\nThis is Norman.\nNorman is a dragon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman wasn’t like\nother dragons. Norman wasn’t scary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nHis friends all had\nhorns, or scales, or long, spikey tails. But not Norman. Norman had\ncute, fluffy feet. And a cute little nose. And big yellow eyes. His\nspikes were soft and fluffy. Bright spots dotted his belly and long\nwhiskers tickled his face. His tail ended with a big fuzzy pom pom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman didn’t like\nbeing cute. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nHe struggled to\nhide his cuteness, tearing out his fur and baring his sharp teeth.\nBeing cute made it very hard to scare people. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“You couldn’t\nkidnap even one princess looking like that,” his friends said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“I could if I\nwanted to,” Norman muttered under his breath.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Oh yeah?”\nhis friends said. The\nother dragons\nchose the smallest princess they could find. She\nwas a little girl in a froofy dress sitting beside the pond outside\nof the castle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n“Go on,\nNorman,” they said. “Scare her.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman’s hairy ears\ndrooped when he saw her. But he couldn’t back out. He crawled low on\nhis belly, sliding under the fence and slinking past the manicured\nhedge. His soft feet made no noise\nas he crept up behind\nher. He\nraised his cute, little head and\nroared as loud as he could manage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nHer\nhead spun around to look at him. Her eyes were as big as dragon eggs.\nShe bunched up her fists tights and screamed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“What a cute\nlittle dragon!!” she squealed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt scared Norman\nvery badly. He ran away on his fast little feet. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman found the\nsmallest, darkest cave and he crept all the way to the back, curling\ninto a ball. He felt very sorry for himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nA soft voice echoed\nfrom outside. “Oh little dragon. Oh cute little dragon. Please\ncome out little dragon.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt was the little\nprincess. She had followed him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNow Norman felt\neven sorrier for himself. He huddled in the darkness, hoping the mud\nwould mat his fur and make it uglier, and he waited for her to go\naway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Go away!”\nhe growled. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nHe saw the\nprincess’ polished shoes. And then he saw her ruffled blue skirt. And\nthen, there she was, her little face, looking into the cave where he\nwas hiding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“There you\nare,” the princess said. “I was looking for you.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nShe forced her hand\ninto the cave and groped the air as far back as she could, but she\ncouldn’t quite reach Norman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Oh, come out\ncute little dragon,” she said again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“I am not\ncute,” he shouted. “I’m a big, mean dragon.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe princess pulled\nher hand back and peered into the cave again, smiling at him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“But if you\nwere a mean dragon then I would be afraid of you. And I’m not afraid\nof you. Not even a little bit.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman squished his\nbelly deeper into the mud of the cave, pouting. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“But I could\nbe mean,” he said. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe little princess\nthought for a while. “Well, do you want to be mean?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman thought long\nand hard. No one had ever asked Norman what he wanted before. He was\nnot very good at being mean. And it scared him a lot when people were\nmean to him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“No,”\nNorman said. “I don\u2019t think that I do want to be mean. But I\u2019m\nsupposed to kidnap princesses. It\u2019s what dragons do.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe princess put\nher finger to her mouth. “What\u2019s involved in kidnapping\nprincesses?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman was not\nquite sure himself. “Well, you have to come and live at my\nplace.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Forever?”\nthe princess asked. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Just until a\nknight comes to rescue you.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe princess made a\nyuck face at the mention of knights. “What if you came to live\nat my castle, instead. And then we could play and I could brush your\nfur and you could practice scaring me. Would that count?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nNorman drew his\nfuzzy eyebrows together and said, “I think it might. Can we try\nit for a little bit and see?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n“Okay. But you\nhave to come out of the cave for me,” the princess said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe princess\nscooped him up in her pudgy arms and carried him back to her castle,\nwhere her family was waiting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nAnd they lived\nhappily ever after. \n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This is Norman. Norman is a dragon. Norman wasn’t like other dragons. Norman wasn’t scary. His friends all had horns, or scales, or long, spikey tails. But not Norman. Norman had cute, fluffy feet. And a cute little nose. And big yellow eyes. His spikes were soft and fluffy. Bright spots dotted his belly and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[151,422,1004,1180],"class_list":["post-11282","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","tag-castle","tag-flash-fiction","tag-short-story","tag-treehouse-vs-castle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11282\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}