Seven Wishes (or Good Luck, Bitches) - J2 - NC17 - Part One
Back to the Master Post
Jared stares into his beer as if it contains the secret of life, spinning the glass in a circle between his hands, making it leave a trail of condensation across the polished surface of the bar. It looks like the sludge trail left by a huge snail and the thought almost makes him smile. Almost. He spins the glass with a little more force, making beer slush over the edges and onto his hands, soaking into his cuffs. Serves him right, he supposes, for drinking beer from the tap and not out of a bottle like a real man.
"Would you stop that?" Jensen, Jared's best friend, asks. "You're driving me insane here."
Jared makes a face, but drops his hands from the glass nonetheless, drying them listlessly on a napkin. He reaches for the peanuts instead, taking a fistful and raising the hand to his mouth.
"I'm warning you," Jensen says. "If you stuff all those nuts in your mouth and then start spraying them around when you talk, I'm leaving."
Jared lets half of the nuts drop back into the bowl before stuffing the rest into his mouth and chewing. Jensen is the worst friend ever. He sucks.
"You suck," he says, only letting a few tiny pieces of peanut mush escape his mouth. One of them attaches itself to Jensen's eyebrow.
Jensen sighs and wipes the smudge away with the back of his hand. "You suck," he retorts, but he doesn't leave so Jared thinks that's a win. Maybe.
"You suck more. All your ideas for how I'm gonna win Sandy back sucks. Flowers? Mix tapes?"
"Yeah, because your ideas are so much better. Sky diving into her back garden? You're afraid of heights. Hiring a plane to write her name across the sky? You don't have those kinds of funds. Sending yourself in a package to her office. Naked? I'm pretty sure she'd hate you forever."
"But you're gay. You're supposed be better at this."
"Oh wait, let me consult the gay manual." Jensen makes a great show of pulling an imaginary book out of his pocket and leafing through it. "Nope, can't find a single sentence that says I should be better at hetero relationships than you."
Jared narrows his eyes and lets his head plunk down on the bar. "I wish there was a way to just get her back."
Jensen opens his mouth to retort but whatever he was going to say is cut short when a ball from the billiards table misfires and hits Jared's glass of beer instead. The glass explodes, sending pieces of glass and beer flying everywhere.
"Shit," Jensen says, jumping back. "Are you okay?"
Jared straightens up with beer dripping from his hair. "Never been better," he says dryly, picking the ball up and turning towards the table.
The shooter is standing with one hip cocked on the table, an obnoxious smile on his face. "Oops," he says, without a hint of regret. "Care to give that back?"
Jared blinks, looking down on the ball in his hand and then back up at the shooter, who's dressed in a purple tight fitting suit, with a lime green shirt underneath. The shirt is half unbuttoned to reveal the shooter's bony white chest and a frightening number of gold chains. Jared would put his age around thirty and he looks about as trustworthy as a kick to the balls.
"Maybe I do," Jared says, getting up from the chair and straightening to his full height. He got at least four inches on the smarmy bastard and maybe fifty pounds of muscle, but the guy doesn't look the slightest bit deterred.
"Take it easy," Jensen says, putting a hand on his arm, but Jared shrugs it off. He's got a head full of glass and he got chills from the beer running down the back of his shirt. He's just gonna have a talk with the guy.
"I couldn't help but to overhear," the guy says when Jared comes closer, picking the ball out of Jared's hand. "About how you want your girlfriend back… I'm good at that sort of thing."
Jared looks the guy up and down, raising his eyebrows. The guy got to be kidding. He looks like a pimp who's some skills short of a ho.
"Thanks but no thanks," he says, turning on his heel and stalking back to the bar, his anger dissolving with the fumes of stale beer from his bangs.
He throws a ten down on the bar, where a wet spot is all that's left of the accident. "I'm leaving," he says to Jensen. "Gotta get this mess out of my hair."
"Be careful," Jensen says with some sort of aborted gesture in his direction.
Jared raises his eyebrows. "Dude, if you wanna wash my hair, all you have to do is say so."
