Evan Miles was twenty-three when he thought he had found the secret to wealth. He sat in his small apartment in Queens with two monitors glowing in the dark, charts moving like waves. The green candles looked like hope. The red ones felt like warning lights, but he ignored them. He had watched a few online videos about day trading and joined a chat group where everyone bragged about quick wins. He believed he could be one of them.

The first time he pressed buy, his heart raced. The stock went up within minutes. He sold and made sixty dollars. It felt unreal. He laughed out loud, his hands shaking. In that moment, he believed this was easy. He thought he had discovered a skill that would free him from ordinary life. His job at the warehouse felt pointless now. He looked at the screen and whispered to himself that he would never clock in again once he made it big.

Every night he studied charts but not deeply. He told himself learning was unnecessary since instincts were enough. The chat room encouraged him, filling his feed with screenshots of profit. He began to trade every morning before work, sometimes even during lunch on his phone. When he lost, he told himself it was bad luck. When he won, he called it talent. The more he traded, the more he felt alive.

His friends noticed he was different. He stopped going out on weekends, saving every dollar to fund his account. When they asked what he was doing, he smiled and said he was building something. He imagined himself driving a sports car, walking through Manhattan with a suit, people calling him a genius trader. He read none of the risk warnings his broker sent. They looked boring.

One Friday, his paycheck hit. He wired it all into his trading account. The number rose on the screen, and he felt powerful. That night, he scrolled through stocks with the same rush someone might feel at a casino table. He didn’t see danger; he saw opportunity. He was ready to chase every green candle until it made him rich.

He didn’t know it yet, but that was the moment the market started watching him, quietly waiting for his overconfidence to grow.