The Overthinker Taming Dragon Pet Finished

Leonard Hex: #143314 | Leodad Hex: #e8b038 | Leomum Hex: #085e2c

22nd of July, 2021

It was a universally acknowledged and unchallenged fact that every youngling of the human race had that one odious phase when they had sufficiently grown to perform basic tasks such as whining, crying, and whining still more. Between the infinite periods of time lost spent sitting helplessly, all but a slave to continuous dinosaur facts being spouted in one’s ear at great, high-pitched volumes, and the steady insistences that the youngling in question was not guilty of a crime they shouldn’t have been aware of at all should said insistences be the truth, that phase was a looming threat most guardians were unprepared for. By then, the only shelter from yet more babbling with yet more fervor would be the ‘no’s, and at that point, the cursed child would have gained a basic understanding that they could combat a ‘no’ with more ‘no’s, and if that failed, they could add more ‘no’s and a few screams and sobs on top. However, to the un-detriment of his already tired parents’ mental health, Leonard Wendell Oaksworth’s membership card to the human race had been dropped under the proverbial couch and evaded retrieval long enough that even its owner had retired from the search. Of course, they were still subject to the endless exposition, expressions of love for completely random scientific facts being as common as breathing to both the younger and older versions of their son, and to make up for the few self-perceived pros of being Leonard’s biological source he was also gifted with a borderline crippling fear of just about anything that wasn’t reading or blinking. Still, the universe seemed to take pity on the pair, opting to have an attempt at balancing the scales of flaws and fortitude, even when the flaws side of that particular machine had broken off and fallen into the abyss long before the possibility of the Welsh boy being born came to light. And thus, the Oaksworths were bestowed a true miracle: a child who’d never asked, not even once, for a pet.

It wouldn’t be a life (or afterlife, seeing as the Slytherin had conversed with enough phantoms to try and be more death-inclusive in his mental monologues) altering shock to anyone with even a speck of social perception to say that Leonard didn’t like animals, much less the animal companions ever so popular with his peers and their peers and their peers’ peers’ peers of the peers of their peers. Ever since his first meeting with their neighbours in Brighton, he’d been rendered completely baffled as to why anyone would willingly sign a contract that made them legally obligated to take care of a germy, slimy beast that wouldn’t even last a quarter of one’s estimated lifetime. To him, it seemed like a complete waste of money and emotional value, flinging objects and attachments to a creature who would only be able to give an illusion of returning one’s love by sticking its tongue against your face or crawling under your skin or summoning an army of deceased pharaoh's cats to take over your home, spirit, and soul. Fine, he didn’t really know what pets did, but that was the one list he didn’t want to expand with hands-on research. And so, he didn’t, living a whole thirteen years and a bit without having to deal with any critters constantly bothering him for food, water, shelter, or more food.

But then, Leodad had an idea. And much to the detriment of his son’s mental health, Leodad always followed through with his ideas.

It’ll be fun, he insisted. It’ll be worth it, he insisted. It’ll be a life-changing experience you’ll thank me for later, he insisted. Well, guess what, Leodad insisted that about nearly everything sans the reading and blinking, and even then he’d recommended Ballerino Nate as though it was a lifeline to every other piece of literature in existence. No matter, for years of surprisingly subtle poking and prodding from his father had made the soon-to-be-third-year’s subconscious, and it was on that fateful day of not-quite-last-minute shopping that a certain store had caught Leonard’s eye.

Perhaps even more obvious than his aversion towards animal associates, Leonard found himself condemning the bustling crowds of Diagon much more than the average Hogwarts student. Loud noises and loud shopkeepers and somehow loud sights were all causes of misery on their own, and when they were paired with mobs of children who could and most likely would make your hat and house combust if they got even a little mad about their ice cream cones’ symmetry. However, maybe fate had decided to use the horrific hordes for good this time around, for after a particularly forceful shove towards the right, the Slytherin caught the site of the Magical Menagerie. He couldn’t quite pinpoint what he felt, but he felt something. As though he was meant to walk in there and adopt one unfortunate soul to stay by his side in peril and pressure. To give his father a bit of credit, he did manage to figure out what his son was feeling. Forget selective hearing, this was the future of selective noticing.

