Then Jon had it. It was the perfect wish. If he made it, it would solve everything.
"Here's my wish," he said. "I forget everything I know now, until I become the same age I was when I first got the stone--except a little earlier--and then I remember everything. My life up to that point will be the same as it was before. Then I get the stone, because when Grandpa sent it to me he sent it back in time several days. I wish I knew if that would do what I wanted."
Jon, after saying that, felt that it did, indeed, do what he wanted.
"I wish it would happen."
Jon was a normal baby again. He grew up just as he did last time around, repeating his life, until one day he woke up. Suddenly he remembered everything. He looked at himself, at the room... checked his email and found the same message from Karyn he had been reading last time around. Nothing had changed.
Then a box materialized on his desk. It was the stone, of course.
But this time it was a few days before spring break. None of the other wishes he made in the present had happened yet. Even Karyn's breasts and hair weren't messed up.
"You got a what?" asked Karyn.
"A wishing stone. Look, I'll prove it. Name a band."
"Evanescence. Uhh, that's cliched. Is it okay?"
"It's fine. I wish Karyn's holding a new Evanescence CD."
Suddenly her hands, which weren't even closed, now held a brand new compact disk. "Yikes!" she said, dropping the CD, then picking it up sheepishly.
"How did you get it? What does it do? Tell me all about it!"
"It grants wishes. As many as I want, but it has a limited range, and you can't reverse the wishes. I got it from my grandfather, who's scheduled to die during spring break."
"Excuse me?"
"Karyn, this isn't the first time this has happened. Grandpa owned the stone. He died and I inherited it from him, and you and I tried it out... and you accidentally gave yourself long blonde hair and big breasts. Then Mom got ahold of it and I tried to fix her wish... I ended up back in the past as a baby. I figured that if I push the time back a little bit I can prevent trouble."
"I'm not sure if I understand this. You're saying that because you got the stone earlier, my mistake didn't happen yet, and you can warn me not to make it?"
"Right. And, maybe, since he hasn't died yet... I can save Grandpa." We have all of Spring Break to do it in, you know. No school.
