short story part 3
Short Story!
PART 3 - ROBIN’S INTERLUDE
“COME OUT OF THERE!” roared Benjamin, bright and early the next morning, which was a Saturday. He was standing in the driveway behind his house, rattling the now-empty trash can with an impatient vengeance. Robin was standing to his left, arms folded across her chest, eyes focused intently on the can.
“Uh, Benjamin?” she whispered, when there was a momentary hush in his screaming.
“WHAT?!” he growled. Beads of sweat had formed on Benjamin’s forehead and his jaw was sealed tightly at the corners.
“I’m not sure he’s here anymore.”
“Of course he’s not! Why would he be here?! He’s NEVER where you think he’s going to be.” Benjamin flopped down into a cross-legged position on the ground, in utter frustration.
Robin glanced about at their surroundings. Her eyes lighted almost immediately on a watering can sitting by the stone steps leading up to the side door of the house. In one solid motion, she picked it up and dumped its contents onto the driveway. As she did so, the genie came spilling out with the stream of water, and lay stonily on the pavement, glaring up at her. “Blast you, clever girl. I don’t feel like being bothered by you kids today.” He floated airily to his feet and hovered about six inches off the driveway, rubbing some sleep dust out of his eyes. “Who the HELL gets up this early on a Saturday morning in the summer?! Whatever you’ve come to wish for, it better be smarter and bigger than that pathetic first wish you made!” His eyes burned feverishly, as he gazed ominously at Benjamin.
“Oh, no, buddy,” Benjamin snarled. “No such luck. I don’t have my next wish yet, I just want to ask you a few questions and tell you how lame that last trick was that you pulled.”
“Fire away,” smiled the Pyrex Genie, suddenly seeming disturbingly cheerful.
Benjamin paused suspiciously, but only for a moment. Then he started in. “First of all, what sort of genie ARE you anyway? You don’t seem much like Robin Williams in “Aladdin.” And you don’t seem like the legends I’ve heard about either. What’s your deal? How did you get this gig? And how long have you even been around? You don’t seem like you know what you’re doing AT ALL.” Benjamin took a deep breath and waited expectantly.
“Make yourself comfortable, young ones, and I shall tell you all!”
Robin plopped herself down beside Benjamin and they gazed up expectantly at the genie.
The genie pulled a large ebony-colored smoking pipe out of thin air and began stuffing it with a strongly-scented fruity tobacco. He labored over this for several minutes, packing it with great care and finally lighting it by striking his finger like a match against the top of Robin’s head and holding the flame gently to the pipe bowl. All of this production was observed in silence by the two young adults. After the genie had taken several contented puffs, Robin cleared her throat slightly. “Aren’t you going to tell us the story now?”
“HAHA! Not very likely!” guffawed the genie. He then laughed so hard that some of the tobacco fell out of the bowl of pipe, but he didn’t seem to notice at all.
Benjamin jumped up again and grasped at the genie’s neck as if to place him in a choke hold, but obviously his hands went right through the Pyrex Genie as if he were made of smoke. “I’m made of smoke, you idiot,” grinned the genie.
Benjamin crouched down, crossed his arms and buried his head despairingly. “You’re impossible!” he sighed hopelessly, echoing a refrain his very own mother could often be heard to mutter. Robin just frowned sadly at the genie.
The genie licked his lips. “Benjamin, you should stop being so whiny,” he said sagely, condescendingly. “Just because your father left you those years ago doesn’t mean you have to take it out on everyone else!”
Robin let out a gasp of frightened surprise and glanced quickly between the genie’s face and Benjamin’s and back again. But at this moment Benjamin’s anger morphed into the silent and deadly sort. “I’m sure you’re not qualified to know anything about that,” he insinuated cleverly.
“Qualified!?!?” exclaimed the Pyrex Genie. “You doubt my qualifications!? How DARE you!” In his gesticulating rage he dropped the pipe, but it disappeared in a puff before it could hit the pavement. “Why, let me tell you, you BRATTY kiddo, I’ve been around for centuries! Millenia, even. I could barely begin to count the years I’ve been trapped in various objects! I began in an ancient Persian Rug, but when that unraveled I was transferred to one of those conventional, restrictive lamps! After that I was traded by Arab mercenaries and wound up living in a fountain in the palace of Ali Baba! For nearly four centuries, I eventually wound up trapped in a lost artifact on the edge of the Amazon rainforest. I served President Hoover. You think that “depression” was an accident?! Then I served Nixon. Stupid greedy idiot, he was! And that barely BEGINS to cover my extensive history of serving myself through serving humanity! My credentials go on and on and ON!” By now there was actual steam rising from the genie’s ears, and he looked completely ridiculous.
