Arin the Genie Part 1, Origin Story

On a crisp spring morning, Arin went out to the park at her college because her boyfriend Ben wanted to meet her there. Arin happened to have a lull moment in her procrastination, and she knew that Ben was not rehearsing today for the play he was in. They met at the usual place, a wooden bench that was perfectly situated by a lake on campus. It as secluded as it got, and the traffic to and from classes died down since it was late afternoon.

Arin was feeling rather chipper, so she wore a crimson blouse that complimented her short fiery orange hair. She let her hair get frizzy because it was so short that it was low maintenance but she could still make it work. A pair of blue jeans and sandals finished the ensemble.  

She saw Ben sitting on the bench already holding a brown sack with that look of hiding something he could not wait to show. He was wearing a camo t-shirt he bought online that said "No camping" and had a picture of two stick figures, one backstabbing a sniper. The brunette young man wore khaki shorts and had a soul patch on his chin for a musical he participated in.

Ben waved with his free hand, "Hey Friz!"

"Hey Apollo!" Arin shot back stopping beside the bench, "How was practice?"

Ben grinned stroking his soul patch, "Great, I'm ready for my breakout role as surfer #2."

Arin hugged him, "Hey, Johnny Depp was in Platoon. Look at where he is now."

Ben was taken aback, "He was?"

Arin nodded going around behind the bench and placed her hands upon his shoulders as she leaned over him, "So, what's in the package?"

Ben smiled as he pulled out some weird wide-based lava lamp from the bag, "Guess what it is? You'll never guess."

There was nothing inside of it, and other than being what looked like glass and black plastic it looked completely mundane. Arin took it and moved in front of the bench as she examined it looking for some sort of trick.

"Why don't you open it?" Ben suggested.

Arin looked to him with a grin, "There's nothing inside silly!"

Ben returned her smile, "Not yet, you have to put something inside."

Arin shrugged and opened it to humor him, what she had not counted on her hands suddenly turning into red smoke. Before she could even squeak in shock, the bottle started to suck her in bit by bit as more of her changed. The opened bottle fell onto the bench as more of Arin sublimated into smoke and was sucked into the bottle. The cap of the bottle then was pulled back onto the top by an unseen force sealing Arin inside. All went dark.

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When Arin opened her eyes, her head was spinning but she was comfortable like she was laying on one of that Temper-Pedic mattresses. She was sleeping on a cloud that really she did not want to get off since she felt like she just came out of a blender. She moaned as she rubbed her head, "What just happened?"

Arin awoke in her dorm room on her bed. Her assigned roommate never showed up, so she took up the entire room. She combined both twin beds together as well as making the desks and closets her own. The poster of Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow was on the wall where it was supposed to be. Also, her large mirror was nestled in its corner.

Memories of what happened flood back to her and she shot up. She rushed over to the mirror to examine herself. She was all there thankfully. She threw herself off the bed and examined herself closer in the mirror. She noticed two things that were different externally and internally.

Externally, the red smoke gave her quite a drastic change of clothes that gave her a sinking feeling. Her shirt disappeared without a trace leaving only a satin red bra that wrapped around her back only by the thinnest of strands. The sliver bands that held up the satin material hugged her form surprising her because really it did not feel like metal against her skin. Neither that nor the bracelets around her upper arms or the jeweled choker around her neck felt like metal despite appearances. They felt comfortably warm. The shoes she wore were more divine than any other she ever wore in life. Each footfall was as if on soft sand.

Asides from the solid satin that enveloped her waist, the rest of her clothing was sheer fabric from the pants that ran to her ankles to a veil that covered her face from the bridge of her nose down. To top it all off, she had turquoise earrings in the shape of teardrops.

Arin ran her hands up and down the revealing clothing, "What... what happened?!"

Arin was stricken with a state of disbelief. She knew of genies in stories and Disney movies not real life! She tugged at the tight clothes, but there seemed to be no way to remove them short of scissors. All things considered, scissors probably would not work either. This just could not be real. Yet here she was staring at her hands that tingled with an electric power under the surface.

