The Three wishes

Desire thrashed around in her sleep unaccustomed to having the whole double bed to herself. She had fitful dreams about her husband who was helping a friend with his guitar stand in a London festival. In her half conscious state she mourned for the opportunities she should have been bold enough to take on. Why do I always think I have to wait until the time was right, I missed out on my dreams. Shouldn’t have walked away, should have told her how I really felt. Thrashed it out. Made up with her.

Why didn’t someone help me? Fairy godmother, come and to wave your magic wand, she mumbled, trying to make her pillow more comfortable.

Asperella appeared in a flash of light at the bottom of Desire’s bed.

She was a bit flushed and she had a feeling that she was rather late.

She looked around her at the alarm clock flashing a digital signal, the laptop open on the dressing table with a picture of a planet on the screen , clothes draped messily over a plastic chair. This was not the century she hoped it would be.

Looking down at her long flowing dress and pointed slippers she hastily waved her magic wand and changed into more suitable dress for the 21 st Century, aiming at the image on the photo on the bedside table of a woman in a mini skirt and a tiny pink tee shirt that ended just above the navel.

She cleared her throat,” awake my dearest god daughter!” She called.

Desire woke up with a start and pulled her duvet up to cover her body.

Ahhrg! She cried when she saw a strange creature trying to cover her navel with her wings, and the message You’re fairy godmother flashing in a light around her head .

“Don’t be frightened I’ve come to help you”.

Desire sat up, having decided that she might as well go along with this, as it was obviously one of her strange dreams caused by the blue veined cheese she had late last night.

“ I have come to give you three wishes to help you out of your terrible incarceration in this tiny house.”

“This is my house that I am very pleased with thank you”, snapped Desire.

“I have come to help you find happiness”. trilled Asperella,"and find a prince who will be your true love.”

“Look godmother, there is more to a girl’s life now than sitting around singing, Some Day my Prince will come, “croaked Desire not quiet managing to hit the high notes, "like Cinderella did in Walt Disney’s film”.

“But that’s what every girl should want”. Asperella trilled

“Anyway our prince is currently taken,” answered Desire.

“No what I want now is spiritual and creative fulfilment and that my man is happy enough to support me when I’m down."
“Oh”, said Asperella, disappointed. She waved her magic wand over Desire’s head and muttered “may you have three wishes to help you find what your heart desires.” And in a flash of blue disappeared.

Desire carried on sleeping dreaming of a world where peace reigned and that she managed to catch up with her credit card payments.

In the morning Desire walked blurry eyed into the bathroom, and felt her elbow hit something. The toilet roll splashed into the toilet basin and started doubling in size with pink water.

“I wish I hadn’t done that,” she thought.

There was a white out and unaccountably the toilet roll was back on top of the cistern totally dry.

Desire gasped sucking too much air and choked looking at the toilet then the toilet paper then the toilet her eyes watering. What had happened? Oh my God I thought it was a dream! My fairy godmother really did give me three wishes. 

Her heart sank. I have messed up one wish, when I could have saved the planet by now she thought.

She wondered down to the kitchen tying up her dressing gown, switching on the radio hearing more depressing news headlines with the usual depressed thoughts spinning round in her head. Why hadn’t the politicians learned from the past mistakes and understood the futility of war.

They never do. All the same feelings, greed, jealousy, the need to dominate and declare that their political beliefs are better than all other parties . It’s still going on. She had grown weary of reading the newspapers. It never changes she thought.

There would always be wars. We have not even started to evolve from warring tribes to the elevated light beings that we could be.

I am still dragged back from nearly reaching true serenity by hearing about out more war and suffering people on the news, over come with sadness that I am powerless to do anything to save all these people from their misery.

“I wish I didn’t have to put the wheelie bin out this morning,” she thought.

“I want a shower before I go out.”

There was another white out.

Desire clutched her head. Fool, fool. I’ve wasted another wish through my laziness. And there was her wheelie bin at the bottom of her drive.

Just my luck that I was granted three wishes when my head is so muddled. Her throat felt dry and her stomach churned noisily.

She went into the kitchen and made herself camomile tea and started working out how to use her third wish to save her species.

She automatically dialled her answer phone. Still no call from her daughter Natasha. I used to be the first person she phoned to talk to about her latest news. When did our relationship change?

I wish I could go back to when she was a baby and I was the most important person in her life.

Desire heard a whooshing sound and she felt herself being dragged backwards down a time tunnel

“I don’t want to be 24 again," she yelled

She found herself pushing a heavy fifties style pram along a street in Hendon, her eldest three year old daughter sitting facing her on the toddler seat, whilst her other three months old daughter Katarina lay sleeping.

“Don’t kick me Maria”, she said, wiping a dusty foot print off her white cotton trousers, “ its not funny.”

“I thinks its funny, “chirped Maria. Desire was amazed how funny and beautiful her oldest girl was. She peered at her baby Natasha, lying in the pram looking up at the clouds with her huge brown eyes. So adorable. But I don’t want to live through the seventies again. Desire thought.

She felt like she was in a film that was being re run without the possibility of editing out the worst bits.

She turned the corner into Hall Lane that lead to the house she and her husband rented whilst he was in Film School, just 400 yards from the massive flyover carrying the M1 motorway, mounted on giant concrete legs. Her heart sank. She had forgotten what it was like to live in the London suburbs.

She carried on as if she was a string puppet being manipulated by a giant puppet master, opening her front door wheeling the pram into an echoing hall.

She lifted Maria off her pram seat and Natasha held out her arms to be lifted. Desire lifted her up feeling her soft hair next to her cheek and her warm body, out of the pram and sank with the baby on her lap into an arm chair. “Put on Rainbow , put on Rainbow,” chanted Maria jumping up and down.

Robot-like Desire switched on the TV and saw Jeremy Irons sitting next to a giant teddy bear. She closed her eyes.

Fairy godmother. I believe in you. Please don’t leave me here. I don’t want to relive my life. I recognise my mistakes. I know my daughter needs to lead her own life. I had long enough to enjoy being the closest person to her. I promise I’ll stop being cynical.

She lay the baby down on a clean blanket so she could roll around on her tummy and went to the kitchen. No washing machine, no dishwasher. Opening the fridge she saw the after math of a stuffed roasted chicken and shuddered. It had been 30 years since she ate meat.

She caught sight of herself in the hall mirror as she returned to the front room carrying a drink for each of them. She was wearing loose white canvas trousers and a tight tee shirt a with red hearts on a white background design.

She was herself in her twenties and also herself in her fifties.

I know I’ver got a great life now. I’ve got time to paint and write. I love my life. I wish you will just get me home!

Desire watched Natalie pull herself up to a standing position holding on to the coffee table and Maria dance around to the music on Rainbow; there was a white out and then she was back in her kitchen in Ireland.

Her fairy godmother was standing next to the kitchen table wearing a long robe this time. "Thank you so much," Desire told her warmly. I feel so strange. Why did you give me a fourth wish?"

“I gave you a final wish so that you would not have to live your life again. But this is the last time I can answer your needs.” And she was gone with a flash of pink and a sound of distant laughter.

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