The Wish That Stayed Too Long

“Three wishes?” Alina raised an eyebrow, eyeing the figure rising from the old oil lamp on her grandmother’s dusty mantle.

The genie, cloaked in midnight blue and gold, gave a knowing smirk. “Three. And choose wisely.”

She didn’t hesitate. “First—I want to be wealthy. Not just rich, but legacy-rich.”

“Granted.”

“Second—I want a long, healthy life. I want to see decades pass without pain.”

“Granted.”

Her eyes softened as she glanced at the photo of her husband, James, across the room. “And last… I want to live exactly as long as he does. Not a minute more, not a minute less.”

The genie paused for the first time. His smirk faded into something quieter. But then, with a small bow, he said, “Granted.”

The next decade was pure bliss. Their bank account swelled. They traveled the world—sipped champagne in Paris, rode camels under Egyptian stars, and danced barefoot at their vineyard in Tuscany.

Alina poured love into every day, but slowly, James changed.

“I want to do more,” he told her over breakfast in Santorini. “Something meaningful.”

They launched a global education fund, and James took the reins. At first, she was proud of his passion. But weeks turned into months apart. His emails became shorter, his voice calls rarer. When he did return, he smelled faintly of something floral, foreign. Not her perfume.

“You’re married to your cause,” she told him once.

“And you're married to a version of me that no longer exists,” he replied, barely meeting her gaze.

The silence between them grew louder than any argument. Yet, they remained together—at least on paper. Publicly, they were still the golden couple. Privately, they were strangers sharing a legacy.

She could have left, but she didn't. Deep down, she hoped the man she loved would return. And besides… the wish wouldn’t let her move on.

Years passed. Alina lived in comfort, but not in joy. She filled her days with books, gardens, and galleries—everything but love. There were moments she considered rewriting her life, but the weight of the wish held her still.

Then, on her 80th birthday, she awoke to a familiar presence standing at the foot of her bed.

“You,” she whispered. “I almost forgot you were real.”

The genie bowed slightly. “Your final wish has ended.”

She sat up, heart thudding slower with each beat. “Is he...?”

“He passed in his sleep, halfway across the world.”

Tears welled up, not from grief, but from the realization that her time was now up, too. She hadn’t seen James in nearly twenty years, yet her life had still been tethered to his.

“I loved him once,” she murmured. “But the wish… it locked me there, didn’t it?”

The genie’s eyes softened. “You wished never to live beyond him. So you couldn’t move forward. Not truly. And you never asked to be happy.”

She laughed, bitter and broken. “No one ever does, do they?”

“In all my centuries,” the genie said gently, “not a single soul has wished for happiness.”

Her final breath came quietly, as though her body was simply exhaling the past. The genie lingered for a moment longer, gazing down at the still form of a woman who had everything—except the one thing that mattered most.

And with that, he vanished, waiting once more for someone else to rub the lamp… and forget the most important wish of all.