“For the rest of their lives, Aladdin and the princess ruled the kingdom wisely and well. And they lived happily ever after…”. I sigh as I close my favorite book and keep it back in my bag. I look out of the resort window as I’m waiting for the rain to stop. We finally planned a trip after almost 2 years, and of course, the rain had to ruin it all. As soon as it stopped raining me and my family entered the forest with our guide to spot some of the most amazing animals. For three hours We got nothing, absolutely nothing. All of us were very tired from that miles and miles of walking and decided to head back to our resort. When we had almost reached there I heard the leaves on the ground shuffle a bit. Having a curious mind I followed the sound in expectation of spotting the animal. Neither did I realize nor did my family that I wasn’t around them anymore but as soon as realization struck me I rushed back to join them. As it was dark I barely could see anything and as expected I tripped over something and hit my head so hard that it all started getting dizzy and I fell unconscious….

As soon as I woke up I could feel the heat under my body as if I was in some desert. When I opened my eyes not only did I find myself in a desert, but what I saw made me question my existence! I saw Aladdin’s villain uncle, Jafar on the flying carpet attacking the city of Agrabad. As I was trying to process it all, someone pulled me right behind a pillar. Ah! There she was, Princess Jasmine. She took me to the palace where she explained to me that Jaffar was trying to get the powerful sapphire hidden in his father’s crown. The Sapphire was the reason the city of Agrabad was prosperous as it had the power of granting wishes. The king used the sapphire to protect the city. But Jaffar had other intentions. He wanted to conquer the world with it. In the back of my mind, I thought ‘ Why is the story different? Wasn’t it supposed to be the lamp’? The very next moment we heard a loud thud. There came Jafar and his serpent wand, staring into my eyes. He laughed looking at me and said, “This is your savior Jasmine? You could do better than this kid.” this hurts the ego of a small, but witty 12-year-old boy. It made Jasmine challenge Jafar to a fight! Jafar with magic powers, and us with manpower. Oh, wait, flashback. Jasmine had given me a wand, which was the only thing that could destroy Jafar as his serpent slave protected him all the time. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was that the wand could only be used once! That made me pee my pants. Cut to the present, we gave a good fight to Jafar, making his blood boil so much that he replicated himself into 10 Jafars. Yes, I had to choose which Jafar to strike to end this. As I grew up watching fictional movies, I searched for a shadow or a mirror for reflection, but there wasn’t a thing that could be of any help to me. Coming from a brown family, my mom always made me remove my shoes as soon as I enter the house, as the shoes leave streaks of dirt wherever we walk…..streaks of dirt…seems like Jafar’s mom didn’t teach him that! As I looked through my peripheral vision, I saw that one of the Jafar was leaving a trail of sand wherever he walked. Gotcha! I exclaimed, confusing everyone but alarming Jafar at the same time. Before he could grab his wand, I used mine. Lightning struck, blinding everyone for a few seconds. As our vision clears, we see the statue of Jafar with his wand. I couldn’t process how, or what had happened until everyone started applauding and screaming. I felt what crowd surfing feels like! I landed in front of the gorgeous princess Jasmine. She gifted me a locket with green pearl and said, ‘ Thank you Ariv. You are our hero!’. I was about to get the most beautiful hug but it all starts getting dizzy.

I saw circles and math equations and then, I open my eyes ….. I sit straight up to find my mom sleeping beside me in the train coach, and the book “Aladdin and the Magic Lamp” tuck in my arm, realizing that it was all just a dream…. I shook my head and smiled. I grabbed my bag and as I was about to keep the book back in, something fell from the book. I reached out it pick it up but as soon as I took a look at it, I froze. Yes, you guessed it! It was the same pearl locket the princess had given me! That night, I couldn’t sleep at all. All I could think of was, ‘ Was it a dream?’…..