Wishes Gone Wrong - I Can Do Better

Author's Foreword:

Hello! This is the first half of my most recent feature-length project!

This one started out as a bit of a darker premise, but ended up sharing a lot of themes I covered in Other Duties, so as it developed I shifted it to bring the tone more in line with Slut High. The result is lighter and funner while still allowing me to really take advantage of the premise!

Please expect the second half of this in 6-8 weeks and some more shorts in the coming weeks!

(All characters herin or mentioned in passing or flashbacked to in a sexual context are all at least 18 and the age of majority!)

Thank you for reading!

Wishes Gone Wrong: Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better

- A Smutty Novella -

= Part 1 of 2 =

By Razmagurk

I should have known it was too good to be true. Nothing in life comes that easy. Can you blame me for hoping though? All I wanted was to be the winner for a change.

Not that, you know, I wasn't. I was athletic, I was popular, I was successful. Things didn't come easy for me, but I worked my ass off and I saw results. It's just that, well, it was never enough. No matter how hard I trained, no matter the sacrifices I made, he was always just one step ahead of me.

Would I have done things different if I knew then what I know now? I'd have thrown that fucking lamp in the trash, that much I'm sure of. "Satisfaction Guaranteed" my ass.

It was a week ago when it all began.

It was the final quarter. I hurtled down the pitch, ground pounding under each foot as I ran - legs pushing for all they were worth, barreling forward in a tiger's stride, stick in hand and ball in stick. I'd pushed clear of the defenders and had an open shot on the goalie.

This was it! Holy shit, I was doing it! A surprise break in their defenses - their whole team eating my fucking dust as the last few seconds ticked down - one final chance to turn defeat into victory.

The crowd screamed, people losing their minds as I made the game-winning play. Me! All eyes were on me! This! This is why I played.

And there! My chance. I took aim and I swung, but - no! - the ground reached out to grab me, to pull me into a rolling tumble. The ball flew up and wide.

Noland leapt, moments behind me, snatching it out of the air, grabbing it away before the other team - so close - could get to it. He landed hard and off balance but he didn't let it slow him down. The screaming of the crowd grew louder as he roared towards the net.

His shot whipped like a bullet. It was fast, but it wasn't fast enough. The goalie's shoulder caught it and sent it bouncing up and off the rim where again it bounced. We screamed, pushing at it with our minds, willing it to go in, daring it to defy us. The goalie fumbled to pull it away, but it was too late. It was good!

The crowd lost their fucking minds, cheering furiously for their golden boy's winning play. The game was over. We'd won. Noland had won.

"Great assist, dude!" He jogged over, panting for breath as he offered a sweaty hand. "Are you alright?"

Noland had won. Not me.

I pulled away. The last thing I needed was his pity. What was I going to say? That I tripped? Those kinds of excuses didn't hold up on the field. This had been my moment. My shining beautiful moment.

"Nick?"

"I'm fine." I pulled myself up onto my feet and brushed the grass off. "Good goal." I tried not to let the bitterness into my voice as I forced a smile. Another victory snatched away.

"Are you sure you're okay?" he looked at me with those soft eyes of his.

"I'm fine!"

"Alright. It you say so." He held up his hands defensively. "I guess that means I won the bet, huh?"

The bet. Uhg. I didn't even want to think about it. I was going to have to spend a whole practice in a sumo suit. It had seemed like such a sure thing when I'd made it.

The crowd had arrived on the pitch, our team just ahead of them. Everybody was rushing over to congratulate Noland on that miraculous play. The girls from the bleachers seemed especially eager to show him their gratitude.

I stepped back and let them carry him away. I didn't exactly feel like celebrating.

I gripped a fist. I wanted to scream. I wanted to yell and break my stick and punch something, but I held back, I kept it all inside. No one likes a sore loser. Instead, I kicked the ground, wincing as my toe made contact with something hard and heavy. I swore under my breath and kicked it again. A bronze handle poked out from the grass.

Wait, shit, what?

Was this what I'd tripped over?

I reached down and gave it a wiggle and then a tug. It was stuck in there good, but I was strong and I was angry. What I was not expecting was just how quickly it would give once I had put my full weight into it. It was too late - I was already overcommitted to the motion. I tumbled backwards, crashing down on my ass.

Blood coursed hot through my face. Did anybody see that? I stumbled back to my feet. No. All eyes were still on Noland.

