Probability's Price

7 - The Unsettling Pattern

The lingering sweetness of Putri’s kiss still warmed Nicolás’s lips, but it was quickly being overwhelmed by the icy tendril of dread that snaked up his spine. The shadow. That impossibly dark, impossibly still figure in the alleyway. He tightened his hold on Putri, deepening the kiss, desperate to erase the image, to will it out of existence. But the cold prickle of unseen eyes remained, a phantom itch behind his own.

When they finally broke apart, Putri smiled, oblivious to the storm brewing behind his eyes. “You alright, Nicolás? You suddenly went a bit… intense there.”

“Uh, yeah, yeah, totally fine, Putri,” he stammered, trying to inject enthusiasm into his voice. He felt a ridiculous flush creep up his neck. “Just… really happy. You know?” He forced a grin, though his jaw felt stiff. “Happy one month.”

“Happy one month!” she echoed, squeezing his hand. “Well, I should probably head in. Got an early lab tomorrow.” She looked up at him, her smile radiant. “Thanks for tonight, Nicolás. It really was perfect.”

“Anytime,” he said, letting go of her hand, almost physically pulling himself away. “Yeah, I should, uh, head back too. Big Microeconomics reading. Super thrilling stuff.” He gave her a quick, awkward hug, his eyes darting towards the alleyway. Nothing. Just shadows and the mundane glow of a distant streetlamp. It was nothing, Nicolás. You’re being ridiculous. Overstimulated.

As he walked back to his dorm, the internal hum, usually a warm, confident thrum, felt… off. It was still there, but it resonated with a subtle dissonance, like a single sour note in a grand symphony. He practically jogged, his paranoia a cold hand at his back. He didn’t look over his shoulder, but he felt watched.

Bursting into his room, he slammed the door shut, leaning against it with a gasp. “Platypus, my friend,” he panted, addressing the ceiling stain, “I think I saw… something. Or nothing. Probably nothing. Just a trick of the light. And the adrenaline. Definitely the adrenaline.” He ran a hand through his hair, pacing. “But what if… what if that’s the ‘something’ I’ve been ignoring? What if this whole ‘good luck’ thing is attracting… attention?” He shook his head vehemently. “No. No, no, no. Stop it. You’re being melodramatic. You just had the perfect date. Focus on the positive. Focus on Putri. She’s amazing, right?”

He tried to distract himself, scrolling through social media, but his eyes kept darting to the window, the shadows outside. The low, discordant hum persisted, a constant, unsettling presence. He needed to shake this feeling. He needed to reassert control.

The next morning, Nicolás forced himself into his usual routine, attempting to bury the creeping unease under a mountain of normalcy. He went to class, feigned interest in fiscal policy, and even managed to find his favorite brand of coffee waiting for him at the campus store, perfectly brewed and extra hot. “See?” he told himself, “Everything’s fine. Just a late-night spook.” The hum of his power, though still slightly off-key, began to regain some of its reassuring strength.

He found Leo slouched in a beanbag chair in the student lounge later that afternoon, staring blankly at his phone. Leo, usually a whirlwind of nervous energy and coding projects, looked utterly defeated.

“Hey, man, what’s up?” Nicolás asked, sliding into the beanbag opposite him. “You look like you just found out your coding compiler ran away to join the circus.”

Leo sighed, a sound of profound despair. “Worse, Ferris. Way, way worse. I just lost my scholarship.”

Nicolás’s nonchalant pose stiffened. “What? No way! Your academic scholarship? But you’re like, a genius! Top of your class in CS!”

“Tell that to the Financial Aid office,” Leo mumbled, running a hand through his already messy hair. “Apparently, there was some ‘clerical error’ on their end. A mistake in my application from last year. They’re saying I was ineligible this whole time and they just caught it. And now I owe them for this semester, too.” He threw his hands up in exasperation. “A clerical error! Like, it’s not even my fault! I checked that thing a million times!”

