Little Blue Bottle
One time, this guy found a little blue bottle down by the sea, and when he removed the cork, inside the little blue bottle was a little blue imp wearing a little blue coat and little blue pants and a little blue hat and little round blue shoes because he had round blue feet.
The man said, "Holy shit, a little blue imp in a little blue bottle."
"Yep," said the imp.
The man had one eye against the opening of the little blue bottle, and that's how he could see the little blue imp.
"Do you grant wishes?" asked the man.
"I do. Well, I'm supposed to."
The man removed his eye from the bottle so he could talk directly into the opening.
"What does that mean? Do you, or don't you?"
"I don't. I should, but I don't."
"Why?"
"'Cause, if I grant a wish, and it's fulfilled, I owe the person who has pulled the cork from the bottle three wishes. And after I grant the third wish, I'm free to go."
"What's so bad about that?"
"Don't want to go."
"No?"
"No. Actually, it's quite roomy inside here. I get twenty-four hour super cable, one million channels, all the food I could want and plenty of women and booze. What's to want? When you're my size, a place like this is really roomy. And it has a downstairs you wouldn't believe. I mean, I got the perfect thing here. No work. All play. Everything at my finger tips."
"But don't you have to grant me a wish, even if you don't want to?"
"Well ... yeah, you got me there. I'm supposed to grant you three."
"Then you must."
"Look, life isn't that bad for you. Not really. Working for things makes life better. It's the way to go, not getting it wished to you."
"Did you work for what you got?"
"No. I sort of … inherited it. Fell into it, so to speak."
"Then why should I work?"
"Guess you have a point."
"First wish, lots of money."
"Okay, done."
"Where is it?"
"In your bank account. No matter how much you spend, there will always be more, and the taxes will be paid. All you have to do is spend the money."
"Cool. For my second wish, I want the best looking nasty redhead you can find to be my constant companion."
"Done."
"Wow," said the guy, his arm around the redhead, "this is nifty. Are those natural?"
"Oh, yeah."
"Purrrr," said the redhead.
"Now for my last wish."
"Go for it."
"I want to be you."
"Whoa!"
"No, that's what I want. You'll be free, and I'll be you. All those channels, and all those women…Hey, I should have saved the redhead wish. "
"Too late for that."
"So, for my third wish, I want to be you."
"Very well. You're me."
And he was. The formerly little blue imp was now outside the bottle, and he wasn't blue anymore. He was now a nice looking man with his arm around the redhead. Inside the bottle, the man said, "Hey, I'm blue."
"You said you wanted to be me."
"Hey, there's no downstairs."
"You found that out."
"It's small in here."
"Very."
"There's not even a television, let alone cable with a million channels."
"Noticed that too."
"What about my bank account, the redhead? And where are those other women?"
"I lied. Aren't any."
"Can you do that?"
"I can. You got all your wishes, but it isn't what you thought. And hey, I got the one I wanted most, to be free. Only catch is, for me to get free, the third wish is you have to want to be me. Not everyone falls for it."
"How do I get out?"
"You don't. Not unless you convince someone to be you, same as me."
"You turd."
"Yep."
"What about the bank account?"
"You won’t need it in there. Nothing to buy. Oh, and it's in your name. I'm you now. You're me. I don't have powers like I had before, but that's okay. That's the price of being free. And, I got the redhead."
"But now I have powers?"
"Sure. To grant wishes to others. It's a pretty sucky position really."
"Shit."
"Yep."
The formerly blue imp who was no longer blue or an imp, removed his arm from the redhead's waist and put the cork in the bottle. He flung the bottle out to sea. The waves picked it up and carried it away.
The man and the redhead walked across the sand, toward town, and the bank. He thought he ought to withdraw some money for dinner, and the weekend.
 
"Little Blue Bottle" was originally published here, on The Orbit, on 05/22/03. "Little Blue Bottle" © 2003 Joe R. Lansdale.