A fortnight had passed since the final exams. By midnight, all the results had been uploaded onto the online student portal. Tasha passed!

Tino was proud of “his girl”. He knew she would not fail. In fact, she did spectacularly well. She was going to graduate summa cum laude!

Immediately after Tasha saw the results, she called Tino. She could not contain her excitement.

“Tino, I passed! With distinction!” Tasha said the moment Tino picked up the call.

“Well done, Madame Freud!” he teased. 

“So you already knew?”, she said

“Of course I did. I told you, remember” he replied.

“Why didn’t you tell me the exact results?”

“Ethics and leverage,” Tino said.

The phone call dragged on for almost an hour. Tino had never heard Tasha this excited and excitable. He loved it!

They agreed to meet up for dinner. This time, Tino insisted on Tasha picking a place. She settled on Tindale’s at seven.

As usual, Tino was early. 

By six-thirty, he had taken possession of a perfect spot. “At some point, I should research the link between the geolocation of a restaurant table and the quality of conversation during a meal,” Tino told himself. He was prone to conjuring up hypotheses to prove whenever he was bored.

Ten minutes later, Tasha walked in. She was not looking as excited as she sounded over the phone. In fact, she looked sad. It was not adding up.