“Genie!” I get another inspiration. “I am thinking hard about inflating her stupid left hand. Is it working?”
“Um…no,” he answers, with a note of worry in his voice.
“Why?” I sibilate like an attacking cobra.
“When I said you needed to be in the proximity of a person to perform any magic on him or her, I actually meant that you need to have eye contact with them. Not necessarily eye to eye, but you have to be able to see them,” he explains, a bit subdued.
“Genie, I am sorry,” I apologize, regaining some of my humanity; he has been the sole target of my fury for the past fifteen minutes. “I am not mad at you. But please stop saying James is not the one, okay?”
“But—”
“No buts.” I silence him with a raised finger.
“By all means you heard the last of it. I promise.” He seems sincere.
“Ok, am I forgiven?” I ask.
“Nothing to forgive, milady.”
I examine my reflection in the mirror. Not good! I look like a scarecrow. My eyes are bloodshot and puffed up from all the crying, my hair is messily scattered in all directions and badly tangled, plus my magic makeup is smeared all over my face. I guess they didn’t get the message to use waterproof mascara for their enchanted maquillage, whoever they might be. How did I accomplish so much disrepair in such a short time? I intensely stare in the mirror and concentrate hard on my appearance of this morning before coming to work.
SWISH.
I am back to a presentable status. I have to admit these superpowers are truly coming in handy; I have no idea how I would have survived without them. Probably I wouldn’t have. Thank you coffer, and thank you Genie.
“Let’s go take the bitch down, then,” I blurt out, determinedly exiting the bathroom like a soldier marching to war.
I sit down at my desk, sleek as a cat preparing for the attack. My positioning is perfect. From my cubicle, I can see Vanessa well enough, but the right panel shelters me from being seen.
The genie is looking at me with a concerned expression.
“I should warn you,” he speaks up in his lecture tone, “that to harm someone can always rebound on you. Look at me. I am the clearest example—”
I stop his sermon, raising my hand. I am not in the mood for a “what goes around comes around” speech right now; I am feeling too vindictive. Plus, I have already thought of a solution. To avoid compromising my karma too badly, I’ve decided that for every evil I perform on Vanessa, I’ll bestow the same amount of godsend on Sally. You know, to even everything out.
She will never be able to wear that engagement ring if it is the last thing I do. I’ll keep inflating her hand until it explodes.
I lean back on my chair furtively to observe the enemy. She’s busy typing on her keyboard. I fix my gaze on her left hand, staring steadily at it and imagining it slightly swollen. The moment I do that, she stops typing, scratches her hand, and then resumes her inputting.
Aha, it worked! I do a mini triumph dance, safely hidden behind my panel walls and under the disapproving scrutiny of the genie. I lie quiet for about ten minutes, but I can’t contain myself. I draw back again and carefully examine an unsuspecting Vanessa.
She looks extremely beautiful, as usual. She has long voluminous dark hair, piercing blue eyes, a small straight nose, voluptuous pink lips, and a fair complexion with flawless skin. Basically, she’s Megan Fox’s secret twin sister. Today she’s wearing a sleeveless sheath dress, which is bright blue with black seaming and trim. It’s obviously a size zero, or even a double zero. The dress is as tight as it gets, and she complemented it with an expensive-looking pair of black patent leather strappy sandals with four-inch stiletto heels.
Even with all my improvements, I don’t feel like I am swimming in her league yet. To be honest, I never will. But it doesn’t matter. She is mean, obnoxious, and full of herself, whereas I am nice, kind (to most people at least), and easy going.
How does James even bear it? I mean, I understand that a man could get sidetracked by the physical attraction at first, and maybe get an infatuation, but after hearing her talk for more than ten minutes he should’ve come to his senses, right? Even if she fakes it big time, after a while it’s impossible not to notice the evilness underneath.
