Genie in the bottle

Sixth chapter

When we got home, my dad ordered me into my room. I marched depressed into the room and started cleaning again.

"Boring!" Amanda said boringly after ten minutes while lying on my bed watching what I was doing.

"I would say please help me, but I would regret it. If I remember correctly, you mentioned a prince for whom you have to do this now." She took a deep breath.

"Here you go. A little popcorn. Have fun." She said and a puppet theater appeared beside her. I grabbed the popcorn sat down on my chair and waited her for talk.

"There once lived a beautiful princess in Spain who had everything. It was official for all the balls and ceremonies where other princesses and princes also attended. This princess was famous all over the world as the most beautiful princess in the world, so many envied her, but others admired her and wanted to marry her. But this princess didn't even want to hear about any wedding. The only thing she really wanted to do was travel around the world and get to know the culture of other peoples. That was her plan. But since the princess was too young for this, she couldn't leave home and listened in good faith to her father's wise counsel and didn't run away thinking that when she turns twenty-one, she can finally be free and go wherever she wants. But all this remained a dream for the princess, as it is customary in Spain to choose the future husband after the twenty-first birthday. The princess didn't want to hear a word about this whole thing, so her parents, satisfied with their daughter's behavior, selected that particular husband candidate. When the princess found out, she was so angry and wanted to escape. She failed to do so because she was caught and taken back to the castle, where she could only speak to the servants. Once she was so upset in her room and crying that one of the maids came in to see how she was. She was so glad that someone was finally listening her. That's why the princess wanted to give something this girl. One night. The maid, of course, opposed her at first, but she couldn't resist the beautiful princess's request. That one night eventually turned into more, which meant that the relationship between the two of them was finally revealed. The princess didn't know this until that particular prince gave her a miracle lamp as a gift that would fulfill all her wishes. There was only one thing to do. Rub the lamp and say I want. The princess did this unsuspectingly, then an empty lamp swallowed her until someone rubbed the lamp again and wanted something. A book was just waiting for her inside, telling the rules what to do. Among them was that she can't touch anything or anyone. She had never met her family, the prince, and that girl again. The end." Amanda finished sadly and the puppet theater is gone.

I focused so much on the performance that I didn't even notice popcorn tipping around me until I saw Amanda staring at my lap. I wanted to stand up to clean the bed, but Amanda wiped it away with a handshake, leaving no stain as if it had never been there. She looked at me sadly and as if tears glistened in her eyes. I was still digesting what I heard and saw. She lowered her head and wiped her eyes with her hand. The movement was so automatic that I didn't even notice that my hand was approaching her shoulder just when I touched her. I went closer to her and hugged her. She stiffened and pulled away from me.

"How is that possible?" She asked and she raised her index finger at me and touched my face, but she pulled it away immediately. "Are you really a human? Stupid question of course you are, then you couldn't ask me for anything."

"Have you ever had a master who wanted to touch you?" I asked thoughtfully.

"Yeah." She said and she conjured a book and glasses for herself and read the lines quickly.

"It was a stupid question." I said and I heard she laughed.

"I found it" Amanda exclaimed five minutes later, which made me again not to care about the mess in the room but to pay attention to her. "Touch. The person in the lamp can't touch anything other just the lamp and themself. This also applies to outsiders who can only touch the lantern but not the person inside or outside. In the event of a problem, the genie cannot help their owner with their body and thus cannot protect the person, unless the person wants something to protect themselves." After Amanda finished the sentence, she ran through the lines with her eyes five more times and shocked her head. "I don't understand."

"Can I see it?" I asked fearfully. She looked at me and pressed the open book into my hand. After reading it I also saw that some lowercase letters are listed below it, but I couldn't read the tiny letters. "Look." I show her. She slowly looked at the book. "What is that? I can't read it." Without a word, she conjured up a magnifying glass and held it over the sheet.

"However, an exception is made for persons of the same sex as the person in the lamp." She read it loudly and after that she muttered something else, I hadn't heard. "Are you kidding me? I read this shit at least a hundred times and it didn't show up?" She said indignantly and closed the book. When she looked at me, she smiled.

"Don't even try!" I rolled my eyes, and I went back to finally clean the room.