at finding regular frogs,” I answered. 

“Well, I’ve been thinking. Frogs like flies, right?”
“Yes.” I started pulling my lunch out of my bag.
“And they like ponds?” Soy added.
“Yes,” I said again.
“Well, that’s something,” he said.
“That’s not a plan though, Soy,” I replied.
“The rest is on you! I spent all morning on that,” Soy shrieked. 

When I reached inside my bag again, I stopped trying to think of a plan. To be honest, my mom wasn’t the best at packing lunch. Every once in awhile, she made one so bad that it was completely un-eatable and un-tradable. Still, she had never given me anything slimy. Never anything wet. And definitely never, ever anything that moved. There was no doubt in mind: I was holding a frog. 

It had to be her. It was the only thing that made sense. Then I reminded myself that none of this truly made any sense. I tried not to panic, but I knew that I had to warn Soy from across the table, without causing a scene. The frog sat still, breathing in and out inside my hand. 

“Eets een my beg,” I said through clenched teeth. 

“What did you say to me?” Soy asked with an eyebrow raised.
"I said, eeeets eeeenn my beg," I repeated. 

“Huh? Who’s seen your pig?”

“No, eeeeeets eeeeeen myyyy begggg,” I said slowly.
“Wait a second. Did you get a pig?” Soy asked with his arms crossed. “If you really have a pig you better let me ride it...” 

Soy was convinced that you could ride any animal larger than a cat. Also, sometimes cats. My mom said Soy was the reason we could never own any pets. 

“Soy,” I said, unclenching my teeth, “put your hand in my bag.”
I slid the bag over and watched him stick his hand inside. His face changed immediately.
“Ohhh,” he exclaimed, “it’s in your bag!”
The frog must have somehow understood what was going on because she was still waiting patiently. 

“Let’s bring it out and ask it some questions,” Soy said. 

The bag moved a little bit. 

“She, I mean! Let’s bring her out!” he said too loudly.
“Shh, we don’t want anyone to hear,” I whispered, trying to think of what to do next. 

Soy was eating make-your-own soft tacos that he'd bought from the cafeteria. They were one of his favorite lunches. He still had the ingredients for two more tacos, with the tortillas waiting on the side. I had an idea, but he wasn’t going to be happy with it.

“Give me your tortillas,” I said.
“What? Why?” he said, shielding them with his arms.
“Soy, I’m sorry… Im gonna need your lunch.”
“But… it’s soft taco day,” Soy replied sadly, “my third favorite day of the month.”

“Trust me,” I reassured him as he slowly slid them over. I was sure that if it was “grilled cheese day” or “pizza day”, I wouldn’t have been so lucky.

In a flash, I used the tortillas and our milk cartons to construct a small fort for the frog. The opening faced me, so that only I could see inside. Gently, I laid my lunch bag down nearby, showing the frog what I had built. 

“Listen,” I whispered into the bag, “when I say so, jump out into the fort. Okay?” 

There was no reply, but I was pretty sure that she had heard. Soy and I checked the surroundings one more time, trying to seem casual. The kids who were sitting closest to us had gotten up to talk to the girls sitting two tables over. Soy looked left, then right, and gave a nod. 

“Now,” I whispered. 

With a quick green blur, the frog jumped from the bag to the taco-day-fort. When she turned around, I saw her glasses. It was her. 

She spoke loud enough for Soy and me to hear, but nobody else. “Are you all right?” she said. “What did the man in the bowtie ask you? What did he do to you?” 

“He didn’t do anything to me, but he did ask about you,” I answered.
“Ream has been on my tail for a while now,” she said, testing the tortilla wall with her leg. 

“Frogs don’t have tails,” said Soy.

Nobody respond. But it did make me realize something. 

“We don’t know anything about you. I don’t even know your name yet,” I said.
“You may call me Delilah, or Deli for short," she replied. Her face got much more serious (as serious as a frog’s face can get). “It’s very important that you tell me exactly what you told Ream. Can you do that?” She asked. 

