Waking up this morning felt great. The birds were chirping, fall weather, and people outside talking. I went downstairs to find my key. This wasn’t just any key. It was my lucky key. One day though it would be magical because the great emperor was going to do one of his spells that only the rich kids get. Those snobby rich kids were gonna get bad karma for hating on those who are less fortunate. You may be thinking, what is so great about this magical powers that the emperor gives out. Well once the key is granted with a wish, your entire life changes. You can wish for one thing and one thing only. It can be anything except for wishing for unlimited wishes of course.

The leaves were beginning to fall down as nature got ready to transition into the fall. It was cold, the wind chill made me wish I had brought my sweatshirt. As if the cold wasn’t pissing me off already, suddenly some teenager in a Porsche flew by and Sally was staring at it the whole time. Even when it passed her she turned around to admire it.

“Sally?”

“Yeah Peter?” She turned back around.

“Do you think our lives will ever change?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know...like will we ever become rich and maybe have our wishes granted by the magical emperor?” I felt my face begin to turn red.

“Well I mean yeah hopefully, but I love my life the way it is. Peter you have to remember that your family is the most important thing to have. No amount of money will make you happy.”

“Yeah your right, I just hate these kids that pull up to school in fancy cars and clothes and think they are better than everyone else.” I felt my heart start to beat faster with anger just thinking about it.

“Want to hear a good quote?”

“Yeah I guess.”

“Money without happiness is just paper.” I hope you’ll remember that Peter. I’ll see you at lunch!”

One day I woke up and my key wasn’t on my desk. I had no idea where it was. Surely it was my little brother playing a prank on me. I opened my white oak wood door and the hallway was pitch black. Maybe the power had gone out I had thought to myself. But it wasn’t that. I heard laughter down the hall. Not just any laughter though, it was more of a mans laugh. It couldn’t be my dad because he doesn’t laugh and kind of has no soul. I went down there pretty scared to be honest. I opened the closet door that holds our clothes. I opened it and there was a blue portal. Ok this must be a dream I thought to myself. Well if I’m dreaming I might as well go in. As I stepped in an electric shock went through my body. It felt like I was in the third person of myself. For a quick second I saw myself. I saw the emperor wearing an all blue robe with a giant key to the side of him. He signaled me over to him. I walked over and he took the key out of his robe. Two words came out of his mouth...One wish.

I pinched myself because I thought that I was dreaming. I wasn’t waking up. He told me that I had one minute to decide. Quickly I yelled out, I wish I was rich! The emperor took my magic key and he put it in his robe. Then he disappeared. The next thing I knew I was back in my bedroom. I got out of my bed and looked around to find nothing but the darkness of my room. My alarm went off. It read 6:45AM. I panicked because I had overslept. I am supposed to wake up at 6AM. I turned on the lamp next to me and I saw huge piles of money just sitting next to my lamp. My heart sank into my stomach. Had my wish really come true? Was I not dreaming?

I sprung out of bed and ran downstairs to show my parents what I woke up with. When I went into the kitchen, they weren’t there. I thought maybe they gone to work early today. Either way, nothing was going to break this mood I was in. I had to skip school today. Maybe Sally would want to skip with me. I texted her a picture of all the money I woke up with. She called me back. I quickly picked up the phone in excitement.

“Sally did you see the picture I sent you!”

“Yes I saw it, but I’m a bit worried”

“What do you mean?”

“Nevermind, how did this happen?”

“It was crazy, I’ll tell you about it when I see you.”

“Ok well I’m going to class.”

“Wait, skip school with me today and we can go out and get whatever we want!”

“Ok fine, but this is the only time I will ever cut class.”

I waited on Oak street by the barber shop for about an hour. I figured that maybe Sally was running late. Another twenty minutes went by. I tried calling her, but she didn’t answer. That wasn’t going to stop me though. It was her loss. I went into every store and bought designer clothing, brand new shoes, chains, and these expensive black sunglasses. At the end of the day, I must've spent about $5,000. By the time I left town it was about 3PM, which was the time we got out of school. I didn’t even bother asking Sally how her day had been like I normally do. She had ditched me today for no reason. Honestly I was sick of being pushed around by everybody. I’d always been the loser of the school. From now on, I was only going to care about myself.

I went home and my parents still weren’t there. That made me nervous until I found a note on the floor in the kitchen. It read “This is what you asked for.” What could that mean? Is the emperor trying to say that since I had all of this money, I would lose my family? I was already so mad because of Sally, that I didn’t care. This was going to be the time that I become the best in the town. I didn’t need Sally or my family.

For the next few days I have been spoiling myself with everything that I wanted. The only thing I couldn’t get was a car because I didn’t have my license. School was getting rough. Sally didn’t pick me up in the morning to take me to school anymore. Lunches at school were lonely and the nights at home were lonelier. At home I would just stare into the ceiling at night wishing that my parents would come home. I wanted to text Sally so bad and tell her that I was sorry. But it just didn’t feel right.

One day when I decided to go to school because I was so bored at home, I saw Sally sitting at her usual lunch spot by herself eating her peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I decided that this would be a good way to apologize. It was in person and not over text.

“Hey Sally”, I said with nervousness in my voice.

“What do you want?”

“I’m sorry for not being a good friend and I should have listened to you.”

“Peter I told you that you would be in regret.”

“I know and I’m sorry, can we please go back to the way things were”

“I want you to get rid of all of the money.”

“Ok fine, I just want my life back.”

“So how do we find the emperor?”

“I have a way.”

We met after school outside the gym at our usual spot. It was dark and gloomy. As we walked back to my house, I started to tell her about book I had been reading about online. It talked about how we can summon the emperor into our dreams. When we got home I started to explain to Sally that we had to do it tonight. I couldn’t wait any longer.

It was almost 1AM. We both started to get really sleepy. We had to concentrate our minds on the emperor while holding hands. We basically were praying to the emperor that night, hoping he would come through. Suddenly I woke up in my room. Sally wasn’t there. I looked around and saw nothing but pitch darkness. I got up and started walking around and I saw a yellow door with a spotlight shining down on it. The door opened up and I saw Sally. She was with the emperor. I ran to the door and I opened it. I was sucked into it. The emperor told me all about how he’s been watching me suffer. He told me that he knew I would go through this. The emperor only gave me the one wish because he was trying to teach me a lesson. He granted me back to my old life. I woke up next to Sally and we were both sweating. I looked around and all of my stuff was back.

“Sally we did it!”

“I know, I’m so happy for you!”

“How did you find him at the yellow door?”

“He brought me to him, he knew that I was looking for him”

One month later things were back to normal and my life was back together. I’ve learned from all of this that life isn’t about money. It’s about being with friends and family and being grateful.