The Christmas Genie (11 page)

“I wish I could go to the moon,” said Anthony.

“That would be cool,” David said.

“I've been to the moon,” Genie Bob said. “It's way overrated. Big bore. Nothin' going on there. Believe me, ya don't want to go to the moon.”

“I wish there was a magical place where no one could go but me,” said Madison. “Nobody could tell me what to do. The flowers would gleam and there would be a wide open field. And pixies would fly over your head.”

“Pixies?” we all said.

“Why are we arguing over where we wish we could go?” said Ethan. “Why don't we just wish for the whole class to have the power to teleport wherever we want? Like on
Star Trek
. That would be even better than a time machine.”

“If everyone in the world had that power,” said Hannah, “we wouldn't need cars, trains, planes, or ships. We wouldn't need to burn gas. There would be no global warming.”

“And we would save so much
time
,” Natalie said. “Can you imagine if you could go from New York to California in seconds?”

“That would be cool,” said David.

“My mom works for an airline,” said Mia. “She would lose her job.”

“
Everyone
in the travel industry would lose their jobs,” Ella said.

“My dad is a truck driver,” said Christopher. “Would he lose his job?”

“Sure,” Mia said. “If we could teleport stuff, we wouldn't need the travel industry, shipping companies, the post office, railroads, highways. It would be a different world.”

“Isn't it kind of risky for us to make a decision
that would change the world so dramatically?” asked Ashley.

“We would be changing it for the
better
,” insisted Ethan.

“Maybe we would be changing it for the worse,” said Mia. “You don't know. We can't predict what might happen.”

“Teleportation!” exclaimed Ethan. “What's the debate? It would be like the invention of the lightbulb, or the airplane.”

“If it weren't for the airplane, there would be no 9/11, no Hiroshima, no Pearl Harbor,” said Mia.

“Oh, give me a break!” said Ethan. “Are you gonna claim the plane is a bad thing because there have been some tragedies involving planes? You can say that about
anything
. “If we didn't have water, nobody would ever drown. So should we get rid of water?”

“Water is a necessity,” Mia pointed out. “Airplanes aren't.”

“Christmas vacation . . .,” Bob said, rolling his eyes. “Slipping away . . .”

Mrs. Walters picked the next card out of the bowl.

“That one's me, baby!” said Andrew, jumping up to high-five Logan.

“You are such an egomaniac,” said Elizabeth.

“You know it!” Andrew said proudly.

“It wasn't a compliment,” Elizabeth said. “Egomaniacs are selfish jerks who think the whole world revolves around them.”

“You're just jealous because you can't control the weather like me,” Andrew said.

“Why don't you get over yourself?” Hannah told Andrew. “If you want to be famous so badly, why don't you do something
great
? Invent something. Cure cancer. Create a brilliant piece of art or music.
Accomplish
something. Then you'll be famous.”

“Paris Hilton never accomplished anything,” Abigail pointed out. “She was born famous.”

“Children, children!” said Mrs. Walters.

“Famous people aren't necessarily happy, you know,” said Mia.

“That's true,” Ashley said. “A lot of them are lonely, pathetic people.”

“Yeah,” Andrew said, “but they're lonely, pathetic,
famous
people.”

“You know, if you were famous, people would be pestering you for autographs all the time,” said Mia. “You wouldn't even be able to go out to eat in a restaurant, because people would come over and bother you.”

“I would hire bouncers to beat up people who bother me,” Andrew said. “And I would have flunkies sign my autograph for me so I wouldn't have to.”

“You can't do that,” said Ella. “People want a real autograph.”

“And if you're famous,” Mia said, “the paparazzi will be chasing you around trying to take your picture all the time.”

“Let 'em,” Andrew said as he struck a pose. “I love getting my picture taken.”

“The paparazzi chased Princess Diana into a tunnel and her car crashed,” said Abigail. “That's how she died.”

“No it isn't,” Ava said. “She crashed because her driver was
drunk
.”

“Some people are famous for the wrong reason,” said Ashley. “Like John Wilkes Booth. He's famous because he assassinated Abraham Lincoln. You don't want to be famous like
that
.”

“Yeah,” said Alyssa. “Then there's Hitler, Al Capone, Lee Harvey Oswald. . . .”

