by Doctor MC
And all because that pink-dressed tramp refused to tell Paula where the green genie’s bottle was, when she knew full well!
Why does everyone always lie to me? Paula whined. Why am I always surrounded by liars?
Fuck this. Paula would make Jernie spill the beans.
Paula rubbed the brass bottle. As soon as Jernie de-smoked, Paula said, “Follow me.” Paula led the genie right out of the house and into the garage.
Paula stopped with her hand on the handle of the walk-in freezer. She looked at Jernie and said, “One last time: Where does Marvin Harper keep his genie thingy? Tell me.”
Jernie said, “I cannot tell you, Master. I don’t know, and I can’t find out.”
“So you say,” Paula replied. She opened the freezer door. “Lucky for you that it isn’t winter now. Because you bet, Alaskan winters get colder than any freezer. You wouldn’t like standing outside in January.”
“Master? I do not understand,” Jernie said. But she looked worried.
“I am your master, and I order you to walk into that freezer and stay there till I let you out. You are not to leave the freezer till I say you can, and you are not to make yourself comfortable.”
Jernie looked horrified. “You want me to go in there, where it’s freezing?”
“Until you tell me where Fatima’s bottle is. Then I’ll let you out. In the meantime, no magically turning the freezer off or otherwise cheating.”
“I obey, Master,” Jernie said. She walked into the freezer with the face of a prisoner walking to his hanging.
But Paula didn’t shut the freezer door yet. She looked at Jernie and asked, “Anything you care to tell me?”
“Just what I’ve told you before: I don’t know where Fatima’s Vessel is.”
When Paula heard that, she slammed the freezer door.
****
Within the walk-in freezer, Jerngert summoned her scrying ball, in order to see when her master had left the garage. But as soon as her scrying ball appeared, it fogged up.
Jerngert grabbed the ball away from its floating place, wiped it on her clothing, and set it back afloat in front of her face. But it fogged up again. Muttering Proto-Germanic curse words, Jerngert sent her scrying ball back to its holding dimension.
Command from her master or not, Jerngert had no intention of remaining in this deadly freezer. She started to make the finger-gestures to foom herself to Marvin Harper’s house—
—and her hands paralyzed. Her hands stayed paralyzed till she quit trying to work her djinn spell.
Centuries ago, Jerngert had overheard the words of a spell by a human witch, to switch the places of any two objects. In the garage was a workbench, by which was a stool—Jerngert intended to work the witch’s spell to swap herself and that stool. But Jerngert only spoke two words of the spell before her voice spasmed and she couldn’t speak.
Like a minute earlier, when Jerngert quit trying to work magic to get herself out of the freezer, her voice paralysis went away.
Jerngert went back to moving her hands, this time to make a fireball to warm herself with. Again, her hands paralyzed before she could complete the spell.
Master had told Jerngert not to leave the freezer. She couldn’t leave it. Master had told Jerngert not to make herself comfortable. Jerngert couldn’t make a fireball.
Jerngert had one last trick to try, and it was hardly worth mentioning. By the workbench in the garage, hung a blue flannel shirt on a hook. If Jerngert couldn’t go out, she would try to bring the blue flannel shirt in.
Jerngert shook her head. I must be very desperate indeed, to think of wearing BLUE.
She started her magical gestures. Foom.
Then she realized why she’d been allowed to complete the spell: Because it made no difference. All that the blue flannel shirt did was to lessen her misery; it wouldn’t keep her warm.
And if she couldn’t stay warm...
Djinn of the three tribes hadn’t believed that they could ever die, until three thousand years ago. That’s when Lodmand of the Pink Tribe froze to death, in what the humans now call Norway. After Lodmand’s death, the Pink Tribe moved from Northern Europe to Persia, thinking that they would be safe.
And so they were. It would take three thousand years before another djinni of the Pink Tribe would freeze to death.
When the time comes, will I be brave? Jerngert wondered.
****
Fatima was still in her lamp, and her master was in danger. For the first time since the awful day when she’d been bound into her lamp, Fatima felt helpless.
