"Mommy! Can I meet a DRAGON?"

There weren't always dragons in the Valley. All of this changed when a flood swept through the town. The water rose above the shoreline, flooding the beaches and the sandbanks, even going so far above the surface that it started reaching people's houses and attacking the basements of the people who lived near the river and the beaches.

Sabrina was glad that she was not at the beach with her children making sandcastles the day the floods destroyed the areas beside the river of her city. Many people didn't have flood insurance to cover all the damages that the floods cost them. Sabrina loved spending time with her children at the beach. Her children loved swimming in the water and playing in the park by the beach and with their friends. Sabrina often bought them sandcastle toys that involved dragons, sand buckets, and sand shovels. Sabrina even made sure to have the floats they often used blown up into dragon and unicorn shapes.

The imagery and artistry of it all are what amazed her. She loved creating a magical world where her children could use their vivid imagination and make things to create art, like when she and her children entered the sandcastle competitions at the beach in the past.

Sabrina was wearing black capris and a blue tank top. She wore dark makeup with concealer, black eyeliner, purple eyeshadow, dark mascara, red blush, and light lip gloss. Sabrina had her hair pulled back and tied up in a ponytail, which she braided in one big braid.

Sabrina was in the living room at her house, pacing around, devastated by the news of what other locals were going through. The other locals who resided near the beach where the flooding was going on risked losing their homes and had to go to hotels and shelters. Sabrina was thankful to be somewhere safe, away from the flooding.

Sabrina was thinking of the older, dapper, tall, dark, and handsome man she met who was a fisherman and owned a few separate boats, from a canoe to a fishing boat to a motorboat. She dreamed of him regularly. Sabrina fantasized about him often. Sabrina just wanted to ride on his motorboat and meditate on the water. She wondered if he could afford a yacht. Sabrina never did get to go on a nice boat cruise.

Sabrina's imagination ran wild; she was flattered in the past by the man she was contemplating in her mind. Sabrina relived memories of him and her. The man's name was Mr. Foxworth. Mr. Foxworth played the saxophone and how it soothed her. Mr. Foxworth also knew how to play the organ and the harmonica. Mr. Foxworth had a friend who played in a band and was a drummer! Sabrina remembered supporting the band he played in and the loud live music. She missed being able to go out and dance the night away when she was able to get a babysitter for her children.

She thought about Mr. Foxworth hard as she brought herself to reality. She needed to focus on her children waiting for her at the kitchen table.

Sabrina went to the dining room, and there, she helped her children with their homework.

"You're good at math!" Sabrina told her son as she watched him learning his addition and subtraction.

"Is it time for dinner?" asked Abigail.

The family sat at the dinner table that Sabrina had decorated nicely with a tablecloth, placemats, and fancy dishware.

"I love homemade Lasagna; can we have ice cream after?" asked Abigail.

"Sure," Sabrina replied, "I'll get you some in the freezer, and after dinner, I want you guys to clean up and have quiet time!"

Demarco and Abigail ate their dinner and helped their mom clean up after, and they helped their mom load the dishwasher.

"Are dragons real?" asked Demarco.

"When I was a toddler, I believed in unicorns!" replied Sabrina.

"Mommy, can we go on a pony or a horse ride?" asked Abigail.

"If you dream about something. You can manifest anything!" Sabrina told her children, and she spoke lovingly, "your imagination makes no mistakes. It helps you find happiness in troubled times!"

___________________________________________________

Two years later, a tornado swept through the city, taking off the roofs of some of the most treasured buildings. Due to the crisis, employees lost jobs, and nobody knew where their next meal would come from due to what felt like a famine.

"Can the city's people ever catch a break?" a journalist wondered to himself as he thought about the next thought-provoking article he would write.

Abigail and Demarco were with their mom at a fair, and they had to rush to safety. The rain kept pouring down, and the family-friendly carnival Sabrina enjoyed with her family had to close due to the safety of the people in the city. Sabrina had gone on rides all day with her children. Their favorite was the Dragon Ride and the Ferris Wheel.

Sabrina grabbed her children and guided them to safety from the storm.

