Dreams do come true

         Sarah jumped quickly from her seat on the couch when the door bell rang. It was Friday night and she was expecting her friends over for a sleep over.
         “I’ll get it!” She yelled through the house as she walked toward the door, excited to meet her friends. She had a surprise tonight and she was excited to share it. She jerked open the door to find her two friends there with their shrill girlish giggles already anticipating a night of fun. “Get in here!” Sarah said, ushering her friends in quickly as if to keep the dusk out.
         “I have something you will not believe,” Sarah said, barely able to contain her excitement. As they rounded the corner out of the foyer and reached the bottom step, Sarah’s dad popped in behind them.
         “Where do you think ya’ll are going?” he asked in a playful voice? “Off to kiss frogs and turn them to princes?”
         “Dad, come on, we aren’t kids anymore, we’re fifteen. You know better,” she scolded him.
         “Well, fair enough. Just don’t sneak girls out of the window and don’t be sneaking boys in the window.”
         The girls gave a hysterical giggle as they ran up the stairs. The joke wasn’t particularly funny; they were just giddy with excitement. Sarah had promised something exciting and she was chomping at the bit to show her friends. Her eagerness was like a pheromone only detectable by fellow teenage girls.
         The three girls piled into Sarah’s room one at a time, slamming the door behind them. “So, are ya’ll ready to see something totally awesome?” Sarah knew they were, she was just trying to build some suspense. She reached under her bed and pulled out a jade green box with ornamental artwork on the outside; it appeared to be a small jewelry box of sorts. Sarah opened the box to reveal a lone ball. Small enough to fit in the palm of your hand and heavy, as if all of the burdens of the world were inside the ball, the girls passed the ball around for each to inspect.
         “What is it?” Amy asked
         “Yeah, you said you had something totally awesome to show us,” Laura added.
         “Well, I’m not entirely sure to be honest. I bought it earlier today in Chinatown. I was looking for a cool gift for my aunt’s birthday. While rummaging through his junk, I found this ball. It caught my attention at first because of its weight. When I noticed the price, I had to ask why it was so much; it appeared to be just like all of the rest but was way more expensive.” Sarah paused to catch her breath. She prattled on at breakneck speed that only a teenage girl could; and only a teenage girl could understand. “He told me it was like a genie bottle. The Chinese guy said that when we open it, we will be greeted by a genie of sorts that knows our dreams and will make them come true!”
         “You don’t believe that crap, do you?” The look on Laura’s face said it was obvious she didn’t.
         “Well, not really, but then I got to thinking. Isn’t it weird how heavy it is? Don’t you get a weird feeling when you hold it, like something special is about to happen? And, what if it is true? We could have anything we wanted!”
         “There is only one way to find out,” Amy said, obviously not caring if it were true, only wanting to open it.
         Sarah moved to her desk, setting the ball on off to one side. She picked up the hammer lying on the other side. “Almost broke it open early,” she said, trying to explain why the hammer was there. “I’ve been thinking about it all day and this is the only way I can think to open it.” She gave one last look around the room to her friends, each of their faces show eagerness. Sarah raised the hammer over her shoulder, then brought it down quickly, true to her target.
         The ball snapped in half, violently. Immediately, Amy and Laura began screaming. Shrill screeches that pierce the human soul, letting all that hear it know something is terribly wrong. The ball bounced, spitting and sputtering, evil flying from the ball. Sarah could see her breath it was so cold and her spine tingled with fear. Shadows flew from the ball towards Sarah’s friends. A ghostly figure that looked like Amy’s mom flew toward Amy. Another shadow surrounded Amy, creating ripples as she flailed. The ghostly figure had a handful of Amy’s hair, forcing her head down as if drowning her. Strangely enough, the black mist around Amy settled. The ripples were still there, and there did indeed appear to be a lake around Amy, as her head bobbed up and down, fighting the figure.
         Sarah shifted her view to Laura. She was huddled in the corner, screaming violently as she stared at the blackness flying at her from the ball. Another figure begins to form. This one, just as ghoulish as the first, was a man that Sarah did not recognize. He held a large axe in his, bounding straight for Laura. He raised the axe and brought it down just below her left knee cap, severing her leg clean off.  The figure then grabbed the severed limb and began beating Laura with it, violently.
         Sarah screamed, over and over, as loud as she could, paralyzed with fear. Suddenly, her door burst open and another shadow swarmed toward her father. He was lifted high into the air, head nearly touching the ceiling, then dropped suddenly, neck snapping as he swung from a shadowy noose.
         Sarah continued screaming looking at the carnage.  She was all alone. Amy floated face down in the shadowy lake. Laura lay in the corner, mutilated, chopped into twenty different pieces, while her dad swung helpless from a noose. The ball fulfilled their worst nightmares.