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It all started with a lamp. One that Kojiro happened upon in a flea market, shoved in his direction by a shifty-eyed proprietor.
“I’ll give you a good price,” the man had said.
Kojiro studied the lamp. It was made of a fine rose gold, inlaid with sakura branches of white gold, and delicate flowers of moonstone petals and ruby centers, a truly beautiful piece.
“How much?” Kojiro asked. He did not trust this man. Any who would display a ware such as this at an out-of-the-way market was sure to have hidden reasons for parting so easily with it.
“A bargain at ten silver,” the man replied; Kojiro could not help but agree.
It was good, suspiciously good, too good. The type of bargain one only finds for objects cursed with unspeakable horrors. Yet Kojiro was inexplicably drawn to it, as if the lamp was whispering to him to take it, not out of malice but out of hope.
“I will take it,” Kojiro declared, and he counted out the ten silver for the man, who smiled grimly as he pocketed the coin.
As Kojiro made to pick up the lamp, the man’s hand darted out, stopping him. “A piece of advice,” said he. “Do not touch it until you are alone.”
Kojiro smiled and nodded, then wrapped the lamp in a cloth handkerchief before depositing it into his bag. “Thank you,” he said to the man, and turned to leave the market.
The man smiled back, then packed up his booth, pleased that he had done the last of what was needed of him to complete his task. He hoped too that the lamp’s new owner would not squander the bargain he was given.
Only time would tell.
“Where am I to put you?” Kojiro eyed the new lamp in yet another setting that did not seem to fit. He had tried his table, then his bookshelf, and finally, the mantle above the fireplace, and none of them seemed right.
It was as if the lamp itself whispered to him as he left the room, asking to be close.
The lamp evoked the oddest sensation. Kojiro had never been one to attach personality to objects, but this lamp… it was as if it was an affection-starved pet relishing in its moments with its master. Projecting its loneliness out into the room, so palpable that those in its presence could feel it too.
Kojiro had not yet touched the cold metal, as if doing so was an act of intimacy he needed to ready himself for. If the lamp were alive, then Kojiro did not want his first touch to be clumsy or vulgar. He wanted it to be a gentle caress, a quiet introduction to his heart.
“Ha!” Kojiro stumbled backward, away from the mantle. How silly of him, seeing a soul in an inanimate object. Believing the caution of a man who likely sold him stolen wares. “What do you think, lamp? Should I find your rightful owner, and return you?”
It was time for Kojiro to give up his silly superstitions. To stop looking at the rose gold and decorated sakura and think of it as anything but a lamp. It was beautiful, yes. It was mesmerizing, oh yes. And something about it captured Kojiro’s soul, as if it had been searching for him too.
“I need to get a grip,” Kojiro finally murmured, and he ran his finger along one of the inlaid gold branches. “You can’t possibly—“
But Kojiro would not finish that thought. Alas, his instinct had been right all along. The lamp on the mantle was no ordinary lamp.
Kaoru often wondered what he would wish for, if he came across a genie’s lamp. He had seen the way that immense riches could corrupt the soul, the way that unearned adoration twisted and destroyed the wishers, how unrequited love, once falsely requited, withered the hearts of both the beloved and the lover.
His favorite wishes were always the modest ones. A child seeing him and asking for three candies, not realizing that they could use just one wish for three, then smiling happily and wishing him a farewell, to find the next wisher, and the next, and the next.
It was a lonely life, waiting. Hoping for a wisher who savored the wishes, conversing with Kaoru in the process, filling the void of monotony that was sitting in a lamp waiting—waiting—waiting for the next to rub its lustrous body, releasing Kaoru for a short time.
Always far too short a time.
At least the last one, the dead-eyed merchant Tadashi, had kept his promise to find a new owner promptly, having wasted his wishes on his soulless master.
This new owner too was something different. Perhaps even something new; Kaoru had been studying the man through his lamp.
He was tall and muscular, with lush hair the color of an ancient forest’s foliage. His eyes were soft, both in color and expression, and they gazed so fondly on Kaoru’s container. He seemed endlessly dissatisfied with where he placed Kaoru, as if he could hear Kauro’s silent cries to not be alone, nothing more than a mere adornment on a mantle, or a bookshelf, or a windowsill.
Kaoru hoped this man would take his time to savor his wishes, so he might have longer to speak to someone. Perhaps this man would also find him a new owner promptly after his wishes were spent, so that Kaoru could pretend he were not tethered. Perhaps…
But he was left to ponder no longer, with the man’s delicate brush of his lamp; Kaoru jumped at the chance to say hello.
“A genie!” The man exclaimed as Kaoru materialized, free at least for the moment from the confines of his prison. “A genie just came out of the lamp!”
Kaoru did his traditional bow, smiling his most simpering smile. “I am Kaoru, of the sakura lamp. Indeed I am a genie, and I will grant you wishes three.”
In Kaoru’s centuries being trapped in the lamp, he had seen his share of reactions. From delight, to confusion, to greed, to surprise.
But this was the first time that Kaoru experienced this expression: sadness. There it was, overwhelming his new owner’s eyes, bubbling up onto his new owner’s face, and trickling down to his new owner’s hands.
Of all the things I had thought about with this lamp, Kojiro pondered, I did not think this to be the outcome of my touch. He needed a beat to make sense of the scene. Of the golden-eyed man draped in fine silks, whose sakura-colored hair trailed down his back.