They hid under shelter, eating their hotdogs, cotton candy, popcorn, and drinking slushies. Not the healthiest snacks to eat, but it gave them joy in the anxiety of the storm! They both just finished a pony ride.

"Mommy, we didn't get to go on the dragon ride a second time!" said Demarco!

"I'm sorry!" replied Sabrina, "maybe next time! The carnival is closed now; we have got to get home safely now."

The wind was so bad, and the weather was so horrifying. Sabrina and her children stayed under shelter near the fair until the tornado passed through. When the tornado started to calm down, Sabrina took her children to the car and drove them home to safety.

She hid away all her fears and anxieties from her children.

"I just wanted a dragon to come to save me so that I can ride on a dragon," said Demarco!

"Your imagination is quite vivid," said Sabrina.

Sabrina went to the library Sabrina had built in her home to find books on dragons Demarco could read.

"Mom, you said I can manifest anything!!" Demarco shouted.

"Life is a rollercoaster; you can manifest anything in your imagination, not in reality!" said Sabrina.

"Mommy, what is the law of attraction?" asked Abigail.

"The law of attraction is where you think a lot, and then the thought becomes a reality!" said Sabrina, "What do you want to visualize?"

"Mommy, I will be an equestrian horseback rider one day," said Abigail. "I watched the rodeos on the television. I'm going to perform in one day."

Sabrina's children were so fascinated by horses and dragons.

"Was it the fairs and the carnivals she took them to? Was it the books she read them or the books they read? Was it the movies they watched? Was it the shows they watched?" she wondered to herself.

Sabrina hoped her children would be interested in science; instead, they were interested in the mystical world. Sabrina wished her children would want to become a doctor or a scientist; rather, Sabrina's children had dreams of becoming show people. Abigail wanted to ride horses, and Demarco wished to become a magician.

Childhood is when parents should fill their children with happy memories and laughter. Sabrina remembered when she was a child and once got a unicorn for Christmas and how magical that gift was for Sabrina. Sabrina decided to help her children embrace their imagination further. With everything happening in the world. It was essential to bring them joy.

A pandemic swept through the world and finally reached the city where Sabrina and her children lived. Loved ones everywhere started to fall over ill, and the numbers kept growing of the people who were unable to recover and had become deceased. Seniors in retirement homes were becoming sick fatally with the deadly virus. Sabrina began to fear that the children would lose their grandmother or grandfather in the pandemic. It was a frightening world to live in for Sabrina alongside everyone else in the city.

Sabrina felt bad she chose the worst city ever to raise her children and reside in; nothing ever seemed to be peaceful. There was always something to concern yourself with, worry, and stress about in the city of Sabrina's and her family's residence. The news became scary to watch. Sabrina wanted to tune out all the negativity and dark energy.

The world order changed from what it once was. The frontline workers became the new heroes. The personal support workers finally got recognition in their profession for how much they sacrificed their lives for their patients and clients.

Sabrina decided to be the best mother she could ever be. Sabrina needed to do a mental health check herself. She believed that her mental health was important. Sabrina knew the only way Sabrina could take care of her children was if Sabrina ensured to care for herself first. She booked an appointment with a therapist.

Her therapist booked her in, and finally, she went to an appointment with her therapist. Her therapist was a beautiful, young, elegant lady who had just graduated college and was recently licensed. Sabrina looked at her therapist, taking the therapist, who called herself Valerie Marie, very seriously. Valery Marie had long brown hair and brown eyes. Valerie Marie wore glasses and a professional business suit for a woman. Most of the professional business suit was black with a white blouse. Valerie Marie decided to touch it up with a button that read: "Just Smile."

Valerie Marie was new to her profession and at the start of her new career.

Valerie Marie invited Sabrina into her office. Valerie Marie and Sabrina shook hands and greeted each other. Valerie Marie sat down on a chair, and Sabrina sat down in the chair directly across from Valerie Marie. The two made eye contact. It was like they were peering into other souls, and both had a moment of empathy for each other.

"How do I explain all this tragedy in our city to my children?" Sabrina asked her therapist. "Are we going into a World War 3? What is happening?"

"No, we're not going into World War 3. I think that's your anxiety talking."

Sabrina nodded.

Sabrina started to develop mental health issues with everything going on around her. Mental health and depression not only took over Sabrina but the entire city.