She had gone into Hyperspeed to text-shape all the words about what she and Marvin had done. So many words she’d text-shaped! Had she written everything the old way, she would have filled most of a scroll.
As soon as she’d sent off her BDIM, Fatima had discovered two BDIMs from Jerngert waiting for her. Each message, in its way, horrified Fatima.
The first message informed her that Jerngert’s evil master knew what Fatima looked like, knew what Marvin looked like, probably knew where Marvin lived, and was planning to steal Fatima’s Vessel.
The only good news in that message? Paula Sarin thought that she should look for a brass bottle, not a brass lamp.
The second BDIM from Jerngert was sent out to everyone, and it read only, “Summoned again by Master Paula??? This does not sound good. Because I think I know what she wants.”
Jerngert had sent that second message almost twenty minutes ago, and she wasn’t back in her bottle. Fatima needed to know what Paula Sarin was up to!
Then too, it was seventeen minutes past the time when her master, Marvin, had promised to rub the lamp. She had no idea why he was late, just as she had no idea why Jerngert hadn’t returned. Fatima hated not knowing!
The odd thing was, Fatima would be overjoyed, most of the time, to learn that a prospective master was plotting against Fatima’s current master. Because with any luck, the lowlifes would kill each other and leave Fatima alone.
But it was different now. Because Marvin was Fatima’s master now, and Fatima loved him.
****
Paula Sarin had a buzz on when she walked back into the garage; she actually fell against the freezer door in trying to open it. After Paula had sent Jernie into the freezer, Paula had spent over an hour doing some serious drinking alone.
When Paula opened the freezer door, she saw Jernie standing in the freezer, just like Paula wanted—but the genie was wearing Ted’s blue flannel shirt.
“Did you walk out of the freezer to get that shirt?” Paula yelled.
“No, Master, I conjured it into here.”
Paula was disappointed that she’d just been denied a good excuse for a tantrum. So Paula said instead, “Are you ready to tell me where Fatima’s bottle is?”
Jernie replied, “My toes have frozen solid. If I knew where that Vessel was, I maybe would be telling you now.”
Paula glared at Jernie. “Or you maybe would still be bullshitting me. Stay in there longer.” For a second time, Paula slammed the freezer door shut.
As Paula walked through the garage to the kitchen door, she thought, Jernie must think I believe anything. “My toes are frozen solid”? Already? Alaskans know a thing or two about frostbite, bitch.
****
Jerngert felt a small sense of relief when Master Paula slammed the freezer door shut. Yes, it would have been nice if Master had let Jerngert leave the freezer, but Jerngert hadn’t expected that.
In fact, Jerngert’s relief was because her small secret had stayed undiscovered.
Jerngert had discovered that she was allowed to conjure a small fireball. The fireball that she was allowed to conjure was only hot enough to keep her hands warm, but as long as she could make magical gestures, she could stay alive.
Good luck had let the little fireball stay Jerngert’s lifesaver. The thump noise against the freezer door had been warning enough (“Master Paula is here”) for Jerngert to kill the fireball.
; Because had Master Paula seen the puny pink fire, she might have banned it outright, out of sheer spite.
Jerngert didn’t want to think about what would happen if she could no longer keep the feeble fireball burning.
****
Still stuck in her lamp, Fatima worried.
Marvin still had not summoned Fatima out of the lamp, almost two-and-a-half hours after he had sent her in. Fatima still could only guess why. Meanwhile, Jerngert had been out of her own Vessel for a little more than two hours; and again, Fatima didn’t know why.
Meanwhile, Fatima had gotten a snarky BDIM from Kharmesh: “Poor baby, stuck in your lamp for over two hours. Try being stuck in your lamp for 3,318 lunar cycles!”
****
When Ted came home, he was drunk. He was surprised to see that Paula also was drunk. She was drunk, yes, but now she had a plan about getting Marvin’s genie.
“Don’t go into the walk-in-freezer till I tell you it’s okay,” Paula ordered Ted. Paula knew that because of an earlier Suggestion, Ted wouldn’t even think of disobeying her.
Ted finished undressing, then climbed into bed and passed out. Paula was herself close to passing out; instead, she made herself walk through the house and into the garage.
