Alaina sat beside Sebastian's bed, watching him as he slept away the effects of the shock her declaration had caused. It had only been half an hour since his collapse but she was beginning to worry that he wouldn't be up before his parents arrived home. The last thing she wanted was for them to be around when he woke in case he started babbling about genies and a magically appearing paradise. It was against the rules for him to tell other people, and having to intervene so that he wouldn't would put a serious hurdle in the path of her plan for them to become friends. No one would want to be friends with the person who gave them an instant case of laryngitis.

Since she was very aware of her time limit, Alaina decided that she couldn't wait any longer for him to come to on his own. Using her mind, she reached out to give him a little nudge, watching in satisfaction as he groaned and began to stir. His eyes fluttered open, glazed and unfocused until they locked on her face. With a strangled cry, Sebastian scrambled backward on his bed, not stopping until his back slammed against the wall.

Slightly offended, Alaina crossed her arms over her chest. "Jeez, you didn't have to give yourself whiplash moving so fast. It's not like I'm gonna bite." Smirking just a bit, she couldn't resist adding, "How do I know where you've been?"

"Who are you?" he asked almost desperately, not seeming to appreciate her attempt at humor.

She sighed. "We've already been over that. My name is Alaina. I'm in your room because I'm a genie, and I was sent here to grant you three wishes. Remember?"

"There are no such things as genies. You're just some crazy girl who thinks she has magic powers. You somehow wandered inside my house, probably because I didn't lock the door. Then you did something weird that made me think I saw something that I couldn't have seen."

"Sebastian, I'm beginning to feel slightly offended by your unwillingness to accept me."

At her words, he closed his eyes. "She knows my name," he whimpered.

"She knows a whole lot more than your name, buddy. Like the fact that you sucked your thumb until you were seven, and once got half of an Oreo stuck up your nose. Oh, and let's not forget the time that you split your pants in math class. That was my personal favorite." Alaina chuckled, remembering the memory she had watched while he was still unconscious.

His eyes popped open. "How did you know all that?"

It was her turn to cringe as she looked away from him. "I sort of peeked into your memories after you fainted. I know it was kind of rude to do it without asking, but believe me, it'll be a time saver in the end. And I only looked at the lighter stuff. I didn't go anywhere near the deeper, darker memories, even though those are probably the ones that will be the most important."

"You were . . .inside my head?" Sebastian looked almost queasy at the thought, although she couldn't imagine why. What she had seen had been the typical memories of someone his age, although there could have been something important in the area she had avoided.

She groaned softly, in more of a hurry than ever to find out what it was about his life that warranted her help. Normal teenagers didn't need genies, after all, so there had to be something about Sebastian that made him special.

"Yes, I was in your head. It was a truly amazing experience, and I will never forget it." Her dry tone finally seemed to make an impression on him. At least it was enough to cause him to relax his one-man huddle against the wall into a more natural position on the bed.

"Okay, let's pretend for just a moment that you're telling the truth and you’re some kind of magical thing. What do you want from me?"

Alaina gave him a disgusted look. "'Thing'? I am not a 'thing', you . . .shaky little fainter boy. I'm a genie, yes, but I'm a person, too. And not the kind of person you want to offend, either. I would learn to use a little respect; especially since I get a little cranky when I'm feeling insulted. You do not want to have a cranky genie on your hands."

Sebastian sighed, rubbing his forehead like he was trying to ease away a headache. "Look, Alaina, was it?" She nodded. "I'm sorry. This is a highly unusual situation and I allowed my discomfort to make me rude. I'll make sure it doesn't happen again."

Even as she smiled in acceptance of his apology, Alaina was frowning mentally. There was something behind his words, some combination of what he said and how he said it that caught her interest. Although she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it was about his tone or polite words that stuck out in her mind, she knew that there was clue to her mission in them.