Jensen's eyes narrow. "Fine," he says. "Go ahead and cut your head open, but don't come crying to me afterwards."
"Later," Jared says with a smile.
Jensen just snorts, but Jared can see that he's fighting a smile as well.
Jared lives just around the corner from the bar, so the amount of time he has to spend outside is very limited. At least it would be if there wasn't a surprise waiting for him leaning against the door to his apartment building. It's the smarmy guy from the bar. He didn't only beat Jared to the door, he also managed a to change his clothes. Gone is the purple and lime ensemble, in favor of a dark red suit with the same unfortunate cut and a black silk shirt revealing a startling lack of chest hair and almost as many gold chains as he was wearing earlier.
"What do you want?" Jared asks. He's not angry any more, but he's got stale beer in his butt crack and he smells like a sloppy drunk. He would very much like a shower.
"I wasn't kidding in there," smarmy guy says. "I really can help you get your girlfriend back."
"How?"
"Let me put it like this… In exchange for a teeny tiny thing that you're not exactly using anyway, I'll give you seven wishes to use as you see fit."
"Seven wishes? What are you, a genie?" It would explain the get up, Jared supposes.
"Something like that yes." The guy does a little pirouette and in a shower of sparks his clothes change again. Jared's not sure it's an improvement, hot pink and lavender does nothing for the guys complexion.
"I think the beer fumes are getting to my head," Jared says, rubbing at his brow.
"It's not a trick," smarmy guy says. "You can call me Chad, but other knows me as Lucifer."
"Lucifer?"
"Belsebub, Shaitan, Prince of Darkness… I'm the freaking Devil."
The guy, well Chad, hands Jared a business card. It's black with red text; Satan - Ruler of the underworld. The S has horns and a little tail that could possibly be painted on with pink marker. Jared rolls his eyes and tries to hand the card back.
"Whatever dude, I don't believe in fairy tales."
Chad sighs, putting his fingertips together. When he pulls them apart and window opens between his hands. Jared looks into it and sees him and Sandy kissing. Her arms are wrapped around his neck and he got his hands on her perky little ass. A stab of longing goes through him, they were so great together. Why can't she see that?
She had a long list of character flaws lined up when she dumped him, going through them on by one until Jared felt as if he'd imagined their entire relationship. He thought they were happy, but apparently he was lousy at communicating, spent too much time with his friends, too little time with her, and failed his sensitive and caring boyfriend class.
Jared reaches out as if to touch the picture and Chad claps his hands together, making it disappear in a shower of sparkles.
"Made up your mind yet?" Chad asks, raising his eyebrows.
"If I say yes… What is it that you want in return?" Jared asks, even if he already knows. Everyone knows what the Devil wants.
"Your soul," Chad says and Jared wonders if he only imagines the resonance of impending doom. Still, it's not like he uses his soul for much, it's just there. It's like a roommate that never pays rent, maybe it's time that it paid its dues. He knows he should think twice about this. Wait and see if it sounds as half a good an idea come morning, but he's tired and depressed and he just wants his girlfriend back.
"Fine," he says. "Where do I sign?"
Chad produces a contract out of nowhere. Jared scans through it, stopping when he comes to his name.
"I, Jared Padalecki, from here on known as The Damned?" He gives Chad a quizzical look.
"Well, you are selling your soul here."
Jared nods, makes sense. He's pretty sure the glass and beer rain gave him a concussion and that all of this is just a dream anyway. He's convinced that if the Devil really existed he'd have a better sense of style, and have horns. He finishes reading the contract and Chad hands him a pen. It's one of those fake feather ones and it evaporates into thin air as soon as Jared's name's on the dotted line.
Chad rubs his hands together and grins. "Let's get going, shall we?"
"Going where?" Jared asks in alarm, because maybe he didn't read the contract as closely as he should have, seeing as this is all just a concussed nightmare. Any minute now Jensen going to wake him up by dousing him in beer and they'll go back to their regularly scheduled moping.