Robin giggled at the sight of him. But Benjamin remained cold and collected, changing his tactic. “I guess you’re right,” Benjamin wheedled. “You must be pretty powerful… I mean, that wish yesterday… I wished for something completely pointless and you made things HAPPEN beyond my wish.”
“That’s because when you wish for something, the OPPOSITE of your intentions is what always results! That’s the most fun of all!” howled the genie exultantly. But immediately, his face fell as if he had just personally betrayed Nixon’s state secrets. (Which, according to his story, might actually have happened in the past.) “I mean… ugh. You TRICKED me.” And with that, the genie vanished in less time than it takes for a teenage girl to fall in love.
Benjamin leapt to his feet triumphantly. “Got him!” he shouted, punching the air. “That stupid fancy-pants drama queen doesn’t know when to shut his trap! Now I know what to do next! Erm… well, not exactly. But I’ve got a STRATEGY!”
Robin was slower to rise. She straightened the fluorescent skirt she was wearing and pushed back a loose lock of hair that was falling into her eyes. “Are you going to try to think of something even more pointless?” she asked curiously.
“Oh, that? Hell no, I don’t care about THAT anymore! Now I just wanna teach that stupid genie a lesson he won’t forget… y’know, show him who’s the real boss of this shithole called Planet Earth!”
“Benjamin… I don’t trust him,” she said as she stood and looked probingly into his eyes.
“Me neither! That’s why I’m tricking him to get answers!” A peculiar look of sudden pain flashed unbidden through Benjamin’s eyes that was not unnoticed by his tender friend.
“Don’t listen to his snarky comments about your dad, k, Benjamin? He had no right to say that stuff.”
“Yeah,” Benjamin muttered gruffly, “that was really hitting below the belt. But it’s weird; I don’t know how he knew that. He really must have some pretty crazy powers if he can just psychically know stuff like that.”
“Guess so,” Robin agreed, but she bit her lip and narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. “You know, Benny, this is a side of you I haven’t seen in a long time now.”
“You mean this brooding, sensitive and emotional guy underneath my hard exterior?” Benjamin teased her.
“No. I mean being so passionate and determined about something.”
“Oh. Is it totally freaking you out?”
“No, actually. It’s nice…” she said softly.
Benjamin’s eyes darted up to her face, and for a fleeting moment a look of something like pride and excitement could be seen in them. Quickly though, he shook his head so that his blond shaggy strands fell back over his forehead and hid his expression. He shrugged at her, and said, as if reading a cue card, “You’re nice too, Robin.” Then he spun a 180-degree turn and marched determinedly down the driveway toward the street.
“Where are you going?” Robin called.
“To the skaters’ park to think! You coming?!”
“Not right now!” she yelled louder, as his retreating figure got farther away. “I’ve got some of my own thinking to do!”
Robin took her time in walking to her destination, the corner of 4th Avenue and Main Street, where Madame Claire Voyant had her shop. Robin was well aware that Madame’s name was tacky, and that most of the tarot reading and psychic communicating she did was a forgery. She knew this because, to her, the woman was Aunt Madame Claire Voyant. Aunt Claire was her mother’s only sister, and Robin had always had an amused fondness for her. But Aunt Claire was a wise woman; she could read people as if their hearts were displays in the main window of an art gallery downtown. This, of course, was why her business as a fortune teller was so successful. Besides that, she had wonderful insights about human nature, a large and all-encompassing sense of empathy, and made really excellent double chocolate brownies. Today was the perfect sort of hot, sticky day for a glass of lemonade and a nice thick brownie. And Robin thought Aunt Claire just might know a thing or two about obnoxious Pyrex Genies.
