Day 6, August 23, 2015 – Sunday
Aria didn't go out that day. She didn't need to. The world was already coming to her, one bloodied candle at a time.
The charts. The posts. The creeping unease behind every "buy the dip" meme on Reddit. She remembered this weekend, not as a headline, but as a scream. Not loud. Just… constant.
Back in 2015, this was the Sunday before Black Monday 2.0.
She just couldn't remember if the real plunge happened tomorrow or Tuesday.
So she prepared like a gambler with a grudge. Coffee in one hand. Pen in the other. The notebook filled quickly.
"Sunday is when the quiet lies."
By noon, she had opened her brokerage account five separate times. Not to trade. Just to feel the balance breathe.
¥415,000.
Up from ¥200,000 in five days.
That number did something to her spine. To her breathing. It made her palms itch.
She wanted more.
And more was coming.
She checked the U.S. futures. Dow Jones was red. NASDAQ was flat, but oil had cracked. Again.
AAPL was holding, for now.
She loaded the options chain. IV was spiking like it smelled smoke.
She whispered to herself, "This is it, right? This is the one."
It wasn't a question. Not really.
At 1:17 p.m., she placed the order.
Two contracts. Deep OTM AAPL puts, expiring next week. ¥80,000 down.
It felt like blood money.
She sat back in her chair and looked around her 6-tatami apartment. The CRT buzzed faintly.
"I should clean," she said.
She didn't move.
Yuji called. Not a message. A real call.
She stared at the screen. The name glowed like a guilt trip.
She picked up.
"Aria?"
"I'm here."
A pause.
"You okay?"
Another pause.
"I'm not sure that's the right question."
He sighed. "I don't know what's happening with you. But it feels like you're somewhere else. Like you're… past me."
"I am."
Silence.
"You're scaring me," he said, quietly.
She almost said: Good.
But instead, she said, "I have to go."
Click.
She stared at her phone until the screen dimmed.
She paced the room.
Her mind buzzed like the charts.
The what-ifs came fast and sharp.
What if AAPL doesn't crash?
What if this isn't the week?
What if she just lit ¥80,000 on fire for drama?
But then, like a cold glass of water over the face, came the deeper what-if.
What if she hesitates and misses the moment?
Again.
She opened her notebook.
"The market is memory with a heartbeat."
She added:
"But memory stutters."
And under that:
"Bet with your blood or don't bet at all."
By 6:00 p.m., she was back at the curry shop again.
Ramesh was wiping down the counter.
"You look like a woman who just married her fate," he said.
"I just bought some rope," she replied.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Not to hang myself," she added. "To climb out."
He chuckled. "Or tie the next fool to the stake."
She smiled. But it didn't reach her eyes.
She paid in silence.
Back home, the night grew louder.
It wasn't noise. Not really.
It was anticipation, a tension in the market's chest.
Asia would open soon.
She opened her laptop again. Loaded the charts.
Her order was filled. Price is already ticking higher. But slowly.
She forced herself to shut the screen. To sleep.
But Aria didn't sleep.
Not that night.
She stared at the ceiling, her breath shallow, hands clenched.
This was no longer about winning.
It was about seeing the monster coming and choosing to stare back.
At 11:59 p.m., she opened her notebook one last time.
"The fear isn't in losing," she wrote.
"It's almost right."
Because she almost didn't make her rich.
Only now would.
And now was just one collapse away.
Outside, the sky had turned the color of wet ash.
Tokyo didn't know it was standing on the edge.
Aria stepped out for air and found herself watching people like she were already gone. A man in a suit walked his corgi like it was a negotiation. A high school couple held hands too tightly for it to be love. An old man shouted at a pigeon.
None of them were thinking about AAPL.
None of them knew what was coming.
She almost envied them.
Almost.
At the Lawson, the night shift clerk from before, the older woman with the sharp eyes, gave her a long stare.
"Back again?"
"Need fuel," Aria said, raising a can of Boss Coffee.
"Or anesthesia?" the woman asked.
Aria considered that. "Both."
The clerk handed her the can without a word.
Midnight passed. Monday began.
The market would open in hours.
And somewhere, in the gears of global finance, the fall had already started.
Aria leaned back. Looked at her open notebook.
She traced one last line beneath her earlier scrawl.
"The world never ends with a bang. It ends with someone betting it will."
She smiled.
Let it come.
01:38 a.m.
She couldn't sleep.
The futures market was now a red sea.
Nikkei down 300 points in pre-open chatter. The Chinese yuan had just been adjusted again, devalued. Oil futures had dropped below $40.
And Twitter? Twitter was on fire.
Black Monday trended before Monday even began.
Every chartist was posting VIX graphs like it was war propaganda. Someone claimed it was a Lehman repeat. Others said it was just a "healthy correction."
She knew better.
This was the whisper before the scream.
She refreshed the AAPL options chain again.
Her puts had already ticked up 12%. On a Sunday.
IV was climbing like a rat escaping a flood.
Her breath caught, just a little.
She imagined the opening bell. The drop. The chaos. The moment when everyone would realize it was already too late.
She imagined the money, yes.
But also the silence that followed it.
The space it might give her.
She closed Twitter. Closed the broker tab.
Opened a blank page in her notebook.
Wrote only one sentence:
"The knife is already falling. I'm just the one who put her hand out."
Then circled it.
Twice.
At 2:13 a.m., she boiled water for instant miso soup.
The kitchen light was too bright, so she turned it off halfway through and finished prepping in the dark.
She liked it that way.
The street was empty.
And yet, it felt like all of Tokyo was holding its breath.
Waiting.
Just like her.