The end of Seth's last summer break of college was rapidly coming to a close. For Seth, it meant sleeping in until lunch and watching "Game of Thrones" would soon be replaced with early morning classes and long hours in the computer lab. Summer was a two month rejuvenation for the long months of hard work in the classroom.
Seth was a senior project and a few lecture classes away from graduating with a double major in Computer Programming and Engineering. A double major in those fields was a near herculean feat on its own, but even more so because he was doing it in just four years.
Most people of Seth's intelligence would be considered a nerd, but to characterize him as such would be selling him short. Sure, Seth was smart; but he was not hindered by social awkwardness or lack of physical coordination, like the caricatures of sitcoms would draw to mind. Seth had been a decent athlete in high school, playing on the basketball and track teams. He had also been popular enough to earn the role of class president and be considered a friend to most anyone he came in contact with.
With so many superlatives, it would make you think that Seth would have been the "golden child" to any set of parents. In most cases you would be correct, but unfortunately for Seth that was not true for him.
Seth was born 14 minutes after his twin sister Amber. It was a small gap, but one that seemed to span much more than just their time of birth, as it seemed to continue through every facet of their lives.
Amber was the first to accomplish everything. She spoke first, walked first, potty trained first. When they got into school, Amber always seemed to best Seth's accomplishments. One year Seth made All-Region for basketball and Amber ended up making All-State. While Seth was named class president, Amber was elected Student Government president. It was a constant struggle that drove Seth as he tried to find a way to receive recognition over his sister.
Seth was a genius, but Amber somehow found a way to match his grades. Amber had the common sense of a jellybean, but had incredible book smarts. Even though Seth was certifiably the smarter of the two, it was Amber who received Valedictorian and got the most scholarship money heading to college.
Fortunately, college had allowed Seth to slip out from under Amber's shadow. The two went to rival state schools that were about an hour from home. Seth, finally free from the popularity of his sister, was able to shine on his own and enjoy an active social life.
In college, Seth experienced attention from ladies for the first time. In high school, all of the attractive girls in school were friends with Amber, the queen bee and prettiest girl in school; and none of them wanted to risk their friendship by dating their friend's brother. Seth was a handsome guy, though. When he arrived on campus as a freshman he was immediately befriended by handfuls of gorgeous girls.
In high school, Amber and Seth's relationship was a little strained; but the distance of being at different schools actually brought the two together, especially in the summers. Their childhood arguments were no more, as they would spend their summers hanging out, swimming at their pool and catching up on TV shows they missed during the school year.
Seth sat starring at the paused TV screen, waiting for Amber to come home so they could finally start their show. Amber had uncharacteristically gotten up early and left the house. She left a note saying that she would be back soon and for Seth to not start watching their show without her. The wait was painful for Seth, who was anxious to see how the cliffhanger from the previous episode would be resolved.
Finally Amber walked through the front door, with a shopping bag in-hand. Amber took great pride in her appearance, which made it even more surprising for Seth to realize that the bag was not from a clothing store, but instead from a cell phone store.
"It is about time," Seth said with a groan, as he scrambled to get the remote ready to start their show.
"I know. I got to Verizon when it opened this morning, but it still took me forever. My phone got dropped in the pool at my friend's last night, so I had to get one first thing this morning."
"That sucks. What are you going to do with your old phone?" Seth asked.
"I don't know. Throw it out, probably. It won't even turn on anymore, so it isn't worth me saving," Amber said as she flopped down onto the couch, scrolling through her new phone.
"Mind if I take it? I might be able to find a way to salvage it. If nothing else, I can use the parts from it for something."
"Sure," Amber said reaching into the bag and tossing Seth her old phone, "Work your nerd magic on it. Turn it into a Transformer or something."
Seth slipped the old phone into his pocket and started up their TV show. Seth had long enjoyed taking phones that other people thought were broken and fixing them up to sell online. Little did Amber know that her "broken" phone was going to earn her brother some nice spending money.