My hand tightened around the muddy thing in my hand as I watched the girls fawning over him. That should have been me. I dashed the stupid thing right back into the ground with a hollow thud. That should have been me!

A lamp.

I looked down at it splayed out in front of me. There was no other way to describe it - it was like something out of a movie. I blinked down at it and shook my head. Was I concussed? Hallucinating? But no, it was still a lamp. I picked it back up. It was heavy. Metal. Brass? It was covered in mud and grass, but there was writing on the side. I could just barely make out the word "Satisfaction" in some weird cursive script. Was this some kind of ad?

I turned it over again and again in my hands as though there would be some clue as to why it was there. Who buries something like this beneath a lacrosse pitch?

Maybe... maybe it was magic?

No. I frowned. That would be stupid. Only an idiot would actually rub a lamp and expect a genie to pop out.

... right?

And yet... I glanced around conspiratorially, making sure no one was watching. I grabbed a towel from my bag and brought it up to rub away the dirt. The thing seemed to almost tremble in anticipation.

"Hey Nick!" yelled Noah, our goalie, "You coming?" The celebration was moving to the locker rooms.

"Coming!" I blushed. He hadn't been about to see me do that, had he? I dropped the lamp into my bag and ran back across the field.

-

Honestly? That was the last I even thought about it until laundry day. I was pulling out my gym bag and it clattered to the floor of my little laundry nook. All of the mud and grime had dried into a thick gray layer.

"Uhg, gross." I picked it up with a rag and threw it into the sink, wishing I'd had the foresight to wrap the damn thing in a towel before it got dirt all over my lacrosse stuff.

It lay in the sink until the first load was humming away in the washing machine. It had landed on its side, poking up at me from the surface of the soapy, grimy water.

There was that word again.

Satisfaction.

I plucked it from the sink and ran a finger back and forth to wipe away the mud covering the second word.

"Satisfaction Guaranteed?" What the hell was that supposed to mean? What even was that advertising?

The lamp pulsed and was suddenly scoldingly hot. My grip slipped. The metal came crashing down on my foot. I yelped and kicked it in frustration, the hot, heavy brass against my unprotected toe just causing me further pain. Bright sparks ran along the metal of the lamp as it skidded across the floor, a pungent smoke pouring out from where it crashed into a pile of dirty laundry.

"Tremble, mortal!" A woman's voice boomed from the smoke. "And know that you, who has transgressed, shall face the wrath of the flame and the desert storm! Ten thousand years of suffering shall be piled upon you and ten thousand more for your arrogance, lest you beg and kneel and scrape for forgiveness, for you stand in the presence of one of the immortals, resplendent and terrifying in her wrathful - Wait, no! Stop!"

I unloaded the fire extinguisher into the smoke.

"M-Master!" a girl stepped out of the cloud, flame-retardant foam soaking her already diaphanous costume. "Really? Really!?"

I stumbled back. Holy shit, there was a girl in my apartment.

She picked up a towel off the washing machine and started drying herself off.

She was - shit, she was gorgeous. I had never seen a woman so exotically beautiful. Skin like brass and dark hair that hung down to her ass. And what an ass, round and full and perfectly presented in a scandalously fit harem-girl's outfit that drew deliberate attention to her prodigious curves.

Her unearthly beauty was capstoned by the smokeless flame that burned in each iris, not that I was looking at her eyes.

"Honestly," she crossed her hands over her prodigious chest. Her accent was exotic and playful, like spiced honey, and was like nothing I'd ever placed before. "All the trouble I go through to make a dramatic entrance, and this is the thanks I get?"

"Who are you? What are you doing in my apartment?"

"Ah!" Her eyes gleamed like sand in the desert. "As I was saying! I am the fury of the desert storm, I am she who stood before Eve, I who have crumbled kingdoms. In other words, oh witless Master, I," she gave a deep, reverent bow, "am the Djinn of the lamp. You have spoken the magical words upon the lamp and so I am beholden to grant upon you your heart's greatest desire."

"What!?"

"In other words, Master," she winked, "your wish is my command."

"Bullshit."

"I swear," she sighed and shook her head, "people these days have no sense of wonder."

"Wait, if you're a genie what was all that 'cower brief mortal' stuff? Ten thousand years of suffering?"

"Ah, well," her teeth glinted sharply as the playfulness fell away from her voice. "You kicked my lamp."