"I meant with the wishes." Chad rolls his eyes.
"Oh… Yeah… Don't I get to shower and change first? I got beer in my underwear."
Chad rolls his eyes again. "Christ, you humans are hard to please."
Jared finds himself showered by sparks and when they stop swimming in front of his eyes he's no longer wet and uncomfortable. He's dry and uncomfortable instead.
"So come on." Chad rocks back and forth on his heels. "Hit me."
Jared is tempted but he stuffs his hands into his pockets instead. "Sandy said she wanted me to be better at communicating. So I guess I want to be better at that."
Chad sighs. "You have to say I wish… and oh… if you for some reason you want out of a wish, just call for me."
"I wish… Want out?"
"Nothing to worry about. Make a wish and I'll make it come true."
Jared narrows his eyes, but once you made your boat you have to sit in it, or whatever expression it was his grandma used to say.
"I wish I was better at communication," he says.
Jared Padalecki is a living legend. At the age of twenty six he's CEO of Western Europe's largest Telecom company and the youngest diplomat the UN has ever seen. He's a great linguist, not only mastering his native Polish, but also Russian, German, Finnish, Arabic, Turkish and the diplomatic language of French. Sources claim that he's also fluent in the language of love, but let's leave that one up to the ladies, eh?
"This is brilliant," Jared says, leaning back in his very comfortable chair and throwing his loafer covered feet up on the huge mahogany desk. "I'm awesome."
He kind of wants to look down on his own mouth, because he understands the words coming out of it, but he doesn't know the language.
"You are awesome, Mr. Padalecki. I always say so."
Jensen is standing just inside the door, hugging a clipboard to his chest. He looks kind of harried, as if Jared's been running him ragged and the collar of his knitted sweater is sticking up on one side.
"Your collar's standing up," Jared says, leaning even further back. He's famous, he's a legend. That Devil really knows what he's doing. "Do you know Sandy McCoy?" he asks, swiveling the chair around to look at Jensen.
Jensen is busy trying to straighten his collar using the murky reflection from the door and he jumps when he realizes Jared's now facing him.
"That American journalist you've taken a shine to? I know who you mean."
It's very odd to hear Jensen speak another language and it kind of doesn't sit well with him that Jensen seems to be less his best friend and more his employee, but whatever, he can change that.
"Can you get her here?"
"Yeah, of course."
Jensen slinks out the door and Jared swivels back to the desk. There's a sleek Mac set up to his right and no less than three phones and a fax machine lines the enormous desk. One wall is more or less covered in diplomas from different schools, written in swirly script and embossed with shining seals. He likes it, makes him look important.
He gets up to look out the huge windows that span the wall facing the desk. The view doesn't really tell him anything, just lots of old houses and the grey sludge of snow covering the ground. He catches his own reflection in the windows and grins, he looks smashing in a two piece pinstriped suit with his hair swept back. Sandy's not going to know what hit her.
There's a polite knock on the door and Jared hurries to open. Jensen is standing outside with Sandy at his shoulder. She looks a bit intimidated, but she brushes past Jensen when he gestures her inside.
"Welcome," Jared says. "Please have a seat."
He indicates one of the plush chairs set up before his desk and Sandy sits down on the edge of it, pulling on her skirt. Instead of sitting in the office chair, Jared opts to take the other visitors chair, crossing his legs and looking his fill of her. She looks amazing, her shiny dark hair is swept back into a tight bun at the back of her head and she's got glasses perched on her nose. She looks like the embodiment of every naughty secretary fantasy Jared's ever had. This is going to be awesome.
"I bet you're wondering why I asked you here," Jared says with a smile. "But there's no reason to be nervous."
Sandy blinks at him, looking anything but reassured.
"I spotted you in the hall earlier and I just had to have my assistant find you, because you, my lady, are the embodiment of perfection."
Sandy still just blinks at him, queasy look on her face.
"If I was a greater man I'd write poems to the shine of your hair and the curve of your lips, but I am nothing but a mere CEO and linguistics expert, so I'll have to settle for telling you that you are wonderful in every language I know, which are quite many actually."
