The Were-Raptor and the Seamstress Robot
by Mary E. Lowd
Angie and Tyler's hands touched the green-gold brass of the magic lamp at the same time. The metal was slick with creek water and they had to dig away the mud and wet moss that had half buried the lamp using their bare hands. Their fingers smeared the mud, leaving their hands and the lamp dirty. Someone must have thrown it into this creek, deep in the woods, years ago.
Angie and Tyler had strayed from the trail hours ago, and Angie kept oscillating between feeling thrilled to be alone with him in the forest... and terrified that she was making a dangerous mistake. She and Tyler had only been dating a few months. He seemed perfect and kind, but she knew that abusive men used a honeymoon period to lure their girlfriends in and then isolate them. Right now, they were pretty isolated.
Still, how many men would dig up old junk in the forest with her and pretend it was a magical treasure? Most adults didn't seem to remember how to play and have fun. Tyler did. She loved that about him.
Both Tyler and Angie washed their hands off in the cold creek water, and when the brass lamp looked as good as it was going to--still rusty and miscolored--Tyler said, "Shall we make a wish?"
Angie smiled. "Yeah, we should. What would you wish for?"
"You first," Tyler said, sitting down on a big sunbaked boulder beside the creek. Angie perched on a smaller rock beside it.
"Okay..." she said. "You won't laugh?"
"I won't laugh." He held one hand up, palm out, as if he were solemnly swearing.
Angie tugged at the edge of her hiking shorts, slightly shorter and tighter than she'd like, and she straightened the t-shirt that had always been too boxy for her but now was also a little too tight. She didn't want to get a larger one, because that would involve admitting that she needed a bigger size. And there were far fewer fun t-shirts in the next size up. "I want a seamstress robot."
"A what?"
"You know, like, a robot that can measure me and sew clothes that fit absolutely perfectly. Sort of like a cross between a 3D fabric printer and... well, a really, really good tailor."
Tyler didn't laugh, but his mouth quirked kind of like he was tasting a lemon. "Can't you just go buy clothes? Or order them online?"
It was easy for him to think that, sitting there in his jeans and shirt, made from fabric several times thicker than the flimsy stuff used for women's clothes, that came in sizes measured in inches instead of a numbering system come up with by Cthulu. Shopping for clothes in stores took hours, and the selection was so limited... And when Angie ordered stuff online, it was like playing roulette. Half of the time, the object that arrived looked nothing like she'd ordered, and sure, she could send it back, but that takes time too. And it was demoralizing. Trying on clothes that were too tight in all kinds of random places and too baggy in others? Ugh. It was Angie's least favorite activity.
"Besides, you already have a lot of clothes that you look good in." Tyler grinned in the way that Angie always felt like she was supposed to feel was a loving compliment... but somehow felt more like a leer.
"They're too tight," Angie mumbled.
Tyler laughed. "Yeah, that's why they look so good. But I mean, if you really want a seamstress... couldn't you just do it yourself?"
"Sewing takes a lot of time," Angie said. She tugged at her shirt again, wishing it didn't show the exact curve of her breasts and belly underneath it so well.
Tyler shrugged. He didn't care about Angie's time.
"Yeah, whatever. What would you wish for?"
Tyler's grin shifted into the one he got whenever he knew he was about to be really, really clever: "I'd wish we were both were-velociraptors who could shift back and forth at will!"
"That would be pretty cool..." Angie admitted. Although, she couldn't help thinking that it would be even harder to find clothes that fit her then.
Suddenly, the light shifted as if the sun had come out from behind a cloud, but the angles were all wrong. Angie realized that the new light was coming from the lamp, and it glowed brighter and brighter, until it left a sunspot shape in her vision. When her eyes cleared, a lumpy, curvy green-skinned woman with bulbous eyes and a wide, wide mouth like a frog stood... well, hovered... since her extremities kind of disappeared into a green mist... before them.
"You only get one wish," the genie said. "You touched my lamp at the exact same time, so you have to share it. Figure out what you're wishing for, and agree on it."
