from time to time

a new day

No. This can't be happening. Was he imagining the twin of himself in front of his face, or was this really happening? It was crazy. He waved an arm, it waved the exact same arm. Like a mirror. He said hi, it said hi at the same time. It had the same chocolate brown eyes. His shoulder-length curly brown hair. Even the same olive skin tone. What was he going to tell his mom and dad? They were currently downstairs, talking to a guest. He would have to wait until after. In the meantime, he was going to have some fun with his new twin.
The first thing he did was have a boxing match with it. They went back and forth for a while, neither of them able to get the upper hand. And Josiah wasn't ready to hit his own beautiful face. It was just too darn handsome.
The next thing he did with his living reflection was play Call of Duty. He and his clone both shot at the same time, so they both would kill each other at the same time. It was frustrating, and after a while, Josiah felt very tired, and drained. Then, the front door slammed shut. The guest was gone. Josiah could show his parents his new friend. But he was too tired. He tried walking to the door, but his legs felt like the noodles that his mom had made him last night. He looked back at his twin. It was slowly fading.
"No!" Josiah cried, but the clone faded, and Josiah collapsed.

Josiah woke up, panting and sweating. He was lying on the floor in his underwear. He had fallen off his bed.
"Are you ok, honey?" His mom called from down the hall, who undeniably heard him fall out of his bed.
He looked at his clock. Perfect timing. 7:35. His alarm clock started beeping, and he slammed the top, turning it off.
"Yeah, I'm good!" He called, getting up off the floor.
He looked out the window out across Boston downtown. The familiar sound of morning traffic filled the air in his room. He loved the noise of it, even if he lived in one of the sketchiest neighbourhoods of the city. But then he realised he was pretty much naked and stepped away from the window.
Getting on a bathrobe, he opened a little portal to the kitchen and stepped through.
"That was pretty risky, Josiah. Someone could have seen you, and this is a small apartment. You could have just walked down the hallway." His mom told him, putting eggs and bacon down in front of him as Josiah sat down on the table.
"Well, what's the point of having powers if you can't use the perks?" He asked, chomping down on a piece of bacon.
"I'm not saying you can't use them, but you have to be careful. You know that the Peacekeepers still are patrolling the apartment halls all day. Old man Jarins was arrested just yesterday for accused powers." Josiah's mom informed him.
"Jarins??" Josiah exclaimed, looking surprised, "That old man just sits in his room all day! We barely see him." He'd looked over at the cooking books on the shelf.
He zoned out for a moment.
"Josiah! Hello?" His mother said.
Josiah jumped out of his trance. "What-oh yeah. Sorry."
He got up then went to get in the shower.
He cranked it to cold and sighed. There was nothing like a cold shower on a hot summer day. He stepped in after it had gotten to the desired level and scrubbed his body. Afterwards, he sent a clone to go grab his clothes while he dried off.
"Good Heavens Josiah! I don't want your naked clone walking around the apartment!" His mom screamed at him from the dining room.
"Sorry mom!" He yelled back as his clone came back, his clone giving him back his clothes.
He went out of the bathroom, slipping into his clothes. Furthermore, he walked to the door and put on his backpack.
"See ya mom!" He called without looking back.
"Bye! Have a great day! Don't be late and be careful!" His mom told him.
"Don't worry! I'll be fine." He smiled as he walked away, locking the door of the apartment behind him.
Josiah stepped in the elevator and pressed down to the main floor, the elevator raced down and stopped at the last second, opening up to the lobby of the building he had lived in for what felt like forever. The memory of his old house where he had been discovered as a radical, or someone with powers, still lingered in his head. But it felt so long ago.
"Hello?" someone said looking at him strangely, he realised he spaced out when stepping out of the elevator "Oh- sorry." He gave a nervous laugh, and walked out of the elevator and onto the and into the streets.
As soon as he stepped outside, it was blazing hot. He walked down the street, passing many people who were sweating buckets. Even after 30 years of it averaging 120 degrees out at summer, humans still hadn't figured out how to adjust to that.
He put his ear buds in his ears and started listening to some music. LoFi was his favourite genre of music. It was always soothing, and distracted him from the chaos of the world around him.
When he was walking, a peacekeeper stopped where he was standing.
Josiah's heart leapt. Was he going to be arrested? Or worse? Killed?
"You got a permit for listening to earbuds, son?" The peacekeeper asked.
Josiah was thankful.
"Yeah, here it is." He said, handing it over, the man in front of him, a piece of paper that he had in his pocket. The peacekeeper checked it.
"Ok, man. Go ahead." he walked away to harass another black person, walking right past a white man listening to his earbuds as well. Racism hasn't changed in about 30 years.
Josiah walked the rest of the way to school without being dragged down again. The subway was hot and stuffy as usual, but at least a guy had performed some break dancing while he waited for the train. Oh yeah. Pog.
When Josiah got on the campus he walked over to security and got his bag scanned. He got held up for about 3 minutes because the security guard thought that the metal pen he had was also a knife hidden in the casing.
When he got to his locker, he got his eye scanned, and the locker opened an inch.
He checked his hair in the mirror, and used a comb to brush it back. Taking his homework out of his backpack, he quickly scribbled in an answer he hadn't finished and stuffed it in his binder. Grabbing his water bottle, he closed the locker. He turned to go to class but his friend, Calliope, was standing there.
"Hey Josiah! Wanna see this new metal I was able to turn something into?" She asked.
Calliope was another one who had powers. She could turn anything into a type of matter. One Time when they were having a playdate when they were 9 and 10, Calliope had accidentally turned his bed into solid gold. He spent the entire week sleeping on the floor, because his bed was too uncomfortable. Another time Josiah remembered when Calliope turned his favourite shoes into copper. The same week she turned her own shoes into titanium, and couldn't take them off.
"Let's see what it is this time calli I have to get to class." Josiah said, tapping his watch.
She held up a parrot that was silver looking. "My pet Jerry passed, so I donated his body to science. I used my science kit to find out. I turned him to Silver! A new metal! Well, for me anyway." She said.
"Well, that's interesting." Josiah said, not paying a lot of attention. "You can be such a geek sometimes."
"Do you want to hold him?" She said, not really getting the hint.
The warning bell rang. Class started in five minutes and history class was halfway across the school.
"I really gotta go Calli. Catch you later!" And with that he ran off.
But he didn't know that he wouldn't be seeing Calli for quite a while.