To Wish Upon A Panda

Here’s a word of advice to anyone reading this story: If a talking panda offers you a wish, say no! Seriously, if you thought genies were bad, they’ve got nothing on pandas. I mean, it was a simple wish; a good wish, and I really didn’t think it could be twisted so badly. After the last two weeks, though, one thing is clear: I underestimated the panda. 

I spent a week, carefully crafting the wish, making sure it couldn’t be twisted to something crazy, but it didn’t matter. Even as I write this, I am barricading the door, hiding from the ghosts. You see, I made a mistake. After thinking it through, I wished to be able to tell the stories of souls long departed from this world. Somehow, it never occurred to me that the ghosts might be angry, although, in hindsight, I think that should’ve been fairly obvious. 

It’s been like this for two weeks. Sometimes, I’ll manage to just get one or two ghosts at a time, and once they tell me their stories, they go back to...well, I actually don’t know. Wherever they came from before, I guess. But for the most part, there are so many ghosts that I have to hide from them. These spirits have waited for so long, and they are so desperate for someone to hear their stories, that they basically stampede me whenever I let my guard down. 

It’s kind of sad, actually, that no one knows who they were in their lives. I guess I’d be desperate for someone to hear me, too, if I were like them. But still, I draw the line at attacking people with pizza. As it turns out, tomato sauce is nearly impossible to get out of hair. After the last two weeks, I don’t think I’ll ever look at a panda the same again.