Sandy shifts in her chair and chews on her lower lip, a slight flush rising in her cheeks. Jared's clearly getting to her. He proceeds to tell her, in no uncertain terms and in a number of languages, that he thinks she is awesome and also that they are meant to be together.
Sandy looks more and more flustered, blinking rapidly and licking her lips over and over again, while staring wide eyed at him. He takes this as encouragement and moves his chair closer, being as brave as to touch their feet together.
She shoots out of the chair so fast it almost topples over. "?????" she says angrily. "?????. ?????"
Jared doesn't understand a word that comes out of her mouth. "What?" he asks.
She keeps on going, waving her hands around and shaking her fist at him. He still doesn't understand, but he can tell she's angry.
"Calm down," he says. "It's not like I'm trying to rape you. I'm just asking for a date."
With a last, "????????" She walks out and slams the door so hard that a couple of Jared's diplomas fall down.
Jared clenches his teeth and glares at the door. It opens a fraction and Jensen looks inside.
"You okay?" he asks. "She looked angry."
"I'm fine."
Jared moves over to pick the diplomas up and throws them on the desk. "She didn't understand me. Can you believe that? I speak seven languages and she didn't understand a one."
Jensen slithers inside and pushes the door shut, taking Jared diplomas from where he threw them and carefully repositioning them on the wall.
"That's how they are, the Americans," he says. "You'll find someone else."
"But I only want her," Jared pouts, throwing himself into the comfortable chair again. "There's no one else for me."
"You look tense," Jensen says. "Want me to rub your shoulders?"
"Yeah, fine. Whatever."
Jensen's hands are warm and strong as they dig into the tense muscles at the back of his neck. Jared lets his eyes slip shut and his head fall forward giving Jensen free access to his aching shoulders. The drag and pull of Jensen's fingers is hypnotic and Jared finds himself at the verge of falling asleep.
He opens his eyes about to tell Jensen to stop when he catches sight of Jensen's reflection in the dark computer screen. The look of wistful longing on Jensen's face sends a stab of emotion that he doesn't even know how to name through Jared's body and he jerks his head up so quick he almost brains Jensen.
"Chad," he near to screams and the world dissolves into sparks.
Jared's got his hands locked tight around Chad's scrawny throat and does his best to bash his head against the nearest flat surface, in the case the floor.
"I take it the wish wasn't to your liking," Chad says with obvious amusement, not sounding as if he's being strangled at all.
Jared just growls and continues trying to kill him.
"I wish I was more sensitive."
Jared blinks his eyes open, he's in a bed in a dark room and Sandy is standing over him dressed in a naughty nurse outfit , with a smile on her face. Score.
"What would you like to eat today?" Sandy asks.
"Steak?" Jared asks with a smile. His voice sounds weird, thin and brittle.
Sandy smiles and pats his shoulder, very, very gently. "You're such a trooper," she says. "Always with a smile."
She does something beside the bed and Jared realizes she's hooking a bottle up to an IV line, a line that goes down to the bed and disappears at his chin. Crap. He looks around, mostly swiveling his eyes because his head is weirdly heavy. He's in a hospital, laid out in a bed, surrounded by machines with tubes, lines and cables disappearing in under the covers.
"This might sound strange," he says. "But what's wrong with me?"
"Oh Jared," she says softly. "What isn't wrong with you?"
He blinks, feeling panicky and tries to sit up.
"Be still," she says. "You know how easily your bones break."
Jared stills. He doesn't know, but that doesn't sounds kind of ominous.
"And if you break another bone, your hemophilia might kill you. We wouldn’t want that now, would we?"
Jared shakes his head, or at least tries to. He doesn't want that at all. The door opens and he hisses as light explodes across his eyes, making it feel as if he's brain's been stabbed.
"Sorry," Jensen says from the door, stepping inside and closing it. "Didn't mean to."
"It's okay," Jared says, blinking to get rid of the spots dancing before his eyes.