The door chimes sounded out the first few bars of a new-age hymn as Robin opened the door of the small, incense-scented shop buoyantly. The shop was cluttered. Dark burgundy curtains covered the walls, and every corner was full of bottles, candles, incense, semi-precious crystals, and stones. A beaded curtain sectioned off the back corner of the room, where there were some large divan-like couches for waiting customers. Right behind the couches was a back door, closed at the moment, with sacred symbols from all the world’s major religions painted across it. Robin’s senses were overwhelmed with the smell of cinnamon and brownies on top of all the visual scintillation.
Robin wandered familiarly to the back of the shop and pressed her ear nosily up against the closed door. She leaned against it to listen, and fell right through it as she quickly discovered it was not latched properly. Tumbling into the back room with a loud exclamation of “Oops,” Robin landed on the floor of the small dark closet space that had been converted into the Readings Room.
“I was expecting you today,” chuckled Aunt Claire, who was seated by herself at the round table, facing the door. Then she glanced at the topmost of six watches she was wearing on her left wrist: the gold, attractive one. “Hmm, actually at this very moment I was expecting my Saturday regular. You’re early…”
From her knees, Robin looked up sheepishly. “Didn’t mean to fall through the door just then.”
“What brings you here, Sweet Bunny?” Aunt Claire was a large, buxom woman, but with a sort of firm and confident largeness, rather than the soft directionless kind. Her jowly chin dimpled as a radiant smile warmed her face. “You’ve got a question for me, haven’t you? Probably a practical one, knowing you… My little skeptic!”
“Don’t know how ‘skeptical’ you can really call me, Aunt Claire, seeing as I’m here consulting a psychic and tarot reader.” Robin climbed directly from her less-than-graceful floor position into the seat opposite her aunt at the table. “But you’re right; it is a sort of a historical question rather than a heart one,” she admitted.
Aunt Claire only smiled invitingly.
“Well,” began Robin, “to keep a long story short… a few days ago Benjamin and I met this genie. He was in a box of old junk from the basement at Benny’s house that we were going to take to the thrift store. Only Benny broke this Pyrex dish, and this horrible genie came out and was all sorts of pissed off. He demanded that Benny make three wishes… said that we can’t have more than three days per wish, or we’ll disappear. And since then Benny’s been, like, out to get him! They’re pretty much trying to start World War Three, firing cannons at each other’s egos. And…”
“Wait. Stop right there. Have you used these wishes yet?” interjected Aunt Claire, an expression of alarm on her round face.
“Only one of them. Why?”
“What was it?”
“Something so stupid and random it shouldn’t have made any difference at all, only it did. It made this girl in the skate park fall in love with this guy. And then Benny got even more angry, and just today the genie said that the opposite of whatever your intentions are when you’re wishing, that’s what happens.” Robin stopped talking abruptly, realizing she’d been talking so fast this whole time she’d almost forgotten to take a breath. She inhaled sharply.
“Hmm, this is surprising news.” Aunt Claire’s brow furrowed, but she looked more amused than worried now.
“Tell me about it! I can’t believe there’s a freaking GENIE directing our lives right now!”
“Oh, no, dear, that’s not the weird part. The weird part is that I didn’t think a modern genie could be so powerful, which makes me think something unusual is going on here. To tell you the truth, Sweet Bunny, most true genies were annihilated in the 4th century or so. And I should have thought the rest were destroyed during the Spanish Inquisition. Did this genie say how old he is, or who his Master of Origin was?”
“He said he’s really, really old… but what’s a Master of Origin?” Robin leaned forward excitedly, eyes enormous.
Aunt Claire leaned back with the dreamy look in her eyes that she always got before telling a long, fascinating story. “Ah, good question. A Master of Origin is the person who creates a genie, and also his first, original master. You see, genies are former human beings who, instead of dying, have somehow become trapped in an object and are slaves to the wishes of anyone who encounters said object. All genies hope to become free one day, become their own masters, but within that there are basically four types of genies, and four different levels of abilities.
‘The first type is a genie who intentionally trapped himself in the object, so that he might live forever. He gets his own first set of wishes, though obviously, he cannot free himself or do anything to change his own state of entrapment. This type of genie is usually a revengeful person, willing to enslave himself to destroy his enemies. This is a selfish thing to do, and as a trade-off for this first burst of mighty power, he will from that time forward be even more susceptible to his future masters’ wills. In other words, he can do intensely powerful magic, but at the precise bidding of his current master, with none of his own interpretation. This type of genie is his own Master of Origin.
