Disclaimer: All concepts and characters belong to Kevin Williamson and the WarnerBrother's Network and are used here without permission for non-profit entertainment.

Rating: G

Spoilers: None

Wishes

Pacey Witter rarely wished on stars, but sitting on the end of the dock at three in the morning with his legs in the cold water and Josephine Potter next to him, it didn’t seem like quite such an absurd idea.

It was chilly out, just cold enough to make the warmth from her body feel like heaven brushing against his right side. The moon was at their backs; he could make out their shadows on the rippling water. There was no sound but the trickle of the creek slipping past and it sounded like yards of silk being shaken by the breeze.

"Go on," Joey said. "Make a wish."

She gave him a smile of pure happiness, the one so honest he had no doubt it came from some deep place within her. He swallowed and felt himself grin unstoppably, nervous and exhilarated at the same time.

"What should I wish for?" he asked.

"Anything you want," she said.

"Okay." He leaned back on his hands, feeling the cool wood against his palms. His panic got the better of him, and he said, "I wish for Mrs. Kindle to realize that my true academic abilities have been squashed by the rigors of high school life and decide to pass me despite my incredible lack of turn-in homework assignments."

"Oh." Joey looked faintly disappointed.

Pacey sat up straighter, mentally slapping himself. What a loaded question, and he’d managed to blow it royally. "That was probably a lousy wish," he said, wondering if he could save the moment.

Joey appeared willing to forgive him. "Plenty of stars in the sky, Pacey," she said, gesturing. "Try another one."

He’d won himself another chance but still had no idea what the right answer was. "Isn’t it your turn?" he asked instead.

Joey blushed. Point for Pacey.

"I already made my wish."

"What was it?"

She shook her head, brown hair falling all around and giving off the slight scent of coconut. "I can’t tell you."

"And why not?"

"Because then it won’t come true."

"That’s just something people say when they don’t want to reveal the deepest longings of their hearts," he told her.

Joey blushed again, deeper this time. It brought out the whites in her eyes.

"Come on," he said, "tell old Pacey what you want for Christmas."

"Christmas," she replied, "now that’s an entirely different event. Santa doesn’t care who I give copies of my list to."

"Then tell me what you want for Christmas."

She shook her head. "Cash. So much cash that I don’t even feel ripped off when I spend six bucks for a cappuccino."

"What else?"

"I get more than one?"

"Forget about Santa. Say it’s a genie."

"The Robin Williams genie or the Sinbad genie?"

"Either one."

Then they both looked at each other, smiled, and said, "Robin Williams," at the same time. Joey broke into laughter and kept turning her eyes away.

"So what does Joey Abobua want?" he asked, unable to help pushing.

"After cash? Let’s see...No, wait, I want to take that one back. Is that allowed, or am I breaking some ethereal law of nature?"

"Rules of wishing," Pacey said, counting on his fingers. "And don’t say I’m not an expert, because Aladdin was playing in the store all of Thursday afternoon. First, no wishing for more wishes."

"Is that the same as trying to take a wish back?"

"Technically, you requested cash from the jolly Jenny Craig-goer, not from the genie, so you still have three wishes. Second rule, no trying to bring people back from the dead." He slipped into his best Robbin William’s imitation, making his voice sliver as he quoted from the movie. "‘It’s not a pretty sight, I don’t like doing it!’"

Joey’s lips pressed tight together when she laughed. "What’s the third rule?"

Pacey sobered. "You can’t wish for anyone to fall in love with you."

She immediately turned away. "Well," she said after a moment, "those rules aren’t going to work."

"And why not?"

"To begin with, it’s unfair to say you can’t ask for more wishes. That’s the one thing anybody in their right mind would ask for, and the Disney executives only made that rule up because it helped limit the scope of the story into a tidy ninety-minute movie. No bringing people back from the dead is probably only became a rule after that gruesome story about the monkey’s paw and all the grossness of having a walking corpse. It would be simple enough to arrange some sort of clause in there that states the wish is intended to alter the circumstances of a past tragedy so that the person in question never died, rather than re-animating their rotting body."

"What about the third rule?" Pacey asked, when she stopped.

For a minute she didn’t reply, and he thought she wasn’t going to. Then she said, "Doesn’t that one sort of take the fun out of the whole thing?"

It was Pacey’s turn to chuckle. Point for Joey.

"Does that mean one of your wishes breaks rule number three?" he asked.

She looked at him defiantly. "My wishes, in order of importance, would be, my mother back from the dead, including the aforementioned clause, more wishes, and a huge deposit of natural diamonds underneath the Ice Box."

Her smile this time was a little smug. "I believe the ball is in your court, Mr. Witter."

He still had no idea what to say. Instead, he sat there on the dock next to her, feeling the occasional splash of water reach high enough to dampen the rolled legs of his jeans, and just looked at her. Her hands were stuffed in the pockets of her jacket. Her lips were a little chapped from the wind. Speckles of starlight fell on her nose and lit up each tiny freckle.

"Come on, Pacey," she said. "You can take you pick, star wishes, genie wishes, or a want list to Santa. What’ll it be?"

He would have been content just to sit and stare at her for a few more hours, but he answered.

"You know those Hindu stories where gods grant boons to humans? That’s what I’d pick. I’d want to be one of those people who found a beautiful goddess who was wonderful beyond anything he’d ever hoped for. And then I’d want to sit in a cave for ten thousand years and pray to her until she came and offered me one boon. Not that the boon mattered. I’d just want her to know...to know that I had been sitting there for ten thousand years dreaming of her, so that she could have it to carry around inside."

Joey’s face smile had melted into the softest expression Pacey had ever seen her wear. "And the boon? What would you wish for when she did finally notice you?"

It was his turn to smile. "Ten thousand more years to make all the dreams come true."

Jory San-Corinth

April 25, 2000