Whoever had been banging on the bathroom door gave up. Their insistent pounding seemed to convey the idea they thought I had the ability to open the door and was simply choosing to stay in a slowly flooding room. The water sloshing around my feet was a little distracting, but my mind began to spin with possibilities. Everything so far had been happening to me, and I was getting tired of it.

I looked at the zombie version of myself reflected back in the mirror, standing almost where my real reflection would be. I resisted the urge to reach up and touch my own face, to make sure I didn’t have pieces of skin hanging off. The muted green tile of the bathroom walls and the dripping water served to help center my mind as I stoped focusing on the gruesome visage and begin thinking.

"You went back," I said, “and picked up again from an old point in time.” I gestured to myself. "Could I do that?" I asked. "Go back to right before she put my blood on the charm?"

Not-me shook his head, causing more skin to fall off. He was decaying at a rate that would make a claymation horror filmmaker proud.

"No, that won't work, kid," said Not-me. "Took me years to set that up. You don't have the time, the materials, or the ability. I believe if you went back, we would both go back, and probably at that point, we would explode."

"All right. Let's see," I said, writing off that idea. I cast around in the water, happily stepping away from the horror show happening in the mirror. Eventually, I found a pencil and a pen. I walked over to my stack of books. The heavier ones had kept the stack weighed down, and they hadn’t floated away. The lower books were completely submerged, but looking at the ones out of the water, I could see dry pages.

I took the second one down, having not been as exposed to the bathroom rainfall.

"Algebra 2. Neat," I muttered.

I carried it to a part of the room that wasn’t raining. The school bathroom was not very large, containing three sinks, four urinals, and two stalls. The smell from the water, doing a deep soak on the high school bathroom floor, was eye-watering. There's a musk that teenage boys seem to be able to apply to any bathroom they communally occupy. Without any sort of immediate crisis to focus on, the smell was beginning to encroach on my senses.

I shook my head to focus. Opening the book to a dry page, I quickly sketched the coin that Jemima had used to press to my finger. Studying the symbols, I feel pretty sure I got it right. I stepped close to a urinal, catching a distorted reflection in the chrome handle.

"This is the symbol," I said to Not-me. "Could we use this like a cork to plug up our luck?"

"Huh," Not-me said. "I never thought of that.”

“What if we draw it backwards? What would the effect be?"

I quickly sketched the coin in a reverse image. It's easy enough to turn it around in my mind.

"Wait, how the hell did you do that?" Not-me said. "I don't have eidetic recall. Can you remember everything you've seen?"

I shook my head. "No, not quite, but with a little focus I usually can remember anything I want."

"This is very interesting, kid. I seem to have stepped into a divergent past," Not-me said.

I brushed that off. It seemed unimportant at the moment. "What if I drew it on my skin?" I asked. "What gives a symbol like this the ability to take our luck? You can tell or feel that we're actively losing luck, can't you?"

"Yeah, I can feel it. It's pretty easy on this side," he said.

"Alright, let's experiment." I sketched the symbol on my hand. "How about that?"

"Okay, but you’re wasting your time, kid. You don’t have the authority to—" Not-me was silent for a long moment. “Holy shit.”

He disappeared out of the reflection. I leaned back and forth to try and catch sight of him.

“What?” I asked. There was no answer.

Closing the book so it didn’t get wet, I sloshed over to the mirror to try and find him. “Come on, don’t leave me hanging, what?”

He stepped back into view, startling me. His appearance slid in from just to the side, like he was standing close to the mirror. More skin had fallen off his face, and I could see his skull underneath. I wondered what would happen when he was just a skeleton.

"That shouldn't have worked," he said.

"What shouldn't have worked?" I said. "You're not very good at this whole conversation thing."

"Oh," he looked apologetic, scratching the back of his head. That might have been a normal gesture, but on zombie me, it was grotesque, as he caused his whole scalp to slough off.

“That’s so gross,” I said. My stomach was protesting after having recently thrown up.

"That shouldn't have worked, kid," he said.

"What do you mean? Seems like simple geometry to me," I said.

"Well, it hasn't worked completely. Hang on. Before I try and explain it, draw one on your other hand."

I did so, not bothering to ask questions. Getting the symbol perfect with my off hand was a little tricky, but I managed it.

"Holy shit," he said.

I looked up.

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"Yeah, you said that before. Why do you keep cursing?"

"Because I'm stunned. This shouldn't work."

"Why?" I asked. "It seems pretty straightforward to me. It’s just math, isn’t it?"

"No, it's not math, you idiot. Look, that symbol should not hold the ability to alter reality if you can't back it up with authority. Get it?"

