Page 12 of Debugging Love

“You’rewalking behindme, genius.“ She sounds absolutely snake-like.

“My I.Q. is 135,” I answer.

“I didn’t ask.”

“What’s yours?”

“What are you doing here?”

“I’m going home.”

Danni squints at me and then looks at our apartment building. Her intelligence quotient must be pretty low if she hasn’t figured it out yet.

“You live here?” she asks with a scowl.

Bingo. “Apartment 242.”

Her shoulders rise as her muscles tense. I’m not happy about this either, but I’m not going to make a scene. I walk past her and climb the stairs. She runs up behind me like it’s a race and hits the landing first. She turns right. I turn left.

There’s a Post-it on my door. I peel it off and look over my shoulder as Danni ducks into her apartment. Apartment 240.

My mom says there’s no such thing as chance. According to her, the universe gets its way whether we like it or not. This, though. Me living across fromher. It’s just a fluke. A blip in the universe. Nothing significant about it whatsoever.

I push through my front door and flip on my lights, head to the kitchen and set the Post-it on the island before grabbing a Coke. The caffeine won’t bother me. I’ll still be up for a bit.

Who’s leaving messages on my front door?

I slide onto the bar stool and grab the note. Anger burns in my belly the longer I read. My eyes pause on the last few sentences.

…please stop leaving your clothes on the railings to dry. This is America. We have dryers for that.

When I called her racist, I was just ribbing her, seeing if she could stand up to a little teasing. I didn’t think she was actually racist.

Wow. Just wow.

I wad up the note and toss it into the trash, gulp the rest of my Coke, grab another, and head into my living room where I settle into my gaming chair.

My apartment is basic, an adjoining living room and kitchen, a short hallway leading to my bedroom and a full bath. Nothing like my parents’ home in Bengaluru, which had polished stone floors, glossy counters, multiple bedrooms—more than our family of four needed—and an enclosed garden with an outdoor kitchen and fountain.

When I came to America, I stepped down, but I stepped into myself. For the first time in my life, I’m on my own, playing by my rules, leaving trash around when I please, making decisions without my mom insisting she knows what’s best for me.

The point: small and plain as it may be, my apartment is mine. As such, I furnished it to serve me, with an 85-inch Samsung flatscreen TV across from a leather couch, and a three-monitor gaming computer in the corner, LED lights everywhere, various controllers, three Bluetooth keyboards to suit my moods. A PlayStation and an Xbox at the ready. I’m hooked up.

Tonight took it out of me, though. I’m too tired to fire up Call of Duty. Plus, I need to rate my date with Danni. Maybe I should add a column called “Racist” and make it an automatic minus twenty.

The first time you meet eyes with your soulmate, you feel it. You know it. But it’s not just physical. There’s a mental component. Your brain instantly knows you found the one. How do I know this? Because my sister experienced both the first time she saw Erish. That’s proof enough for me.

Danni didn’t give me an instant zing and my brain didn’t say, “She’s the one.” Mostly because she dug right in with the attitude. Also because she has no sense of humor. I can’t spend the rest of my life with a woman who doesn’t know how to laugh.

I lean back in my chair, thread my fingers through my hair, stare at the ceiling, recall the moment with Danni when my body lit up like a fireball. What column should I filethatunder?

Maybe it deserves a new column.

I click on my LEDs bathing my room in a blue glow, tap my mouse, and pull up my spreadsheet titled JustInCase.xlsx. Just in case my IT contract runs out before I feel a zing. Just in case my sister was wrong and it takes two or three dates for me to hear, “She’s the one.”

Finding your soulmate isn’t an exact science, but the process can be quantified to speed things along. First, opposites do not attract. I don’t care what Hollywood movies say. Introverts and extroverts don’t belong together. And just like that, my dating pool shrinks by half. Hello introverts. Now we’re getting somewhere.

Next, split the introverts into age groups. I need someone in her mid-twenties, like me. See? The dating pool just became a dating puddle.

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