*Before long I was standing down in the living room in nothing but a plain black bra and matching underwear to cover my modesty. In my hand I held the wishing stone. Zoe was right of course. I couldn't reverse an earlier wish, but I thought that I might have found a way around it. I didn't know if this was going to work for sure, but I had to try. I had to know what was so special about this other Karyn. Aside from Zoe, who I sometimes think began hanging out with me to spite her sister, nobody would have lifted a finger to save me. What was so special about this alternate version of myself? What had she done to inspire such loyalty?
There was only one way to find out. I thought about what the wishing stone had shown me. I recalled how things had begun with a boy named Jon, and his friend, one Karyn Black. I could remember the image of them sitting on the wall in the schoolyard, and I could almost see her making the first fateful wish to alter reality.
"I wish," I began, trying to ignore my racing heart, "That, standing before me right now, was a perfect duplicate in mind and body of the Karyn Black who existed immediately before she made the accidental wish to change her hair and breasts."*
My heart began to race as the room was enveloped in the familiar flash of light.
" wish I had long blond " from a sitting position a few feet in the air a girl fell to the carpet landing flat on her ass and looking more than a little confused. "Ouch," she said in an all too familiar voice as she began to look around the room. Her eyes failed to notice me at first, and I took that moment to take stock of the girl. "Jon!" she called. "This isn't funny! What the hell's going on?"
It was hard to believe that this scrawny little girl was me, or at least the me that might have been if my life had taken a different path. She was so scrawny. As she stood up, facing away from me where she'd landed. I realized that we were built along similar lines. She was thin, wearing loose denim jeans that completely hid her butt, the total opposite of what I normally wore. Unlike me, who had long blond hair for as far back as I could remember, at least until I'd fallen into the Goth crowd and decided to dye it black, her hair was short, and a bright red. When she turned around and saw me, there was more than a little surprise in her eyes. This Karyn, this alternate me, also looked like she smiled a lot more than I did. She was unblemished by the almost permanent scowl I always wore. Although the rather worn green jumper she was wearing did a lot to hide her chest, it was obvious that I was quite a bit more top heavy, we'll say, then she was. In some ways looking at her was like looking in a mirror. Aside from the readily apparent emotional differences etched in our skin, our faces were nearly identical. If she'd worn some eye liner and mascara, she might almost have passed for me.
"What's going on here?" she asked when our eyes met. Although she was obviously nervous, there was a kind of inner calm about her that I knew I would never possess. "Where's Jon?" She paused for a moment, as though she'd experienced a flicker of recognition. It was dark in the room aside from the moonlight, and I knew from my vantage point, I had a much clearer view of her than she did of me. "Are " she started, "are you Jon?" she was squinting now, trying to get a better look at me.
I shook my head, but I really wasn't in the mood to answer her questions. Seeing this thin little bitch filled me with emotions of all kinds, all vying for control of my faculties. Maybe Zoe had been right. Maybe this was a bad idea. Gripping the rock tightly I knew the right thing to do would be to wish this Karyn back into oblivion. I should just be rid of her, go upstairs, get back into bed with Zoe, and forget this had ever happened. That would have been the right thing to do. As much as I knew that though, I knew that I just couldn't do it. She was hear now and if I didn't take the opportunity, I knew I'd regret it.
"What the hell makes you so fucking special Karyn Black?" I snarled.
Karyn looked taken aback. It was apparent that the voice had shaken her, but she also hadn't been expecting such rage and hostility. "I I don't know what you're talking about. I'm not special." Even through the fear, her voice remained level, probably trying to distract me from the fact that she was taking a step backward. She was going to try and bolt.
"I wouldn't if I were you," I told her. My voice was a little calmer, but not much. I was having a hard time dealing with this. To emphasize my point I held the rock up so that she could clearly see it.
"Where did you get that?" she asked, her eyes widening. "Where's Jon?" I heard her voice shake ever so slightly. A chink in her armor.
"I think you'd better stay right there, and get used to the idea that I'm the one who's asking the questions right now. If you so much as breathe wrong I will fuck up your life beyond repair Karyn." It was weird calling her by that name, and part of me couldn't help but feel like I was talking to myself here. Still it stopped her from moving. I smiled ever so slightly, feeling a little bit more under control now and stepped into the light. "Now, we're going to have a little chat, okay?"
She simply nodded. I wasn't sure if she recognized me, knew that I was another version of her, but the look in her eyes told me that the wheels were turning in her mind. "You're going to answer my questions, do you understand me? If you cooperate, I might just let you leave unmolested." It was an outright lie. I had no intention of letting her leave at all, but whether or not she believed me, she nodded.
