by Aisha Saeed
Without another word, Jasmine swallowed her disappointment, turned on her heel, and walked away.
ALADDIN WATCHED the flickering glow of the lanterns in the courtyard below as he stood on the edge of Jasmine’s balcony. The music from the Harvest Festival played faintly beneath him. Palm trees rustled against one another. The moon glowed full and bright against the night sky, the stars a glittering blanket above.
He half expected Abu to scamper up one of the trees. It felt strange not to have his pet monkey by his side. But Jasmine had met Abu when they’d explored Agrabah together—seeing him here now would have given the whole thing away. And he knew Abu was enjoying being pampered in Aladdin’s guest quarters anyway.
Aladdin plucked a wayward silk thread from his royal outfit. He’d wished to be a prince, and Genie had done a perfect job in granting his wish. The clothing still felt strange, though, with all its poufy layers. The hat itched a bit, too. He fidgeted. Regardless of what he thought about his clothing, none of it mattered if he couldn’t erase the look of disappointment that had settled across Jasmine’s face earlier that evening.
The three wishes Genie had granted Aladdin when he’d rubbed the golden lamp had initially seemed like plenty. But Aladdin had already used up his first wish to become prince of the fictional “Ababwa,” and he’d promised his last wish to Genie to free his friend from a lifetime of servitude, which left Aladdin with only one. And since he couldn’t wish for more wishes—Genie had been quite clear about that—he needed to make each of them count.
The magic carpet hovered on the other side of the balcony, just out of sight. Aladdin glanced down at it now; it waggled a tassel in greeting.
“Shouldn’t be long,” Aladdin promised.
Jasmine’s room was still empty. As Aladdin studied the red roses climbing up the pillars across from him and the golden goblets of carefully arranged flowers along the balcony, doubt crept into his mind. Genie was distracting Jasmine’s handmaiden right this minute, inviting her for a stroll through the palace grounds so Aladdin could have a chance to smooth things over with Jasmine. But was it really the best idea to sneak into Jasmine’s quarters like this? His palms began to sweat, panic rising. He’d need to think fast about exactly what to say before she called out for every armed guard in the palace to arrest him at once. And if she did, who could blame her?
It had all been going so well at the Harvest Festival. She’d forgiven him for his awkwardness when he’d first arrived at the palace. And then later, when they danced together they connected, just like they had when they’d met on the streets of Agrabah. She was beginning to like him; at least, she seemed to be. When his favorite song had begun to play, he’d thought he’d finally found his opportunity to really impress the princess. And while the crowd of people around him had cheered, he’d watched as disappointment spread across Jasmine’s face. He realized then what he must have looked like to her—just another prince, there for the attention and praise. She didn’t realize he was only there for her.
Aladdin had never connected with anyone the way he had with Jasmine that day on the streets of Agrabah. And when he’d discovered she was not a handmaiden of the palace but the princess herself, Aladdin felt heartbroken. As a street rat, he could never have a chance with a princess. But now, thanks to Genie, he was Prince Ali—worthy of trying to win her heart.
Suddenly, he stood up straighter. There was Jasmine. Just across from where he stood. She walked toward a collection of papers spread across a large desk. She was so engrossed in them she didn’t notice him standing there. Yet. Aladdin took a deep breath. He needed to get this right. He had to. This was his last chance to smooth things over. Whatever he said, it needed to work.
You can do it, Aladdin told himself.
But could he?
He tapped his knuckles against the balcony to get her attention, but she was so immersed in what Aladdin could now make out was an array of maps that she didn’t notice him. He hesitated before knocking louder.
“Come in,” Jasmine said without glancing up.
“I’m in already,” said Aladdin.
Jasmine looked up with a start; her eyes widened. And then they narrowed.
From seemingly out of nowhere, a tiger popped into view. And while Aladdin had never actually met a tiger before, this one seemed particularly enormous. Its fur shone a brilliant orange with white and black stripes across its body. The tiger faced him. And then, baring its teeth, it snarled at Aladdin.
Jasmine quickly stood and held up a hand toward Aladdin.
“Don’t move!” she warned.
