"Great! This is awesome!" Amanda said, running her hands along her scaly hips. She
flapped her tailfin again, and the motion traveled, wavelike, down her tail, just like it
would in an aquatic creature. Which she was. "Now I need to go swimming!" she said.
I could see that. "I wish Amanda and I were alone on a tropical beach." I closed my eyes in
anticipation of the jump. When I opened them, I saw... books. We were still in the library.
"It took a long time to change me, too," Amanda observed. "Are you doing something
differently?"
"What is there to do differently? I just make wishes." I looked around to be sure no one
else could see Amanda the mermaid. "Well, let's wait and see if something happens."
I didn't want to start making more wishes if the first one was still in progress.
A nervous two minutes passed, by my watch. When I looked up after checking the time, I
was temporarily blinded by the sun, which hadn't been visible in the library. We were on a
beach.
But why had it taken so long?