Original Fiction: The Wrong Wish

This is still a work in progress, but it is almost complete. What I'm posting now is close to the final draft. The only thing left to do is polish up sentence structure and add a bit of filler content in the first few paragraphs.

Feedback would be greatly appreciated.

For this story, I challenged myself to make a play on words into a dark story in less than thirty minutes. This is the result.



As I was walking down the street, a glint of light caught my eye. In the gutter of the road lay, I kid you not, a lamp. This isn't the kind that lights up a room; I'm talking about the kind that has a genie inside.

Of course, I don't believe in fairy tales or the like. I consider myself to be too mature and rational to believe in the supernatural. Still, I couldn't bring myself to just keep walking by it. I picked it up, stuffed it in my backpack, and continued walking.

I'm sure a bunch of people would have immediately rubbed the lamp without hesitation on the childish belief that a happy genie would pop out and merrily begin bibbity bobbity boo-ing their way through some wishes. I, however, was standing in public while holding a dirty lamp. I didn't want to look like a complete idiot out in front of a bunch of strangers, so into my backpack it went.

Later that night, I sat alone on my bed and stared at the lamp now sitting on my desk. It was pretty dirty, and I would need to clean it up if I wanted to keep the darn thing. Grabbing a rag, I chuckled as I began rubbing the dirt off the lamp.

"This will make a neat little thing to show off. Maybe I'll rig it to spew smoke out whenever people walk by just for the heck of it," I thought, still rubbing the grime off the lamp.

It began rattling suddenly, and I dropped it onto the ground in surprise. Of course, exactly what you would expect happened. Green smoke billowed out of the lid and a genie formed from the haze.

"Congratulations!" his voice boomed. "You've freed me from my gilded prison!"

Right away, something struck me as odd about this genie. The genie we all think of from that Disney classic had a happy smile and a general cheery attitude. This genie was still smiling, but he didn't seem too happy or cheery. His smile was more like a sly grin, and his attitude just seemed... off.

"I'm sure you know the rules," he said. "You released me, so you get one wish."

"Uh... Actually, I don't really want a wish."

Technically, I wasn't lying. I wasn't exactly telling the whole truth, either. I know enough about stories and folklore to tell what kind of genie it is I'm dealing with. The kind and happy one we see in our cartoons are few and far in between. The majority of genies, like the one I had to deal with, were vicious and brutal tricksters. They would find greedy men and would exploit their wish granting powers to ruin the lives of those who freed them from their lamps.

"You don't want a wish!?" he said, looking hurt. "Come on, surely there must be something you would like?"

"Nah, not really. I'm content with how life is right now."

I knew better than to fall for his tricks. Anything I directly wished for could simply be turned into a weapon against me, and I was not about to let him ruin my life.

"Look, could you just wish for something anyway? I can't leave until I grant you a wish," he said, sounding mildly irritated.
"Alright then, I wish that I was not required to make a wish."

He groaned and slapped a misty hand to his forehead. "That's not how it works. [SIZE=8pt]Idiot.[/SIZE] You can't cheat the system; you have to actually give me something to do. I want to get out of here, so get on with it already."

"I really don't want to."

He frowned and rose up a bit in the mist, leering down at me in a threatening way. "Listen up, human. You may have freed me from the lamp, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let you keep me bound here because you refused to make a valid wish."

Unfortunately, I fell for his trick.

"Fine, fine, I get it," I grumbled. "I wish that you would leave me alone."

He grinned darkly. "As you wish."