Jon stopped in his tracks at the bottom of the stairs. The living room had been substantially redecorated -- the furniture was leather, there was a grand piano in one corner, and the carpet appeared substantially more plush. He turned the other way to see similar furniture in the family room, facing a gigantic TV that hung on the wall in the spot where the old familiar TV had been sitting atop a card table.
Confused, wondering if he'd made a wish in his sleep or something, Jon crossed through the family room -- huh, it didn't used to have a fireplace -- and went through the swinging door into the kitchen.
He stopped in his tracks again. The kitchen had been small and dark, something his mother complained about all the time (even though she hardly ever attempted cooking), but now it was huge and bright -- it appeared that the house had been expanded into the backyard, and the new back wall was mostly windows. The stainless-steel appliances and the copper pots hanging from the ceiling kind of made it look like it was straight out of an architectural magazine.
"Oh, good morning, honey," came a voice from behind Jon. "How does bacon and eggs sound?"
"What?" Jon turned to see a woman who looked like his mother Jane, but was about 15 years younger, wearing an abbreviated red silk robe with an Oriental design and matching high-heeled shoes. She had Jane's face, but tweaked ever so slightly -- lips plumper, cheekbones higher, eyes a sparkling blue -- and, from the way she was filling out the robe, a body out of a male's fantasies.
"My photo shoot today isn't until this afternoon," she said, "so I thought I'd make breakfast for you and Zoe." She walked past him to the refrigerator, which she opened and started rummaging around in. She came out with an armful of various foodstuffs that she put down on the counter. "Why don't you have a seat?"
"Uh, okay," Jon murmured as he moved numbly to the kitchen table, over by the copious windows. Had he made wishes that he wished to forget?
He sat down and asked, "Uh, Mom?"
She was taking a couple of skillets out of a cabinet and putting them on the stove. "What is it?"
"You're cooking," Jon observed.
"Yes, I know," she said, grabbing a few utensils out of a drawer.
"But, um, why?"
"Just a little treat for you two. I mean, over the last couple of months, I've kicked you out of the house when I had dates over and was cooking for them, so you've hardly gotten to have anything I've made."
"Dates?" Jon muttered to himself. His mother hadn't had a date in almost a year, as far as he knew. Although he'd already seen the wishing rock's reality-changing powers, so maybe looking like this...
"Oh, shoot," said Jane, looking over the assortment of ingredients she'd gathered. She held out a hand and said, "I wish I had a bunch of fresh basil."
Jon suddenly felt a sensation of something building up inside him, almost like air. It then felt as if it quickly exploded outward, and he saw some greens appear in his mother's hand. He gasped.
His mother turned, a look of concern on her face. "Are you all right? I'm sorry -- I thought you said you'd gotten used to that feeling. I know, I said I wouldn't use you for minor stuff -- but, trust me, you're going to be glad I put basil in the eggs."
While Jon was trying to process that, the swinging door slammed open.
"Oh, there you are," said Zoe, looking right at Jon. She was still obviously Goth, her face painted with dark makeup, but now she had a definite elegant look. Like Jane, her face had been noticeably tweaked to make her more beautiful; she also now had an impressive hourglass figure, being barely disguised by a lacy black babydoll nightie and panties, plus a pair of black platform heels that clicked across the kitchen floor as she walked toward the table.
She held up a Gothic fashion magazine. "I wish I was done up like this today," she said, pointing to a picture of a model.
Jon felt the sensation again, and after the pressure was released, Zoe was indeed done up like the model, in a purple-and-black vinyl fetish dress with a corset top to push up her porcelain cleavage and a ruffled miniskirt that stuck out. She wore purple-and-black striped stockings, and knee-high black vinyl boots with heels that must have been 8 inches high. Her black hair was now streaked with purple and separated into two long pigtails that came out the sides of her head; her makeup, still heavy, had altered to match the ensemble.
Looking down at herself happily, Zoe sat in a chair at the table as Jane said, "I thought we agreed we weren't going to take advantage of Jon's powers like that. You have a closet full of clothes like that, and whenever you want to buy more --"
"But, Mom," Zoe interrupted, "it's not like I'm hurting anything. We've been over this before. I'm the one who was into magic before this happened to Jon. We had that whole discussion about the 'if it harm none, do what ye will' philosophy that ended up with you wishing to look like that!" She gestured toward Jane, who responded by turning back to the mixing bowl of eggs and attacking them with a whisk.
Zoe leaned toward Jon and said, in a low voice, "And you have to admit, you've definitely been the opposite of harmed by some of the wishes I've made for you."
Jon gulped -- he shuddered to think of Zoe's interpretation of things that would be beneficial to him.