Maybe it’s impossible only if you’re a woman. Kyle, our boss, is leaning over her cubicle right now, asking her for some documentation she had to prepare. She is saying she hasn’t done it yet and that she won’t be able to finish it by today, but the sugarcoat she puts on her words by flirting, batting her long lashes, and invitingly leaning some cleavage forward must be completely obscuring the actual meaning of her speech to her male audience. In fact, Kyle leaves as happy as a puppy that has just been cuddled. If it had been me delivering those lines, I would have gotten an entirely different response.
She makes me so mad! Time to get some other action. I focus on Vanessa’s tiny figure, ready to gift her five pounds.
SWISH.
She suddenly emits a little surprised cry and jumps slightly in her seat.
Sally, who is just now passing in front of Vanessa’s desk headed to the photocopying machine, notices her little screech and stops.
“Did you get an all over prickle?” Sally asks, smiling.
“Yes,” Vanessa replies curtly, while tugging at her dress. Evidently cajoling is reserved purely for the men species.
“I had it before, too. It’s electrostatic air. Did you know?” Sally continues, ignoring Vanessa’s rudeness.
Ah Sally, I love her. I think I will shed another five pounds from her.
SWISH.
She squeaks loudly. “See, it just happened again.” She happily giggles, moving on to go copy her files.
I scrutinize Vanessa a while longer. She’s twenty pounds underweight, so an additional five pounds will not make her fat. If anything she’ll seem less anorexic, but with the dress she is sporting today she must feel like a squeezed sausage at the moment. In fact, I watch her as she undoes the tiny black belt on her waist and changes holes to give her compressed stomach more room.
I do an evil laugh in my head while the genie keeps scowling at me, shaking his head in a gesture of disapproval. I dismiss him with an innocent shrug and decide to give Vanessa’s hair a bit of a frizz, drop a few zits on her flawless skin, and chip a couple of perfectly manicured nails. To protect my aura, I make Sally’s hair and skin less oily.
Ah, I’m feeling better already.
Unfortunately, the happy sensation vanishes almost immediately, and shortly after my little pranks are over I feel sadness invading me again. The enormity of the situation is beginning to dawn on me. My main reaction so far has been rage, but now that the adrenaline has left my body, I feel… I don’t know what I feel. I’m confused.
The truth is that I could make Vanessa as ugly as I want, but knowing James, he would never be with someone merely for looks. He wouldn’t marry someone just because she is beautiful. My heart skips a beat as the thought that he may actually love her crosses my mind for the first time since I’ve seen them together. Here comes the tachycardia again.
I try to calm down and rationalize a bit. I don’t know. My instinct tells me something isn’t right here, that things don’t add up the way they should, but I can’t put my finger on what’s amiss. I’ve always trusted my sixth sense, and my intuition has never failed me. Well, with the one exception of James, but that doesn’t count. It’s all part of the same scheme.
I need to see eye to eye on this. Maybe I’m simply too involved to see straight. The situation calls for some consultation, and there’s only one person’s opinion I’ll trust on this. Namely, my best friend Brooke.
By now they all must be back from their romantic getaway, since it’s a workday. Actually, now that I think about it, it’s weird that I haven’t heard from her yet. We usually text each other at least a couple of times per day.
I grab my phone and text her right away.
Ally: Hey sweetheart, how was the WE? Did u miss me too much? I need to talk to u ASAP! Can u meet me for cocktails at 6.30? XO
Brooke and I have been friends forever. We lived in the same neighborhood growing up and she’s like a sister to me. She’s always been there for me when I needed her. In fact, I get her reply immediately.
Brooke: Can do 7. WE ok, Amy babbling nonstop as usual, wanted to kill her after 2 hours. Imagine by Sunday night!! Everything all right babe? XO
In our group besides me, there are Brooke and Dave, her college sweetheart, Megan and John, and Amy and Luke. Brooke and I met Megan in college, then Brooke and Meg found a job in the same company as head hunters and Amy works with them. I am not very close to Amy; she’s not my favorite, but she isn’t too bad, and she throws the best house parties ever. As I’ve said, I’m the only single one.
