[Author’s note]
[ Tolerate this first chapter, since nothing sexual happens in it. Added stories will be more entertaining. Thank you.]

Chapter 1
The last day of my dull life.

Hi, I’m Shawn. I’m 29, fit, ’bout 170 pounds, a 6’1 hellbilly from Williamsport, Tennessee, but by no means I’m like the rednecks stereotyped on TV.
Though I was held back one year in high-school I graduated with a 3.2 GPA, and I’ve completed over 5 years of Political Science, American History, Human Biology/Anatomy, and American Sign Language in college.
Personally I also write action, crime and fantasy stories which I sell to local publishers for quick money. It’s an easy three to five-grand every now and then.
Being somewhat close to Nashville, music was pretty big to me too, so I took to learning the acoustic 7-string guitar, drums, and electric bass. I tried to learn the fiddle but I never could throw myself into learning the thing.

I’m not you’re typical dumb redneck.

I work at the local grocery store, working the evening cash register and the graveyard-shift working in the stock room.
June is the store owner and a kind old lady too, so fighting between employee and employer never was an issue.
But at $8500 a month, sometimes it ain’t enough.

Saturday nights at Kell’s Bar was the big deal before Sunday morning. With no exception, it was always packed. It holds about 70 people, and at full swing it’s a fine place to hook up a sweet girl for a one night stand or even sometimes something longer-lasting.
When I get there, it’s already filling with the smell of cigarette smoke, and kitchen fixin’s.
Once in a while I’ll get on stage next to the jukebox, and play a few cover songs for free drinks a few burgers, and tips.
After a few Wayne Hancock, and Hank Williams cover tunes, I was drunk enough to switch to beer and eat dinner.

I’m a modest man living the best I can.
But for all my earnings, knowledge, for all my accomplishments, having or even keeping a steady girlfriend was next to impossible.
It wasn’t my looks. I mean sure, I got a little extra hanging over the belt, but their are other guys around town, twice my weight with girlfriends and even married.

3:00am was when Kell’s closed, so I was already walking out… well more like balancing myself out of the bar to my pickup-truck to drive home. It was a short five minute drive pass the liquor store by the drive-in. It’s a quite little, single story, wood-shack.
The liquor is still in me and preventing me from unlocking my own damn front door. Once inside I toss off my black/green flannel jacket, brown work boots, take out my .44 revolver from my pocket and stored it away under my pillow, and basically stripped down to my boxers and undershirt.
It takes me less than a minute to fall asleep.

—

The next afternoon I woke up… sorta. It took me twenty minutes to want to get out of bed, and fix my late lunch. A ham sandwich, a bowl of frosted cereal, and a coke. On the news was nothing good as usual. An inept President, a new $900 billion bailout plan being considered for failing manufactures of plastic fruit, Tumuki automotive, and of coarse more banks.
“Well shit, where’s the money come’n from?”

Sometime last night, I must’ve knocked over and broke my potted potatoes. Well a quick trip to the junk-yard will fix that.
Dressed up in my black jeans with ironed on confederate flags and marijuana leaves patches, and my boots, I got in my truck and headed off to replace broken property.

—

Three in the afternoon, in a junk-yard is not how I like spending my Sunday afternoons, and today is no different.
The smell, It’s everywhere and I’ve already slipped twice in what I can only guess was at one time, Chinese food and horse manure. The white stringy things are either noodles or worms, and right now I don’t want to have to guess.

Well, I’ve found spiral copper tube, some brass or tin pots, and a small bathtub. Not a bad haul, I can plant a nice little garden in the tub if I can till up some decent soil for it.
Back home, with my newly acquired treasure, I spent the rest of the evening chopping up soil and mixing in it some compost. I’m already thinking of planting carrots in it.
My last action outside for the day, I refill the bird-feeder with honey-sunflower-seeds, and call it a day.
Inside my shack, I’m downing a beer while watching a rodeo. The best part is always when someones ribs are kicked by any of the animals. As a kid I was headbutted by a goat in the ribs, so I feel the pain all over again when I see it.
Later that evening, I’m watching “Beer Valley” on TV. It’s basically women in swimsuits, or less, playing water sports like water volleyball, water polo, water balloon fights, and the like.
During the commercials I grab one of the small brass pots, which more looks like a really old oil lamp, and attempt a spit-shine polish.
Rag in hand I spit on one side, and rub side to side the caked on dirt and grime. Now the metal itself shows.
I rub a little harder, then the damn thing jumps out of my hand nearly taking my thumb with it.

The little brass lamp lands on the floor right-side-up and begins spewing a cloud of blueish, sorta orange smoke.
It took form, and in the middle of my living room appeared from the smoke, a Arab man, in ancient looking Arab clothing, golden jewelery around his neck, his waist, and draping around his legs like a skirt.
“Oh shit what’d I do?!”
I scrambled for my bedroom and grabbed the 12 gauge as fast as I could, and crouched behind my bed waiting for whatever would walk through my bedroom door.
Was I scared? Oh hellyeah, I was scared. I was scared shitless!
“You out there! I am armed, and I’ll blast you an half if you come near me!” I yelled out.

“And may I ask, how you would accomplish this at me?”

I heard a voice from behind me. I turned around and saw the same man that formed from the smoke.
“ARUGH GE SHIT!” I jumped at least four feet in the air after seeing him. [THUMP] I landed feet first on the bed mattress, then fell backwards bashing my head on the hard-wood-floor. The last thing I remember is my heart pounding at 100 miles an hour and lightning shooting through my heart to my feet, then it all went black.