Kojiro had never seen one so beautiful as Kaoru.
And yet, deep behind those golden eyes laid something more. Something that had whispered to Kojiro from the lamp. Something that compelled Kojiro to keep the lamp in his sight, to make sure the lamp was not alone. It could not be hidden behind false delight at servitude, or fancy adornments and pleasing smiles.
“Being a genie is lonely, I imagine,” Kojiro said, studying the way the Kaoru’s mouth stuttered, without saying words.
“It is the life that I am bound to,” Kaoru finally said. “Granting wishes gives me purpose.”
“What was your favorite wish?” Kojiro asked, careful to make sure his words never used one of his three chances. His instincts were whispering to him still, in the same way they had in the market when he first laid eyes upon the lamp.
And Kojiro had already decided what it was that he was going to do.
Kaoru shifted his weight uncomfortably. The times that his owners attempted small talk was often accompanied by wishes grandiose and selfish, as if befriending him would somehow make their wishes more palatable. Kaoru hated those wishers, and hated those wishes; he often egged them on to make their wishes as quickly as possible, so he could disappear into his lamp once more and wait for the next.
But this man was not radiating the darkness of those wishers. Kaoru did not know if he should be frightened or hopeful this time. If he should pull down a mask of formality over his face and hope to escape back into his lamp, or if he should cast the mask aside and bear his soul.
Kaoru had lived so many long lives. His wishers always made their wishes three. And this one, like all the rest, would too.
But perhaps it would not hurt to lift the mask up, if only a little.
“A child asked me once to bless her with a little sister, so she would no longer need to play by herself,” Kaoru answered. “Watching the way her eyes lit when I granted that wish is one memory I carry with me still.”
As if he could see into Kaoru's soul, the man’s eyes lit too.
“Are you lonely?” The man then asked; Kaoru did not want to answer. But instead of waiting, he continued. “I had a hunch.”
“To be a genie is to be lonely,” Kaoru snapped, unable to contain himself. He did not like the way the man seemed to just… know. Kaoru should never have lifted his mask. He wanted to retreat back into his lamp, back where it was safe, back where he could make himself believe that his new owner was selfish and dark and grandiose. “So what is it you wish for… um—”
“Kojiro,” the man—Kojiro—answered, immediately hearing Kaoru’s pause at his not knowing a name. “And I have only one wish.”
Kaoru silently scoffed; Kojiro was not the only person who was insistent that he only had one wish. They always only had one wish, and then another, and then another. Those were the worst, the ones who would rage when Kaoru retreated into his lamp, their “only one wish, then another, then another” exhausted.
“What is it you wish?” Kaoru asked carefully, and he braced for Kojiro’s ‘only one.’
But Kojiro would not wish for something grandiose, or evil, or dark. He would not ask for a sister or three candies or shallow riches or good health for himself. Because that is not why the lamp came to be in his possession.
Kojiro knew the price of the lamp now, and felt a warmth of being the one blessed with paying it.
“I wish for you to be free, Kaoru,” Kojiro said, and there was not so much as a hint of doubt in his mind.
The legends long had spoken of the curse of genie’s lamps. That someone who came upon one must be careful in their wishes, for genies were tricksters, looking to twist the most selfish of wishes into lessons for the wishers.
But Kaoru’s answer, that his favorite wish was one that rescued a child from a lonely life, spoke volumes beyond his tale. It was no wonder Kojiro could hear a soul crying for him from the lamp. A soul that belonged to a beautiful and lonely man.
There had been only one—the darkest soul that Kaoru had ever served—to offer Kaoru his freedom. It was simply not done; the nature of human greed being what it was.
Being strung along, as if the final wish would set Kaoru free, had nearly broken him. Instead, with a red-eyed grin, that man had asked him for prodigious athletic skill, then said a callous goodbye as Kaoru was tugged back into his lamp.
It was the last time Kaoru would ever allow himself to dream of such a thing.
Yet here he was, looking down at his wrists, the rose gold shackles dissolving before his eyes, then back up at Kojiro’s soft expression, then back down, unbelieving the abruptness of it. A rain of sparks showered them both as Kaoru’s bonds were finally broken. His soul felt light, singing at its severance from the sakura lamp.
Kaoru was now a free man.
“W—wait! Wait!” Kaoru had begun to tremble. “W—why?” He took three strides, so that he was close enough to feel Kojiro’s breath. “Why would you wish for this first?”
“Because I was supposed to,” Kojiro shrugged. His eyes, his smile, his body were warm as he said those words. As if his choice in wish made his soul as light as Kaoru’s. “Because… I don’t desire anything that a genie would need to grant me.” He let out a woodwind chuckle. “Now I can show people my beautiful sakura lamp that I purchased for ten silver coins.” The laugh though ended near as soon as it started, and Kojiro trained his eyes on Kaoru’s. “And maybe I can introduce them to my—my new friend, Kaoru.”
Before he could stop himself, Kaoru heard a noise coming from himself that he had never heard before. A matching woodwind laugh, one he could share with his very last owner and…
And his very first friend.
“Is that what you wish for, Kojiro?” Kaoru beamed. “For me to be your friend?”
“Indeed that is,” Kojiro answered.
“Your wish then,” Kaoru extended his hands out to take Kojiro’s, “is my command.”
Artwork by clementinesgulag