Bud hunched his shoulders. That had sounded very much like an expensive drawing table being tipped over and kicked. But Aster was at an age where her bedroom door was a. a shield against an irrelevant outside world, b. the guardian of her privacy, her identity, and her human rights, and c. a force field completely impenetrable by a father’s question. Resolved to make his own ears soundproof, he went back to considering the claims of chips or microwave popcorn as an accompaniment to the Sunday Afternoon Really Bad Movie. He had about fifteen minutes to make up….
His head came up. THAT sounded like the world’s largest bloodhound baying with lungs set on high. Shrugging, he shook the half bag of soggy tortilla chips. He’d had his tastes in music sniffed at before this. Perhaps the next sound—as if that very hard to assemble even with instructions spread out drawing table being had been flung against a wall–was just the newest percussion effect of another currently (and perhaps perpetually) undiscovered band.
The bag of chips lowered toward the counter. Bud turned toward the noises. Squaring his shoulders, he forced his attention back to the snack question. Aster’s tastes and talents ran to the visual arts, and an artist needed privacy. He had known that without her mentioning it from time to time (each day.) This weekend she was exploring the hopefully remunerative art of fantasy illustration, and had locked herself away to consider an online course entitled “How to Draw Dragons”. She had been drawing dragons since she was four, and twelve years’ experience had honed her talents to a point where Bud wouldn’t have thought an expensive video course in….
His hands broke a dozen chips as they clenched on the bag. THAT had sounded like a sonic boom. And it was succeeded by even scarier sounds: a door slam and stamping feet. Apparently, the online instructor had failed to turn her instantly into a famous illustrator.
He shook himself. Best to go into Supportive Dad Mode (very similar to Blind, Deaf Dad Mode). It was that or miss the opening credits.
Good intentions flew out the window as his daughter appeared in the kitchen. “What in…. Have you been drawing with charcoal?”
Her hands and face, and much of her T-shirt, were streaked and smudged with black and dark gray. “No!’ she snapped. “It was the course on how to draw dragons.”
“How can drawing….”
“I should have read the description better. It was about ATTRACTING dragons—drawing them TO you–not sketching them! It took every White Pearl eraser I had to get rid of the whole flight!”
She slapped at her shoulders, which were actually smoldering, and turned her eyes to glare at the bag of chips. “Do we have any chocolate?”
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