That genie bitch was still straight-faced lying to Paula, claiming that she didn’t know where Fatima’s bottle was. But at least Jernie was getting a little karma payback for her lying: Paula noticed that Jernie was walking strangely, like she was wearing stiff ski boots.
****
Monday, 7:00 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time
BAM-BAM-BAM! I was awakened by someone pounding on my bedroom door.
“MARVIN?” a young woman’s voice called. “YOU’LL BE LATE—”
By now I had unlocked the door. Standing beyond the door was Janice. She said, “It’s 7:00, Marvin sir. Are we still all going to meet at school at 7:15?”
“Shit, I overslept!” I said. Then I told Janice, “Be at my car in five minutes.”
Janice gave me a dubious look, and I realized that I was still wearing yesterday’s clothes. But what she said was, “Yes, Marvin sir.”
Then Janice glanced past me to my bed and asked, “Have you seen—?”
But I held up a hand. “Janice, I need to get ready for school.” Without waiting for her to answer, I shut the door.
Showering was out. I dragged a razor over my face, brushed my teeth, yanked my old clothes off my body, jammed myself into clean clothes (almost forgetting to swap out comb, wallet, and keys), and grabbed my book bag. I was strongly tempted to slide down the bannister, just to get to my car a few seconds earlier.
****
Minutes later, on our way to Plato Smith’s front doors, Janice and I spotted Stephanie Eklund and we waved to her. Stephanie walked over to us and gave each of us a hug. Janice looked relieved to see her, since Stephanie’s I-serve-Marvin outfit nuked the dress code as much as nervous Janice’s own clothing did.
As I said, the three of us walked through the doors at 7:18. I expected to see waiting ahead, a teacher and four girl students. Or fewer than that, if someone was running late.
Instead, waiting for me was a teacher and five girls. Anna Kay said, “Marvin, it’s same song, second verse. Kelly Brown wants to join your group.”
Reader, I’ve mentioned Kelly Brown a few times. The PSHS joke about her is this: Does Kelly Brown have standards? Certainly! She won’t fuck a guy whose dick is less than three inches, and she draws the line at forty guys in one night.
Now I noted how Kelly was dressed: Slutwear with a capital S. Maybe she fully expected to be allowed into my harem today. On the other hand, what she was wearing wasn’t much different than outfits she’d worn in the past.
Kelly had larger-than-average tits, puffier-than-average lips, and suicide-blond hair. Meaning, even if she were forced to wear a choir robe, she’d have sex appeal. But Kelly Brown was much more than a sexy body. If the Wicked Witch of the West were to dress like Kelly dressed, and move like Kelly moved, even the Tin Man would get an erection.
So you can imagine my body’s reaction when Kelly sashayed up to me. “Hiii, Marvin, you’re looking big and strong this morning.”
“Stop, Kelly,” I commanded. “Stand right there, hands at your side.” I did not want Kelly touching me unasked, and becoming my touch-slave accidentally. Kelly obeyed me, because of my magic pheromones.
I stood out of her reach and asked, “Why do you want to join my harem?”
She said, “Because it’s one group I’m perfectly qualified to join. In fact—”
“Do you have any other reason to want in my harem?”
“Ooh, ‘harem’, such a sexy word. I have another reason, Marvin sir, but I don’t want to tell it.”
“Too bad. Tell it anyway.”
Kelly looked at me with anger, then fear. She made several faces, and twisted her hands together; clearly she did not want to answer the question. But then she said, “People have asked me the last few days, ‘How come you’re not in Marvin’s harem? Are you so skanky that he doesn’t want you?’ ”
“No comment,” I said. “Now I know why you want in, but my next question is: Why should I take you?”
Kelly gave me a dick-stiffening smile. “Well, I’m sure I could teach your other girls a thing or two.”
“Pfft,” Janice said. “Tell us, Kelly sweetie, do you do Kegel exercises?”
Kelly didn’t look cocky anymore. “Um ... I guess not. What are those?”
“I’m not sure what a ‘Kegel’ is. But you know when your bladder is full, but you don’t want to pee in your panties, there’s a muscle inside you that you squeeze?”