"No," I said.

"Look, did you spend the last twenty five years in Haiti practicing their religion and apprenticing under a master? I think you would remember if you'd done that, wouldn't you, kid? Or have you spent the last forty to sixty years studying underneath some of the more powerful deities? It takes a lot longer to build up momentum with some of the other religions, but if you're willing to put in the slow burn time, there's a lot more power there."

"Uh," I said.

"Exactly. Holy shit, holy shit! It worked. It really worked. You stopped the leak of luck."

"Leak of luck. That's a real tongue twister, isn't it?"

Not-me's excitement was palpable. He was shaking his head, which caused more and more skin to fall off, exposing his skull. I was getting the answer to my question. I was now talking to a skull. It didn’t affect his ability to speak.

“Alter... reality?” I asked. “Wait, does this mean I have superpowers?” I said, feeling excited about this turn of events for the first time.

“Uh, no. No, not really.”

I deflated. I got stuck with a zombie for a reflection—a luck deficit. And I didn't even get superpowers as compensation.

“So what can I do?” I said. “You seem really excited about this. Can I draw more reality-altering math?”

“Uh, actually, you might be able to do some of that. Although what you would probably be most excited about would be the basic psychokinetic abilities that this should have unlocked.”

“Psycho... kuh... what?” I was lost. “Wait, psych... oh! Psycho, as in... of the mind. Kinetic, as in movement. You mean telekinesis?” I shouted.

My shouts apparently drew the attention of someone. Whoever had been working on the bathroom door had given up banging on it. But now they resumed, their shouts on the other side indistinct, especially compared to the uncanny clarity of Not-me's voice whenever I was looking at a reflection.

I flinched as the window behind me shattered. It wasn't a large window; it was one of those high up, only-big-enough-to-let-in-light bathroom windows. Looking over, I saw a man's face peeking through. He was wearing a fireman's hat. I waved at him. He looked around the room, frowning.

“Are you in immediate danger?” He shouted.

I realized then that the spraying water was fairly loud. It had become background noise for me as I was talking to Not-me. I sloshed across the room to speak with him.

“No,” I said.

“Are you hurt?”

“No.“

“Can you open the door from your side?”

I explained to him that the automatic mechanism had jammed shut and now it wouldn't budge. He craned his neck so he could see the door and then nodded.

He looked at the window and sighed. “When will they bring the buildings up to code with egress? Hang tight, kid. Stand clear of the door. We'll get you out.”

“Thanks,” I said, as his head disappeared.

“The fire department's going to break me out,” I said, feeling kind of excited about the prospect.

I sloshed back over to the mirror and stepped up close, looking back and forth, trying to find Not-me. I spotted him after a minute, sitting cross-legged on the floor with his chin in his hands. He was one hundred percent a skeleton now. Even my clothes seemed to have rotted away and fallen off of him.

"Tell me how to move stuff with my mind," I said, feeling excited.

"Huh?" Not-me looked up. "No. We've got to figure out how to refill our luck. Otherwise, we're going to be reliving this day for a long time."

I cast a wary glance at the pipe spewing water out of the wall. I could see the pipe now; the force of the water was not just coming out in a single jet but had been spraying out in a broad arc, and it had caused more of the wall and the tiles attached to it to slough off and fall into the room. Now I could see the inside of the wall. It was very interesting. I had never seen a wall opened up like this before.

I turned my attention back to Not-me. "If we step outside, are we going to get struck by lightning?" I asked.

He shook his head. "No, I don't think it's quite that bad yet, but it's pretty bad. I wouldn't play near a busy street if I were you. Or use power tools. You know what? Actually, I changed my mind. It's bad. It's real bad. I think our only chance is going to be to try and stay near other people."

"People?" I asked. "Why?"

"Well, their ambient luck will make it less likely that something off the wall will happen to us."

"Huh," I said. "People have ambient luck? Is that, like, an aura?"

"I'm not playing twenty questions, kid. Forget about it. Just, once we get out of here, try and stay near people for as long as you are alive."

"For as long as I... You make it sound like dying today is a foregone conclusion."

"Have you made it through yet?" Not-me asked.

I didn't have a good answer to that, so I stuck my tongue out at him. "I'm getting tired of dying. And if we're going to die at the end of the day anyway, then teach me telekinesis. I want to move stuff with my mind," I said.

"Ugh, you're such a child. Fine. First, you have to imagine every inch of the action that you want the object that you're affecting to take. Then you have to exert your will in order to use your authority on the object. The trick is, it requires real muscle to move. Some things are true across the universe. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. And in this case, if you want to apply leverage on something, you have to lever from somewhere, and you have to apply force."