—

When I woke up it was morning… I think. I remember seeing some Arab guy in my house. It was either, I had been drinking to much, a bad nightmare, or drugs I can’t remember taking.
As I wandered through my house, I heard my TV was on, then shut it off.

<Fuuuck, what time is it?> I scratched my head for a moment before scratching over a sore spot, and jolting my hand away.
<Time to eat.> But then I looked at the clock
“Oh shit, I’m late.” I phoned my work at the store, and waited for some to answer.

“Hello, June’s Produce. This is June.”

“Hi June it’s me, Shawn.”

“Shawn? We’ve been open for hours.”

“Yeah I know. Last night I fell and hit my head. I just woke up, like fifteen minutes ago.”

“Oh dear lord, are you okay?”

“Sortta. I just wanted to phone-in to let ya know I’d be late. And please don’t tell Heidi I hadn’t shown up.”

“I wouldn’t toss that rotten-bitch a life jacket to save her life, much less tell her you’re late.”

Good ol’ June. She was like the Grandma everybody wanted, and everybody liked.
“Thanks June, I’ll be there when I can.”

“Sure thing, Bye.” Okay now what-

“Master, you’ve awakened.” My eyes went wide hearing a voice behind me.
“I began to worry your health would-“

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold up!” I said backing into the wall away from the man.
“You- you, you’re… who are you?”

“I-” He started as he bowed formally at me.
“-am Hei-sawli, The genie of the lamp. And it is you who has summoned me to do your bidding. My obligation to you Master is to grant you three wishes of your desire.

“….Uh-huh…of coarse. Um, can you prove that?” I say this absently because I know I don’t have my .44 near me, and if this guy is gonna stab me, I want to be as far away from him as possible.

“Mortal, I have lived life-spans beyond the most powerful kingdoms and empires.”
He teleported me above a expansive field where I saw men like Alexander the Great, Napoleon, Genghis Khan, King George the III, and all their armies fighting other armies, all at the same time, and seeing their kingdoms come and go.
“I have seen planets and galaxies come and go.”
We both were suddenly teleported to a empty blackness and I saw a planet form from space-rocks, and grew titanic in size, violently swell with volcanic eruptions, forming a earth-like planet abundant with life, then it decayed into a barren gray heap of rock.
The genie showed me a man, that transformed into an animal, then a bird, then it turned into a bright energy, back into a man, his skin disappeared, then his muscles, this his nerves, leaving his skeleton, that shortly turned into dust, then simply dissolved into the floor I stood on.
That is, if it was a floor in the typical way I understood it to be.

At this point, I know I couldn’t be high on anything I’ve used before, and I was sure as shit, that I wasn’t dreaming.
“Okay, okay. I’m convinced.” I was teleported back to my home. Not a second had passed since we had left.
“So, you can grant me any wish?”

“Yes. Any wish to your heart’s desire.”

“Uhh, have you ever came across any wish you’ve never been able to grant?”

“In my countless years, and many masters, not one wish have I not been able to grant. No wish has ever been so small or so grand for me to grant by human desire.”

Having said that. I was a little dumbstruck and honestly overwhelmed. Here I have a genie capable of granting me any three wishes, and I have no idea what to wish for.
“Uhh… do I have to make my wishes now, or can I save them?”

“Of coarse you can save them. I shall return to my confinement to await your summoning again.”

“Okay, see ya next time.”
With that said, he turned back into the smoke, and returned into the lamp. A quick shower later, and half an hour drive I was at work. Lucky for me not to many shoppers right now, so it only took one cashier up at the front. So I took to the dust-mop and worked up and down the isles. I stayed an extra hour at work helping out in the stock room and hauling flour to the bakery across the street.

Day in and day out this went on. While I worked I was keeping my mind on that lamp, and what the hell would I wish for.
I thought about never having to pay taxes, then that turned to wishing for unlimited wealth. It wasn’t a bad idea.
I thought about being a famous writer, then that turned into being a famous Hollywood actor, but I kinda worried about would I turn into one of those rich dick-heads. And I liked being the way I was now.
A week later, I thought about wishing for a new truck with unlimited gas, then that turned into owning a fleet of cars, trucks, ATVs, motorcycles, boats, yachts, and planes all with unlimited gas.
It didn’t take long after that, for me to remember some of my comic books I had collected since I was a kid. Everything from superheros foiling super villains plotting to take over the world, to detective stories solving outrageous conspiracy theories. Furry’s comics with cat-people, mice-people dealing with normal life problems.
Little bits and pieces here and there, filled my mind with inspiration.

Ten days pass and I got paid, just enough to get by. My initial thought was to head on over to the liquor store, to by something new. Halfway there, I stopped.
<Well I do have that bottle in the ice box. Haven’t even opened it either.>
I decided to do something else, and headed to the book store. Didn’t really know what I was looking for, and nothing really took my attention.
Later that night, sick of the political bullshit on tv, I was watching Air-Jaws on the nature channel. There’s just something about a 20 foot fish, with a bear-trap for a mouth eating smaller prey, I couldn’t get enough of.
At two-am, there’s also A Hike with the Dinosaurs. The kid in me refuses to turn it off. When I was much-younger, my mom would sit my skinny ass down in front of the tube, and made me watch every nature show that came on.

—

It’s been a month now and I’ve figured out my first wish. The mere thought of it, is intoxicating just to think about.
Tomorrow once I get a good night sleep, and breakfast. I start on it.

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