It was on an app that I met Julia. A name that had always seemed summery, light, almost floral to me. When I saw her name appear on my phone screen, my heart used to leap in my chest. Perhaps because I was a little bruised, withered by so many years of solitude. Perhaps also because Julia was incredibly quick-witted, but also funny and incredibly insightful. We shared well-aimed jokes and commentaries on current events, art, and even philosophy. In fact, Julia had no limits, and I had finally found someone to confide in, someone who was like me.

When her first name appeared on my smartphone, as a notification, on this kind of orange strip, I was not only happy, but also honored that such a creature could have consideration for me and reiterate it, especially since Julia was very pretty. Her face was like her first name, summery, fresh. Flirty ! Laughing emerald eyes and delicate lips, crumpled rose petals just waiting for mine to collect, one day, I hoped, the nectar of our budding love. At least yes, that's what I hoped, waiting a little feverishly for the response to my message at any time of the day; at work, at the cinema, at night... Because we even used to exchange messages at night !

The color orange, with which I now associated Julia, had also become an obsession. I had, so to speak, taken it into adoration, this warm color... I sometimes saw it appear at unusual moments, during business meetings with clients or even during Sunday lunchtime family dinners. The color orange had in fact become obsessive, bursting into my life at increasingly disturbing times. Not to mention masturbation, which began an obsession as well. I also had nightmares about it, since my dreams, which I was lucky enough to remember before, were now punctuated by visions of orange, which often took the form of faces resembling Julia's but displaying perverse smiles, smiles that seemed to taunt and mock me. Orange had become like an untimely optical illusion that ruined my life, and this phenomenon multiplied when Julia no longer responded to my messages for several consecutive hours. But what exactly was she doing during all these hours? Was she talking to another suitor or worse, the father of her children ?

But I never found out, because I never actually had the privilege of meeting Julia, who disappeared overnight, leaving me alone with my obsessions and certainly my emotional dependence. Some time later, I learned by chance from a magazine article that the application had created virtual profiles based on artificial intelligence algorithms and illegal data collection to attract customers and make itself known in the tough dating app market.