"Huh?" I said, not really following the explanation.

Not-me shook his head. "Alright. Too complex. I get it. How do I explain this? Think about what you want something to do. Imagine it happening, then use part of yourself to do it, but without moving. Then... Push."

"Push," I said.

"Yeah, don't get hung up on that step. See steps one through three."

"So what? I just..." I looked over, trying to find an easy target. The room was full of water and floating bits moving back and forth, but I decided it might just be random chance if I tried to move something and it went the direction I wanted in the water. So, I held my book out in front of me, maneuvered myself until the ceiling wasn't raining on me anymore, and then placed a pencil on top of it.

I remembered I had seen a magician make a pencil on top of a book spin. I had always wanted to try it. So, I imagined how that pencil had looked spinning. With some force of will, I changed my imagination to picturing the pencil on the book right in front of me spinning. Nothing happened. I had to move it without moving, I remembered.

I reached up and spun the pencil with my fingers, then stopped it. I focused on picturing how that had felt, but didn’t move my arm this time. I imagined moving my arm. I imagined the pencil spinning. Focusing, I tried again. Still, nothing happened. I sloshed back over to the mirror. After peering back and forth for a second, I found Not-me.

"It's not working," I said. "I thought you said I had authority."

"Yeah. You do have authority. But you don't have will. That has to be developed."

"How do I develop will?" I asked.

"Meditation," he began to tick them off on his fingers. "Hard work. Investment. Practice. Deliberation."

I let out a deep sigh. "This is going to take forever."

“Hey, kid.” The fireman's head reappeared in the window. I looked up.

"Yeah," I said.

"Come over here."

I walked over.

“Stand clear of the door,” he said.

"I'm standing clear," I said. I was all the way across the room. I didn't know what he wanted. He lifted a walkie-talkie up to his mouth and said, "All right, he's clear."

There was a thundering boom. Startled, I turned and looked at the door. I heard a voice squawk on the fireman's radio. And then the fireman said, "Still clear. Hit it again."

And again, there was a boom. I wanted to ask what they were doing, but the fireman, leaning in the window, seemed intent on watching the door and speaking into the radio. Five more times this happened, and then there was the sound of wrenching steel. If you've never heard the sound of wrenching steel before, I don't recommend a front-row seat. It screamed like the end of the world. I dropped the book I was holding and threw my hands over my ears.

Then the noise stopped. I was pretty much too late to do anything about blocking it out, and my ears were ringing. The fireman said something, but at first, I couldn't hear him over the ringing in my ears.

I looked up. "What?" I said, shouting, my own voice sounding dull to me.

The fireman shook his head. “The door twisted in the frame. We're going to have to cut you out, kid. Sorry. Just unlucky.”

I started laughing at this.

“Why don't you try and find a dry place to wait," he said, looking around the bathroom.

I gave him a thumbs up, then made my way over to the bathroom stall that was not geysering water and crawled up onto the toilet, sitting on the tank with my feet down on the seat. It was nice not to be standing shin-deep in water.

After a few minutes of sitting there, the water in the adjacent stall stopped spraying, kind of petered out, and ended. I let out a sigh of relief that I didn't know I'd been holding as the room finally stopped filling up with water.

Then I waited…

…and waited.

Feeling bored, I took the pen back out of my pocket and examined the symbols I had drawn on my hands. I began experimenting with doodling more of the symbols around the ones I had already drawn. If two were good, more were better, right?

After I had drawn five or six on each hand, of varying sizes, I began to work my way up my arm, continuing to doodle. I drew the symbol backwards as well as forwards. Forward was becoming too easy.

I heard a voice as I worked, somewhere in the background, too indistinct to make out. Doodling the symbols was interesting, and it began to feel important. My luck would be completely good with enough symbols.

The ringing in my ears was growing louder instead of quieter. Was this how your ears were supposed to react? I began to feel a little bit dizzy. It became harder to focus on making the next symbol. I dropped my pen at some point, it falling into the water. I felt mildly irritated at that. I would have to go fishing for it so I could sit and doodle some more.

As I bent down to climb off the toilet, I caught sight of my reflection. The voice that I could mildly hear beforehand came thundering in my ears.

"What are you doing?" the voice shouted.

"Huh?" I said, not comprehending.

"Wash the symbols off! Quick!" I heard the voice shout.

"Wash them off?" That didn’t make any sense. I had just taken all this time to carefully draw each and every one of them.

"Come on! Before you..." I didn't get to hear before I what, as I passed out, falling forward off the toilet. I remember thinking it was good there was water to cushion my fall.

***