‘The second type of genie is one who has been trapped either accidentally or intentionally by someone else. This type of genie tends to have lesser powers than the first kind, but a lot more free will. His Master of Origin is the person who magically ensnared him. This second type of genie is often a trickster, as his greater free will gives him the chance to put his own special ‘spin’ on his master’s commands.”
“Hey, that sounds a lot like this genie! He’s a real jerk, and he seems to do whatever he wants…” Robin could hardly keep herself from jumping up with avid excitement.
Aunt Claire fixed her with a stern look. “Hmm. Interesting… but keep listening. The third type is one who has been trapped by a backfiring of his own magic that was directed at someone else. This genie’s Master of Origin is his intended victim, and this genie has less power, and less free will than either of the first two types. As I’m sure you know, there is great power in intention, so the intention that creates a genie forever shapes him.” Aunt Claire paused, allowing the tension in the room to mount for dramatic suspense.
“And lastly,” she began, “and listen closely, because this is the type of genie that I believe all modern genies are… You see, human beings these days have, for the most part, lost their sense of magic. They can no longer aim spells at one another or intentionally ensnare themselves through magic. Therefore, the fourth type of genie is most common nowadays because he results when-“
But just then the chimes out front were heard to sound, and within another moment a tall woman dressed in a long flowery skirt with huge hoop earrings came bounding back into the Reading Room. “Claire, darling, am I ever in need of your services this week!” she exclaimed, her voice warbly and emotional. “You won’t believe what my cat’s been putting me through!”
“Oh, do come in, my dear, come in at once,” soothed Aunt Claire. “Robin, I have an appointment, Sweet Bunny, but you can get a brownie and some lemonade in the kitchen before you go.” She pointed to the door behind her, which led into the rest of the apartment where Aunt Claire lived and where customers were never allowed. “I’m afraid I really am booked up for the rest of the day, but perhaps we can continue this conversation later. Just don’t make any more wishes until you talk to me!”
“But- ”
“Sorry, dear, off with you now. Oh, yes, come back tonight and I’ll finish explaining! It must be tonight!”
Robin huffed out the way she had come in, entirely uninterested in brownies and lemonade at this point. She absolutely had to find Benjamin, and quickly, before he made his next wish!
PART 3 - ROBIN’S INTERLUDE
“COME OUT OF THERE!” roared Benjamin, bright and early the next morning, which was a Saturday. He was standing in the driveway behind his house, rattling the now-empty trash can with an impatient vengeance. Robin was standing to his left, arms folded across her chest, eyes focused intently on the can.
“Uh, Benjamin?” she whispered, when there was a momentary hush in his screaming.
“WHAT?!” he growled. Beads of sweat had formed on Benjamin’s forehead and his jaw was sealed tightly at the corners.
“I’m not sure he’s here anymore.”
“Of course he’s not! Why would he be here?! He’s NEVER where you think he’s going to be.” Benjamin flopped down into a cross-legged position on the ground, in utter frustration.
Robin glanced about at their surroundings. Her eyes lighted almost immediately on a watering can sitting by the stone steps leading up to the side door of the house. In one solid motion, she picked it up and dumped its contents onto the driveway. As she did so, the genie came spilling out with the stream of water, and lay stonily on the pavement, glaring up at her. “Blast you, clever girl. I don’t feel like being bothered by you kids today.” He floated airily to his feet and hovered about six inches off the driveway, rubbing some sleep dust out of his eyes. “Who the HELL gets up this early on a Saturday morning in the summer?! Whatever you’ve come to wish for, it better be smarter and bigger than that pathetic first wish you made!” His eyes burned feverishly, as he gazed ominously at Benjamin.
“Oh, no, buddy,” Benjamin snarled. “No such luck. I don’t have my next wish yet, I just want to ask you a few questions and tell you how lame that last trick was that you pulled.”
“Fire away,” smiled the Pyrex Genie, suddenly seeming disturbingly cheerful.
Benjamin paused suspiciously, but only for a moment. Then he started in. “First of all, what sort of genie ARE you anyway? You don’t seem much like Robin Williams in “Aladdin.” And you don’t seem like the legends I’ve heard about either. What’s your deal? How did you get this gig? And how long have you even been around? You don’t seem like you know what you’re doing AT ALL.” Benjamin took a deep breath and waited expectantly.
“Make yourself comfortable, young ones, and I shall tell you all!”