He tugged on his father’s sleeve, gaze still fixated on the shop. “Dad, erm, b-by any chance, would you be against the possibility of buying a—”

“A pet? A pet?! You want a pet!” Apparently, not even his sentence required finishing to gain confirmation that Dad was, in fact, not against the possibility of buying a pet. “Absolutely, anything you want, my boy.”

At that, both Leonard and his mother turned to face a newly nervous Leodad. Frankly, Leonard had felt like the mere prospect of his father being nervous was utter blasphemy, but it made enough sense that his mother would be the perpetrator when it did happen. “Really?”

The bespectacled man looked at his wife with a more sheepish sort of smile. “Well, if your mother’s okay with it too, then you can get anything you want. Right, love?”

Silently, Leonard wished he’d done more investigating when it came to his mother’s psyche. The last time he’d dared put forward such a hefty request was when he nearly ran off the platform before the Hogwarts Express could come to collect him and his soon-to-be classmates, and there really wasn’t a choice when it came to that. It was as though he hadn’t truly been spared from the instinctual desire for a hopefully domesticated enough pet, and it was only upon locking his eyes to the entrance of the establishment holding all his dreams and hopes that it came rushing through. The barrier of Herculean denial between him and the longing had finally broken, and if his mother were to stamp on his figurative heart, he hadn’t any idea what he could possibly do other than whine. Just a little bit of whining, yes. But he couldn’t relent from a challenge that had yet to start. He would need an opening statement that left room for further conversation, a logical few bits taken from whatever articles about the benefits of pets he’d read to make fun of back in Year Three, an emotional ending that would trip her so far into guilt she would have no choice but to. He was just about to figure out what tone of voice to use, with there being evident disadvantages to passive should he attempt to create a strongly impassioned conclusion to his debate, when his mother had put an end to her pensive grumbling and glaring at his father.

“Fine. Nothing too expensive, though, and you will have to promise to take care of it yourself, keep it in your room, and not let it run around the bakery.”

“Mum, I know you think that anything Dad agrees with immediately becomes null and void, but…” A pause that was supposed to be for fully formulating a rebuttal to that quickly became one of confusion, a frown forming as the words came together in his brain. Eventually, he regained his trademark eloquence, a most poignant answer being his next word. “Sorry, what?”

“Go!” Leodad pushed a small pouch of clinking coins into his child’s mid-gesture hand, a large grin affirming that he was completely unaware of the initial assertion the child had made seconds prior. “I’ll wait right outside the door to help you out with whatever pet-y stuff you need, kid.”

Just like his sudden flood of dread when the train’s silhouette started to approach, Leonard was positively assaulted by a seismic wave from the sea of terror. He might’ve taken a test with those who battled with bravery against beasts of blood, he might’ve tossed a quick ‘hello’ in the halls to those who would fight criminals practicing the dark arts in the near future, and he might’ve dozed off in the same dormitory as those who would actually become those criminals practicing the dark arts in the near future, but he didn’t quite fit into any of those courageous categories. No, he took up his own lone space in a void far away from the criteria of Hogwarts in a little rubbish bin with a piece of tape for a label, stating he was too scared to ask for the number of the bakery he would later own because that would mean admitting he couldn’t remember everything. Still, this was not a chance that would come to him again, and he was resolved to not leaving Diagon without some sort of company that wasn’t a family member, a human being, or a human family member. Later, he’d wonder how strange it was he specified a human family member in that list, but perhaps it had simply passed his single-minded single mind.

Pulling on the bottom of his tie as though his neck would fall off with his head attached to it should he stop applying the pressure, Leonard entered the store with the stiffest expression he could manage. Almost immediately the composure decomposed itself, for not even the cage of the smallest toad would be safe from loud noises and still somehow loud sights, and though he could feel some hints of a homely feel from it, he was just a slight bit more than terrified. His breathing was laboured, partly due to the fact most of the oxygen was being used by the little faction of crowd that had broken off to make his purveying and purchasing a purely petrifying memory he’d bury far away and partly due to the fact his senses were being crushed under all of the everything. He could barely keep his focus on the scarce blurs of fur, scale and skin that came in the few spaces between boisterous bodies. He just couldn’t find anything or anyone that felt right. Did he come in here for nothing? Was this all some mistake, some practical joke his mind played on him? Had he mistaken his reaction from the ice cream as some cosmic connection teasing him towards the menagerie? He needed to think, and he needed a place that was less squawks and jabbers and jibbers and everything that was happening.