“Yeah,” said Kelly, with a Where are you going with this? look of puzzlement.
Janice said, “Well, in a Kegel exercise, you voluntarily squeeze that muscle as hard as you can, then you keep squeezing, then release. Then you do that ten times. Then it’s just like gym class: three sets of ten reps, do that every day. And after a while, you have a pussy that can crush rocks into gravel.”
I added, “And I can tell you, Janice’s pussy feels great.”
Kelly looked deflated now. “Well, can I just straight-out ask to join your girls? Anna Kay did that Friday, and you let her join.”
I sighed. “The thing with Anna Kay was, I’ve had a crush on her since tenth grade—”
“Really? Wow,” said Anna Kay. Then she moaned and shook with orgasm.
“—and so when she asked, of course I said yes,” I said.
Anna Kay said, “Yeah, right. Marvin, tell Kelly about all the pussy I had to lick before you said yes.”
I’d delayed giving Kelly an answer. But now was answering time. I said, “Kelly, for guys it’s really hard to walk up to a girl and ask her for a date, or ask her for sex. Rejection is scary! And most girls haven’t a clue what agonies the guy suffers. But you know that, you’re being very brave—”
“Oh shit,” Kelly said, “you’re turning me down, aren’t you?” She started to cry.
I said gently, “With the exception of Anna Kay, who’s a special case—”
“Yeah, you had a crush on her! But nobody gets a ‘crush’ on Kelly Brown—if a guy wants me, he gets me. God, I’m pathetic,” Kelly sobbed.
“—any girl or woman who asks me before I ask her, will get turned down. Of that group of Marvin-rejects, potentially numbering billions, you’re the bravest, and so you’re the first.”
She looked at me with hope. “So that’s the only reason you’re turning me down? Because of ... because of...?”
“Policy,” Bellina suggested.
“Policy is some of it,” I said. “But also, Kelly, I want to feel special. Whatever girl I’m with, I want to be the only man in her life. Whereas you—”
Kelly said, “This is so unfair. You fuck lots of girls; I fuck lots of guys. We’re the same.”
“Not so. A teacher here has made it clear that she wants me for fun on the side. She’s married, you see. But I don�
��t do married women, and I don’t do ‘fun on the side.’ Can you say the same, that the guys you fuck, don’t fuck anyone but you?”
“No,” Kelly said in a small voice.
Then I raised my voice. “My ladies, each of you give Kelly a hug, to show no hard feelings.”
As Kelly got surrounded by girlflesh, she looked at me, clearly hoping that I too would hug her. I shook my head. “Kelly, I think it best that I not touch you.” She nodded, as tears ran down her face.
When the hugs were done, Kelly looked at me and stood straight (while still sniffling). She said, “You don’t respect me, Marvin. This hurts ten times worse because you haven’t called me nasty names. Hell, you’ve bent over backward to be nice. But I swear, I am gonna bust my ass so that one day, I have your respect.”
And with those words, Kelly Brown moved away from me and strode straight toward the school office.
By second period, the school was abuzz with the gossip: Kelly Brown, after she’d talked to me, had ambushed Mr. Bender, and had told him that she was going home and changing clothes. Without Mr. Bender ordering it first.
During class change after third period, I passed Kelly Brown in the hallway. She was wearing non-tight jeans, and a sweater draped over her low-cut top. She actually looked normal, if genetically blessed. I gave her a thumb-up; she gave me a weak smile in return.
****
“Fuck!” Virgilia said. She threw the covers off and climbed out of bed, even though her body craved sleep.
Virgilia, newbie dancer Pepper, and Yuri had been the last to leave Nimfo Club. Which meant that Virgilia had gotten only three hours of good sleep, before sunlight and noisy motel guests started disturbing that sleep this morning. And yet here she was, five hours after she’d gone to bed, unable to ditch the thoughts that were blocking her sleep.
From the motel room’s other bed, Sherry said sleepily, “What’s wrong, Virgie? Why you up?”
Virgilia said, “I need to talk to someone at the mansion, Sher.”