Chapter 2The backpack hadn’t been stolen or crushed by a truck. It sat right where we left it, and then we sat next to it, dressed again and fully satiated—for the time being. I gave it an hour. Probably less
“Well,” said the genie, “as I stated before, a novel approach.”
“I think you’ve done that before, Genie,” I said, and he started to reply, but, as I was growing accustomed to, abruptly stopped. “Either you know more than you’re telling me or perhaps aren’t allowed to tell me. You were trapped in the bottle. I’m guessing by that curse I mentioned. Were you cursed as well?”
He snapped his fingers. We were no longer in the street. We weren’t in the bottle either. We were in a desert, dunes on all sides, the sun high overhead, beating down. Apart from a hot breeze rustling over us, the