Nicolás felt a cold knot tighten in his stomach. A ‘clerical error.’ Unforeseen. Unexplained. His mind flashed back to the restaurant, the orchid, the concert tickets, all the things that had just… worked out for him. “Man, that really sucks, Leo. I’m so sorry.” He tried to keep his voice steady, but the internal hum gave a faint, unsettling tremor. Clerical error. Unexpected. Unavoidable. Unlucky.

“Yeah, sucks is an understatement,” Leo grumbled, kicking at the beanbag. “I’ve gotta call my parents. They’re going to kill me. This is just… it’s been a week, man. Everything’s going wrong. Remember my laptop? Now this. I’m seriously cursed.” He chuckled weakly, a bitter sound. “Maybe you’re absorbing all the good luck, Ferris. You’ve been on fire lately.”

Nicolás forced a laugh that felt hollow. “Nah, man, don’t be crazy. Just a lucky streak, I guess.” He tried to dismiss it, but the seed of paranoia from the night before seemed to be sprouting, unfurling dark, unwelcome leaves. Is it connected? No. Couldn’t be. That’s insane.

The next day, the cold, uncomfortable pattern continued its grim march. Nicolás was walking with Leo near the bike racks, heading to a shared elective.

“Dude, where’s your bike?” Nicolás asked, seeing the empty spot where Leo usually chained his beat-up but reliable mountain bike.

Leo froze. His eyes widened, scanning the racks, then the ground. His face paled. “No… no, no, no way. It was right here! I chained it right here! I swear!” He started frantically searching, pulling at chains, looking under bushes. “My bike! Someone stole my bike!”

Nicolás felt a jolt of alarm, sharper than before. He looked around. No sign of forced entry on the lock, no broken chains. It was just… gone. Cleanly. “Seriously, Leo? Man, that’s… that’s unbelievable.” He remembered the florist’s vanished orders, the concert tickets that just appeared online. His internal hum, which had settled into a gentle, content rhythm, now felt like a frantic, confused flutter, a bird trapped in his chest. Stolen. Just like that. Right when I got those concert tickets that just ‘appeared’…

Leo was practically in tears, running his hands through his hair. “My bike, man! My only reliable transportation! What the hell? I can’t afford a new one! This is… this is a nightmare!” He slumped against the bike rack, utterly defeated. “Everything! Everything I touch just turns to ash! It’s like some cosmic joker is having a laugh at my expense!”

Nicolás stared at his friend, his heart sinking. The triumphant roar of his power had been replaced by a deafening silence in his mind, broken only by the echo of Leo’s despair. He remembered Sarah losing her wallet, the coffee shop owner losing her business. He’d pushed them away, dismissed them as coincidences. But Leo… Leo was right here, losing everything.

The final blow came two days later, just before finals week. Nicolás found Leo in the library, head down on a table, surrounded by an impressive array of computer science textbooks. But he wasn’t studying. He was just… lying there.

“Leo? What’s going on, man?” Nicolás asked, concern etched on his face. He sat down opposite him.

Leo slowly lifted his head, his eyes red-rimmed and swollen. “I failed it, Ferris.” His voice was raw. “My Discrete Math final. I failed. I studied for this, man. I studied. I pulled all-nighters. I went to every review session. I thought I knew this stuff cold. But… but when I got in there, it was like my brain just… shut down. Like I couldn’t remember anything. Like every question was designed to trip me up, specifically me.” He slammed his fist softly on the table. “And now I might lose my major. Everything. It’s all gone. Just… poof.”

Nicolás stared at his friend, the air suddenly thick with a suffocating realization. His Microeconomics B+. His perfect study session with Putri. His ability to ace quizzes without studying. His brain had been firing on all cylinders, while Leo’s had apparently short-circuited. Every question designed to trip him up… The words echoed in Nicolás’s mind, a chilling premonition.

