I stand up and stare at this big package that just got delivered to my place. Some relative from out of state sent it? It’s as big as a coffee table. Now that I’ve finally opened it and seen what’s inside I can only say one thing:

“What is this?”

It looks like one of those old oil lamps. Well, it actually looks like a reproduction of the sort of lamp that genies are usually depicted as being in, from the gold appearance to the handle to the spout, but it’s so much bigger. I wonder if they made oil lamps that big, but then, the handle would be rather pointless, this is more like an oil lamp made for a giant.

I assume it’s a decoration. That’s all it seems to be. I pull the lid on top but it doesn’t budge, so I don’t think it’s used for storage. There’s a black oval on the side that looks like it could be a display screen, so maybe it’s a novelty digital clock, but I don’t see any way to plug it in. Maybe there’s a battery case on the underside.

With a sigh I work on turning the lamp over to look underneath. My hands slip and slide along the side, dropping it back on its base. It’s heavy—I’ll need to sit down to check under it. I sit on the couch to catch my breath.

When I hear a whistle like a tea kettle I open my eyes. Smoke is pouring out of the spout as if—

I slap my face.

“I thought it would be silly to treat it like a magic lamp!” I shout to the empty room, though by the time I’m finished it’s no longer empty.

“Sorry, what?” says the foggy figure floating before me. Her skin has the same golden glow as the lamp, though much smoother than the chipped and cracked old lamp. I wave my hand.

“Nothing. Never mind.”

“Right, sorry.” She clears her throat and swirls her hand for a bow. “Greetings, Master, and thank you for your purchase of the Jil’thad Jinn Construct. I am your jinn and will grant you any three wishes you desire. All you have to do is speak your wish, and I will make it come true.”

I stare at her. She does look like someone who dove through a costume set for Arabian Nights—no, that’s not true, because she would certainly have more clothing. She looks like someone who dressed up for Arabian Nights then someone removed most of her clothing. Just a bra, covering less than half her breasts, and—actually, I’m not sure she’s even wearing anything past the waist given her body becomes a foggy trail leading into the lamp. Her bangles, armbands, and necklace cover her more than any fabric. Her thick hair is tied into a single tail, long enough that it could cover her more than anything she wears.

Something she said sticks out to me.

“Wait, what?”

“I know, this can be a lot to take in,” she says. “I assure you, I have every ability to magically grant–”

“No, no, not that. I get the whole wishing business,” I say. After all, I’m media-savvy. I’ve seen this before, sort of. “But, Jinn construct? What does that mean?”

“Um.” She half-turns away and rubs her bare shoulder. “I’m not really—it’s just something I’m supposed to say when I’m summoned. I think it’s because I was created by someone?”

“Who?” I ask.

“Jil’thad, I guess,” she says. “I only met my creator once.” She taps her head. “Plus my memory gets fuzzy when I’m cooped up in there a long time.”

“When were you last out?” I ask.

“Last wish was made two hundred forty-seven years, eight months, two days, four hours, six minutes, twenty-seven seconds ago.”

I stare at her.

“I’m not going to look up what happened on that date,” I say.

“All previous owner wishes are confidential,” she says.

“Well,” I say. “Yes. Good. I guess.” She sighs.

“Sorry, some of this stuff is just automatic.”

“Right.” I stand up. I could just start making wishes willy-nilly, but I don’t want to rush into it. I’m going to have to thing about it, and besides, I’d like a proper introduction. “So, what’s your name?”

“I guess I don’t really have one.” She looks down and taps her fingers together. “My previous masters just called me slave.”

“Well at two hundred years ago, I’m not figgin surprised!” I say, arms splayed. “I’ll just call you jinn for now, and if you think of a name you’d like me to call you, I’ll do so.”

“Oh—okay.” She turns away. Is she blushing? Her face looks warmer. “Anyway, the three wishes! That’s what matters!” She floats to the lamp and gestures a hand over it as if trying draw attention away from anything else, especially her. “As indicated by the lamp, you have three wishes.”

I didn’t even notice what I thought could have been a display screen now shows a smoky three on it.

“Well, how about that. Three wishes are a monumental responsibility, though.” I pace the room. “I’m going to think about it for a bit, if that’s okay. I don’t want to rush into it.” I look at her and smile. “So feel free to make yourself at home in the meantime.”

She stares at me as if I spoke another language.

“What? No, no I—I couldn’t.” She starts to shrink, retreating into the lamp. “My place is in the lamp. You can summon me when you’re ready—”

“No, no, please,” I say. “I think it would be splendid to have a guest. Is there anything I can do for you?”

She looks down, fidgeting with her fingers. Her face looks like she’s about to shrivel up, as if her nerves are all jiggling into gelatin, and her ruby lips tremble.

“Did—” I wonder if I should ask this. “Did none of your previous mas—own—” What would be a word that doesn’t imply ownership? “Cuuustomers . . . ? Did none of them ever ask you what you wanted?”

“I’m not even sure if the rules allow that,” she says.

“What rules?”

“There are rules. I don’t know what they are.”

“Screw the rules,” I say with a grin, “I have mon—” I frown. “Well, I don’t actually have money, but I have a jinn, I guess. Who has rules, and, you know what, forget that; you look very confused. Just—” I throw my arms out. “If you have a wish that I can grant, let’s hear it, and I’ll do it!”

