I wish I was already at school now, ready to go to class in the next half hour."
The stone's wish went off... and Fran was now in the schoolyard. So was Jamie. So, in fact, was everyone else on the bus. Except one thing was a little strange. The bus driver, who was in her twenties, was there too... only she was now the same age as everyone else.
"Wait a minute... said Fran. "You're right, that is a magic stone, but... what just happened? Why does the bus driver look the same age as the students?"
"I don't know," replied Jamie.
"I do," replied Karyn, who was on the bus, now was in the schoolyard. She didn't even notice that she--or Lola--or Jon(nie)--had moved. But she seemed to know something was up, anyway.
"Karyn?" replied Fran. "What do you know about this stone?"
"I know," she replied, "that it belongs to Jonnie. Or the real one does. This is a bad stone. It doesn't grant wishes to you, it grants them to everyone around you too... whether you want to or not!"
"Yeah," said Joanna. "What did you wish for?"
"Uhh," said Fran. "I wished I was at school and ready for class."
"And you got it!" replied Joanna. "So did everyone else. We're ready for class. The bus driver, whoever that was, is now ready for class too... so she's turned into a student."
"Anyway," replied Lola, "we need it back. We need to figure out what happened, and get the right one. This one doesn't work right, it can cause a disaster!"
Fran didn't really want to give the stone up, and probably wouldn't have if it had been the real stone, but the prospect of accidentally making everyone the most popular girl in the school, or giving everyone the same boyfriend, scared her. Reluctantly, she gave the stone back to Karyn.
"Now what do we do?" said Karyn.
"I don't know," said Lola. "What do you think, Jonnie?" she asked, rubbing up against the now female Joanna.
"I don't know... We need to find the real stone. I don't see how I could have thought this was the stone... it's three inches bigger! Maybe if we went somewhere where there wasn't anyone around for fifty feet...."