Robin plopped herself down beside Benjamin and they gazed up expectantly at the genie.
The genie pulled a large ebony-colored smoking pipe out of thin air and began stuffing it with a strongly-scented fruity tobacco. He labored over this for several minutes, packing it with great care and finally lighting it by striking his finger like a match against the top of Robin’s head and holding the flame gently to the pipe bowl. All of this production was observed in silence by the two young adults. After the genie had taken several contented puffs, Robin cleared her throat slightly. “Aren’t you going to tell us the story now?”
“HAHA! Not very likely!” guffawed the genie. He then laughed so hard that some of the tobacco fell out of the bowl of pipe, but he didn’t seem to notice at all.
Benjamin jumped up again and grasped at the genie’s neck as if to place him in a choke hold, but obviously his hands went right through the Pyrex Genie as if he were made of smoke. “I’m made of smoke, you idiot,” grinned the genie.
Benjamin crouched down, crossed his arms and buried his head despairingly. “You’re impossible!” he sighed hopelessly, echoing a refrain his very own mother could often be heard to mutter. Robin just frowned sadly at the genie.
The genie licked his lips. “Benjamin, you should stop being so whiny,” he said sagely, condescendingly. “Just because your father left you those years ago doesn’t mean you have to take it out on everyone else!”
Robin let out a gasp of frightened surprise and glanced quickly between the genie’s face and Benjamin’s and back again. But at this moment Benjamin’s anger morphed into the silent and deadly sort. “I’m sure you’re not qualified to know anything about that,” he insinuated cleverly.
“Qualified!?!?” exclaimed the Pyrex Genie. “You doubt my qualifications!? How DARE you!” In his gesticulating rage he dropped the pipe, but it disappeared in a puff before it could hit the pavement. “Why, let me tell you, you BRATTY kiddo, I’ve been around for centuries! Millenia, even. I could barely begin to count the years I’ve been trapped in various objects! I began in an ancient Persian Rug, but when that unraveled I was transferred to one of those conventional, restrictive lamps! After that I was traded by Arab mercenaries and wound up living in a fountain in the palace of Ali Baba! For nearly four centuries, I eventually wound up trapped in a lost artifact on the edge of the Amazon rainforest. I served President Hoover. You think that “depression” was an accident?! Then I served Nixon. Stupid greedy idiot, he was! And that barely BEGINS to cover my extensive history of serving myself through serving humanity! My credentials go on and on and ON!” By now there was actual steam rising from the genie’s ears, and he looked completely ridiculous.
Robin giggled at the sight of him. But Benjamin remained cold and collected, changing his tactic. “I guess you’re right,” Benjamin wheedled. “You must be pretty powerful… I mean, that wish yesterday… I wished for something completely pointless and you made things HAPPEN beyond my wish.”
“That’s because when you wish for something, the OPPOSITE of your intentions is what always results! That’s the most fun of all!” howled the genie exultantly. But immediately, his face fell as if he had just personally betrayed Nixon’s state secrets. (Which, according to his story, might actually have happened in the past.) “I mean… ugh. You TRICKED me.” And with that, the genie vanished in less time than it takes for a teenage girl to fall in love.
Benjamin leapt to his feet triumphantly. “Got him!” he shouted, punching the air. “That stupid fancy-pants drama queen doesn’t know when to shut his trap! Now I know what to do next! Erm… well, not exactly. But I’ve got a STRATEGY!”
Robin was slower to rise. She straightened the fluorescent skirt she was wearing and pushed back a loose lock of hair that was falling into her eyes. “Are you going to try to think of something even more pointless?” she asked curiously.
“Oh, that? Hell no, I don’t care about THAT anymore! Now I just wanna teach that stupid genie a lesson he won’t forget… y’know, show him who’s the real boss of this shithole called Planet Earth!”
“Benjamin… I don’t trust him,” she said as she stood and looked probingly into his eyes.
“Me neither! That’s why I’m tricking him to get answers!” A peculiar look of sudden pain flashed unbidden through Benjamin’s eyes that was not unnoticed by his tender friend.
“Don’t listen to his snarky comments about your dad, k, Benjamin? He had no right to say that stuff.”
“Yeah,” Benjamin muttered gruffly, “that was really hitting below the belt. But it’s weird; I don’t know how he knew that. He really must have some pretty crazy powers if he can just psychically know stuff like that.”