"I -" she seemed to loom despite her height. I took a step back. There was no telling what this crazy girl could do. "I'm sorry?"

"Apology accepted!" The wind fell away and the mood snapped back. There was a smug edge to the smile on her face, like a tiger with its meat. "Now tell me, oh repentant Master, what is your desire?"

"My desire?"

"Your wish! Which will be my command. Anything your mortal heart craves. The world is yours, oh fortunate Master," I shivered as she ran a slender hand down my chest. "For all of one shining want."

"Wait, hold on, one wish?"

"Ah, well," she waved a hand dismissively, "we used to do three, but its a lot better this way, trust me! People kept using their last two wishes to fix their first. It was a whole horrible thing, just a huge waste of magic and energy. So much paperwork. It's much better this way. Less waste. Very green."

"I didn't know genies cared about the environment."

"Of course! There's a lot of competition these days, we have to keep up with the times."

"Wait," I furrowed my brow, "don't most genie stories end badly? How do I know you aren't about to fuck me over?"

"Master!" she chided. "I'm hurt! We recognize that you have a number of alternatives for bespoke reality alteration these days and we value your patronage. Besides, we rely heavily on word of mouth. Where would we be if you didn't leave us a good review during the post-wish interview?"

"Interview?"

"Yes, satisfaction guaranteed! That means if you don't like your wish after the fact, we can go back over the details afterwards and change it. I pride myself on my many happy masters."

I think that was when the shock wore off. Holy shit. A genie. I wracked my brain trying to think of what that implied. I'd heard of genies, sure, but what had I seen that actually featured them? Aladdin? When I was a kid? Robin Williams wasn't nearly so hot.

Although - my eyes roamed hungrily over the exotic beauty - that did give me an idea.

"Wait, hold on." A sly smile crept its way across my face. "How do I know you're really a genie?"

"Oh no, don't you get started with that." she sighed. "Was the fact that I just came out of a lamp not enough for you? Do I need a great big glowing sign over my head that says 'Free wishes?"

"So you say, but if you're a genie, you have to fulfill my desires, right?"

"Yes, you are my Master."

"Because I can think of some desires for you to fulfill." I flashed her a smile as I took a confident step towards her. I put my hand on the wall behind, pressing in close.

"Ah - careful Master," she didn't even flinch. "What kind of desires did you have in mind?"

I handed her the feather brush.

"What's this?"

"You can start by cleaning my apartment."

She laughed.

"Is that your want, oh bedraggled Master?" She grabbed the brush and her clothes melted from harem girl to a sexy french maid's. My eyes bulged at the flesh revealed by those scandalous silks - this was no dollar store costume. "That you would elevate yourself as the greatest of mortals by weirding a djinn's cosmic power for mundane domestic servitude?" Wind whipped at the detritus scattered about and my dirty clothes started floating through the air. "Is that your wish?"

"Not my wish. Just a desire."

"Ah, well." The clothes fell from the air. "That is less fun." Her maids outfit shifted from slutty to practical, though on her it was no less sexy. "Ordinarily, I wouldn't allow myself to be tricked so easily into a task, but frankly, Master, you could use the help. This place is filthy."

"Yeah, well," I frowned. "If I knew I had a genie coming over I'd have tidied up." I tilted my head to the side as she started to pick up the clothes from the ground. "Can't you just magic it all clean?"

""If you're trying to trick me into using my magic to demonstrate my power, it won't work." she waggled an admonishing finger "You get magic when you wish for magic, until then you just sit back and let me work."

I sat down on the couch as she started cleaning my apartment, her ass swaying too and fro as she hummed some song I had never heard. She was good. She picked up the floor, she swept, she dusted. I don't know if the apartment had ever been dusted in all the time I'd lived there.

And as she cleaned, I sat back and thought. A wish. My head pounded. What the hell was I going to wish for?

My life was already great, wasn't it?

"Hey, what sort of things do people normally wish for?"

"Ah, well..." she glanced around nervously. "These days? Sex, mostly. It's such a shame. The people of this era are so wonderfully creative! They have the most vivid and intricate of imaginations - fantasies the likes of which history has never dreamed! And they waste it all on sex." She shook her head.

"There's that many people wishing to get laid?" I stared at her ass... it had a certain appeal to it.