I stepped a little closer, and took a better look at my quarry. Although we had our differences, she certainly wasn't unattractive, and I began to feel the slight fluttering of inappropriate thoughts gathering together in the back of my mind. For the moment I set them aside though. Nothing was more important than figuring out exactly what made this girl tick.
"I'll ask you again," I said rather more in control of my emotions, "What makes you so special? What makes Jon and Natalie so eager to save you when everybody was so willing to push me aside?" At the mention of Jon's name I noticed a change in her eyes. "Why are they so willing to rewrite everybody else's life to bring you back?"
Karyn looked confused. "I still don't know what you're talking about," she said. "Please, let me see Jon."
"You just don't get it do you?" I said. "I have the rock now. Jon is completely irrelevant as far as your near future is concerned. Just answer the God damned question!" I didn't mean to shout, but I couldn't control it. Something about her brought it out in me. "Don't make me use this on you." Once again I held the rock up. In truth, I didn't want to use it on her. To find my answers I needed the Karyn Black who had existed before all of this started. If I started making reckless wishes I risked changing her and losing my chance to find out what I needed so desperately to know.
"I can't answer a question I don't understand," she said softly. There was a pleading edge in her voice.
I shook my head. This was getting me nowhere. "I did everything I could to make her like me," I said. "I tried to be the best friend she could ever have and she threw me out like some old garbage. What makes you so much better?" I paused. I was saying a lot more than I'd wanted to and I was only beginning to realize that I needed to get this off of my chest. "Jon would have walked through the fires of hell to save you. Why?" I paused for a moment. "Yeah, he definitely wanted to fuck you, but there was more to it than that. What made your friendship so special, so valuable?" It was difficult, but I managed to keep my voice from shaking.
"Who are you?" Karyn whispered. Something in her tone told me that she was starting to realize exactly who I was.
"Answer the question!" I shouted rather unexpectedly. She shrunk back a little.
"Why do you keep referring to Jon in the past tense?" she sounded scared now. Part of me liked it. "Did something happen to Jon?" I could see her breathing faster.
"I wish I had a very sharp knife in my free hand," I said quickly, opening my palm as I felt it materialize there. Covering the distance in just a few steps, far more quickly than she could react, I stepped behind her. I wrapped one arm around her torso, holding her arms in place as well, and used my other hand to press the edge of the knife softly against her throat. "I'm getting very fucking tired of this," I whispered in her ear. "If you don't start answering my questions then I swear to God I will slit your fucking throat. Do you understand me?"
"Yes," she whispered.
"Now, tell me about your friendship with Jon."
"Okay," she said, barely above a whisper. I could feel her body shaking against mine and I could practically taste her fear. It was an intoxicating feeling. It reminded me of how I'd felt watching the swarm engulf Cassandra. "We met at the bus stop, the first day of second grade," she began. "My family and I had just moved into town, and I really didn't know anybody. I kind of kept to myself anyway."
This was all sounding extremely familiar.
"I ignored him at first "
"But she wouldn't stop," I said almost automatically as the memories started to flood back. "It didn't matter how much I avoided her, or how many times I walked away, she just kept coming back. She kept on trying to make me laugh "
There was silence for a moment before I snapped back into the present. "Keep going," I urged, pressing the blade a little more forcefully against her flesh.
"Um, yeah," she said slowly. "We started to hang out a lot. We didn't live very far away and the neighborhood was fairly safe so my parents let me go over to his house sometimes after school and on the weekends." Though she couldn't see it, I nodded. I could remember it all so clearly, like it had happened only yesterday. "Sometimes, when we were younger, my parents would let me spend the night over at his place " I could tell by the sudden stop that there was something that she didn't want to talk about.
"What is it?" I asked. "Why did you stop?"
I felt her take a deep breath, felt her chest rise and fall. "I had a problem when I was younger. I grew out of it before I hit my teen years, but "
"You used to wet the bed," I said. It wasn't a question. "And Jon found out about it."
"How do you know all of this?" she asked softly, her voice quaking ever so slightly. "And why are you asking this? You seem to know everything there is to know about me."
"How did he react?" I asked, ignoring her questions.
"At first he was a little weirded out, but he came around, and promised not to tell anybody "
"And did he keep his promise?" I asked forcefully. "Did he keep your secret?"
"Yes," she whimpered. When I looked down I noticed I'd drawn a little bit of blood. On reflex I pulled the knife back a little. So that was where things had gone different. While Jon had kept her secret, Natalie had used it against me, but why. "Why did he keep his promise when she broke hers?"
"I don't know," Karyn whimpered. "I have no idea."
"He kept your secret for a reason!" I barked. "Why!" I turned her around and looked her directly in the eye. The moonlight coming in from the window glistened off of the tears that were running down her cheeks. "What made you so damn special!"
