When I left the school building on my last day of 8th grade, the one thing on my mind was what I’d be doing over the summer. My excitement to go on a vacation was only heightened by my friend Lavender chatting about the cruise she was going to go on. My other friend, Lilyn, walked with us, occasionally interjecting to comment on what Lavender was saying.

“You’re so lucky,” said Lilyn for probably the tenth time. I couldn’t blame her, all she had to look forward to over the summer was being stuck with her three chaotic little sisters.

“Seriously,” I agreed. “I’m going to the mountains with my mom again and like, I’m excited, but it’s the same thing we’ve done every year for as long as I can remember.”

“Hey, at least you’re going somewhere,” Lily told me. “My family might go to the desert again, but that’s about it for me.”

“I could ask Mom if you could come with us to the mountains,” I offered, thinking that bringing a friend along would make the trip way more interesting.

“I mean, sure,” said Lilyn, not really looking like she thought she’d be able to come.

“Guys,” Lavender interrupted us. “The popular girls are in the way again, we gotta go around.”

“I wish they wouldn’t do that,” I said, looking ahead to see a cluster of girls standing in the middle of the main sidewalk and talking loudly. “Some people actually need to get through.”

As we walked through the grass I couldn’t help but overhear their conversation. It was like they didn’t know how to speak quietly. Today’s drama seemed to revolve around Victoria, a girl who was basically child Barbie. Apparently she’d submitted an application to DragonSword Academy, pretty much the most prestigious high school on the continent. If acceptance was grade-based, there was no way she’d get in. If she could buy her way in, though, I had no doubt she’d make it.

I had considered applying there too, but there was no way I’d get in. My grades were barely above average, and I didn’t have the money or status to get in any other way. Lilyn, I was pretty sure, had applied, but she was way smarter than me, and while I was confident in her, not even she was very sure she’d get in.

When we made it around the group (gaggle?) of popular girls, I started looking around for my mom’s car. She was picking me up from school today (yay!) instead of letting me ride the bus home like usual. I spotted her pretty quickly, but not before Lavender said her goodbye and started off towards her dad’s car.

“I gotta go too,” I told Lilyn when I’d located my mom. “I’ll text you about the vacation thing, we can have our parents discuss it if my mom okays the idea.”

“Okay, bye.”

“Bye,” I replied, and took off walking towards my mom’s car.

When I got in, my mom greeted me cheerfully. “Hi, Destiney! How was your last day of 8th grade?”

Normally when she asked me how school had been, I'd reply “It was school,” not in the mood for conversation. Today, though, I bypassed that answer. I was in a good mood and besides, I needed to talk to her about the mountain trip.

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“It was good. We didn't really do any work, since we already finished end of year testing and all that. Everyone was kinda chaotic, though, which got pretty annoying. Oh, um, also. Me and Lily talked about asking if maybe we could bring her on vacation with us to the mountains this year? She's not going anywhere except maybe the desert and it might be fun to have someone else along.”

“Sure,” replied my mom almost immediately. I was relieved I wouldn't have to convince her, though I'd already planned what I would say if I had. “She'll have to check with her parents though.”

“Yeah,” I confirmed. “I was gonna text her and let her know what your answer was so she could ask her parents and maybe you and them could get in contact so you're not trying to do everything through us.”

“Alright, as long as you're initiating it.” My mom was pretty big on me doing things on my own. I had some... codependency issues. Nothing terrible, but if I could get someone else to do something I didn’t want to do for me, you better believe I was going to.

“I'm gonna,” I told her, pulling my phone out of my pocket to text Lilyn 'she says yes!' She didn't reply immediately, I didn't expect her to. She was probably in the car with her own mother by now, and had better things to talk to her about than what I had to say.

When we arrived home we were immediately greeted by Sammia, my mom's enormous feline. And no, I don't mean a big ol' house cat. Sammia was a dragon. Small as dragons went, really. She was a little larger than a Great Dane, and looked pretty much like what you'd get if you combined a cat with a snake and gave it fuzzy wings.

“Hi Sammi,” said my mom, petting the creature's head. Sammi purred and walked beside her as we went in the house. The two had a strong bond that my mom said was magical. Apparently she and Sammia could communicate with their thoughts, an idea I personally found a little unsettling. It was like something out of a book, really.

That's not to say I didn't believe her. “Dragonbonds” were a widely accepted phenomenon, though many people would never experience one. Like me. The way my mom had met and bonded with Sammia was through a school program that sought to connect kids with dragons, I guess just to make sure people and dragons would stay on good terms or something. The school program in question could only be found at a few schools, including DragonSword Academy. I could never hope to get into any of them. There were other ways to obtain a dragonbond, but all the dragons that were any bigger than a large dog were pretty unlikely to want to associate with some random person on the street.

Lily texted back shortly after I'd dumped my bookbag in my room and wandered back to the kitchen to see if there was anything to snack on. Her parents had said they'd talk to my mom and see if something could be arranged. 'Yay!' I replied, and she responded with a smiley face emoticon.