"Don't feel beholden to the trend, oh storied Master! You could have your own kingdom! Or walk among the clouds like a bird! I have nothing against sex, Master, as you might imagine," she wiggled her hips seductively, "but I do wish more people would wish for love."

I frowned. Love? Love was not my style. And I certainly didn't need any help picking up chicks, even if I was in a bit of a dry spell at the moment.

"Ooh, what's this? My Master is an athlete?" She had found my trophy case. "Surely, he is as strong and as virile as he looks. Those are also popular wishes, but I see you have no shortage of either.

I grinned. I worked hard. It was nice to be reminded of my success.

"Perhaps, Master, I could grant you youth unending? That you may forever reap the benefits of your prowess? Or maybe - wait - why is so much of it silver?"

I flinched.

"Oh?" her lip curved into a teasing smile. "I've struck a nerve? Perhaps my Master is not the greatest and most powerful of Masters after all?"

"Look." I rose to my feet and stormed over. "I'll have you know I'm a great athlete!" I looked over at all of the trophies and clippings and medals. "You see? A whole lifetime of accomplishments that anyone would be proud of!"

Yet she was right. There was a lot of silver. I sighed.

"You see this guy?" I pointed to the guy standing on the first place podium, grinning like an idiot as everybody fawned over him. "This is Noland." I'd tried to crop him out of the photo as best I could.

"Ooh, he's very handsome."

I shot her a glare.

"Every time I try to get ahead, every time I try to win, he's there. My whole life." I pointed to the picture of the two of us as kids, he'd won the MVP trophy while I'd won the most improved ribbon. I glanced over the articles of us in our youth - track and field, soccer, football, swimming, wherever I went he followed. Lacross was the one damn thing I could give him a run at his money at. "All my life I've been living in his shadow." I clenched a fist.

"Ah," She grinned. The blaze of her eyes flared in excitement. "Now we are getting to the heart of the matter. Here is your heart's desire. Speak it, Master!"

"I want to win."

"There we go!"

"More than that! My whole life I've been struggling - giving it my all in everything I do - and always I land in second place! I want that to change. I want to live in a world where I've always been a winner. No more humiliation, no more silver, no more game-winning assists!"

"You want to be stronger! More powerful! Victorious from your first breath!"

"Yes!" I could finally be where I belonged. More! "And I want to rub it in his face! I want to surpass Noland at everything he holds dear. Everything he values, everything he attempts, I want to be better than him. Indisputably so. I want him to struggle to even get to my level. I want him to know the pain of humiliation because whenever I win he'll know he isn't good enough!"

Wind roiled once more around the apartment, all of the lights dimming save the fire in her eyes. The genie's hair whipping about behind her.

"Then say it Master! Make the wish!"

"I wish - I wish that - wait no. No. No."

"Master?"

I looked back at the trophy case, at that picture of Noland with his perfect smile and his beach blonde hair and all the girls fawning over him.

What would second place do?

"No, he'd still be Noland, wouldn't he? He'd still be successful and happy and everybody would still flock all over him when I wasn't around." My fist shook, my voice was heavy. "Second place is too good for him. I want him- I want him low. I want him to suffer. I want him to become something that he'd hate. Something humiliating."

"A toad perhaps, oh wrathful master? It's a little off brand for a djinn, but it is more than within my -"

"No! Worse! He thinks he's gods gift to women? He thinks he's confident and powerful and masculine - I want him as far from that as possible. I want him stripped of that. I want him reduced to a... to a... "

"A woman?" she put her hand on her cocked hip.

"Yes!" a smile crept across my face. "No better than those girls he's always picking up in the bars. The kind of horny slut that thinks guys like him are so fucking hot just because they score the big game winning goal - those slutty cheerleader types, you know? The kind you look at and you figure all they have going on is looking good, social media, and finding some fresh guy to fuck. The kind who look good no matter what they do."

"I should warn you, Master," she sighed "Those who wish femininity as an insult often find themselves in, er, unfortunate circumstances."

I furrowed my brow. Was that a threat? "I thought it was satisfaction guaranteed?"

"An observation, oh implacable Master. I have your best interest in heart, I assure you. It is only that I have seen a great many wishes granted and -"

"I don't care! I don't care! As long as he's brought low. That's my desire!"

"So which will it be? Do you wish to be better than him at everything he does and values, naturally successful in all such endeavours, or do you wish to turn him into a girly boy-loving slut?"