Jensen smiles down at him and set something down at the table beside the bed. "How are you holding up man?" he asks.
Jared sighs. "I'm just peachy," he answers, looking up at the pristine roof.
"I'll leave you two to catch up," Sandy says, apparently done with whatever she was doing beside the bed.
Jared looks after her as she leaves. "She's perfect," he says, shutting his eyes as the door is opened again, not looking up until the evil light is shut out. "Just perfect."
He cuts his eyes to Jensen who looks like he's the one bleeding inside. "I brought a new book," Jensen says with the fakest smile Jared's ever seen. "I don't think there are any… exciting scenes in this one."
Jared sighs. "What is it?"
"Harry Potter. The first one. Thought it might cheer you up."
Jared sighs again. "You know what would cheer me up? Being able to jerk off without breaking my wrist."
He looks at Jensen again to find him blushing crimson. "I'm sorry," Jensen says. "I wish there was something I could do to make you better."
Jared smiles, genuine this time. "You come here every day," he says. "That means a lot."
Jensen blushes even darker and Jared takes pity on himself by calling out for Chad.
"What the fuck was that?" Jared screams, chasing Chad around a car.
"Hemophilia, osteogenesis imperfect, severe food allergy, light sensitivity and yeah, a screwy immune system… In reality you wouldn't have survived your first year, so it was a blessing, really."
"I HATE YOU," Jared screams, launching himself over the hood of the car towards Chad.
"I'm the Devil," Chad says, sidestepping easily. "I'm used to it."
"I wish I was a better listener."
"And then he said, I bet you'd look great with red hair. I mean… what does he mean by that? Does he want me to dye my hair? Or is he trying to hint that he likes redheads? I don't get it. Why even say something like that? Guys are such dicks. And still I find myself sitting by the phone waiting for him to call, how pathetic is that? I knew I should have never agreed to stick a finger up his ass, he got all weird after that. I mean, what's the big deal if you like to have your prostate tickled? It's not like it makes you gay or anything, but now he's like blowing me off… Do you think he's gay?"
Jared shakes his head slowly as not to agitate Sandy even further. She snorts and throws her hands up.
"You men are all alike, having each other's backs at all times. I bet he's gay. Are you gay?"
Jared shakes his head again and she makes an impatient noise through her nose.
"I don't even know why I come here anymore. It costs a fortune and it's not like you've healed me or anything. I'm still just as neurotic. Remember that thing I told you about with the pancakes and the chocolate sauce and the ice cream? I still do that, even though I've been seeing you for a year. Anyway back to Helmut. He has the tiniest little dick, would you believe it? I act like he's fucking Godzilla, but really? It's fucking tiny. It's like getting fucked by a toothpick. Have you ever been fucked by a toothpick? It's not very satisfying."
Jared hums and looks down on the notebook he's got open on his knees. It's scribbled full with Sandy's name and little hearts, and yeah, there's the name Helmut with the words die, die, die written three times over it.
"Oh God, I wish I could just quit him, you know. But how the fuck do you quit a guy? They get under your skin and suddenly you're looking for their approval every step of the way and if you break it off, you feel guilty. I mean, who would want to go out with a loser like Helmut? I'm like his savior, or something."
She grows quiet and looks up at the roof for a moment.
"I had a dream the other night that you fucked me on this couch. Can you believe it?"
Jared jerks his head up and opens his mouth.
"I mean… that would be gross. No offense but seriously… ewwww."
Jared takes offense, snapping his notebook shut. "Oh dreary, look at the time," he says. "Will I see you next week, Ms McCoy?"
She blinks a couple of times before swinging her legs off the couch and sitting up.
"Yeah," she says with a smile. "You might not be a miracle worker, but it's great to have someone that listens."
She grabs her bag off the floor and gets to her feet. "See you next week Dr. Padalecki."
Jared opens his mouth to say: 'call me Jared,' but she's already heading for the door. "Bye," he says instead, but it rings out to an empty room.
The door opens again and there's a quick rush of hope, but it turns out it's just Jensen.
