Tim was annoyed at his roomates. Stephen and Matt, both finance majors, were playing their brand-new video game in the living room. Blaise and Dace were in the kitchen. Judging by the awful sound of the food processor, Dace was meal prepping, and Blaise was chatting him up, yelling above the sound of the old machine that was either an ancient family heirloom, or found during one of the student’s archaeological dig. Finally, Oscar was playing the cello in the room next to his. He said he hadn’t touched it in a while, but it felt to Tim like he actually never had. Why didn’t the biology major choose an instrument with a mute, or even better : an electronic one? Oh, yeah. For the exact same reason that made them rent rooms together in this house : they were poor.
Tim tried once more to open his geology manual. He had spent too much time tutoring to cover his part of the rent, and was now behind in most of his subjects. With the racket in the house, he could not concentrate on the differences between these subtypes of pyrites. If he was even on the proper chapter. He double-checked that and sighed. The urge to pull hair out of his scalp pushed like a wave. He regretted not spending this Saturday at the library, but it was now too late. When he finally got himself to stop chilling with his roomates and start studying, it was already half past three. The other five had followed his lead but, after dinner, they did not go back to their homeworks. Swearing at his late meal, Tim watch the clock in his bedroom only to realize that, by the time he would get to the library, it would be about to close.
Giving up, he grumpily browsed on his smartphone. The occasional hooting from Blaise’s booming voice indicated he had migrated to the living room, probably annoyed that Dace didn’t pay much attention to his stories. Blaise wasn’t uninteresting, he just tended to repeat himself. A lot. He was the only one here with a sports scholarship, but would rather send the money home than use it to live by himself, or with less roomates. Medical bills, he answered the others when they asked. His family was probably the only topic the Maths student was not effusive about.
The screen of Tim phone froze for a second, leading him to mistap on it. Somehow, the home screen flashed and the app store opened. Dumbfound, he didn’t pay attention to it and switch back to his social media page, without closing the store. Dace noisily put away his food processor but, judging by the clatter of kitchen utensils, the future teacher (aiming to become principal by thirty) was not done just yet.
A notification appeared at the top of the screen, saying a new app was correctly downloaded. Curious, he clicked on the notification, and the new app opened. It pretended to generate sentences that were always perfectly accurate. Intrigued, Tim clicked the generate button. "The desklamp is blue" appeared instantly. It was true. So, someone hacked cameras for that ridiculous thing? Tim was about to close and uninstall the app when he realized the button now read "Edit sentence". It was accurate, why should he need editing it? Curious, he clicked it nevertheless. Light gray boxes surrounded each word. A tutorial pop-up urged him to choose one word to modify. Tim frowned : shouldn’t it say correct? He clicked on the last word of the sentence, the box becoming white and the keyboard automatically opening. A new pop-up explained how Tim could change this word for any other. It read that although minor grammatical errors could be overlooked, more considerable mistakes could have more dramatic results. Confused, Tim typed in red, clicked the submit button and raised his eyes. The lamp had changed ! The app was back at its homescreen, and Tim generated a new sentence. This time, the tutorial explained that he could target any object or person within 50 ft or roughly 15 ¼ meters. He selected the house, hoping he could transform it into a mansion, or something else.
"Timothy Melnick lives in this house with his roomates."
Not exactly what he had in mind, but he could easily make it work. Or, he told himself, he could change something else. Get a dog, for example. Or a girlfriend. The other guys like to tease Stephen and him for being the only two guys here without any lady friend. This could soon be over, leaving only the other man to suffer the friendly banter.
Startled by the banging on the bathroom door, Tim heard Oscar yelling at whoever was showering to leave some warm water for the next one. By deduction, this could either be Matt or Blaise. The young student eyes dropped back to the phone in his hand and, with a slight hesitation tapped "edit".