“I won’t.” Aladdin raised his hands in the air. “I came because you left so abruptly.”
“How did you get here?”
“Magic carpet.”
“Huh.” She raised an eyebrow. “Actually, now that you’re here, I can’t seem to find Ababwa on any of my maps. Can you show me?”
“Am I allowed to move?” Aladdin glanced at the tiger. “Nice kitty?” The tiger growled, baring its teeth wider.
“Raja, don’t eat the prince,” Jasmine said. “He needs his legs for dancing.”
Aladdin flushed. “Did I go too far?”
“A little.” She nodded. “So…Ababwa.”
Aladdin edged past the tiger, which still studied him suspiciously, and picked up a map. This was going to be fun—showing her a country that did not actually exist. She didn’t seem too upset about the dance floor debacle, but now he’d gone and made things much worse. He had to find Ababwa on a map or be exposed as a fraud—which, Aladdin supposed, swallowing nervously, he was. How on earth would he get out of this one? He lifted the map up, obscuring himself from Jasmine’s view.
“Genie,” Aladdin whispered under his breath from behind the map, hoping the powerful being could hear him. “She has a lot of maps. I need to find Ababwa.”
“Have you lost your country?” Jasmine asked sweetly.
“No, no, of course not,” Aladdin said quickly just as Genie showed up on the map, so small he was almost imperceptible. He jumped up and down, pointing to where letters began to appear, spelling out the word Ababwa.
“Thanks,” Aladdin whispered. He could’ve kissed his little blue friend. Giddy with relief, he lowered the map. “See?” He pointed. “There it is.”
Jasmine leaned down to look at it.
“I don’t think so.” She frowned as she studied the map. “No, it’s not…” But there was no denying it. There it was: the kingdom of ababwa. She looked at another map to check its accuracy. Aladdin glanced around. There were so many maps of all different sizes. Many of them were marked, most of them worn around the edges. But they all now seemed to display the fictional kingdom of Ababwa, clear as day.
“How did I not see that?” Jasmine wondered.
“Maps are old and useless. No practical value.” Aladdin shrugged, trying his best to move away from the topic.
“Maps are how I see the world.”
“Really? I’d think a princess could go anywhere.”
“Not this princess.”
Aladdin brightened. He had the perfect way to make things up to Jasmine! And it was waiting for them just a few feet away.
“Well…” Aladdin leaned against a pillar as casually as he could muster, brushing some dust off his shoulder. “Would you want to—” But before he could finish his sentence, the pillar wobbled. A bowl of red pomegranates crashed to the ground.
So this plan is going great. Aladdin sighed. He bent down to pick up the pomegranates and put them back in their bowl. Raja walked up and licked his face. It must be going really poorly if the tiger was feeling sorry for him.
“Thanks,” Aladdin said. “I needed a face wash.”
Raja nuzzled Aladdin and purred. Aladdin petted the tiger and rubbed its ears. Cats loved getting their ears rubbed, at least the ones in Agrabah did, and wasn’t a tiger basically an overgrown cat? He looked up at Jasmine; she was staring at the two of them like they were doing synchronized cartwh
eels together.
“So, I was saying,” Aladdin said, straightening. “We should go see these places. There’s a whole world outside of books…Do you want to?”
“With you?”
“Yes.”
“How? All the doors are guarded.”
“Who said anything about doors? Sometimes, Princess,” Aladdin said, “you just need to take a risk.”
He walked toward the balcony. This was it. His moment to make up for all the mistakes from this evening. If this didn’t work, nothing would. He leapt up to the balcony railing and stepped off the edge—out of sight.
“What are you doing?” Jasmine gasped and rushed toward the balcony. “What just happened?”
Slowly, Aladdin floated back up. Jasmine’s mouth fell open as she took in the sight of him upon the magic carpet.
“What is that?” she asked, her voice hushed.
“My magic carpet. I told you.” He held out his hand toward her. “Do you trust me?”
“What did you say?” Jasmine looked at him now in the most peculiar way.
“Do you trust me?”