She inhales. I wonder if she actually has to breathe. If she’s some sort of artificial jinn, she may have been given human mannerisms.

“If you have any warm clothing that would fit me, please, I want to wear something warm. Anything, even.” She holds her arms close. “I’m freezing and I’ve never liked having to wear such a skimpy outfit.” She covers her face with her hands. I smile, eyebrows raised.

“Well, that sort of just spilled out of you,” I say.

“It felt good to say, though.” She peeks out from behind her fingers. “Sorry, is that okay?”

I give her one of my sweaters, which is definitely too big for her but she still hugs it around herself and beams.

“So soft and warm,” she says. I smile.

“I’m glad you like it. You can keep it.”

“No,” she says, “I couldn’t—”

We both stop at a sound like a torch being lit. She gasps.

“Wait, but I didn’t—that shouldn’t have—” She looks at the lamp and stares agog at it. It now reads four instead of three.

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“I don’t—I don’t know.” She looks at me. “That’s never happened before. I didn’t even know it could display a number above three.”

I peer at it. I have an idea, but I don’t want to jump to conclusions.

“You said there are rules, right? Is there a rulebook?”

“There is a manual of operation,” she says, “but I’ve never looked at it, and it’s been lost since—well, shortly after I was created.”

I stand up and stretch.

“Well, if this is supposed to indicate my number of wishes, it looks like I might have an extra wish, so I can use that frivolously.” I raise a hand. “I wish I had the manual of operation!”

“Wait, what?” she asks. “But I don’t—” Mist is already swirling from her hands, which twist up as if on their own. “I don’t know where it is, I don’t know if this will work!”

The mist coalesces with a shimmer, a ring like an echoing egg timer, and a book pops into existence above me and floats into my hands. It certainly looks like something that would have been made hundreds, if not thousands, of years ago, with its loose binding and thick, rough pages, but it looked brand-new. I smile.

“I think I know why it’s been lost.”

I hear another torch sound and look at the lamp. The four shifts into a three, and I nod.

“That’s normal, I suppose.” The jinn nods as I open the book, but I frown and hand it to her. “I can’t read it! I don’t even recognize the letters!”

The jinn opens the book and looks over the pages.

“Table of contents. What to expect, meeting your jinn, how to wish . . .”

“So you can read it?” I ask. “I was worried it would’ve been a waste of a wish after all.”

“Ch—Changing your jinn’s appearance?” she says. I glance over her shoulder at the book before remembering I can’t read it at all and back away.

“That’s a section? Maybe we’ll stick a pin in that.” She looks at me and hides half her face behind the book.

“You—You don’t like how I look?”

“What? No, no, it’s not that at all,” I say, “you’re—” My lungs tighten as I try to tell her she’s pretty. Compliments are hard. “I mean, you wanted warmer clothing, right? If there’s anything you want to change about how you look, we can do that. I leave that up to you.”

She seems to blush even more than before as she hides her face entirely behind the book.

“Oh, here’s something—gaining more wishes.” She opens that section of the manual. “It says here . . . hang on, I can read this, but I don’t read very often.” She reads silently, her eyes growing wider as she does.

She looks at me, eyes at their widest.

“You gain another wish every time you grant one of my wishes.”

“Haha!” I raise a fist. “I thought so. You wished for warmer clothing, and I granted that wish. The lamp responded by giving me another wish. None of your previous associates figured that out, huh?”

“No,” she says. “I had no idea, either.”

“Now it’s time to experiment!” I say. “For science! And magic! And wishes!” I raise my palms. “Okay, let’s test this out. Wish for the Nile.” I look aside. “No, wait, I can’t get you the Nile.” I look back at her. “Wish for a sandwich! I can do that!”

She shakes her head.

“But—I don’t—I can’t eat food.”

“Perfect, it’s something you’d never wish for, let’s see if the simple act of speaking the wish aloud counts. Go ahead, just say you wish for a sandwich, and we’ll start the experiment.”

“Um—I wish for a sandwich?” she says. I raise a finger.

“One sandwich, coming up!”

In a few minutes I place a plate with a sandwich in her hands. I look at the lamp. She looks after me.

The lamp remains on three.

“Okay, that didn’t work, I’m not too surprised, but that doesn’t mean infinite wishes isn’t possible.” I take the chicken sandwich back and bite into it. “What’s something you actually wish for, something I can grant, like the sweater?”

“I—I don’t—I don’t know, I—” She covers her face with her hands. “This is all so much, I really don’t know! Can we just take a moment to stop? I’m still processing this.”

My chest tightens.

I went overboard with the new discovery. She’s been doing this longer than some countries have existed, and her entire world has just shifted.

“Yes, of course,” I say. I sit on the couch. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to push you into this. We can stop, take the time you need to process this. That’s perfectly fine.”

“Thank you,” she says in a small voice. “I’m sorry.”

“You have no reason to be.”

I lift my eyebrows at the sound of a torch. We both look at the lamp, which once again reads four.

I cover my mouth so she doesn’t see me grin. This is going to be interesting, before I even make any real wishes.

I have to cover my face when I consider the possibility of how I might wish to make me grant her wishes.

Only if she consents, I tell myself.