He remembered his own words, his flippant dismissal of Leo’s earlier misfortunes. ‘Maybe you’re absorbing all the good luck, Ferris.’ Leo’s bitter joke. ‘Cosmic joker.’

The joy, the triumph, the exhilarating hum of his power – it all evaporated, leaving behind a cold, desolate pit in his stomach. The instances weren’t isolated. They were connected. The wallet. The coffee shop. Sarah’s lost wallet. Leo’s laptop, scholarship, bike, exam. All his successes. All their failures. The scale was balanced, alright. But it wasn’t random. He was the fulcrum. And the world was his chaotic seesaw.

He looked at Leo, his friend, whose life was crumbling. And he, Nicolás, had been celebrating his own ‘miracles,’ oblivious, even contributing to the destruction. He clenched his fists, a surge of adrenaline, but not the thrilling ‘action sequence’ kind. This was pure, unadulterated terror. He had to fix this. He had to.

“Okay, Leo, listen to me,” Nicolás said, his voice surprisingly firm despite the tremor in his hands. “We’re gonna turn this around. I’m going to help you. Right now.”

Leo looked up, a glimmer of desperate hope in his eyes. “How, Ferris? How can you help? It’s over for me. I’m ruined.”

“No, you’re not!” Nicolás insisted, his mind racing. He had to make it small. Undeniable. Something that would prove his power could also be used for good. He cast his eyes around the library. “Okay, look. What’s something you’ve lost recently? Something small but important?”

Leo frowned, thinking. “Uh… my lucky pen? The one my grandma gave me? I can’t find it anywhere since I started studying for this damn final. It’s probably gone, too.”

“Perfect!” Nicolás almost shouted, earning a glare from a librarian. He lowered his voice. “Okay. We’re going to find that pen. Right now. Just… focus on it. Picture it turning up. Okay?” He closed his eyes, searching for the hum. It was there, but it felt sickly, resistant, like pushing against a heavy, viscous fluid. He forced it, trying to manifest Leo’s lucky pen. Pen. Lucky pen. For Leo. Find it. Now. He pictured it, appearing on the table, or falling out of a book. A small win. Just one small win for Leo!

He opened his eyes, scanning the table, the floor, Leo’s backpack. Nothing. The hum faded, leaving behind a profound emptiness. He tried again, pushing harder, forcing the unwilling energy. Find it!

“What are you doing, Ferris?” Leo asked, looking utterly bewildered. “Are you… trying to find it with your mind or something?” He reached for his phone, which was sitting on the table, to text someone.

Just as Leo’s fingers closed around his phone, Nicolás felt a jolt of feedback, a sharp, unpleasant crackle in his mind. Then, with a sickening CRACK, the screen of Leo’s phone splintered into a spiderweb of irreparable cracks. It went completely black.

Leo stared at it, then at Nicolás, his mouth agape. “Are you… are you serious right now?! My phone?! My brand new phone?! What the hell, Ferris?!” He gripped the useless device, his face a mask of utter disbelief and mounting anger. “It just… it just died! For no reason! It was perfectly fine a second ago!”

Nicolás stared at the shattered phone, then at his own hands, which felt suddenly alien and cold. The hum, no longer a triumphant symphony or even a discordant buzz, was a chilling, absolute silence, a vast, terrifying void. He had tried to reverse it. He had tried to help*. And all he had done was make it worse. He had broken his friend’s phone. He, Nicolás Ferrer, the master of probability, had actively, directly, caused harm.

His happiness, his triumphs, his perfect life with Putri—it all coalesced into a single, horrifying truth. This wasn't a gift. It was a curse. And he was its unwitting, devastating conductor. His hands, which had once felt like instruments of fortune, now felt like conduits of despair, stained with the invisible cost of his every selfish wish. The universe wasn't just balancing itself. It was taking its pound of flesh, and Leo, his loyal, unlucky friend, was bleeding f

or him.

This was the price. The horrifying, undeniable price of his happiness.