Of course, the summer before he'd been Spike, and the year before that it was Stunned Dog. Each had its own particular story, none of which he was likely to tell.
Edgy stalked around in the cold, grumbling at the other kids as they skipped along home after school. He waited until his girlfriend Beez came out and he escorted her home in silence.
The snow was blinding. And Edgy had left his good sunglasses in shop class again. Beez slid her hand into Edgy's pocket, digging in where the warmth was strong.
"What's wrong with you?" She asked, "You've been pissy since third period."
Edgy grumbled and kicked at the loose snow which lay half-trampled on the sidewalk. "It's my mom... She's back in the hospital again and ..."
Beez tightened her dark fingers around his chilly pale ones. "Oh, Edgy... I'm sorry. Do you think she'll be okay?"
Edgy snuffled, his nose more red from the cold and snowy weather than from emotion, but Beez knew he'd been crying in private.
"She's going to be all right," Beez decided out loud. "She'll be okay."
"James, your records are really starting to worry me." The man said with a frown. "There's got to be something to be done about it. You can't just lay about all day and ditch class after class."
Edgy remained silent, except for the jingling of his boot.
"I'm supposed to ask you to come in after school for detention, only I know you won't possibly show up for it. Will you."
Edgy shook his head, staring at the floor.
"Right. Then you know you're looking at expulsion, or being held back a grade. If you can't see fit to come in to your classes. I don't see it helping. I realize that with winter break coming up you MIGHT be able to pull two months worth of homework out of your parka-covered ass," the councellor sneered, "but I doubt it."
"You'd never even ask me what my problem is, mister 'councellor-man'?" Edgy finally spat, his eyes red and on the verge of tears. He stood and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him and leaving the campus in a huff.
The councellor straightened the thick file on James Tosberg into its manila folder, and leaned back with a frown. "Bum punk kid..."
Edgy, James, hugged the new parka which his mother had given him to his chest. He buried his face in the soft fluffy artificial-fur lining. The three small boxes addressed to his mother lay unopened, as did one package which had somehow made it to the house labeled to his father.
As if his father's death almost two years before had managed to slip the notice of some dumbass out west. One of his business lackeys, most likely. How could they not remember? The deals which went all sour when his father had been struck by a car and died in the hospital without even bothering to have updated his freaking will?
Edgy snarled at that little box, it was probably a tie or a little desk-picture with some inspirational saying and fluffy-cloud picture on it. In his anger, Edgy laughed, perhaps it was a tie with fluffy clouds on it...
He woke later, to the sound of a group of carolers who had wandered by the house. They'd probably sung in front of his window, the lights were on and the tree was almost decorated.
It was snowing again. Edgy hated snow, but he despised the heat of the west coast more. It meant that his parka would not go unused. It meant that...
"I'll never lose this, mom... I'll never forget what you did for me..." He hissed, face buried again in the parka. He turned the lights off, and went upstairs to sleep.
But now it was time for him to face the world alone. Beez was a nice girl, and she'd even introduced Edgy to her parents -- and they liked him. She had thought that because he was white they might not. The fact that he was a punker in a techno world never even occurred to her, or her folks. They wanted him to stay with them, if he needed to. Alone in that big house...
He declined, but Beez watched him from afar just in case. When he walked away from the grave where his mother lay with his father, under freshly fallen snow, Beez snuck behind him and watched him walk through the park.
"For a punk, you sure are sensitive," Beez said, startling Edgy. His shoulders shrugged in a half-laugh.
"Thanks, I pride myself on it. But don't you dare tell a soul..." He said. "It's cold out here. Almost cold enough to have a snowball fight." Edgy got a mischievous look on his dour face, and reached for the snow below him. When Beez realized he was serious about it, she squealed and dove for cover behind a tree. The snowball splattered across the bark, and spray hit her nose.
"Oooh, that was too close, Edgy!" She called, and was busy putting together her own retaliatory snowball when she heard a 'thuff-thuff' ... footsteps? They were heavy, though. A police horse? Who knew?
Edgy stood staring at the path, and Beez shortly followed suit. On the hillside, covered in snow and between the few trees, stood a dragon.
"Oh this ain't happening," Beez said, "no way... Edgy?" She pulled his elbow, noticing that he was wearing The Parka, and had applied the old Anarchy patch from his battered hand-me-down onto the arm. "Edgy, what is this?"
"It's a big ass dragon, and a girl." He gulped. "Mom would have loved this... Hippie chick. She was a hippy, you know..."
"Yeah," Beez said. Neither of them had taken their eyes off the rider, or the big silvery-white dragon who stood on the hill. It almost blended in, the color of snow with a sheen of ice upon it.
The woman who got off the dragon was... well, she was the most beautiful, pale-skinned thing that either Edgy or Beez had ever seen. Her hair matched the static-snow of the dragon, as did her clothing. Even her eyes were the color of static. She glided up to the pair like a wisp of wind, like a snowflake on the breeze.
"Greetings," she said, musically. "My name is Misota. This is Dantinath." She waved her hand and the silver dragon nodded her head deeply.
"I'm... I'm Edgy, and this is Beez..." Edgy said, only half-nervous. What else could happen? His parents were both dead, he was failing everything in school but English Literature and History, half the adults in the world thought he would be 'better off' in a foster home rather than waiting out the year and a half it would take for him to reach 18 and get access to his trust funds... He was ready for this.
A dragon and its rider. Sure. Beez clutched Edgy's hand, and he looked at her with a calm that surprised her. "I'm scared," she said, quietly.
"It'll be all right," he promised her. "I think they're here for me anyway. You're the only thing in my life that I really have, any more..."
Misota tilted her head and looked both curious and bemused. "I'd like to take you to Ryslen Weyr. It's ... well, it's very far from here, but right now you couldn't hardly tell for all the snow. It's snowing there too..."
Edgy's eyebrow, the one with the ring in it, raised up a bit. Beez took in a breath and stifled a giggle. "You wouldn't," she whispered.
"I would."
He aimed a swift snowball at Misota, which missed and smacked Dantinath square on the neck. Surprised, the dragon chuffled and waved her big curved wings, burying the trio in a tummult of snow. Laughing, Misota shook her hair out and smirked.
"You're coming with me. We can come back, you'll know the way. If you need to come along, that would be okay too. We're quite good at getting children back home before midnight."
Beez glanced at the dragon, sobering. "I... I don't think so. This is your ride. You'll come back and see me. Is there anything you want me to do for you while you're gone?"
"Kick councellor Laredo's ass for me, will you?" He said, "on second thought I'll come back and do that myself. Don't let anyone break into my house..."
"I won't... I won't..." Beez said, half sobbing, but smiling. What could she say to her folks?
Tell them the truth, child, Came a voice into her mind. She shrank from it, but knew that it was the dragon's. They may not believe but you will have told the truth. And he will come back for you, if you wish to be among my kind some day. Your curiosity will grow...
Edgy kissed Beez and then removed one of his earrings. "Here, now you know I'll come back."
She put it into one of the spare holes in her own ear, and promised that she'd not remove it until he took it from her hand himself.
Edgy had no need to collect anything, everything precious to him was either standing before him or oon his back. He climbed onto the silver dragon's back, and held on tight. When they left the ground, he imagined himself on his father's back as a tiny child, playing horse... The tears on his face froze as they teleported to the world of the dragons.
