Jake Miller was nobody special. At 21, he'd settled into the kind of life that didn't turn heads or spark envy. Just a steady, predictable hum that carried him from one day to the next. He lived in a beige-brick apartment complex on the edge of town, the kind of place where the grass was patchy and the parking lot smelled faintly of motor oil. It wasn't glamorous, but it was home, a third-floor unit he shared with his mom, who worked nights as a nurse at the hospital and left him to his own devices most of the time. Jake didn't mind. Solitude suited him.
He was a junior at Westfield Community College, majoring in computer science because it seemed practical and might potentially pay well eventually, not because he had some grand passion for code. His grades hovered around a B-plus, good enough to keep his scholarship but not enough to make anyone take notice of him. Three afternoons a week, he slung espresso shots at Brew Haven, a cramped coffee shop two blocks from campus where the tips were decent and the Wi-Fi was free.
Jake's days followed a rhythm as steady as a metronome. Wake up at 9:00 a.m. to the blare of his phone alarm, drag himself to morning classes, Intro to Algorithms or some godforsaken English elective, then trudge back home by three if he wasn't working. Afternoons meant gaming, usually something mindless like
Call of Duty
or
Elden Ring
, his thumbs mashing buttons while he half-listened to a podcast about conspiracy theories or retro tech. Dinner was whatever he could scrounge, microwave burritos or his mom's leftover lasagna if he was lucky, followed by more screen time until his eyes burned and he crashed around 2:00 a.m. Rinse, repeat.
The apartment complex itself was a pretty decent example of suburban monotony, but it had its characters. There was Mrs. Delaney on the first floor, who chain-smoked on her balcony and yelled at her yappy terrier every morning and night. The Rodriguez twins, both freshmen at Westfield, lived across the hall and blasted their pop music loud enough to rattle Jake's cheap IKEA desk. And then there were the girls. Girls he noticed in passing, although sometimes wondered if they noticed him. Like Sarah from 2B, a leggy brunette who jogged every evening in neon leggings that hugged her curves just right. Or Mia, the tattooed barista who lived downstairs and sometimes bummed cigarettes off the other employees at Brew Haven. Or Lily who lived across the courtyard in 3C with her mother and stepdad. Jake didn't know her well, they'd shared a couple classes last semester, exchanged nods in the stairwell, but she had this vibe, like she was hiding something interesting beneath all that shyness. He'd catch himself glancing her way sometimes, wondering what her deal was, then shrug it off and keep moving.
Tonight, though, was shaping up to be another nothing-special kind of Thursday. Jake sprawled on his bed, the springs creaking under his lanky frame, his laptop balanced on his stomach. The room was a mess, empty Mountain Dew cans littered the nightstand, a tangle of controller cords and charging cables snaked across the carpet, and a pile of laundry slumped in the corner like it was staging a protest. The glow of his screen cut through the dark, casting shadows on the dated wallpaper. He'd meant to do some homework, there was a coding assignment due Monday, but instead he'd fallen down a rabbit hole on a sketchy tech forum called ByteRiser, a cesspool of hackers, trolls, and weirdos trading tips about everything from pirated software to DIY drones.
He scrolled lazily, skimming threads about overclocking GPUs and some guy claiming he'd hacked his smart fridge to order beer.
Then a post caught his eye: "RealityShift.exe, Change the World, One Line at a Time." The username was a string of nonsense, xXGlitchLordXx. But the description was even wilder: "Found this buried in a darknet archive. Legit can rewrite reality to match whatever you type. No bullshit, no catch. Thought I'd share. Link below. Don't blame me if you fuck it up." A download link sat at the bottom, a shady-looking URL that screamed malware. Jake snorted, rolling his eyes. It was the kind of thing you'd see in a bad sci-fi movie. A magic program that bends the universe to your will. Total crap. Still, he hovered his cursor over the link, a grin tugging at his lips. He was bored, and his antivirus was really decent.
"Alright, GlitchLord, let's see your masterpiece," he muttered, clicking the link. A progress bar popped up, sluggish and jerky, as the file trickled onto his hard drive. His laptop fan whirred like it was about to take off, and for a second he wondered if he'd just bricked the damn thing. But then a new icon appeared on his desktop: a pixelated black spiral labeled "RealityShift.exe." No readme, no installer, just the file, sitting there like a dare.
Jake double-clicked it, half-expecting a ransomware popup or a flood of porn ads. Instead, the screen flickered, and a window opened, a barebones interface that looked like it'd been coded in the '90s. A gray text box stared back at him, labeled "Input Desired Change" in blocky font. Below it, a single green "Confirm" button pulsed faintly, like it was breathing. That was it. No instructions, no splashy graphics. Just a blank slate and a promise.
He leaned back, scratching the stubble on his jaw. "Rewrite reality, huh? What's next, a time machine in my inbox?" He chuckled, but his fingers lingered over the keyboard. It was stupid, obviously a hoax or some elaborate troll, but something about the idea hooked him. Maybe it was the late hour, the caffeine buzzing in his veins, or just the sheer absurdity of it. He glanced out his window, where Lily's room glowed faintly across the courtyard, her silhouette hunched over a desk. She was probably cramming for upcoming exam, same as always. A flicker of mischief sparked in his chest.
"Okay, fine. Let's play," he said to no one, cracking his knuckles. He typed the first dumb thing that popped into his head: "Lily finds that she is no longer interested in studying and gets obsessed with her stepdad." His fingers froze mid-sentence before he added "seducing" before "her stepdad," making it "Lily finds that she is no longer interested in studying and gets obsessed with seducing her stepdad," then smirked at the screen.
The cursor blinked expectantly. Jake's hand hovered over the mouse, as he slowly slid it over to "Confirm." He clicked it, and the screen flashed a quick, blinding pulse that made him flinch. A timestamp appeared below his input: "Change Logged: 03/30/2025, 11:47 PM." Then nothing. No fireworks, no ominous music. Just his words sitting there, mocking him.
"Wow, so life-changing," he deadpanned, shutting the laptop with a snap. He tossed it onto his nightstand and stretched, his joints popping. Whatever that was, it wasn't worth staying up for. He'd scan for viruses tomorrow, maybe dig into the forum to see if anyone else had fallen for it. For now, sleep was calling.
He flicked off the light and crawled under the covers, the hum of the complex settling around him, Mrs. Delaney's dog barking faintly, the twins' music thumping through the walls. Across the courtyard, Lily's lamp still burned, her shadow unmoving. Jake yawned, closing his eyes. If reality was shifting, it sure didn't feel like it.