Dragging her attention back to Sebastian's question, she tried to decide where to start. She waved her hands helplessly. "There's a lot to explain, so it's going to take a while. You're going to have to hear me out, and keep an open mind. The more stupid questions and bouts of denial that you go through, the longer it will take to tell you everything." He nodded his understanding and she went on with her speech.

"The first things we'll have to talk about are the misconceptions that you might have about genies in general. A lot of the things you've heard are completely wrong, and we'll get along much better if you aren't expecting things that will never happen. After that, I'll tell you why I came to you and not someone else. Then come the rules, which are also really important, since they shape both the wishes themselves and how you have to act until I've granted them all. Once we're through with all of that, we're done with the talking and ready for some action."

She grinned at him, finally allowing herself to show her excitement over that part of her mission. From what she had overheard the older students saying, actually granting the wishes was the best aspect of the deal. For that one moment, you became powerful, filled with the knowledge of all who had come before or would come after. It was a common rumor that if you concentrated hard enough, you could even glimpse your own future, the one future a genie normally couldn't see.

Her smile faded as her thoughts turned a bit darker. She remembered something else that had been whispered about in the halls and bedrooms. That first time of tapping into the magic was also the time that caused some genies to be removed from service. They just got recalled immediately and weren't sent out again. The teachers never spoke of times like that, even to offer an explanation.

The gossip that she had heard said that the higher-class genies also used the granting process to get a glimpse of what their students would accomplish in the future. If they saw something that they didn't like, the genie was removed from duty, thereby stopping the problem before it ever had a chance to happen.

Absently chewing on her lower lip, Alaina felt her earlier doubts rising again. Although she couldn't imagine herself doing anything against the rules that had been drilled into her since childhood, there was always the chance that something might happen that would change that. Now that she was in the middle of her first assignment, the moment of truth was getting closer. What would her teachers see? What would she see?

"Um, Alaina? Are you all right?"

Sebastian's voice pulled her from her thoughts. She looked at him, blinking a few times as she cleared her mind. Summoning another smile, she bounced lightly on her seat. "I'm fine. I was just thinking about something else. Anyway, are you ready to start?"

Before he could answer, the sound of voices from downstairs had both their heads whipping towards the door. "My parents are home." Sebastian told her, managing to look relieved and alarmed at the same time.

It only took a single glance at his face for Alaina to decide that the interruption was probably a good thing. Sebastian had barely accepted the possibility that she truly was a genie; laying all the rules and regulations on him just then might cause an overload. Since the hardest step was out of the way, she figured she could be generous with her time.

A quick test of her sharp hearing revealed that she could make out every word that his parents were saying to each other in the kitchen below. That meant she wouldn't have to leave his room to stay within wishing distance of Sebastian. Knowing a good opportunity when she saw it, Alaina made quick plans to allow Sebastian time to calm down. "Okay. You should go and have normal night with them, and we'll finish all this later. Does that sound good to you?"

He nodded enthusiastically, telling her that he was hoping she would be gone when he returned. Before she could tell him otherwise, he had risen from the bed and vanished through the door. She sighed, shaking her head at the hopelessness of the situation. She wondered if every client had such a hard time coming to grips with the arrival of their genie.

He had only been gone for a second when he popped his head back through the doorway. "And Alaina?"

"Yes, Sebastian?"

"About earlier; guys don't faint."

"Ah, I get it. If anybody asks, you merely lost consciousness in a totally manly fashion."

"Stop laughing."

Alaina lounged on Sebastian's bed, idly listening to his conversation with his parents. They were talking about school, asking him about how much homework he had and if he had studied for an upcoming test. It seemed to be a routine with them, something they probably did every night over dinner.

As she listened, she was getting the same feeling she had gotten when Sebastian apologized to her. There was something about his carefully worded answers and the emotion behind them that rang false. While his parents seemed honestly interested in what was going on in his life, he gave the impression of someone playing a part. He had all the words down perfectly, but the feeling behind them wasn't genuine.