"I don't know!" she cried.
"Tell me bitch!" Without thinking I threw her to the ground as hard as I could. I knew she was holding out on me, and I was going to do everything I could to find out what she wasn't telling me. "Did you sleep with him, huh? Did you spread your legs and trade sex for confidentiality?"
"We were eight!" she cried out. "I don't know why he didn't tell! He was my friend! My best friend."
I stepped over her and crouched down over her stomach. Without reservation I brought my hand down and slapped her across the cheek as hard as I could. It made a satisfying crack and turned her head to the side. "Tell me you stupid bitch!" I slapped her again. Now she was crying in fear and pain. "Tell me what you did to make him like you!" Another slap across the red skin on her cheek. Karyn was crying now.
"What's going on down here?"
I turned to see Zoe standing at the foot of the staircase. She was naked aside from a pair of lacy purple underwear, and she looked extremely tired. Her eyes drifted from me to the Karyn laying beaten on the floor, and then back to me. There was a sad look in her eyes. She shook her head slowly and began to walk over to us.
"I told you this was a bad idea," she said softly as she came up behind me.
She pulled me without struggle up and off of Karyn, turned me around and gave me a hug. "This isn't the right way," she said quietly, "but I know why you did it." I hugged her back, struggling to regain my emotional balance. I leaned in and kissed her softly on the lips before I turned and looked back down at my doppelganger.
Her eyes drifted back and forth between Zoe and myself, a look of shock coming over her. "Zoe?" she whispered.
The younger girl turned her head ever so slightly and cracked a faint smile. She simply nodded.
"Zoe, we have to find your brother," Karyn pleaded. "Something's gone completely wrong, and he's the only one who can fix it." There were still tears flowing slowly from her eyes.
Zoe's eyes lit up and I could tell she was about to say something evil, but an idea was starting to form in my mind. I nudged her slightly, and was relieved when she took the hint and kept her mouth shut.
"What if I told you this was all Jon's idea," I asked casually." I felt Zoe wrap her arms around my waist, and I could tell she had an idea of where I was going with this.
"You're lying," she said, but I could detect the hint of doubt in her voice. Where a magical rock that granted nearly any wish came into play, nothing was certain.
I decided it was now or never. "Why would I lie to myself?"
"So it's true," she whispered, "You are me."
I nodded. "A version of you," I told her. "When Jon realized he could never have you, he used the rock to create me," as I lied, I could see the doubt beginning to grow behind those eyes of hers. "I wasn't good enough though, I wasn't the real thing." I paused, allowing this to sink in. "I'm not angry with him, probably I'm not allowed to be," I said casually, gesturing toward the rock.
"No," she whispered, but a lot of her defiance was gone. "When did he have the time? I was just with him?"
Good, I thought. The questions she was asking told me she was really considering what I was telling her. "He wanted the original you, before you changed your breasts and hair. He made me pluck you from that point in time." I paused and added, "Four days ago."
"He wouldn't," she said, but I knew she had to be wondering. Jon had a stone that could grant him any wish, and he could always alter it to avoid the consequences. If he really wanted her that badly, why shouldn't he take the opportunity to go for it.
"Well, you'll know soon enough," I told her. "He knows you're here and he'll be home soon. He's been waiting for this for three weeks now and boy does he have plans for you."
Karyn was shaking her head, and it was easy to see that she was scared out of her wits. "Now," I told her in a soothing voice, "let's get you ready." I crouched back over her, trying to hold back the arousal I was starting to feel. Seeing her lying there on the ground, feeling completely powerless was giving me a little bit of a thrill. In the back of my mind I knew that I shouldn't be feeling it. I was certain there was something wrong on a deep psychological level with being sexually attracted to yourself, but I didn't really care. Before she could say anything else, I back handed her, knocking her out.
About ten minutes later we'd finished handcuffing Karyn's wrists to the bed post in Zoe's parents' bedroom, and were staring down at her. For the purposes of prolonging the experience she was about to have, we'd left her fully clothed. I'd had to fight Zoe on that one, who'd wanted to take a quick look. Now, as we finished admiring our handiwork, we stepped out of the bedroom and closed the door.
"I still say you should have let me have some fun," Zoe pouted, "We could have used the rock to make her forget about it afterward."
I looked at her, more than a little surprised. "Do you ever think about anything besides sex?" I asked with a smirk.
"Can't help it," she said. "Channeling as much supernatural energy as I usually do has a very erotic effect on the body."
"Well don't ever stop channeling then," I said. "Now, I think it's time we begin. She nodded in agreement.
Standing in the dark, in the hallway with the bedroom door closed, I held the rock tightly. "I wish "
