The Wishing Stone By Teek © 2020

Summary: Making a wish on the Wishing Stone is a great honor. One that only ten people every hundred years gets to make. Many wishes throughout time have dramatically changed the life of the Wishee for the positive, but there are consequences to one's actions. When the youngest Wishee in history makes a life-altering wish, those around twelve-year-old Mikey must adjust to the changes.

Chapter Summary: Mom learns more about how Milly got her name, and some about Mikey's time as Milly. Then, a nightmare triggers the Wish Particle to make more changes.

“Did you sanitize your teeth Sarah,” Mom asked as she came into the room?

“Yes, Mom,” Sarah said as she hopped into bed and grabbed her stuffed panda.

“Potty and training pants?”

Sarah hopped out of bed and ran off to the bathroom. Soon, Sarah was getting back into bed.

Mom sat down on the edge of the bed, “I am so proud of you for being a good big sister today. I know it has been a rough day with all the changes and the focus being on Milly.”

“She’s really cute Mommy. It’s going to be fun having a baby sister.”

“You know, she probably doesn’t like being called a baby. You didn’t when you were her age.”

“But she acts like a baby and is so little. She sits in booster seats, drinks from sippy cups, and lives in a make-believe princess world. How young is she going to get Mommy?”

“I don’t know,” Marsha said. “That concerns me too. She just keeps getting younger.”

Mom smiled, “House, how old is Milly?”

>>Melissa is 6 years, 2 months old - - - Correction, 6 years, 1 month old.<<

“Mikey would have loved this,” Sarah said with a smile.

“Did Mikey ever tell you he was a girl?”

“Only when we played dress-up.”

“He would play dress-up as a girl?”

“Sometimes, but only when Daddy was busy and told us not to disturb him. He was more fun when he pretended to be a girl,” Sarah said. Thinking for a moment, “I was the one that started calling him Milly. Calling him Mikey when he was in one of my dresses was just too weird.”

Mom hugged Sarah, “Milly is a wonderful name. Thank You for picking it for her.”

The two just sat there snuggled together for a few minutes, each thinking about Mikey before the wish.

“How did he fit in your dresses,” Mom asked. “He was bigger than you.”

“They never fit. Mikey hated that. We never did up the backs and always chose ones that went down to my feet. That way, they weren’t too short on him. His biggest complaint was his short hair. He always wanted pigtails or braids, but all we could do was put barrettes in his hair.”

Sarah smiled and giggled a little, “We got caught a few times. Mikey got the dress off before Daddy got to the room, but not always the barrettes. Daddy always said he looked silly with them in but said it was nice of Mikey to let me play hairdresser with him.”

“I wish we knew. If we did, we would have gotten Mikey his own dresses. Boys who are girls on the inside are called Transgender. Sometimes, people don’t have a body that matches their mind and heart. That is what happened with Mikey. He was a girl on the inside and a boy on the outside. If Daddy and I had known, we would have let him be the girl she was.”

“We didn’t have to hide it?”

“Nope. No one should ever hide who they are on the inside.”

“I’m not a veggie eating person on the inside,” Sarah declared.

“Thanks for letting me know,” Mom said with a big smile. “But, you still have to eat your veggies.”

“It was worth a try . . .”

>>Nightmare Alert - - Nightmare Alert<<

Sarah and Mom looked at each other.

“So that is how you always knew when I was having a nightmare.”

“Built-in feature of the House’s Sleep monitoring of kids,” Mom said as she stood up and headed for Milly’s room. Looking more closely at her personal display, “That is weird. Milly’s Wish Particle number is 58. Nightmare first.”

Sarah followed Mom.

“No . . . No . . .” Milly was tossing and turning in bed. “No, I don’t want to be a boy. I want my dress back. I’m not Mikey. I’m Milly.”

“House, low-level nighttime lighting, nightmare soundtrack volume 2, increase room temp 5 degrees,” Mom said as she approached the bed.

“Always love that music,” Sarah smiled. “It looks like she is having a bad nightmare. Poor thing.”

Mom sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled Milly up into a hug, rubbing her back, “It’s okay. It’s okay baby, Mommy’s here.”

