I look away from Lizzy. Someone told me years ago that some people hate being looked at when they eat—they feel like you’re judging them. I don’t remember who said it, or why, but I guess Lizzy is one of those people. She is not going to eat like this, and I try to come up with a new plan, a way to distract both me and her.
I look at the dragon in the middle of the square, remember what I was doing and thinking when I made it. It takes me a moment before I realize I’m starting to babble, filling the silence, keeping Lizzy’s attention on me instead of her food. I keep out the part about Joey, as he was going through one of his bad stages at the time. I also keep out the crappy ending—his death, just days before the dragon was revealed. The dragon he loved so much that he had spent weeks wa
