Bob put a hand on his hip too, obviously mimicking me. Then he flounced. I definitely did not look like I was doing that. Whoever this strange intruder was, he was making fun of me. That was okay. I liked daft jokes ‒ but I still dropped my hands.

‘Ooooooh,’ Bob said. ‘Touchy.’

Folding my arms, I glared down at him. ‘What the hell are you and how did you get into my flat?’

‘Well, duh! Isn’t it obvious?’

A prickle of annoyance ran down my spine. ‘If it was obvious, I would hardly be asking you, would I?’

He shrugged. ‘It’s true that you don’t seem to be the smartest owner I’ve ever had but, hey, it’s not like I had much of a choice.’

My eyes narrowed. That was an interesting – and incredibly distasteful – choice of words. ‘Owner?’

‘Of course!’ He pointed to the letter opener. ‘I am Bob. The Genie of the Sword.’

I looked from the fallen blade to him and back again. ‘You mean letter opener.’

‘No, no, no, no,’ he declared. ‘This is a sword.’

‘It’s really not.’

He flicked a disdainful glance at it. ‘Alright,’ he conceded, ‘it’s not a sword. But it is a very fine example of a dagger.’

‘It’s a letter opener.’

‘No, it’s a…’

I held up my palm to forestall him. ‘Let’s agree to disagree, shall we? Besides, I thought genies lived in lamps. How do you live in a letter opener?’

‘Dagger. And there was one genie who lived in one lamp a very long time ago who gets all the sodding credit and is in all the sodding stories. Most of us aren’t that lucky.’

‘You live in the metal?’ I asked doubtfully.

‘Of course!’ He sprang back to the blade, grinning. ‘Watch.’

There was another painful flash of light. I swore again, wincing because my eyeballs felt like they were on fire. When I recovered enough to see properly again, I picked the knife up gingerly between my finger and thumb. Sure enough, reflected there in the flat surface, was Bob’s smiling face. He gave me a two-dimensional wave. Then the air filled with a hum once more. At least this time I was smart enough to cover my eyes.

‘So,’ Bob said cheerfully, ‘what would you like?’

I frowned. ‘Excuse me?’

‘What wishes would you like? You get three, you know.’

No way was I going to fall for that trick. Anyone with a scrap of intelligence knew to steer clear of anyone offering wishes. ‘I’m good,’ I told him with a definite edge to my voice.

‘I don’t care whether you’re good or bad. What do you wish for first?’

‘Nothing. I don’t need anything.’

‘Hah!’ he scoffed. ‘Everyone needs something. Go on. You can tell Bob everything. I can make it happen.’

‘No thank you,’ I said primly.

He gazed at me, disappointed. ‘Why ever not?’