Since she had nothing else to do until Sebastian decided to make his reappearance, she had been passing the time analyzing his personality. She had come to some interesting conclusions that, if correct, would certainly explain why she had been sent to him.

At school, Sebastian came off as a model student, helpful to his peers and respectful to his teachers. At home, he was the image of a normal son, complaining about the normal things while dealing with his parents in the normal way. All in all, he was just too normal.

While she had been mentally listing all the aspects of who Sebastian Mueller was, she had made a thought provoking discovery. If someone had handed her a list of all the qualities that an average, everyday teenage boy might possess, it would be almost identical to the one she had made on Sebastian. That meant one of two things. Either he was the epitome of a regular guy or, more likely, that's what he was pretending to be.

Flipping over onto her stomach, Alaina absentmindedly twirled a strand of her red hair around her index finger. If he were playing the role of normal boy, it would explain the need for her in his life. No human being should have to live their life as though they were someone that they weren't. If it required a genie to remedy whatever problem had caused the act, than so be it.

Her newly gained insight had given her part of the reason why, but did nothing to answer the rest of her questions. She didn't know why he felt the need to pretend, or even if it was something intentional. It could be that he was acting the way he did entirely subconsciously. She had studied more than one case like that back at school. The person didn’t even realize what they were doing, only that they were unsatisfied with the way their life was going. If that were true, she would need to handle it in a much more delicate manner than if he were doing it on purpose.

Each case had to be dealt with one step at a time, she reminded herself. She needed more answers before she could choose her path and she needed them relatively quickly. While she could get them by browsing through Sebastian's mind, she didn't want to do it that way. If she did it while he was sleeping, he would never know, but she would. It just felt like it would be a huge invasion of his privacy, and the thought of carrying that on her conscience made her squirm. There was just no way she could do her job with that kind of guilt hovering in the back of her mind.

That meant that the only way she was going to get information was for Sebastian to relate it to her willingly. She would need to get him to trust her enough to want to tell her the things about his life that made him unhappy. Before she could be his genie, she would need to be his friend.

Alaina groaned. It just figured that her first case would be something difficult and most likely annoying. Her teachers had probably done it on purpose, as some kind of punishment for all her slacking off. They were probably watching right now, laughing their heads off as she tried to figure out what to do. She could just hear Yersa's voice as she lectured on the importance of patience during the learning process. She had frequently been reprimanded about trying to rush into things before she was truly prepared to handle them. It had been the quality of her personality that had most hindered her progress through her training.

Well, she would just show them. She was going to do the best job they had ever seen, and then they would have no choice but to admit what a good genie she was. It would be no time at all before she moved up in the ranks.

Alaina sat up quickly as she heard footsteps making their way up the stairs. They were too heavy to be Mrs. Mueller, but not heavy enough to be Mr. Mueller, which left only Sebastian. Hopping off the bed, she crossed to stand beside the open window to give him as much space as possible.

He entered the room warily, his eyes quickly scanning the room until he found her. He took the minimum number of steps inside so that he could close the door and then shoved his hands deeply into his pockets. Kicking at the carpet with the toe of one sneaker, he cleared his throat.

"So you're still here."

"Yeah, I am."

"So I guess that that means this is all really happening, doesn't it?"

"Yes, it does. But if you don't mind an admittedly biased opinion, this isn't some horrible thing for you to suffer through. You're getting an opportunity that few people do. You're going to be able to change your life dramatically, and do it in a way that most other people wouldn't even be able to imagine. You should be excited, happy. You should be interested, at the very least."

With a heartfelt sigh, Sebastian moved to reclaim his earlier seat on the bed. Dangling his hands off his knees, he finally met her eyes. "I guess I am interested. It's just that I'm also confused and a little worried. I mean, I have no idea what all this involves. Is there something that I have to lose? Some price I have to pay? How is this really going to affect my life? Or my parents?"

Alaina smiled at him. "If you want your questions answered, all you have to do is ask."