Sarah watched as a very familiar routine was followed. Mommy was so gentle and managed to calm Milly back down.

“Wow, Mommy, you were so good at that. She didn’t even wake up enough to know that I was here.”

“You and Mikey gave me a lot of practice. Hopefully, in the morning, she won’t even remember that she had a nightmare.”

At the doorway, Marsha stopped and looked back at Milly, “House, reset room to previous settings.”

Marsha looked at her personal display screen, watching the steps House was taking. -She pressed a button and switched the info over to Milly, “House, confirm that Wish Particle number.”

>>Confirmed, Melissa has a Wish Particle Number of 65.<<

“Which do I call,” Marsha asked? “Both I guess. House, notify Dr. Mire and Professor Ian. Com-Link them in just above a whisper volume. Tell Gregg to come up here and put Sarah to bed.”

“But Mommy, I want to help Milly too.”

“Be a good big sister and go to bed for me, please. You can see Milly is fine.”

“Then why are you calling Dr. Mire and this ProFuser Guy.”

“Professor Ian knows a lot about the wish magic, and Dr. Mire wanted to know if something changed with Milly. Her Wish Particle numbers are going up, but she looks just fine. They just need to know what is going on.”

Gregg came up behind Sarah, “Come on Sarah Bear, let’s leave Mommy to deal with Milly.”

Sarah and Gregg were walking away when both Professor Ian and Dr. Mire appeared.

“Something up,” Dr. Mire asked, looking at the sleeping child and her scan readings?

“You wanted me for something,” Professor Ian asked?

“Milly’s Wish Particle number is going up,” Marsha said, looking at her display instead of them. “Shortly before bed, it was at 24, but now it is at 72. It is climbing fast. When I Com-Linked you, it was at 65.”

“House,” Dr. Mire said. “Give me a continuous reading scan of the basic medical info.”

“House,” Professor Ian directed. “Is there anything else in the house with increasing Wish Particle numbers?”

>>In this room, numbers are going up for all of Melissa’s clothing and some of the furniture. Some toys throughout the house have increasing numbers, and Milly’s car seat in both cars.<<

“Look at her age readout,” Dr. Mire pointed out. “Every few minutes, she gets a day younger. Correction, it is up to a day every minute.”

“Doctor,” Professor Ian blurted out. “Keep an eye on her health and organs. I am going deeper. Scanners are now at a sub-atomic level.”

“Wish Particle numbers just passed 120,” Dr. Mire stated.

“She’s glowing,” Marsha announced.

The other two looked up for a moment and then back down to their displays.

Dr. Mire went into the room and stood next to the bed, “House, display muscular structure above the body and then the skeleton above that. Show me the nerve impulse reading and the nerve pain index reading above that.”

Marsha came up next to Dr. Mire, “Is something wrong?”

“Not really,” Dr. Mire said. “She is shrinking, which would be expected if she is getting younger. Her nerve impulse reading is off the charts, but . . . look for yourself, the nerve pain index reading is zero. She is registering zero pain through all of this.”

“That’s good,” Marsha stated. “Isn’t it?”

“Look at her muscles. Not just that they are getting smaller, but also getting weaker. Her bones are losing mass and strength. When kids grow too fast, they get growing pains. She is getting younger one day every minute, during an age range that there is great growth in the body. Well, for her, it is significant shrinkage. Yet, she has no pain.”

Marsha looked at the displays, keeping an eye on the Nerve Pain Index reading. It was still at zero. The glow from Milly’s body at this point could be seen through the blanket.

“Seconds after she entered R.E.M. sleep, there was another spike in the Wish Particle Number,” Dr. Mire said out loud. “It is at 175. Regression is now at 4 days per minute.”

Gregg came in and wrapped his arm around Marsha. For three hours, the four adults watched a six-year-old child turn into a four-year-old. Bed railing netting had magically appeared on the sides of the bed just after she became four. A pacifier appeared on the nightstand next to the bed. Although all the Little Girl toys in the room stayed, the Big Girl toys were transformed into Toddler toys. The items on the top of her dresser disappeared and reappeared on the window seat. A changing pad appeared on top of the dresser. The diaper disposer that had been in the bathroom appeared next to the changing table.