The siblings sat and watched their shows for about an hour. Amber began to doze off and finally Seth stopped the show and woke her up to tell her to go take a nap. The early morning and supposed late night partying with her friends had left Amber worn out.
With no shows to watch while Amber napped, it seemed like a perfect opportunity to play with the broken phone that Seth's sister had given him. He took the lifeless phone into his bedroom, which doubled as his nerd lair.
At one end of the room sat the operating table, a place where many a cell phone had been brought back to life from the clutches of death. Seth set the phone down on the table and began to take it apart.
Amber had been right, the phone was badly water damaged. Seth began to take his special tools and remove the water that had become wedged in the crevices of the device. It was a slow process, but eventually he removed the excess moisture from the device. Connecting the phone to a power source, the battery appeared to be holding a charge. This was a good sign given how this was one of the most expensive and difficult parts of the phone to replace.
With the phone connected back to power, it was time to boot it up. Seth pressed the power button and saw the light on the small micro-processor flash on. The phone was brought back to life. However, when Seth looked at the screen there was no image appearing. He pulled out his multimeter and checked the connection at the screen. Much to his disappointment, no power was flowing to the screen, it was fried.
A replacement screen was going to cut heavily into Seth's profit margin on selling the refurbished phone. He was convinced that he could still make some money on it, as long as the rest of the phone didn't need anything replaced. Before he was going to order a new phone screen, he needed to know if the rest of the phone was operational.
This was not the first time Seth had dealt with a phone that didn't have a working screen. He actually had found a way a few years prior to connect the visual output from the phone to his computer, which he could then view using a cell phone emulator. This emulator allowed him to control and run tasks on the phone from his computer, with the same view that you would have on a normal phone screen.
Seth rigged the phone up and connected it to the computer. The emulator loaded and began to process the information from the phone. Within a few seconds, the phone was synched to the computer. A selfie of Amber and her boyfriend popped up on the computer screen. This lock screen was a good sign, because it showed that the memory storage on the phone hadn't been damaged.
Seth pulled up the number pad and entered the digits of their birthdate into the phone, which caused the lock screen to disappear and fade to the home screen. The home screen was loaded with pages of apps that his sister had downloaded to the phone. Everything from Instagram to Candy Crush was littered across the screen.
Opening up apps, Seth began to test the functionality of the device. The phone quickly connected to both the cellular and wireless networks, showing that all was functional with the most expensive parts of the device. The phone seemed to move a little slower than Seth's, but much of that was attributed to all of the apps hogging the memory on Amber's phone.
Pleased with the function of the device, Seth flipped over to his favorite tech website and placed an order for a new screen. When the new screen arrived, Seth planned to wipe the devices memory and put it up for sale.
When the order was placed, Seth flipped back over to the phone emulator to shut it off and head downstairs for a snack. However, the phone screen had two text messages showing up as new on the phone. Seth was left with a decision, shut off the device or click the "View" button and see what the texts had to say. His curiosity got the best of him as he quickly clicked the "view" button, bringing up all of Amber's text messages.
Being as popular as Amber was, the list of conversations on her phone stretched a mile long. Group messages with different sets of friends, along with individual conversations with almost all of her friends. The phone was now a clone of the new phone his sister had purchased, since it synched up with her wireless number and online account. This didn't mean that Seth was seeing what his sister was doing on her new phone, but he was receiving all of the information that was sent, received or saved on her new device.
The two new texts were from Amber's best friend, Lindsey, and Amber's boyfriend, Drew. Seth clicked on the conversation with Lindsey and saw the tail end of their conversation about her getting a new phone.
"Glad you got a new 1..was sooo bored without you to talk 2 lol," the newest text message said.
Seth then flipped over to the conversation with Drew. That conversation was much the same, as Amber had been obviously filling in her boyfriend about her new phone and telling him about her day.