"Women are insane," Jared says with a sigh. "I'll never understand them."
Jensen grins. "It's just one of the reasons I'm happily gay."
"What are the others?" Jared asks.
"Well, guys have bigger dicks. I must admit that's an important factor when you like taking it up the ass…"
Jared flushes bright red and crosses his legs. Jensen grins, completely unrepentant.
"And generally speaking they're more in favor of giving blow jobs, because giving means receiving. Oh, and they smell better. I just don't like that flowery vanilla crap that girls seem to bathe in."
Jared squirms and Jensen's grin widens. He leans back against the door and crosses his arms across his chest.
"Am I getting you all hot and bothered Dr. Padalecki?" he asks. "Please do tell me if I'm crossing the line."
"Chad," Jared says helplessly, because what else is there to say.
"You know when they say be careful what you wish for? It's not just something they say," Chad points out, leaning back against the wall and crossing his arms over his chest.
He's dressed up for the occasion in a black velvet suit, with flared pants and a bright pink shirt underneath. There's a heavy gold chain hanging around his neck with a pendant that spells Satan in sparkling rhinestones. It looks horrible, but then so does all of Chad's outfits.
Jared sighs and runs a hand over his brow. The wishes aren't turning out the way he want them too. He needs to pick the right one. He already covered three, but he's got four left. There must be one wish that goes his way. He runs through Sandy's little speech in his head again and nods when he remembers one he hasn't tried yet.
"I wish I didn't need to spend so much time with my friends."
It's 8.25 which means that in less than five minutes Jared's divine neighbor will walk out the door heading for work. Jared doesn't know her first name, but in his head he calls her Ms. McCoy because that's what it says on her door. Jared looked at it once, while she was at work, but then he had to go lay down for a while.
Some days she will turn in his direction after locking the door and those days Jared almost faints with the excitement, blushing bright red for hours afterwards, but this doesn't seem to be one of those days. She just locks the door, hoist her bag up on her shoulder and walks down the corridor towards the elevator.
Jared presses closer to the door to be able to see better. She's wearing a light yellow tunic and leggings, with those high heeled boots that Jared likes so much. Her hair is gathered up in a pony tail and he thinks he spots nail polish when she reaches out to press the button, his heart races. She shifts her feet a couple of times and looks into her bag while she waits for the elevator. Jared wonders what she keeps in there, because the bag is huge. It's just one of the mysteries that surround her.
The elevator arrives and she steps inside, disappearing from his line of vision. Jared stays pressed to the door until he's sure she's not coming back, before taking a step back and inhaling sharply. Sometimes, late at night, he lay awake and imagines her ringing on his door. It's happened once before, but she went away before he could work up the courage to open. It's probably just as well, he can't talk to girls. He sweat and stutter and blush and sweat, until they give up and go away, but in his dreams he can talk to them. In his dreams, he's awesome at talking to girls.
The doorbell rings and Jared nearly flutters out of his skin, sneaking up to the door and looking out. It's Jensen. Jensen delivers groceries and is the only one Jared knows how to talk to. Kind of.
"I don't think I can open the door today," he says.
Jensen smiles and waves at him. "Just put your hand on the lock and twist it and then you press the handle down. Don't forget the security chain."
Jared follows the instructions. Jensen is cool. He pushes the door open just a tiny bit and looks out at Jensen.
"Hey," Jensen says. "I brought your groceries."
He holds the bags up and Jared nods, stepping aside. Jensen kicks the door wide open when he walks in, so Jared hides in the living room for a moment, waiting until he hears the snick of the door closing. He looks around the corner to find Jensen standing the hall. Jensen smiles at him.
"Want to check and see that I got everything?" he asks, indicating the bags at his feet.
Jared shakes his head slowly. He's marginally better at talking to Jensen than girls, but only marginally.
"They were out of the dark toast so I got you white. Is that okay?"
Jared nods again.
"Did you see Ms McCoy today? Was she pretty?"
Jared manages a smile and nods. "She's… She's… Uhm… she's always pretty."