She studied the carpet. Had he said the wrong thing? he wondered. A million questions played upon her lips. She reached her hand toward him, but then she hesitated. Aladdin tried to stay calm. She had to take his hand. She had to. If she didn’t…
But she did.
She took his hand.
She nimbly climbed upon the magic carpet, sitting next to him.
Before either of them could say another word, it whisked them into the air.
Aladdin looked up at the stars. The night sky was dark and lovely.
It was filled with possibilities.
JASMINE COULDN’T believe it. More surprising than the magic carpet flying straight into the sky was the fact that she’d taken Ali’s outstretched hand. She was not the sort to get swept away—to trust a complete stranger this easily—but there was just something about him. Maybe it was the way he looked at her, the sweet boyish look of hope in his eyes. Or maybe it was what he had said: Do you trust me? Those four words. The same words Aladdin had said to her on the streets of Agrabah. And she had trusted Aladdin, just as she now trusted Prince Ali. What was happening to her? After a lifetime of cynicism, was she going…soft? She wasn’t sure. She did know that against all odds, right this minute, she was soaring into the sky, the clouds around her, sitting next to a prince she’d just met earlier that afternoon.
“You okay?” Prince Ali nudged her gently. “Not carpet-sick, are you? That’s actually a thing, you know.”
“No,” she said. “I mean, I—whoa!” A gust of wind rushed against them. Ali placed an arm around her; Jasmine gripped the rug tightly as it swayed. The magic carpet fluttered, then readjusted, rising farther into the sky.
“Sorry,” Ali apologized as the rug straightened out and the air returned to a gentle breeze. “The wind can get unpredictable when we’re still climbing up, but it should settle now. And don’t worry about falling—the magic carpet is really sturdy.” She glanced at his arm, still around her shoulder. “Oh!” His eyes widened. He pulled away. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I just…the rug slipped, and…”
“No, it’s fine. I appreciated the reassurance.” Jasmine looked down at the rug beneath them. “You’re right about this carpet, though. I never thought one could actually fly, much less be this sturdy.”
“There is definitely more to it than meets the eye,” he told her. “Now tell me, Princess, where would you like to go?”
“Where can we go?”
“Anywhere you’d like.”
“Anywhere? There’s a whole world out there to see.”
“Whole world? You got it!”
Jasmine laughed. “We don’t have time for that.”
“You’d be surprised. Magic carpets make good time.” Ali’s eyes twinkled. “Hold on tight!”
The clear sky above and the deep dark ocean below blurred into one another as the magic carpet geared up. Before Jasmine could ask any more questions, they zipped further into the night sky. Trepidation filled Jasmine’s mind. Where were they going? Sure, Ali seemed comfortable on this rug, but was this honestly safe? She braced herself and shut her eyes. In a matter of seconds, the magic carpet stopped. Opening her eyes, Jasmine blinked.
“Is that…is that snow?” she asked in disbelief.
Indeed, far below them was a wide-open meadow, dotted with yellow flowers and snowy patches of ice, overlooking a crystal-clear lake. She was about to ask him just how far from home the magic carpet had taken them when her gaze shifted upward. Red, green, and purple lights streaked across the night sky.
“That’s the aurora borealis,” she whispered, scarcely believing it. “I’ve only read about it in books.”
“Nicer in person?”
“There’s no comparison…” she said with awe. “But how did we get here so fast? How can this be real?”
“Magic,” Ali said simply.
They lingered for a bit, watching the sky light up in all its brilliant spectacle before the magic carpet blurred the landscape once more and whisked them over thundering waterfalls, misty jungles, and wide-open savannahs. They watched monkeys swing from branch to branch through shady canopies and listened to the howl of hyenas as they galloped below. And then the magic carpet rumbled again, and within seconds Jasmine and Ali stood atop a pristine mountain peak. Their feet sank into the cool snow. The world was dark and silent below them.
“There are no other footsteps here.” Jasmine glanced at the ground. “Not even animal tracks.”
“Well, this definitely looks like the highest peak.” Ali looked around. “Maybe we’re the first to have reached the summit. Think about it…” His eyes glinted with a smile. “You and I are discovering new lands together.”
