Kian stares at the screen. Then at the door. He doesn’t knock. He just sits on the steps. The video runs for eleven minutes. He doesn’t move. The sun rises. The file ends.

A scanned image. Front: a beach in Goa. Back, handwritten in a rushed scrawl:

“You think love is a choice. I think it’s a glitch in the matrix. So here’s the deal: one month. You pretend to fall for me. I pretend to fall for you. No real strings. First one to say ‘I love you’ and mean it loses. Winner gets the loser’s vinyl collection. Deal?”