“Yes. I, well… I accidentally told him that you and I spoke. I’m sorry,” I said, and meant it.
“That’s all right," Deli said. “It’s not your fault.”
“Then he asked why you came to talk to me… Why did you come to talk to me?” I asked. 

“Don’t worry about that now," she said. "What did you tell him?”
“I told him that Soy and I caught you by accident in the forrest, and that you were angry about it,” I answered.
“Brilliant!” she said. "It probably won’t hold him off for long, but it might confuse him. Then what happened?” 

“Then my mom saw that he had upset me and kicked him out straight away," I told Deli.
“Oh, she did wonderfully! Your mom is a strong one, you know,” she said. 

I wanted to know how she would know that, but there were other things that I wanted to know more. 

“Who is he?” I asked.
“That,” she said with a deep breath, “is a complicated answer.”
“He’s an alien, isn’t he?” asked Soy in an excited voice.
“No, he’s not an alien,” Deli replied, but in a way that didn't make Soy feel silly for asking. It made me like her a bit more. 

“Can you tell us who he is then?” I asked.
Deli paused for a while before answering. “He’s a dragon,” she said. 

I wasn’t sure how to respond. I thought the word must mean something different than the one I knew.

“Technically, he’s the King of the Dragons,” she added.
Soy rolled his eyes. 

“Thanks for clearing that up,” he said, “I was going to guess unicorn.” Deli couldn’t see his eye roll, but Soy’s tone made it clear that he thought she was delusional.
“You mean like… a dragon-dragon?” I asked.
“Wait, maybe she meant dragonfly,” interjected Soy, “like this guy Ream must be the dreaded King of the Dragonflies!” 

Deli wasn’t amused. 

“I mean dragons!” she said firmly. “As in fire-breathing, hard-scaled, big-not-small dragons,” she rebutted.
“But...” I said like I was breaking bad news, “dragons aren’t real." 

Deli brought one of her frog legs up to her head and smacked it.
“Listen to me. There are things in this world that we don’t know, until we do,” she said. 

It was a good point, and it was made by a talking frog. If we were arguing in a courtroom, that would have been her “Exhibit A”. 

“Okay, fair enough. But if dragons are real, then why hasn’t anybody ever talked about them before?” I asked.
“They have. You can read about them in hundreds of books,” she countered.
“You mean like in fairytales?” asked Soy as he raised his head above the fort, trying to peek in. 

Before Deli could say another word, a hand hit the table and started tapping its nails. Soy and I froze. Deli tucked herself back under the cover of the fort as far as she could go. 

“The bell has rung, boys,” said Miss Weaver. “Lunch is over, and Principal Lance would like to see you.” 

I had completely forgotten about the bell, on account of the existence of dragons. Miss Weaver was not in a good mood. She always got that way when it was her turn to chaperone the lunch room. Probably because it cut into her shoulder pad naps. 

"We’re not done with our lunches, Miss Weaver,” I said as politely as I could. 

“This looks more like play time than lunch! I can’t have you building houses out of food,” she said, struggling to find a reason, “because... because then everyone would want to do it!” 

Soy was nodding in agreement.
“It’s true. I’m already jealous of yours,” he admitted.
Suddenly, Miss Weaver was walking away to grab one of the garbage cans at the other end of the table. 

“Deli!” I whisper-shouted, “she’s bringing a garbage can. You’ve gotta hide!” 

Without a word, Deli leapt forward. A split-second later Miss Weaver turned around and dragged the trash can over to us. She used one arm to push all of our food into the can. That put Soy in a worse mood than Miss Weaver. His soft taco lunch was gone forever. Never to be eaten. 

“Get moving. Don’t keep Principal Lance waiting,” said Miss Weaver. 

At that moment, I didn’t care about the principal or Miss Weaver. I cared about dragons, and the frog named Deli hiding inside my shirt.