“Probably not.” Jasmine laughed, thinking about her detailed maps and books about geography. But it was a nice thought. She wondered who ruled the land below them. Had she been sultana, she might have visited this country on diplomatic missions and seen these very mountain peaks from a different perspective. Well, she reminded herself, at least she was here now.
Back on the carpet, they sailed gently now, cresting over wind gusts and looking down at twinkling city lights below them. Dalia was never going to believe any of this.
“This is exactly what I needed,” Jasmine told Ali as the carpet floated along. “Sometimes life can start to fall into a rut. You know how it is, I’m sure. You do the same thing every single day and then you see this whole new world and realize…”
“How beautiful our world is.”
“Exactly. I mean, even if we took this magic carpet and flew to every place on earth, we’d still end up missing something.” She turned to look at him. “Thank you so much for this adventure. I know I won’t forget any of it.”
And I won’t forget that I got to see it all with you, she thought as she studied his profile. Jasmine knew that, as a prince, Ali must have traveled the world three or four times over, and with a magic carpet for a friend surely none of what they’d seen was new to him. Yet he seemed just as excited and awestruck as she felt. He hadn’t grown jaded like the other princes she had met over the years; he, too, was genuinely in love with the world. She liked to think that if she had the chance to travel and explore the world on diplomatic missions for Agrabah, she, too, would retain her sense of gratitude for the beauty of the world around them.
Ali’s eyes met hers. Looking at him now, she felt herself go off-kilter. Those eyes were liquid brown and so deep—she could get lost in them.
No.
She couldn’t fall for him. She did not have time for that. She cleared her throat and looked away. Peering over the edge of the magic carpet, she noticed a tiny patch of land beneath them.
“Is that an island?” She pointed down below. “Must be the smallest one we’ve flown over so far.”
“Hard to make it out.” Ali leaned over and squinted. “Even with all the moonlight.”
“It’s so dark, it must be uninhabited.”
The carpet, intuitive as ever, swept down gently so they could get a better look.
“Wait…” Ali’s voice trailed off. “There is some light. It’s not coming from the island, though—it’s surrounding it.”
He was right. The lower the magic carpet floated, the clearer they saw a thin band of light that ringed the island.
“Maybe it’s the moon’s reflection?”
“Maybe,” Jasmine mused. “But it looks like the water is glowing. Could it be electric eels? Or bioluminescent fish? I’ve read about them…Do you think we could go down there? Unless you’re tired, of course. It has been a long night.”
“Your wish is my command, Princess.”
“And we won’t get too delayed?” she asked, the concern suddenly—not to mention annoyingly—springing to mind. “I don’t know what my father would do if he discovered I was missing.”
“Don’t worry,” he reassured her. “Part of the magic of flying by carpet is both seeing the world and experiencing time in ways we can’t fully understand.” He patted the carpet gently. “Can you take us down, buddy? Just want to explore one last thing.”
The magic carpet nodded a tassel in assent and slowly began its descent to the island below.
Jasmine wasn’t sure she understood how time could slow down or work differently when traveling by magic carpet, but until tonight she hadn’t known a magic carpet ride was possible in the first place. He had asked her if she trusted him, and tonight, perhaps she would. She wanted to see the island and what the glowing ring of light was all about, it was true. But a part of her was also grateful for this interlude because she simply didn’t want the night to end.
ALADDIN WANTED to pinch himself to make sure this wasn’t all just a dream. Was he really on a magic carpet ride with Princess Jasmine? Exploring glacier lakes and soaring past waterfalls? He couldn’t wait to tell Abu all about the cheetahs prowling in the tall grass and the silverback gorillas that had watched their flight under the moonlit sky. Their time together was going better than he could have imagined, but—not for the first time—Aladdin wondered what would happen once they returned. Sooner or later she’d find out he was not actually a prince but just another commoner from the streets of Agrabah. Would she be furious? Would the doors to her heart be shut to him forever? He simmered at the injustice of it all. To connect with someone but not be worthy of them because of one’s station in life. Aladdin sighed. This wasn’t the time to dwell on that. There would be time to sort through all of that later; for now, he wanted to enjoy his time with Jasmine.