“The Hamburglar,” added Alex.

“Who's the Hamburglar?” asked Christopher.

“He's that guy who steals hamburgers from Ronald McDonald,” Alex told him.

“That guy ain't famous,” said Christopher.

“Okay, I think we've established that fame can have its drawbacks,” said Mrs. Walters. “Let's hurry. There are only a few more wishes left and it's almost two-thirty.”

“That one had to be Alex,” I said. “Nobody else has such a twisted mind.”

“I take that as a compliment,” Alex said proudly.

“Why would anybody want to eat a tennis ball?” asked Olivia, “That's gross!”

“If it tasted good, it wouldn't be gross,” Alex explained.

“That's just sick, man,” said Logan.

“Hey, we eat pigs and cows and chickens,” Alex pointed out. “And did you ever read the ingredients on a box of Twinkies? You might as well eat tennis balls.”

“I'm going to assume you were just joking, Alex,” Mrs. Walters said as she pulled the next card.

“Yeah!” said Logan. “That's right. And no books, neither.”

“I'll try not to take your wish personally, Logan,” said Mrs. Walters.

“It's nothin' against you, Mrs. Walters,” Logan said. “But if I didn't have to be here, I could be having fun.”

“And what would you be doing if you weren't here?” Mrs. Walters asked.

“Probably out breaking some law,” Elizabeth said.

“I would not!” Logan said. “I'd be home playing
Grand Theft Auto
.”

“Oh, you wouldn't be breaking the law,” Elizabeth said. “You'd
simulate
breaking the law. Much better!”

“That game is not appropriate for kids,” said Hannah.

“What do you two know?” Logan asked. “I bet neither of you have ever played the game.”

“School isn't dumb,” said Natalie. “People who don't go to school are dumb.”

“Yeah, if we didn't go to school, we'd be stupid,” said Madison.

“Some of us are stupid anyway,” Ava said.

“Excuse me,” Mrs. Walters interrupted. “But ‘stupid' is a word we don't use in this class.”

“You just used it,” said Logan.

“I know you're all going to make fun of me,” Madison said, “but getting a good education is how we grow up to get good jobs, and become good parents and productive members of society.”

“Nobody's going to make fun of you, Madison,” said Mrs. Walters. “You're absolutely right. I would hate to see what civilization would be like if we didn't have an educational system.”

“I didn't say nothin' about anybody
else
going to school,” Logan said. “I just wish that
I
didn't have to go.”

“I wish you didn't have to go to school either,” Abigail said, “because then you wouldn't be here.”

Some of the kids laughed. Logan stood up.

“Hey, how come they can say all kinds of mean stuff to me, but I get yelled at whenever I say mean stuff to them? It's not fair.”

“You're right, Logan,” Mrs. Walters said. “I'm sorry.
Everybody
should be respected. But everyone must go to school too. I'm sorry you don't like it more.”

“Don't we all!” said Mrs. Walters.

“I really meant to write
optimistic
more than happy,” Mia said.

“So you consider yourself a pessimist?” asked Mrs. Walters.

“Well,” Mia said, “I don't like being disappointed. I figure that if I expect that things are going to be bad, and they turn out to be bad,
then I'm not so disappointed. And if I expect that things are going to be bad, and they turn out to be good, it's a pleasant surprise. But if I expect that things are going to be good, and they turn out to be bad, it's so depressing. Do you know what I mean?”

“I don't know what the heck she's talking about,” said William.

“I know
exactly
what she's talking about,” Ethan said. “But that's a messed-up attitude. Why don't you just cheer up? Problem solved.”

“It's not as easy as that,” Mrs. Walters told Ethan. “If I asked any of you to change your personality and think in a completely different way, it would be very difficult. What if I asked Jacob to stop loving sports, or Isabella to stop loving animals?”

“No way,” Isabella said.

“Not gonna happen,” said Jacob.

“See what I mean?” Mrs. Walters said.

“You wouldn't want to be happy all the time either,” Ella told Mia. “People who are happy all the time are annoying.”

“And if you're happy all the time, you're ignoring reality,” Natalie said. “If something
horrible happened, it would be weird to be happy about it.”