Nobody Likes Megan McGowen

19. Jake's Turn

When Jakob had first appeared on that sidewalk in the middle of the night, he'd been less than impressed. Even in the dark, he could see the frizzy-haired girl standing there in her ratted jeans and faded sneakers. She looked almost scared when she saw him, and he tried not to sneer at her.

He'd seen her kind before: incredibly average, maybe a little on the shy side. Definitely the kind who could be easily intimidated – even by him. She was probably the kind to wish for someone to like her. If he played his cards right, he could be in charge with this one – finally have a little control over his own life. He worked hard to keep his face neutral; if he gave anything away too early, the girl could get suspicious.

They went through the usual opening – was he real, was he actually going to grant her wishes? At first those kinds of questions used to bother him; of course he was real. And when they asked him things like that, he knew it was going to be an uphill battle. At least all of that had really stopped bothering him a couple centuries ago. Now, he just tried to get the introductions over with as fast as possible. He didn't even try to hide the fact that he couldn't lie to them anymore – it seemed to help with their inherent distrust at least. And anything to curb that was always a good thing.

It always seemed like forever before they finally got around to asking for what they wanted. At least after the first one, the rest seemed to come pretty quick.

Of course once she was finally convinced that it wasn't a trick, the first thing she asked for was to be popular. Figured. Just like everyone else. It was amazing how easy they'd gotten to read. At least maybe he could have some fun with this one.

He was surprised when she actually wanted to wait on her second wish, but he shrugged it off. Not everyone was completely predictable. Besides, this would give him a chance to figure out how to stay ahead of her.

As it turned out, she was incredibly easy to mess with – almost too much so. And every time he got to her – the look on her face! She always looked so surprised, like it was his job to only do exactly what she asked and nothing more.

At first that level of naïveté really got to him. Was she really so arrogant that she'd just assume everything would go her way? But after a couple of days watching her, he began to think maybe it wasn't a sense of entitlement that made her act like that. He began to wonder if it was more of an insecurity thing. He was still going to try to outsmart her of course – it was too risky otherwise. But it was the first time in as long as he could remember where he kind of felt bad about it.

When he finally saw the opportunity to actually do something, he took it. Sure, it was just school, but it was a lot better than sitting around her house all day. He practically dared her to take him. He knew it wasn't the nicest way to go about it, but it was the only way that ever seemed to work – asking never got him anything. And he'd gotten so used to it, it was more or less a habit by now.

The first day of school, he was actually a little nervous, which kind of surprised him. It wasn't the idea of meeting a bunch of new people or going to a place he'd never been to before – he'd gotten over those kinds of worries a long time ago. What he was most concerned about was how she'd actually react. She might have agreed to this, but that didn't mean she couldn't just change her mind later if she decided. Still, he wasn't going to let Megan know how worried he actually was about her feelings.

He'd decided almost instantly that he'd be in all of her classes. And despite what he might have led her to believe, it wasn't just because he wanted to annoy her. Of course, that was part of it – that and the opportunity to see one of his wishes backfire on somebody was just too good to pass up. He always got to hear about it of course, usually as he was being screamed at for incompetence. But he'd never really gotten to see it in action.