At last, he made it to a clearer space. Far from clear, most definitely, but at least he could take a breath and try to figure out what he wanted. Not a cat, for certain, both by virtue of the fact he was semi-sure his grandmother was allergic, them having such sharp claws, and them being much too big for his liking. He quickly scratched off a toad from the ever-shortening list in the same second. Even if they were roughly the cheapest of the bunch, he couldn’t see himself lasting a day with such a mucous monster, much less an entire school year. Next to go was the owl with a speck of regret, since even with the best restraints and the strongest locks he wasn’t completely sure he’d be able to hide a bird of that size for too long in his bustling, muggle-inhabited neighbourhood. As for the rats or mice, he couldn’t exactly say he would be a good owner seeing as he couldn’t even tell the two apart from looking yet. All that was left were the pygmy puffs and the lizards, and he was sure the former would die as soon as he introduced it to his dormmates. He started to mutter various words, some English, some Welsh, some absolute gibberish, all very much negative. How was he supposed to choose? There was so much that could go wrong, and so much going on, and so much that already had gone wrong, and so much that was going to go wrong if he couldn’t just pick some stupid animal, and so much he didn’t plan for and he couldn’t plan for and he hated it, he hated it, and maybe, just maybe, none of this was meant to be.

And maybe, just maybe, one day he could stop getting pushed around by whoever that one person in Diagon’s perpetual congregation of wizards and witches and fire hazards, but the twenty-second of July was not that day. He received a little probably unintentional push from someone towards another set of animals, being met with the view of the second option on his checklist. Many, many of the second options.

Alright, this was good. This was great, even. All he needed to do was choose from these many, many things, all of which had limitless possible problems he wouldn’t be able to be aware of until after he spent a handful or two of Galleons on them. He tried to do his quick scan method, finding himself stuck in a loop for some short while of looking at every reptile over and over and over and over and over and over again. He was just about to do it for seemingly the hundredth time when just like how his vision had been fixed to the zoo-business amalgamation, something caught his eye. Someone, even. It was small, though not as small as a few of the others in nearby terrariums, but likely not anywhere near fully grown. Covered in light orange and a bit of dirt from somewhere, its eyes were just as fixed on Leonard’s as the Slytherin’s were on it. He felt the worry seep out from his mind, replaced with curiosity. Who was that little thing?

“That would be a baby bearded dragon, young man. Friendly, tame things, they are. But still fun!” A male voice, undeniably older than Leonard answered his query with a jolly tone. In response, the young man who felt much more like a young child in a sweets shop nodded, unable to let the little dragon win their self-imposed staring contest of sorts. That answered his question, didn’t it? There really wasn’t any choice to make after all, not when the word dragon had reached the boy’s ears. Marshal was going to love him, and more importantly, he was going to have a best friend. A lizard best friend who could go with him wherever and whenever. What more could he ask for? Other than the price, of course.

“I would like you. I want you,” he went up and down with every word, black soles tapping against the floor as a smile began to form. “This one. This, this is it, this is mine. This is who I want.”

A few minutes later, Leonard departed from the store completely enamoured with his newly discovered soulmate as his parents tried not to let any of the accompanying equipment slip from their grasp. His very own dragon, Merlin Ddraig-Oaksworth. Who cared if he was a few hundred feet off from being an actual dragon? He loved Merlin, and that was all he cared about.

WORD COUNT: 2,628

OOC Note: I sincerely apologise for everything.

What animal do you wish to purchase? The Baby Bearded Dragon
What do you want to name it? Merlin
Is this a boy or a girl? A girl, but don’t tell Leonard that.
What is your pet's date of birth? 6th of May, 2021