“Guess so,” Robin agreed, but she bit her lip and narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. “You know, Benny, this is a side of you I haven’t seen in a long time now.”
“You mean this brooding, sensitive and emotional guy underneath my hard exterior?” Benjamin teased her.
“No. I mean being so passionate and determined about something.”
“Oh. Is it totally freaking you out?”
“No, actually. It’s nice…” she said softly.
Benjamin’s eyes darted up to her face, and for a fleeting moment a look of something like pride and excitement could be seen in them. Quickly though, he shook his head so that his blond shaggy strands fell back over his forehead and hid his expression. He shrugged at her, and said, as if reading a cue card, “You’re nice too, Robin.” Then he spun a 180-degree turn and marched determinedly down the driveway toward the street.
“Where are you going?” Robin called.
“To the skaters’ park to think! You coming?!”
“Not right now!” she yelled louder, as his retreating figure got farther away. “I’ve got some of my own thinking to do!”
Robin took her time in walking to her destination, the corner of 4th Avenue and Main Street, where Madame Claire Voyant had her shop. Robin was well aware that Madame’s name was tacky, and that most of the tarot reading and psychic communicating she did was a forgery. She knew this because, to her, the woman was Aunt Madame Claire Voyant. Aunt Claire was her mother’s only sister, and Robin had always had an amused fondness for her. But Aunt Claire was a wise woman; she could read people as if their hearts were displays in the main window of an art gallery downtown. This, of course, was why her business as a fortune teller was so successful. Besides that, she had wonderful insights about human nature, a large and all-encompassing sense of empathy, and made really excellent double chocolate brownies. Today was the perfect sort of hot, sticky day for a glass of lemonade and a nice thick brownie. And Robin thought Aunt Claire just might know a thing or two about obnoxious Pyrex Genies.
The door chimes sounded out the first few bars of a new-age hymn as Robin opened the door of the small, incense-scented shop buoyantly. The shop was cluttered. Dark burgundy curtains covered the walls, and every corner was full of bottles, candles, incense, semi-precious crystals, and stones. A beaded curtain sectioned off the back corner of the room, where there were some large divan-like couches for waiting customers. Right behind the couches was a back door, closed at the moment, with sacred symbols from all the world’s major religions painted across it. Robin’s senses were overwhelmed with the smell of cinnamon and brownies on top of all the visual scintillation.
Robin wandered familiarly to the back of the shop and pressed her ear nosily up against the closed door. She leaned against it to listen, and fell right through it as she quickly discovered it was not latched properly. Tumbling into the back room with a loud exclamation of “Oops,” Robin landed on the floor of the small dark closet space that had been converted into the Readings Room.
“I was expecting you today,” chuckled Aunt Claire, who was seated by herself at the round table, facing the door. Then she glanced at the topmost of six watches she was wearing on her left wrist: the gold, attractive one. “Hmm, actually at this very moment I was expecting my Saturday regular. You’re early…”
From her knees, Robin looked up sheepishly. “Didn’t mean to fall through the door just then.”
“What brings you here, Sweet Bunny?” Aunt Claire was a large, buxom woman, but with a sort of firm and confident largeness, rather than the soft directionless kind. Her jowly chin dimpled as a radiant smile warmed her face. “You’ve got a question for me, haven’t you? Probably a practical one, knowing you… My little skeptic!”
“Don’t know how ‘skeptical’ you can really call me, Aunt Claire, seeing as I’m here consulting a psychic and tarot reader.” Robin climbed directly from her less-than-graceful floor position into the seat opposite her aunt at the table. “But you’re right; it is a sort of a historical question rather than a heart one,” she admitted.
Aunt Claire only smiled invitingly.
“Well,” began Robin, “to keep a long story short… a few days ago Benjamin and I met this genie. He was in a box of old junk from the basement at Benny’s house that we were going to take to the thrift store. Only Benny broke this Pyrex dish, and this horrible genie came out and was all sorts of pissed off. He demanded that Benny make three wishes… said that we can’t have more than three days per wish, or we’ll disappear. And since then Benny’s been, like, out to get him! They’re pretty much trying to start World War Three, firing cannons at each other’s egos. And…”
“Wait. Stop right there. Have you used these wishes yet?” interjected Aunt Claire, an expression of alarm on her round face.
