A Genie in a Jamby Oonah V. Joslin | |
| Table of Contents | |
|
|
|
Chapter 5: Spongy Strawberry | |
A heightened scent of ripe strawberries came with the opening of the jam jar. And so of course, did the genie. He was getting quite good at olfactory enhancement but his timing was still erratic.
‘Grrreetings,’ said DJ and then looked around to ascertain to whom he was speaking.
‘Yo!’ came the reply.
DJ was a vision in his strawberry red turban, T-shirt, leggings and Nikes, a tad bright it seemed for his host, who squinted at the sight of him.
‘You look awfully shiny! D’you think maybe I had too much already?’
From the young man’s speech and demeanour, DJ concurred; he’d certainly had an ample sufficiency of something. The tousled strawberry blond hair, gaunt unshaven face and staring eyeballs spoke to the fact.
‘Aw, what the heck! Just one more wee slice with some o’ this nice jam on it.’ The young man began to spoon jam onto what looked like a very innocent sponge cake. ‘It’s good jam this. Strawberry. D’you like strawberry? You look like you do.’
DJ took in the evidence of a lively party; half-empty glasses, cups of abandoned tea, streamers and birthday cards, platefuls of half-eaten pizza and curly, dry sandwiches. Birthday cards! That brought with it the possibility of candles, any one of which could be an informer hired by Obsidian. DJ took a good look around. There were many candles but none of them lit.
The youth continued to chatter in his Scottish accent. ‘I thought everybody had gone. How about a wee slice of space cake? Will you no join me?’ he enquired politely of his visitor.
‘Um, no thank you,’ said the genie, ‘and perhaps you should refrain too, young sir.’
‘What kinda talk’s that?’ giggled the youth, mimicking, ‘You should refrain too, young sir.’
DJ could tell he wasn’t going to get much sense out of this one. He was becoming concerned that rumours might reach the Djinn High Council that his career was not striking the right note and about certain... irregularities of conduct, so he had to keep trying. He peeped inside one of the cards. This, apparently, was Jamesy.
* * *
‘Okay Jamesy, here’s the deal,’ he began. ‘I’m like, this genie see, the Genie of the Jam...’ He tried to feel comfortable with the vernacular.
‘That’s right. I saw you come out of the jam!’ Jamesy laughed. ‘This stuff makes everything look funny. You should try a bit.’ Jamesy tried to take a bite of cake, missed his mouth and got strawberry jam in his hair. ‘Did you come in fancy dress? It wasna fancy dress you know. Somebody was pulling your leg. Don’t get me wrong, I like the get-up.’
‘No, I didn’t, and I didn’t actually come out of the jam either. What you saw was the result of a dimensional shift in the thermal equilibrium...’
‘A widna be a bit surprised,’ Jamesy snorted and giggled.
‘It tends to look to the uninitiated — and to the stoned — that I do emanate from within the conserve itself, but I don’t.’
‘Like, WOW! my wee man. I like the lingo.’ Jamesy was helpless with laughter but really, had he been confronted by an axe-wielding haggis at that moment, he would still have been laughing.
‘Listen to me,’ insisted DJ.
‘Where’s my cake... Did a no have a piece o’ cake just now?’
‘Listen. Are you listening?’
‘Yeah. Whatever....’ Jamesy just wanted DJ to go away but he was trying to listen as best he could. He would never dream of being rude to a guest, let alone an apparition.
* * *
‘I’m supposed to grant you a wish... A WISH.’ DJ wasn’t at all sure the lad was with him. Maybe he should just call an ambulance or something.
Jamesy had stopped laughing and his brow was creased in earnest thought. ‘It would be a pity to waste a wish on anything friv-ivolous,’ he said. ‘If you’re going to have a hallucination, you might as well take it seriously.’ He had it. ‘Worrald peace!’ he said. ‘That’s what I wish for... worrald peace, aye.’
DJ was rooted to the spot. He couldn’t do world peace! It was beyond his jurisdiction.
‘I’m afraid....’
‘You said you’d grant me a wish an’ now you cannot? I want a solissiter! I want worrald peace!’
This was very awkward. DJ was contractually obliged to grant the wish but he’d never given any thought to how to respond to a stoned request for world peace.
‘Well I... Really I’d have to... Can you just wait here, while I consult my superiors?’
At that moment Jamesy slumped off the chair and onto the floor.
In a state of increasing agitation, DJ searched the lad’s pockets for his mobile phone and scrolled down the entries. At last he found a promising candidate — the word Mum. He dialed the number and when a woman’s voice answered, he said, ‘Hello, this is a friend of Jamesy. I think he needs help. Can you come?’ DJ placed the phone on the table and disappeared in a hurried flash of strawberry coloured flame.
* * *
‘I might’ve known it would be you,’ said Obsidian who happened to be on call in the Council Chambers. ‘What have you done this time?’
DJ managed not to take the bait. ‘Eminence, I have a client who has wished for world peace.’
‘Well he can’t damned well have it! World peace — Huh! It’s their mess. Let ’em clean it up themselves.’
‘But what shall I do, Eminency?’
‘Persuade him he wished for something else.’
DJ stood in dumb desperation.
‘SMOKE AND FIRE, DJ!’ bellowed Obsidian, his inner snowstorm threatening a blizzard. ‘You and your ilk are what give the Djinn a bad name; always meddling, courting popularity, but do you think of the consequences? Oh no! You all want jam on it, if you ask me!’
DJ blushed deeply. Surely Obsidian hadn’t heard about the Carlena thing?
‘If you consort with humans, young Djinn, you’re going to get into this kind of sticky mess... I mean... jam.’ This diatribe seemed fraught with punning... Obsidian was beginning to feel silly and he didn’t like feeling silly.
‘Actually I don’t get into the jam, Eminence, I co-exist dimens...”
Obsidian flared. ‘You DARE lecture me in Djinn mechanics you... you... WISP OF SMOKE!?’
DJ felt the sudden heat of the Elder’s anger and found himself back in the same room as before and no closer to a solution.
* * *
There was Jamesy, this time dressed in a sober grey suit and eating toast and jam. His strawberry blond hair was tamed and he was clean-shaven. On seeing DJ he looked momentarily horrified and then shut his eyes and shook his head. ‘This isn’t real... It isn’t real... It’s one o’ them flashbacks. The doctor said this might happen. Calm doon now, Jamsey. Calm doon. I’m going to count to three and when I open my eyes, it’ll have gone.’
He crossed his fingers for luck and shut his eyes tight. ‘God, I wish I’d never touched that stuff! This is a nightmare. One, two, three....’
No problem! thought DJ as he disappeared. A wish is a wish is a wish. There’s nothing like a personal crisis to put world peace into perspective. And thank God for Mums!
Copyright © 2010 by Oonah V. Joslin