"I know present times are frightening, filled with darkness," Valerie Marie Responded.

"I think you might be right," Sabrina replied.

"We are going into a period of change. Change is difficult for everyone." Valerie Marie said sympathetically.

"This is new to me," Sabrina said in a soft-spoken whisper.

Valerie looked down at her notes.

"You need to share the positive side and restore courage in your children!" the therapist replied, looking back at her notebook, notes to see her notes for her records, and taking down more notes. The therapist looked up again, "it's so important for you to make sure that your children develop emotional regulation, and you teach them to understand that storms will come, but they will get through them, and so will you!"

Sabrina decided she needed to see a psychiatrist too. She booked an appointment for that too. The psychiatrist who went by Dr. LoveLord prescribed Sabrina an anti-depressant, a prescription medication known as Prozac, otherwise known as Fluoxetine, for Sabrina's severe anxiety disorder. It helped Sabrina somewhat with her mental health conditions.

"It's trial and error!" said Dr. LoveLord. "Medications, particularly anti-depressants, take approximately six weeks to work and kick in."

Sabrina went home. Sabrina continued to take the prescribed medication that she picked up from the pharmacist.

Now the city had another setback. Sabrina turned on her television to watch the news.

Remote learning for students across the world started to take place online. The schools began to shut down into locked down modes, and parents were learning to adapt to a work-life balance between home and school. Sabrina would sit with her children and watch their online learning.

Sabrina's children participated in remote learning too.

The teacher would read the children stories about dragons. Sabrina was confused about why dragons were ruling her life.

"Dragons are extinct," Sabrina said to herself.

Downtown the city was filled with chaos.

Teachers started to go on strike. The government began to give up. It truly felt like the world would come to an end soon.

"Is a civil war about to start?" one person from the crowd asked.

Protests took place everywhere, across America, for the #BlackLivesMatter movement!

Racial injustices were everywhere!

"Where was the fair treatment of marginalized communities such as indigenous people, black people, and those in low-income neighborhoods?" a news reporter questioned.

Black people started to speak up against police brutality and how police often treated black people. Intersectionality became an important term to learn.

The #EveryChildMatters marches started across Canada to make awareness of residential school survivors and the children who lived the past horrors that never returned home.

The government, professors, teachers, parents, and everyone alike started to fill up with anxiety.

"What was happening? Were there going to be more riots? Were people going to burn down cities?" Sabrina contemplated.

People were rebellious, and shops were targeted and destroyed. Business owners became paranoid!

It was a time of fear, desperation, isolation, and fear of a virus, and now there was fear of climate change on top of it. The LGBTQ community demanded their rights to be treated with equality as human beings. Everything changed from what it once was.

It was also a challenging time for students.

It was a challenging time for many parents and their children. People were going through depression, and many people turned to alcohol, drugs, and other substance abuse issues to cope with their mental health.

"Were people becoming suicidal, or were people overdosing on drugs?" mental professionals asked themselves; as they came up with meaningful topics to research.

It was important for Sabrina to set the example if you're feeling sad or depressed. Mental health issues should never become a stigma in society to reach out for help. People do care. Professionals do care.

Sabrina had lost a close friend named Lily to a fentanyl overdose. The paramedics had tried to save Lily, and the paramedics were too late.

Nothing was going right in the City where Sabrina and her children lived. Sabrina tried hard to protect her children from all the negative news that absorbed social media, the newspapers, and the darkness in the city.

The city wasn't a dungeon, but it started to feel like one.

Suddenly, Sabrina opened her newsfeed on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, and she saw a big advertisement that a horse dragon was coming to the city. She got so excited and ran to show her children so she could plan another happy trip that she hoped would help her children forget all the chaos. Sabrina's children were of Canadian nationality with a mixed Jamaican and German descent in their heritage.

Sabrina wanted to tell Demarco and Abigail about the horse dragon coming to the city, not a real dragon, but a robotic one created by people and run by electricity. She tried to make her children Abigail's and Demarco's fantasies become a reality.

Fear soon crept in for Sabrina.

Another storm returned to the city. This time it knocked all the power out, and there were power outages everywhere. This time the wild thunderstorm was worse than the previous tornado. It was a derecho, and it knocked the power out around.

