[ WP ] all humans gain a super power on a random day of their life . you awake on your 70th birthday to discover you have finally gained your power .

Jeremy threw open the door of my room with a hurricane force wind that he conjured. `` Up and at'em! It's a bright sunny day, I made sure of it!'' 
 
 I rolled over in my bed and covered my face with my pillow. `` Go away, Jeremy.'' No matter how many times I remind him, he ca n't help but rub his powers in my face. I get it. You control the weather. You have a congressional medal of honor for alleviating that big drought. Shut up about it. 
 
 Most people are more sensitive. I seem to be the only one here at Sandy Palms Retirement Home who *hasn't* discovered their power. Even the janitor is nice about it, but I still see him snickering as he cleans my toilet with his water controlling. `` It'll come,'' everyone tells me with a sympathetic shoulder pat. Then they fly off to go do something amazing and heroic. How *awesome* for them. 
 
 I'm used to it, though. I've dealt with this my whole life. In 6th grade, Sam Elston got his powers: invisibility. He was the first one; it has something to do with puberty allowing the gene to express. I do n't remember how all the science works. Sam would regale us with tales of sneaking into the girls locker room, or taking bottles of beer from the local grocery store. Sam was *the man*. Everyone wanted to be him. 
 
 By high school, something like a quarter of the school had their powers. I cruised through classes, not really studying or paying particularly close attention. All I could think about were powers. I only got by with the help of Sanjeet, whose power was memory retention and speed-reading. The Ultimate Bookworm, he called himself. Once he memorized most of the library, I never had to worry about another paper or presentation again. 
 
 On graduation day, more than half the people had presented. Erin Adams zipped across the stage with her super speed, sending the principal's hat flying off in a gust of wind. Louis Han was too big and muscular to even fit into the photo with the principal, so the yearbook just had a photo of his brawny chest and cut off at the neck. I, however, was still powerless. Sanjeet, of course, got into every college that he wanted, while I stayed home and went to community college. For plumbing. How thrilling and exciting. 
 
 And that's basically how the rest of my life went. I fixed pipes for the powerful, glamorous superbeings around me. Luckily no power ever revolved around swapping out corroded components for new valves, otherwise I would have been out of business like so many others. Every day, more and more people I knew would realize their gift. They went on to do amazing things. Linda's heat vision made her an amazing miner who could bore through rocks with surgical precision. Andy's ability to miraculously grow plants made him the biggest farmer in the whole county; who would have thought that we could grow avocados in *Wisconsin*? I just waited and waited for my turn to come. And it never did. 
 
 So I retired. I moved down to Florida, away from everyone I knew. I just wanted to live out the rest of my days swimming in the warm waters of the Gulf and forgetting all about superpowers. 
 
 `` Come on,'' Jeremy persisted, blowing open my window and sending my blankets and sheets flying across the room. `` I'm bored. Let's hit the surf!'' He liked to pretend he was still young, though the nice young nurse here with the Rejuvenation power did help quite a bit. 
 
 I finally relented and met him out on the blindingly bright beach a few minutes later. Maybe he had a point; a swim would do me good. I shuffled foward across the hot, white sand, zigging and zagging to take advantage of the brief shady cover of beach umbrellas. I could practically hear my feet sizzling. 
 
 Finally, I reached the ocean, gently lapping against the shore. I stuck a foot into the water, ready to relieve my burning soles. 
 
 The water was... hard. Like glass. I looked down; my foot was resting *on* the water. I felt a weird tingling sensation as the tide pulled the water away again and my toes dug into the sand as it receded. *What the... * 
 
 Another wave came. I took another step into it, and the same thing. My foot just stayed on the surface. I took another few steps forward till I got about ten feet out. The water around me seemed to calm, giving me a pretty steady base to walk around. 
 
 *I can walk on water*, I realized. 
 
 `` Hey!'' Jeremy yelled from a few feet behind me, `` You did it! Your power manifested!'' 
 
 *All this time I've waited... * 
 
 I could n't help but laugh. `` I moved to *fucking Florida*,'' I told Jeremy. `` All the way across the fucking country to enjoy my retirement by the ocean. So that I could just swim in that famous Florida surf every day. And *this* is the shit that I get!''