"You should talk to her, you know," Jensen says, reaching into his pocket for the receipt. "I think she'd like you."
Jared shakes his head so hard he gets dizzy and Jensen laughs. It's a good sound, soft and full, kind of like Jared's pillow.
"You laugh like my pillow," Jared says, because there's more than one reason he can't talk to girls. He has a tendency to say exactly what he thinks.
Jensen laughs again. "How so?"
Jared blushes miserable, sweat soaking through his shirt. "It's soft," he mutters.
"My laugh, or your pillow?"
"Both."
Jensen smiles and holds out the receipt. Jared moves closer and snatches it out of Jensen's hand. It's still warm from Jensen's fingers and he kind of want to hold it to his cheek.
"Money?" Jensen asks, when Jared just stares at him.
"Oh right."
Jared fishes his wallet out of his pocket and carefully counts out the amount from the receipt, then he adds another ten for Jensen.
"For your car," he mutters, blushing red.
"Thanks man," Jensen says, taking the money out of his hand.
Jared shivers when their fingers touch, pulling his hand back. "See you Friday," he murmurs, ducking his chin.
"Friday," Jensen agrees with another smile.
Jared locks the door after him when he leaves, pressing up close to be able to watch him at the same time. Jensen waves before he enters the elevator and Jared dumbly waves back, hitting his knuckles against the door. He sighs and bangs his head against the door a couple of times.
"Chad," he says, but not with anger this time. His tone is more tempered by resignation.
"You're very creative, I have to give you that," Jared says, when he reappears in his own apartment trailed by a shower of sparks.
Chad grins. He's honoring the occasion of Jared's fifth wish dressed in a three piece brown leather monstrosity with a wide lapelled canary yellow shirt underneath. Despite the dusk of the room he's wearing oversized sunglasses, and rings glimmers on every finger.
"Did you think of another wish?" he asks, with a smile that would make the Cheshire cat proud.
Jared sighs and rubs his hands over his face. "I don't know," he says.
To be honest, even if he's not ready to admit that even to himself, he's getting kind of tired of Sandy. She's an amazing girl and they had a great time together, but Chad always manages to twist her into someone who's unattainable, or just downright annoying.
"Come on, man," Chad says. "She's the woman of your dreams."
At the moment it's more of a nightmare, but Jared's never been a quitter. "Fine," he says. "One last chance. I wish I spent more time with Sandy."
When the sparks stop dancing before Jared's eyes, he's standing in a dark room. There's enough light trailing in through the windows for him to make out the shape of a couch and a table, but not much more. He takes a step forward and stumbles over something in the dark falling to the floor with an angry curse and a lot of clatter. A door opens and light spills into the room.
"Who's there?" It's Sandy's voice, she sounds scared.
"It's just me," Jared says with a smile, disentangling himself from the footstool he stumbled over in the dark.
Sandy looks adorable in a white flowing gown with bunny slippers on her feet. There's only one wrong in the picture and that would be the gun she's pointing straight at him.
"Jesus Christ Jared," she says. "Are you never going to give up?"
Jared looks down the barrel of the gun, noticing that her hands are not shaking at all.
"The restraining order says you have to keep at least fifty feet away from me. This is not fifty feet."
Jared sighs and hauls himself up on the footstool, burying his head in his hands.
"I'm calling the cops," she says, fumbling behind her for the phone.
"A little more to the right," Jared says helpfully.
She narrows her eyes, but she moves her hand and gets her fingers around the receiver, pulling it from the holder on the wall. The gun never stops pointing in his direction. She's hardly had time to lift the receiver to her ear when he hears sirens outside, coming closer at alarming speed.
"You're such a fucking klutz," she says. "You must have triggered the alarm when you got in."
Jared nods, looking at her through his fingers. "I'm sorry," he says.
