Ding Dong.
Someone’s at the door, John paused the twitch stream he was watching. He got up from his living room coach and went to answer the door. He opened the door to find two little girls dressed in girl scout uniforms, each with a big smile stretched across their face. Behind them stood an older woman dressed in a similar uniform.
“Go on girls. Just like we rehearsed,” the older woman said.
“Would you like to buy some girl scout cookies?” the two girl scouts asked at the same time. John noticed that they were twins.
“I would love to. What kind of cookies do you have?” John asked.
“We have chocolate chip, lemon cookies, coconut and caramel, oatmeal, peanut butter, and snickerdoodles.” The girl on the left pointed to each one in her red wagon.
“I’ll take two boxes of peanut butter cookies and a box of chocolate chip cookies.”
“Okay that will be twenty dollars and twenty-five cents”
John pulled out his wallet and opened it to find a five and twenty dollar bill. “Do you have change for a five?”
“Sorry, we gave all our change to the last customer. We can just come back if you don’t have the money right now,” the older woman said. She took the hand of the two girl scouts and started walking away.
The girls’ smiles disappeared. Their shoulders slumped as they dragged their feet following the older women.
John could not let this happen. He was a man of his word. These girls scouts would get their money. And most importantly, he would have his cookies.
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“Wait!” The trio stopped at John's call, confusion on each of their faces. “I think I might have some change inside. Just wait here and I’ll be right back with a quarter.”
John ran back inside. I need those cookies, he thought. He searched between the cushions of his couch, nothing. The change bowl in his kitchen was empty. Even the piggy bank that he had not touched since October of last year was empty, which was strange.
He couldn’t find a single coin in his entire house. Did I move all my change and forget about it?, he thought as he pulled at his hair. Then he heard it. The faint sound of snoring. He paused and stopped to listen, there it was again. Coming from the second floor of his house.
He made his way up the stairs. Following the sound of snoring to his bedroom. He slowly opened the door and peeked inside. Nothing looked out of place, his bed was made, and his bedroom floor was spotless. Pushing the door further open, he stepped inside and paused.
The snoring was even louder now, it was coming from his left side. Turning to his left, he saw the top drawer to his dresser rumbling along with the sound of snoring. Going to his closet, John grabbed his bat and approached the dresser.
Slowly he pulled the top dresser drawer open. Inside was a bunny sized dragon sleeping on a mountain of socks and coins. His spare change and socks. Its loud snoring caused the coins and dresser drawer to rumble. This fiend almost cost me my cookies.
He thought about bashing it over the head with his bat. But on second thought hitting a dragon, even a small dragon, seemed like a stupid idea.
John slowly reached toward the dragon's horde. All he needed was twenty-five cents and he would have his cookies. He gently grabbed a quarter on the top of the pile of coins and pulled, causing an avalanche of coins to slide down the dragon’s horde. The coins rang as they hit the wooden bottom of the dresser drawer.
John lifted his head to find the dragon awake, its eyes open and slit pupils focused on him. Sweat dripped down John's back and he ran out of his bedroom, the quarter held tightly in his left hand. The dragon sprang into the sky, breathing fire, and chasing after him.
John ran down the stairs dodging fireballs. He dashed to his front door, straight towards the terrified faces of the girls scouts. Out of the house, he slammed the door in the face of the dragon.
“Here is your money,” John said with a big smile on his face as he handed one of the girl scouts the money.
“Mister, your shirt is on fire.”
“What?” John turned his head around to find flames covering the entire back of his shirt. “AHHHH!” John dropped to the ground, rolling like a madman. The heat and pain slowly vanished as he put out the flames.
By the time he put out the fire, the girl scouts and their guardian were gone. But in their places were the three boxes of cookies he ordered. Opening a box of peanut butter cookies, he started devouring them. Now all he had to do was figure out how to remove a dragon from his house without getting cooked alive.