She then examined her 'dorm room' more closely, She examined her room closer. The textbooks on her desk were where as she remembered them, but when she opened each of them they were curiously blank. It was now that she noticed there was no doors or windows.

"I can't believe Ben!" Arin groaned as she placed the book down, "What did he do to me? I wish I knew what was going on."

As soon as the last syllable escaped her lips, a great wind blew through the room. All of the blank books in the room flew into the air and swirled around in a sparkling red tornado in front of her until they all compressed into three books.

Arin picked it out and sat back down again to examine them. The first was reminiscent of a college textbook and it was titled Genie Mechanics by Scheherazade. The second was a comic book titled Being a Genie. Finally, the last book was… Chicken Soup for the Genie's Soul? Arin shrugged her shoulders and started reading the comic since it was the shortest read.

After losing herself in the reading on wish granting and the dynamics of having a master, Arin suddenly felt another wind pick up. It looked like the roof of her dormroom pulled up and she groaned as her form shifted to formless red smoke again. She did know a bit more about this whole genie thing from reading so she had a greater degree of control over herself while she was smoke than she thought prior. She could "sense" the world around her, and was able to decide her landing. She stumbled a bit but managed to stay on her feet in front of the now standing Ben.

Ben looked disappointed, "I was hoping to see something cool when you were in there, but it just made it look like any other old lame lava lamp."

Arin raised her eyebrow trying to conceal her irritation, "And how long was I in there?"

"Only ten minutes hun, no big deal." Ben replied dismissively.

Arin at first thought this impossible. However, all things considered that was a the least odd thing that occurred recently. However, that did not change the fact that he forced her into this role against her will.

"No, not a big deal at all." She said with a hint of venom.

Ben rubbed his hands together, "Alright, time for some wishes! Are you ready?"

Arin shrugged halfheartedly. Although, his words brought a song to her head- Friends on the Other Side from Disney's Princess and the Frog. She had to work to suppress a smile from crossing her face that would make the Grinch proud.

She gave him a wink, "Wish away. I want to see what I can do."

Ben grinned, "There's the Arin I know!"

The new genie's mortal boyfriend pondered his wording carefully, "I wish I could be a better actor."

Arin drew upon her reading while in the lamp to put the wish into effect. While the book said that a genie had many ways to use their magic, Arin crossed her arms and blinked a la Barbara Eden. A bright orange-red glow enveloped Ben disintegrating his clothes. He shrank  and grew hairier. Her once boyfriend now stood before her a monkey staring at his new paws in shock shrieking.

Arin blinked again and a cage materialized around the shrieking monkey. She got up and bent down next to him. He grasped the bars shaking them with fury. Arin shrugged, "You wanted to be a better actor. So I figured monkey see, monkey do."

Monkey Ben rattled the cage in objection. Arin stood up crossing her arms, "Don't worry, I'll see to it that you reach a good home. It's the least I could do after you did this to me."

However, before Arin could taunt Ben more, she sublimated back into her bottle with a sigh since her master was unable to give her further commands. It served him right to only get one wish!

Arin laid down on her back upon the replication of her dorm room bed with the last hour weighing heavily on her mind. With a wave of her hand, she was on a small desert island with only her books, her bed, and a single palm tree for company. She used her hand to manipulate her lamp's sun into setting; then the sky in her bottle changed to the beautiful pinks and purples of sunset.  She now understood the words of the Genie from Disney's Aladdin, 'PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER, itty bitty living space.'

Playing with the magic in her bottle brightened her spirits a bit though. She probably should not have done that to Ben since she needed a master to be free, but did it feel good to pay him back after he tricked her into magical servitude! Maybe she could make something out of this genie thing. Freedom could come later. However, being a genie was an opportunity in life few could say that they had.

Arin rolled onto her belly and resumed reading her books. It may be some time before she gets another master, and she wanted to be as a prepared for it as if it was an exam.