My name is John. I'm twenty-two.
I live in a single room on the third floor of a building that smells like cooking oil and damp concrete.
I work as a travel consultant for Gree Asia Travels, which sounds better than it is.
All day I sit on a cracked plastic chair, headset crooked, selling trips to places I've never been.
Kashmir is always "paradise on earth."
I say it so many times the words start to taste like ash.
I'm supposed to be an engineer.
I was supposed to be a lot of things.
Instead, I'm here, telling strangers about houseboats on Dal Lake while my own life is leaking out through the cracks.
I finish at six, but there's always one more call.
Today it's some guy who wants to take his family to Gulmarg in January.
I tell him the snow will be perfect.
I don't mention the curfews, the soldiers, the news I scroll past every night.
He books.
I hang up.
The office is already dark.
I walk home through streets that feel like they've forgotten me.
Gym at eight is the only hour that doesn't belong to someone else.
I down pre-workout, feel the caffeine and beta-alanine light my veins on fire.
I lift until my hands shake and my shirt sticks to my back.
In the mirror I look like someone who could be dangerous if he tried.
My friends are there—guys who are either waiting for visas or already running their fathers' businesses.
They talk about bars, girls, weekend trips.
I smile, nod, make excuses.
I never have money to split the bill.
I never want to owe them dinner.
So I go home alone, eat three eggs, and lie on my bed staring at the ceiling fan.
One night the fan kept spinning and I kept staring.
Three hours.
I thought about school—how I used to talk about startups, about moving to Bangalore, about girls who'd laugh at my jokes.
Those dreams felt like they belonged to another person.
I hated that person.
I hated the one who let them die.
I sat up.
Walked to the mirror.
Saw the same tired face, same shadows under my eyes.
I opened the cupboard, lit a cigarette.
The first drag burned my throat.
It felt like punishment.
It felt like honesty.
I logged into my fake account.
Posted whatever garbage came into my head.
Texted every girl whose profile I could find—random, desperate messages.
Five minutes later I deleted everything.
I sat there, chest tight, feeling like the world's biggest loser all over again.
Then a message popped up.
A girl.
Or so I thought.
"What's up bro, what happened?"
I typed back the truth, raw and ugly: I'm broken. Broke. Empty.
I need to do something.
He waited.
Then he said:
"Do a coin flip. Let the coin decide your fate."
I laughed out loud.
It sounded hollow in the room.
I almost closed the app.
But the idea stuck.
A coin.
One flip.
No more thinking.
I tore a page from an old notebook.
Wrote two options.
Heads: Go downstairs and force Charlene to sleep with me.
Tails: Go back to sleep and pretend this never happened.
I held the coin between my fingers.
My thumb trembled.
Charlene lived on the ground floor.
Her husband—Rohan—was my classmate from college.
They had a two-year-old daughter.
I'd seen her playing in the courtyard.
I'd seen Rohan come home tired, kiss his wife, carry the kid upstairs.
This wasn't just stupid.
This was evil.
I could feel the shame already, hot in my chest.
I almost threw the coin out the window.
I sat back down.
Lit another cigarette.
Told myself I wouldn't do it.
I could just go to sleep.
Forget the whole thing.
But the itch was there—the same one that made me text strangers, the same one that made me stay up staring at the fan.
I needed to feel something.
Anything.
I closed my eyes.
Flipped the coin.
It spun in the air, caught the dim light from the bulb.
It landed on the floor with a soft clink.
Heads.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
I stared at the coin like it had just spoken to me.
I told myself I could ignore it.
I could lie down and pretend it landed tails.
But the coin doesn't lie.
I'd made the rule.
I'd asked for this.
I stood up.
Walked to the door.
Barefoot.
In my boxers.
Down the stairs.
Every step felt louder than the last.
I knocked on Charlene's door.
Once.
Twice.
The hallway light flickered.
She opened it slowly, sleepy, hair messy, nightgown loose over one shoulder.
She blinked at me.
Didn't recognize me at first.
Then she did.
I said, "I'm going to have sex with you."
She stared.
For a long second, nothing.
Then she said, "Okay."
I stood there, frozen.
I hadn't expected that.
I'd expected a scream, a slap, a door slammed in my face.
Instead she turned and walked inside.
Left the door open.
She stopped halfway across the living room.
Turned back.
"What did you just say?"
I stepped inside.
The door clicked shut behind me.
The coin doesn't care about right or wrong.
It doesn't care about your shame or your future.
It just falls.
And you follow.
I followed.
And for the first time in months,
I wasn't numb.