Eating Out!

• Tyler McCarthy, Grade 1
• Short Story
• 2011

Before going out to 'Aqua', Mum and Dad came out to the backyard and sat on a seat and watched me play a game of football with my two brothers.
My dog and lizard were running after me trying to play, too. We all had a lot of fun and it was a good game. Then we went inside to have a shower and get dressed in our nice clothes. Dad did my hair so it was spiked up, looking ‘cool’.
I was ready to go but I didn’t want to leave the animals home by themselves. So, I put my lizard up my shirt and snuck my dog under the seat of the car.
We got to 'Aqua' restaurant and parked the car. Mum and Dad smelt a funny smell and said, “What is that smell?” And I said, “I brought the animals with me because I didn’t want to leave them home by themselves." Dad said, “WHAT! THERE ARE NO ANIMALS ALLOWED IN THE RESTAURANT. SO, THEY HAVE TO STAY IN THE CAR!”
I left the dog in the car but snuck my lizard in my shirt and walked into 'Aqua' with him.
I got a plate of food for myself and it had strawberries on it because that’s my lizard’s favourite food. I put a piece of strawberry down my shirt, the lizard quickly took it while no one was looking.
Dad said “What are you doing with your strawberries?”
“Nothing, Dad, I keep dropping them down my shirt!” I said.
Lizard was trying to climb up and was tickling me and I was laughing my head off when Dad said “Right, you have got that lizard haven’t you?”
“Sh! Sh! Sh! Dad, they might kick us out.” I whispered.
The lizard started to crawl out of my shirt and the waiter saw it and screamed “AH! THERE’S A LIZARD IN OUR RESTAURANT!”
The lizard ran fast, and ran under a table. The waiter tried to catch the lizard and tipped the table over and all the glass plates fell off the table and smashed on the ground. The restaurant people said, “Get that lizard out of here because it’s not a Lizard Restaurant. You need to take your lizard out of here and you can all go home too!”
We caught lizard and Dad said to the waiter “All of us are staying here because we need to have our dinner and my son will put his lizard back under his shirt.”
We had some seafood and ice-cream and I kept some for my dog, in the car. I wrapped some prawns up in a tissue and hid them in my pocket. Then we went to the car and my dog was hungry, too. Lucky I hid some prawns for her in my pocket because she loved them.
We all went home when dinner was finished.
It was a fun night but I WILL NEVER TAKE MY PETS TO A RESTAURANT AGAIN!