Chris went to his university, but during one of his classes he couldn't help but notice that his good friend Natasha seemed preoccupied and dejected. He stopped her out in the hall on the way out, and she reluctantly agreed to go sit and talk with him awhile in the main library.
"Tell you what, I've got something on my own mind, so I'll go first," said Chris. "I had the weirdest dream last night. There was this ... council. I couldn't even be sure who they were, or what they were supposed to be. Wizards ... demigods ... it wasn't clear. Anyhow, they explained to me that I had been chosen to be a genie."
"Genie?" Natasha smirked. "You mean ... a granter of wishes?"
"Yes. And I wouldn't have to dress in any sort of costume, or live in a bottle -- unless I misbehaved. I could just be good old me, and grant people wishes."
Natasha's smirk softened into a smile. "That is so like you, Chris. Anyone else might have a dream about their own wishes being granted. But you, you get to make the wishes come true for someone else."
"It was very vivid, very solid -- I can still feel my brain insisting it actually happened. But I never left my bed, so, you know, Occam's razor."
"Huh!" Her smile grew wry and she wagged a finger at him. "Maybe we'd better watch out for you."
"Anyway, it's your turn. It's not like I have a REAL problem, but I suspect you do."
"Yeah. All right. Well, I started seeing Mike, and it was going good, he seemed interested in me -- and now I find out he's been sneaking around seeing Marlene. Well, I don't know how much you know about Marlene, but she and I are nothing alike. So I confronted him, and I asked him, What do you see in Marlene?" She sighed. "Well, it's nothing I haven't had to deal with before. I mean, look at me. I'm rail thin. I'm a stick figure."
"You're beautiful," said Chris, and he meant it. Natasha had a dazzling face, and while her body was very lean, enough to inspire nasty rumors of anorexia or such when she simply had a high metabolism, she moved with grace. "You're saying he wanted you ... heavier? Maybe more muscular?"
"No, not more muscular. If you've seen Marlene, it's obvious. She's really, really ... " Natasha placed her hands on her flat chest, then moved them outward. "You know what I mean?"
"He broke up with you for that?"
"I'm not surprised. It's happened to me before. And believe me, I've though about getting ... you know, operated on ... but going under the knife, I mean, even to save my life, scares the hell out of me, and for cosmetic surgery ... I don't know if I could ever bring myself to do it. But honestly, Chris, honestly ... there isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about it. And it's not just getting burned by boyfriends, either. I would really be fascinated to do it, you know, to actually have them. I so, so wish I had really big breasts."
Sat Apr 18 22:06:48 2009