Throughout the process, Milly was hugging the Susie doll. It appeared to be growing during the process, but it was just Milly getting smaller. She looked so small and skinny compared to the six-year-old that Marsha had tucked in only a few hours ago.

“I think that is it,” Professor Ian said. “The Wish Particle numbers in her are down to 10, and they are no longer in anything else throughout the house.”

“If that is correct,” Dr. Mire said. “It looks like the final regression brought her down to 4 years, 6 months old. Records show she’s not potty trained yet, but about 50% of four-year-olds are still in diapers full time, so that isn’t anything important.”

“Thank You, Dr. Mire and Professor Ian,” Gregg said. “Your help has been greatly appreciated.”

“We will keep the constant scans going until there are no Wish Particles detected. Then I have instructed the House unit just to scan every hour until she has gone one month with no sign of the particle,” Professor Ian said. “When that happens, a team will be dispatched to take the external power plant out of your yard. If you need me, you know how to contact me.”

Professor Ian vanished.

Dr. Mire held a finger over her mouth and signaled for the parents to follow her out of the room, “During the rapid transformation, the sensory signals from the body were not connected to the brain. They just got reconnected. Didn’t want to wake her up.”

“Doctor,” Marsha asked? “Is she okay?”

“Oh, she is fine for a four-year-old girl. Those scanners the Professor installed are better than any I have seen in the Hospital. The upgrades to the House unit made it possible for me to run any scan I wanted. I ran a lot of different scans,” Dr. Mire chuckled. “With those scanners, I may be coming here to do the girls' physicals instead of you coming to me. Your scanners are way better than the ones in my office. Kind of jealous, but considering the circumstances, I am glad you had them this evening. If you didn’t, she would be in the hospital at the moment. She slept through all of this and will wake up unaware of any of it happened. Much better than the trauma a hospital visit can have on a little one.”

“What about her cognitive ability? She seemed so much younger than her actual age this afternoon. She acted more like a . . . a four-year-old,” Marsha stopped as realization struck.

“Bingo,” Dr. Mire smiled. “This last transformation brought her body in line with the brain. From the scans that I have done, all of Mike’s memories are still there, just not connected with his current level of access. The brain developments that happen at ages 6, 9, and 12 are all gone like she had never developed them. Cognitively, she is a typical 4-year-old. Her motor, social, emotional, communication, and adaptive skills all align with a 4-year-old. You are now the proud parents of a very healthy, perfectly normal 4-year-old. Well, except for the fact that no one has ever seen or heard of her before today. Just a typical day in the life of a parent with a 4-year-old.”

Gregg and Marsha laughed.

“I am not certain, but I do not know of any transformational wish that had two stages to it. If this is the first, I think it has something to do with the age. Maybe the wish magic wanted to see if the brain could handle jumping down through two of those stages before bringing the body down that far. Just a theory. I’ll share it with Professor Ian unless you object.”

“No,” Marsha said. “Share anything you feel would be helpful to future parents of children wishing. Being the first can be nerve-racking. As long as the information isn’t plastered all over the news, I’m okay with you sharing it.”

“As I understand it, the Wishing Stone Society is under some of the same restrictions as the press. Until Milly turns 15, they can’t reveal anything they learn from Milly. They will be researching the data they collected tonight for eleven years before they can reveal any of it to the public,” Dr. Mire said. “I reread the law this afternoon. The child clause is very strict, protecting minors from abuse and exploitation. It also protects the rest of the family from being the targets of people seeking information. Whoever wrote it must have been a parent, probably a Mom.”

Marsha smiled.

“As Milly’s doctor, I am bound by that law and the Health Records Confidentiality Act. I can’t say anything to anyone but you. What I put in her School Medical File cannot mention or link anything to the Wishing Stone.”

“Thank You, Dr. Mire,” Gregg said.

“My pleasure,” Dr. Mire said. “Well, it has been a long day for all of us. I will check in with you tomorrow. Night.”

With that, Dr. Mire vanished.