Since Karyn was not in the room when Jon made his wish, that meant of course that Jon didn't see the actual transformation as it happened. This also meant that Karyn didn't hear the wish, and therefore she...now he...would not remember ever being a girl named Karyn. Jon was not really thinking about this at the time, though.
At that moment, Kevin awoke in his room, pondering the weird dream he had had. His best friend Jon had a magical wishing stone which was apparently some sort of inheritance from Jon's grandfather (who, Kevin recalled, may or may not in fact be dead. Jon wasn't entirely sure). The stone was capable of granting any wish someone uttered while holding the stone. Apparently, changes made would be as if they had always been so, apart from those within earshot of the wish. The really scary part was that wishes couldn't be reversed...at least not directly.
Jon had turned a tree branch blue with a wish, but he couldn't change it to any other color. He could only make it a darker shade of blue. And then Sarah McMillan and her crowd of adoring male admirers had passed by. Sarah was an attractive girl, Kevin thought, but her obnoxious personality was just too much of a turnoff for him to even be friends with her, let alone ask her for a date. He didn't see why so many of the other guys at school were willing to let her unpleasant behavior toward her schoolmates slide.
The only conclusion Kevin could reach was that those shallow guys only liked Sarah for her body, and that Sarah was more or less taking advantage of that. Really, Kevin thought, anyone with long blonde hair and big boobs could get that sort of attention.
Kevin, like Jon, was not one of the more popular students at school. Kevin only meant his wish to have long blonde hair and big boobs as a joke. When he realized he was holding the stone and had said that wish out loud, he shuddered. He didn't want to be a girl, nor did he want long blonde hair and big breasts.
It would have been better, Kevin thought, if he had been transformed into a girl. That way he wouldn't have had to make up a story about a practical joke when he got home. He told his mother his breasts were false ones and that the long blonde hair was a wig. And then he went straight to his room and went to bed without dinner.
At least that was all a drea... Kevin's thought was interrupted as he sat up and eyed the breasts on his chest. "AAAAHHHH!!!!"
Kevin jumped out of bed and looked in the mirror. Sure enough, he saw a young man with long blonde hair and big breasts staring back at him in horror. This was wrong. He couldn't go through life looking like this. There had to be some way around that wish.
Kevin quickly got dressed, choosing his largest and loosest shirt so that it would fit around his breasts. Then he opened his window and snuck out of his house. He ran directly to Jon's house, hoping very few people would see him.
*****
Jon had just finished getting dressed, when he heard his mother call out "Jon, your friend Kevin is here to see you."
Kevin?, thought Jon. I don't have a...oh, right. I forgot...
"Send him in." Jon called back. He wondered for a moment just what Karyn, now Kevin, would look like.
He was shocked when Kevin threw open the door and stormed in, looking very upset. Kevin was a guy with long blonde hair and big breasts. As Jon realized that his new wish hadn't automatically negated Karyn's previous wish, Kevin spoke.
"Look at me! I'm a freak!" Kevin said. "Everyone's going to laugh at me! I don't care if you said wishes can't be reversed! Do something about this!"
"Karyn?" Jon asked.
"Karyn?" Kevin growled. "Oh, that's really funny! Calling me a girl. What are you going to do next, wish me all the way into a girl?"
Only now did Jon realize that Kevin remembered nothing of his previous life as Karyn. That was how the stone worked. Only those within earshot of the wish would know anything was different.
Jon also knew that neither he nor Kevin could wish Kevin into a girl, even though Kevin no longer remembered being a girl. Jon's wish was for Karyn to be his male friend, which meant that neither Jon nor anyone else could wish Kevin to be female or his enemy because those would go against the very specific wording of that wish.
"No." Jon said. "But I don't know what I should do. Wishes can't be reversed..."
"I know." said Kevin. "But there are ways around them. Give me the stone."
Jon thought about it for a moment, and then...