She sighs and shakes her head. Someone must have picked up at the other end because she explains the situation and hums a couple of times. He barely has time to react before a couple of policemen burst in through the door and he's tackled to the floor and handcuffed. He's never been handcuffed before, it's very uncomfortable and they hit his head against the car when they help him into the backseat. He's pretty sure they do it on purpose, he did see one of the policemen, a big blond guy, give Sandy a kiss before they left.
They strip him of everything that could be used to harm himself, or someone else, and throw him into a holding cell. It's a very disturbing experience, Jared's never been arrested before. The cell smells vaguely like piss, and he's not the only occupant, there is another guy sitting on one of the benches with his legs stretched out before him. He's not wearing shoes.
Jared spends a few minutes looking at the guy's bare feet. They're dirty underneath, as if maybe he didn't wear shoes before he was arrested. Just Jared's luck as of late, sharing his cell with a lunatic. Except for that he looks pretty normal, in his early forties maybe, a day's worth of stubble on his chin, sympathetic brown eyes and tousled dark hair. Jared would even go as far as to say he's good looking, even if he's not in the habit of noticing things like that. He sighs and rubs his hands over his face. He should have known his wish would turn out bad, all his wishes turn out bad.
"Rough day son?" the stranger asks. He sounds kind.
Jared looks up and smiles wryly. "Feels more like a rough week," he answers.
The stranger nods and leans his head back against the wall. "Care to tell me about it?"
Jared shrugs. "There's this guy… We can call him Cha… Chakra. He's been trying to help me win my girlfriend back, but I don't really think he's dedicated to the cause, you know. At first, when I met him, I kinda thought I was delirious, and now I know I was, but not for the reason I thought to begin with."
The stranger raises his eyebrows.
"He asked me for something… Something important to help me and I said yes, and I'm beginning to think that was a huge mistake."
The stranger nods solemnly, staring off into space. "Sometimes," he says. "What you need isn't the same as what you want and sometimes you don't know what you want even when it's right in front of your eyes. You gotta listen to your heart, man. Always listen to your heart."
Jared has a feeling the stranger spends a lot of time sitting on lonely mountain tops with his legs crossed, thinking deep thoughts, but he nods anyway. It's as good advice as any, he supposes. Better than any advice he's likely to get from Chad.
The cell doors clanks open and Chad appears, dressed in a white suit with tucked up arms Miami Vice style and a navy blue silk shirt. He nods to the stranger, as if they know each other and gestures for Jared to come with him. Jared gets up and at the door he turns to say goodbye to the stranger, but the cell is empty. Great, now he's delusional as well.
"So… What are you going to wish for next?" Chad asks, when they appear on the street outside the police station in a shower of sparks.
"Nothing," Jared says curtly, looking around to get his bearings.
"Nothing," Chad mimes as if he doesn't understand the concept.
"You heard me right."
Jared starts walking in a direction he thinks might be right, leaving Chad to follow him if he so wish.
"What do you mean nothing? You haven't gotten your girl back yet."
"In your last little fantasy my girl as you call her pointed a loaded gun at me. Believe me, I've had it with that woman."
"But…" Chad hurries to keep in step. "I thought you were meant to be together."
"Obviously not," Jared says. He's tired, he's got a headache and he still has the smell of stale urine in his nostrils. The only thing he wants is to get home and sleep for a year and he doesn't have to use a wish for that. With Chad's help home would probably turn out to be Antarctica anyway.
He jumps halfway into the street and hails down a cab. He doesn't comment when Chad gets in beside him, but he refuses to even look at him as he gives the address to the cabbie.
"Look," Chad says. "I know I haven't been on my best behavior, but there has to be something you want."
"Sleep," Jared says. "A bottle of Advil and a glass of water… and that's NOT a wish."
Chad sinks into sullen silence, and when the cab stops outside Jared's apartment building he's no longer there. Jared pays the cabbie and ignores the suddenly empty space beside him. He's had it with this day and people that disappear mid-talk.
He takes the stairs, two at a time, and lets himself in, getting two Advil from the medicine cabinet and swallowing them down with some water before falling into bed with his clothes still on. He's convinced everything will look better in the morning.
Continue to Part Two