Page 8 of A Wish For Jo
Downstairs, the radio blared. Aaliyah normally slept like a log. Jo yearned for the good old days when she could conk out for twelve hours straight, but like her ability to eat loads without gaining a pound, that talent had vanished over the years.
'Morning.' Jo's greeting went unheard, as Aaliyah was up, singing along to something upbeat and annoying. Jo liked to start her days with either total silence or classical music at low volume. So many adjustments had been needed since Aaliyah had gatecrashed her life, but at least Jo could adjust the volume control.
'Ee, that's one of my favourites!' Aaliyah grumbled, tossing her swishy ponytail around like a horse flicking away a cloud of flies.
Not for the first time, Jo marvelled at Aaliyah's luxuriant mane, the ponytail extending as far as her perfectly pert bottom. 'Do you have a hairpiece?' she asked. She had never been able to grow her hair past the top of her shoulders.
'Eww, that's like, totally gross and a bit personal.' Aaliyah shuddered before taking a bite of toast slathered in butter and Marmite. Jo wouldn't normally give house room to the vile concoction, but…
‘Sorry, I just wondered—'
'No, I donothave herpes. Not the ones on the face, and certainly not the ones down under.' Aaliyah gestured to her crotch, her face contorted in horror. 'I knew someone once who had these horrible thingies all over their lips, like something out of The Plague. Revolting.'
Jo didn't know whether to laugh or cry. 'No, I meant ahairpiece.' She enunciated the words carefully, pointing at her head then at Aaliyah's. 'It's a fake piece — well, sometimes it's made of real hair — that you attach for extra length or volume. I’ve never tried one myself, but they're pretty popular.'
'Not with me, sweetie. I am one hundred per cent au naturel.' Aaliyah chomped through her toast, pushing the crusts to one side.
Jo poured herself cereal and a mug of coffee. 'We need to leave at 11.30 to open up,' she said. Aaliyah nodded, then turned the radio back up.
'Listen, I've been thinking.' Jo sliced a banana on top of her granola. 'About my parents, and about things to wish for. I wondered if—'
'You want new ones? I’m not sure my WIFI can conjure up replacement mums and dads. I did try to resurrect Horatio the hamster, bless him, but something went wrong and he wasn't the same.' Aaliyah shivered.
'What do you mean?' Jo's appetite shrivelled up at the thought of a dead rodent showing up. Not that she was a fan of live ones, either. Her only family pet had been a supercilious cat called Candy, who had walked into her parents' kitchen one day and never left.
'It was like something from a Stephen King movie. What's the one? Ah, yes,Pet Sematary. It fair gave me the heebie jeebies, Jo. All blood-red eyes and pointy teeth, snapping and snarling like a bad 'un.'
'What did you do?' Jo chased away both her vision of a demonic hamster and her surprise at Aaliyah's knowledge of the works of Stephen King. By now, nothing ought to surprise her about genies.
Aaliyah's expression was distinctly sheepish. 'Well, I couldn't let my master see it like that. Or his daughter, bless her. Cute little thing, but scared of her own shadow. So I disposed of it humanely, like. A quick whack with a shovel, buried it in the herb garden, and that was me done with raising the dead. So if you're asking—'
Jo shook her head so hard that her brain rattled. 'No, absolutely not. That's not what I meant. I'd just like the chance to spend one more day with them. Go back in time, I guess. Tell them how much I loved them. How much Ilovethem. We rarely said it, I don't know why. We just weren’t a family who said stuff out loud.' Jo closed her eyes, forcing back the tears. 'Stupid, isn't it. So many words spill out of our mouths every day, but the ones that really matter get stuck or swallowed because actions speak louder, as the saying goes.'
'No idea what you're on about,' said Aaliyah. 'Me and Dhassim were all about the action, if you catch my drift.' She winked, and Jo pushed away her untouched cereal. 'He liked to gush on a bit, mind you, did Dhassim. Dribble, dribble, waffle, waffle. Hard work, I tell ya!'
Jo didn't want to hear about Aaliyah's sex life, and especially not the dribbling bit. Her own remained a distant, rather dull memory. 'If I could have just a day, even a few hours, with Mum and Dad, it would give me closure. God, I hate that word, but I don't know how else to put it.'
Aaliyah yawned and whipped out her WIFI.What did I expect?thought Jo.An outpouring of empathy from a woman who'd bludgeoned a mutant hamster to death with a garden tool?
'Looks like it might be your lucky day, Jo.' Aaliyah pushed buttons in a shotgun fashion, the device tinkling and beeping as she jabbed away. How she managed to hit the right ones with such long nails remained a mystery. 'Reet, you have to say your wish out loud, like. Ready, steady, go!'
Jo closed her eyes and swallowed. 'I wish to spend one more day with my parents. As they were before, not after they died, obviously.' She garbled the last bit, thoughts of shuffling zombie-like creatures making her stomach churn.
There was silence, then… 'Your wish is granted.'
Jo's ears hissed and popped, her stomach lurched, then everything went dark.
CHAPTER10
The warmthof the duvet enveloped Jo, her head cocooned by the fluffy pillow. The rhythmic glug of the radiator and the faint traffic noise barely registered as she stretched her legs and wiggled her toes. Ooh, still some residual heat in the fleece-covered hot-water bottle. Jo snared the bottle with her feet, brought it further up the bed, and—
Wait a minute.Jo's radiator didn't glug, hardly any cars passed her house, and she hadn't used a hot-water bottle in years.
She sat up so quickly that her vision blurred. Blinking furiously, she took in her surroundings bit by bit. The garish green and blue wallpaper. The white wooden dressing table with trifold mirrors. The wonky wardrobe, one door always slightly ajar.
She was home.
As if on cue, an achingly familiar voice came from below. 'Are you awake, love? Just popping some bangers under the grill, or Lorne sausage if you'd rather.'