Ally: Sort of, just need some consultation. Usual place at 7 then. X
I’ve been forbidden to even utter James’s name for a while now; my friends think it’s the best strategy for me to move on. That, or they couldn’t stand my self-pitying whining anymore. Maybe a bit of both. But for an ex-boyfriend engagement to a long-loathed colleague, Brooke will surely make an exception.
That’s also why I want to see her alone. She’s my oldest friend, and I’ll be more comfortable if it’ll be only the two of us. She never judges, and always listens patiently to all my rambling.
At precisely six-thirty I grab my new black leather Miu Miu bag and leave the office.
“Do you want to meet Brooke?” I ask invisible Genie in the elevator. “She’s my best friend.”
“Do you want me to meet her?”
“Do we always have to play this game?”
He eyes me with a mischievous expression.
“You have ten seconds to decide and appear.” I give him an ultimatum. “Once these doors open, you stay in whatever form you’re in.”
He doesn’t respond, just smiles smugly. I understand he is visible purely from his reflection appearing on the shiny metal of the elevator.
“I see you’re up for some sociability,” I comment matter-of-factly. “Here’s our story. You’re from London, we met there during…” I stop mid track.
We are walking down the street, and he keeps looking around wide-eyed, not paying attention to what I am saying.
“Are you listening to me?” I ask, annoyed.
“Most certainly, Miss Johnson.” He snaps into focus.
“Another thing—none of this miss-milady crap.” Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to have him visible. “Today I’m just Ally, and everybody else is just their first name. No Miss, no Mister, and no milady.”
“Yes, mi…Ally,” he stutters clumsily.
I glare at him intensely for a few seconds to make it clear this is important for me.
“I will try my best,” he says, raising his hands defensively.
“And please try to sound as modern as you can manage.”
He nods, probably too scared to speak.
“As I was saying,” I resume where I left off, “you are English, from London. We met there during my semester abroad. We haven’t been in touch for a long time, but you were transferred to Chicago to work…hmm…as a consultant on a project in finance. Keep it vague and you should be fine—nobody wants to hear about boring financial stuff. Everything clear up to now?”
“Yes,” he says, repeating the story to memorize it.
“Okay,” I continue once he’s done. “Now comes the difficult part for you. You remembered that I was in Chicago and you tracked me down on Facebook.”
He looks confused.
“Did you read any of the books we bought yesterday?” I ask.
“Yes, all of them.”
“All of them?” I ask skeptically.
“Yes.”
“And when exactly did you do that?”
“Last night. I was striving to keep myself occupied.”
“You read twenty-something tomes in one night?”
“My magic was of assistance in the process,” he says apologetically.
“Okay,” I answer, still unconvinced. “So you’re up to date on social networks?”
“Ah, yes. I am.”
“Good. If Brooke asks you where you are staying, say you are at the Whitehall Hotel.” I keep building up a bulletproof story. “You are there temporarily because you are searching for an apartment to rent as you don’t know how long your job will keep you here.”
“Do you foresee it is going to be a long time?” he asks keenly.
“Depends on how well you behave.” I smile at him teasingly. “We’ll have to give you a Facebook profile tonight, just to make the lie more believable,” I add. “Anyway, to conclude our fake story, we were really good friends for the six months I was in England, you arrived here Saturday and didn’t know anybody in the city, so we’ve been catching up during the weekend. We went shopping because they lost your luggage and I told you everything about James.”
“Have you told me everything?” he asks, interested.
“All you need to know,” I reply curtly.
“We were supposed to meet for drinks tonight as well, but I called you to tell you there was a James emergency and that my friend Brooke would be joining us, okay?”
“Yes.”
“If she asks you some random questions you’ll have to improvise. Do you think you can do it?”
“Yes, madam.”
“Good, ‘cause we are here,” I say, pushing my way through the heavy glass and metal doors of my favorite cocktail bar.