A Valentine's Algorithm
Copyright© 2026 by Tantrayaan
Chapter 16
A week later, they were eating dinner at the small kitchen table. Vikram had been mostly silent for days, but he’d been present. Actually chewing and looking at her when she spoke.
“Can I ask you something?” he said suddenly.
Inna looked up from her soup. “Anything.”
“Why did you come back?” He set down his spoon. “After the confession. After you ran. You could have stayed away. Let someone else handle the Vane interrogation. But you called me.”
Inna was quiet for a moment. “Because I wanted to be there for you. I wanted to see the joy in your face when you found out where Elara could be hidden.”
“Even though it meant facing me after...” He trailed off.
“After I humiliated myself?” She smiled sadly. “Yeah. Even then. Turns out my pride isn’t as important as you are.”
Vikram reached across the table. Took her hand. “You didn’t humiliate yourself.”
“I told you I’d share you.”
“You told me you loved me enough to accept whatever I could give.” He squeezed her fingers. “That’s not humiliation. That’s courage.”
Her eyes filled. “I don’t feel very courageous.”
“You moved in with a broken man. You’ve spent weeks bringing me back from nothing. You’re the bravest person I know.” He paused. “Inna, I don’t know what happens next. I don’t know how to be the man I was before. But I know I don’t want to do this without you.”
“You won’t have to.”
“Good.” He smiled. Small, but real. “I’m not done needing you yet.”
“Great! He needs me,” she thought. “Like he needs his medicine.”
She just shook her head in despair.
The following week, Inna came home to smoke pouring out of the kitchen.
She ran in to find Vikram staring at a pan with the same intensity he’d once brought to encrypted files.
“What are you doing?”
“Attempting to make dinner for you.” He gestured at the smoking pan. “It was supposed to be chicken.”
“That’s ... very black chicken.”
“I got distracted reading the recipe.” He dumped the pan in the sink. “I’m better with code than cooking.”
Inna started laughing. She couldn’t help it. The sight of Vikram Sen, brilliant data scientist, defeated by poultry.
He looked at her. Then at the ruined dinner. Then back at her and started laughing too.
“I’m trying to do something nice and I can’t even cook chicken.” He was still laughing. “I built encryption algorithms. I decoded steganographic images. But chicken defeats me.”
“To be fair, chicken is tricky.”
“It’s vindictive.” He pulled out his phone. “I’m ordering pizza.”
“Best decision you’ve made all day.”
They ordered pizza and argued over whether pineapple was a valid topping or not. Inna was a fierce critic while Vikram argued that if California Pizza Kitchen could sell pizza with salad as a topping then pineapple qualified. When the pizza came, they ate it on the couch and watched a movie together. For the first time in months, the apartment felt like a home instead of a hospital.
Soon, they began to walk. At first just to the corner. Then to the park.
By December they were the inseparable pair of the neighborhood. Walking arm in arm. His stride growing stronger. His eyes losing the glassy sheen.
They didn’t talk about Elara. They didn’t talk about Chronos.
They talked about the architecture of the brownstones. The way frost looked on iron fences. What they wanted for dinner.
But Inna watched him. Studied him when he wasn’t looking.
She saw him struggling. Saw the weight he carried. The guilt.
He’d been in love with her while Elara was being tortured. While Elara was protecting him. Dying for him. That knowledge sat on him like a stone.
To read the complete story you need to be logged in:
Log In or
Register for a Free account
(Why register?)
* Allows you 3 stories to read in 24 hours.