“Only one of them. Why?”
“What was it?”
“Something so stupid and random it shouldn’t have made any difference at all, only it did. It made this girl in the skate park fall in love with this guy. And then Benny got even more angry, and just today the genie said that the opposite of whatever your intentions are when you’re wishing, that’s what happens.” Robin stopped talking abruptly, realizing she’d been talking so fast this whole time she’d almost forgotten to take a breath. She inhaled sharply.
“Hmm, this is surprising news.” Aunt Claire’s brow furrowed, but she looked more amused than worried now.
“Tell me about it! I can’t believe there’s a freaking GENIE directing our lives right now!”
“Oh, no, dear, that’s not the weird part. The weird part is that I didn’t think a modern genie could be so powerful, which makes me think something unusual is going on here. To tell you the truth, Sweet Bunny, most true genies were annihilated in the 4th century or so. And I should have thought the rest were destroyed during the Spanish Inquisition. Did this genie say how old he is, or who his Master of Origin was?”
“He said he’s really, really old… but what’s a Master of Origin?” Robin leaned forward excitedly, eyes enormous.
Aunt Claire leaned back with the dreamy look in her eyes that she always got before telling a long, fascinating story. “Ah, good question. A Master of Origin is the person who creates a genie, and also his first, original master. You see, genies are former human beings who, instead of dying, have somehow become trapped in an object and are slaves to the wishes of anyone who encounters said object. All genies hope to become free one day, become their own masters, but within that there are basically four types of genies, and four different levels of abilities.
‘The first type is a genie who intentionally trapped himself in the object, so that he might live forever. He gets his own first set of wishes, though obviously, he cannot free himself or do anything to change his own state of entrapment. This type of genie is usually a revengeful person, willing to enslave himself to destroy his enemies. This is a selfish thing to do, and as a trade-off for this first burst of mighty power, he will from that time forward be even more susceptible to his future masters’ wills. In other words, he can do intensely powerful magic, but at the precise bidding of his current master, with none of his own interpretation. This type of genie is his own Master of Origin.
‘The second type of genie is one who has been trapped either accidentally or intentionally by someone else. This type of genie tends to have lesser powers than the first kind, but a lot more free will. His Master of Origin is the person who magically ensnared him. This second type of genie is often a trickster, as his greater free will gives him the chance to put his own special ‘spin’ on his master’s commands.”
“Hey, that sounds a lot like this genie! He’s a real jerk, and he seems to do whatever he wants…” Robin could hardly keep herself from jumping up with avid excitement.
Aunt Claire fixed her with a stern look. “Hmm. Interesting… but keep listening. The third type is one who has been trapped by a backfiring of his own magic that was directed at someone else. This genie’s Master of Origin is his intended victim, and this genie has less power, and less free will than either of the first two types. As I’m sure you know, there is great power in intention, so the intention that creates a genie forever shapes him.” Aunt Claire paused, allowing the tension in the room to mount for dramatic suspense.
“And lastly,” she began, “and listen closely, because this is the type of genie that I believe all modern genies are… You see, human beings these days have, for the most part, lost their sense of magic. They can no longer aim spells at one another or intentionally ensnare themselves through magic. Therefore, the fourth type of genie is most common nowadays because he results when-“
But just then the chimes out front were heard to sound, and within another moment a tall woman dressed in a long flowery skirt with huge hoop earrings came bounding back into the Reading Room. “Claire, darling, am I ever in need of your services this week!” she exclaimed, her voice warbly and emotional. “You won’t believe what my cat’s been putting me through!”
“Oh, do come in, my dear, come in at once,” soothed Aunt Claire. “Robin, I have an appointment, Sweet Bunny, but you can get a brownie and some lemonade in the kitchen before you go.” She pointed to the door behind her, which led into the rest of the apartment where Aunt Claire lived and where customers were never allowed. “I’m afraid I really am booked up for the rest of the day, but perhaps we can continue this conversation later. Just don’t make any more wishes until you talk to me!”
“But- ”
“Sorry, dear, off with you now. Oh, yes, come back tonight and I’ll finish explaining! It must be tonight!”
Robin huffed out the way she had come in, entirely uninterested in brownies and lemonade at this point. She absolutely had to find Benjamin, and quickly, before he made his next wish!