Nobody had any electricity or hot water, and everyone had to throw out their refrigerator food, and the hydro workers weren't even sure how to restore the power. Trees were falling everywhere, knocking out power lines and power grids. The city became hazardous.

"Who was going to clean it up?" a city worker thought to himself.

Sabrina tried to survive off power banks, flashlights, and candles that she lit to create light.

Sabrina started losing hope as she turned her shower to cold water; thankfully, she understood that cold showers could benefit her health. Although her household had lost power and hot water, she tried to stay positive.

The fear returned as she looked outside, and a dragon came to save her children. Sabrina looked up to the sky above her head, where the storm had just passed through her city. Sabrina's children waved at her, and they were sitting on a dragon, and the flames were leaving the dragon's mouth. She started panicking.

Sabrina looked at her children, horrified. They were with one of the most dangerous species that Sabrina herself thought only existed in the fantasy world.

"How on earth did they manifest a dragon?" she contemplated.

She only taught them to visualize things they wanted to manifest.

The voices of her children got louder, and the dragon got closer.

"Mommy, Mommy!" screamed Abigail waving at her mom.

"Come get on the dragon, mommy!" yelled Demarco. "Let's go get my mommy, DRAGON! Dragon! Go get my mommy!" Sabrina could hear Demarco shouting.

The dragon flew down to Sabrina, and she got on the dragon with her children. The dragon spread his wings and started to fly.

"We will be safe now because our dragons will protect us," said Demarco.

"Mommy, are you excited?" asked Abigail, "they're going to put on the concert in the valley!"

"We'll see Mr. Foxworth and the magnificent band with the drummer," said Demarco.

"What is the dragon's name? Are there other dragons?" asked Sabrina as she saw the Valley ahead in the distance.

"The dragon's name is Flying Justice," Demarco and Abigail said in unison.

"And Flying Justice has a brother and another sister." Said Demarco.

"His brother's name is Speedy Sky, and his sister's name is Flaming Charity," Abigail added to her brothers' comments.

"I guess our family is part of a dragon family now!" Sabrina said. Sabrina was excited as the dragon, known as Flying Justice, took them to the Valley, where the band had been busy setting up, and the band was almost ready to play their show for the audience in the Valley.

"This is so exciting!" screamed Sabrina.

Flying Justice was such a friendly, bold, and persistent dragon. Flying Justice just wanted to protect decent civilians.

The frontline workers who usually help people during wild storms such as Derechos by flying them on helicopters, wanted to learn about the Dragon family who came to save the day for everyone involved.

Flying Justice's brother Speedy Sky went to save another family whose boat had capsized in the city. Flying Justices' sister Flaming Charity was trying to help clean up the trees from the storm to save people's lives.

Was this going to cause more danger with the power lines and the power grids? Flying Justice, Speedy Sky, and Flaming Charity appeared to be very caring dragons.

Sabrina wondered if another dragon family existed that wasn't so nice and why the dragons came to protect the city's people and fly them to the Valley.

"Were evil dragons coming to harm the city, and were the dragons saving the city's people to prepare to fight the other dragons?" Sabrina kept contemplating. "If the evil dragons found Sabrina and her family with the caring dragons," suspense-filled Sabrina's mind as she pondered: "How would she learn how to slay the other malicious dragon tribe preparing for war?"

Real-life dragons were all new to Sabrina and her family. Her children had made friends with real-life dragons. She was frightened but excited to take on the adventure of what was to come.

Can you imagine being rescued by a dragon? What were Sabrina's city and the world coming to in this era of her life? The possibilities were endless. Sabrina's children were happy, but Sabrina stayed in complete suspense.

It was the start of a new world all over. Dragons would probably start showing up out of nowhere. Sabrina figured she better train herself in self-defense and martial arts if she needed to learn how to slay the evil, malicious, vile vindictive ones. She wanted to learn self-defense and karate class.

Sabrina wanted to make sure her children trained with an expert instructor in these classes. It was also important she learned how to shoot bow and arrows so that one day she could help slay the dragons who might come to spew venom.

Was Sabrina ready to go up against dragons?