It was strange that Sarah would become my savior. She'd never want to, of course. She'd never knowingly do anything to help me like that. But she didn't need to. Just saying what she had said had already saved me.
"Liz," I said, "listen to me a moment."
"Fine" she said. "If it'll get you calmer so we can get this problem fixed...."
I explained to Liz just how what Sarah had said showed the hole in Liz's story. "Liz, the rock didn't make Sarah want me to be Jennifer, because she was out of the range of the stone. Sarah might have been, oh, a couple of miles away. Now, you're telling me I lived in California and I wished myself to Illinois with that stone, making a completely fake existence halfway across the country? How is it that a couple of miles is outside the range limit and California to Illinois isn't?"
"Steps" she said hesitatingly. "Maybe the stone did it in steps. Transported you a couple of miles over and over again... until you got here."
"So you're telling me I made a single wish for things to be different, and the stone decided to make it come true by doing a hundred things in a row when the way I worded the wish could easily have just moved me a block or changed my hair color instead? I think you're reaching. Tell Dad to let me go, Liz."
She hesitated again. But clearly she was no longer quite as eager to make the wish. She kept holding the stone, but she didn't say anything.
"Let me see the rock" said Karyn. "We'll figure out how to make him into Jennifer."
And Liz handed it to her. Maybe Liz was too conflicted to make the wish herself, but not so much so that she wouldn't hand the stone to someone more eager to change me while sparing Liz the burden of deciding anything.
"Karyn, no!" I exclaimed.
Karyn gripped the stone in her hand... and made a wish I certainly hadn't expected. "I wish that everyone in this room except me, Liz, and Jon were gone and wouldn't remember what happened here." Dad was gone from the room. Sarah, having saved me quite unintentionally, was gone too. As I stumbled, my dad no longer holding me, Karyn pressed the stone into my hand. "You know, Jon" she said, "I really think you should be Jennifer. At least consider it, okay?"
I had underestimated Karyn. Vastly underestimated her. Think about it... if someone was really your friend, and you wanted them to do something, would you force it on them? Maybe if you were trying to stop them from driving drunk or committing suicide, but usually, no, you wouldn't. Why, then, had I expected Karyn to force me? She didn't think she was righting a horrible wrong by making me Jennifer, she just thought it would be cool.
Holding the stone, I made my wish. "I wish that me, Liz, and Karyn know what's really going on here and why Liz thinks I'm Jennifer." And we did....
