When My Love Was Rated, I Said No

Chapter 5

By the time Grant came home that night, I had done everything exactly the way he liked, just as I had every evening for the past seven years.

Dinner was on the table, the plates and silverware were lined up neatly, and the bathwater had been drawn to the perfect temperature.

Grant sat down at the dining table, took a sip of soup, and nodded. "The temperature is perfect today. One point added."

He opened the app, tapped the screen a few times, then looked up at me. "Evelyn, your total score this month has fallen below the warning threshold. You need to make up for it."

I held my bowl in both hands. My voice came out very quietly. "How am I supposed to make up for it?"

Grant thought for a moment. "I'm traveling for work next week. Clara is still settling into her new firm on her own. Go help her organize her project files. That will count as bonus points."

I gently set down my fork and looked up at him.

At that moment, there were so many things I wanted to tell him. I wanted to tell him that my fever had finally broken that day, and that once the fever cleared, so many things had become painfully clear to me.

I finally understood why Grant had never truly fought with me. In his eyes, even an argument was nothing more than data. Conflict would deduct points from both of us and reduce the overall efficiency of the relationship.

I also understood why he had never comforted me. In his eyes, my emotions were only a fluctuating curve. If he gave them enough time, they would regress to the mean on their own. No human intervention was necessary.

And then I understood what I had seen on the wish board he had made for Clara. The colorful sticky notes, the hand-drawn stars, and the little smiley faces were all proof of the same thing.

That was love. It did not need performance metrics, and it did not need a scoring system to prove its worth. It was genuine down to the bone. As for what Grant had given me from beginning to end, it had been nothing but points.

But I did not say any of that. I only lowered my head and kept eating. Because I knew that saying those things to a man who only understood data would be a waste of breath.

Late that night, after Grant fell asleep, I sat alone in the dark living room and opened his laptop. The colorful wish board was still there. There were one hundred plans in total.

Twenty-three of them had already been crossed off, each one marked with a check: watching the ocean together, watching the sunrise together, learning to make tiramisu for her, and bringing her late-night snacks when she worked late.

Next to every item was Clara's crooked handwriting.

Grant, you're the best!

I'm so happy!

Happiness score for today is 100%!

I scrolled through page after page as tears streamed down my face. So this was what it looked like when someone truly knew how to love.

So I had not been unreasonable. I had not been asking for too much. What I wanted had never been too much at all.

Grant had simply never wanted to give it to me.

At three in the morning, I closed the laptop. Then I started packing.

After seven years, I should have had more belongings than I could count, but very little of it truly belonged to me.

Almost everything had been bought according to Grant's standards, from the colors and styles he approved of to the exact places where he wanted everything kept.

I packed all the black, white, and gray clothes into bags and dropped them into the donation bin downstairs.

After that, everything I actually wanted to keep fit inside one small suitcase.

Then I opened a drawer. Inside was an envelope. It held a travel credit I had secretly saved two years ago.

Grant had always said travel was the least efficient form of leisure, but I had always wanted to go to Riverbend and spend an afternoon sketching by the canal.

He would not go with me. So I would go by myself.

I took out my phone and opened the exhibition page again. Beneath the title, Blue Isle's Farewell Exhibition, the final stop was listed as Willowmere.

I bought a one-way ticket.

When the sky began to lighten, I wheeled my suitcase to the door and looked back one last time at the apartment where I had lived for seven years.

It had been a cage where I was quantified, evaluated, and scored.

On the coffee table sat the pair of smart wristbands. They were still unopened. Underneath them was a note I had written.

Grant, happy seventh anniversary. I spent seven years trying to earn enough of your points, but I could never earn your love. So I am done playing. I am leaving the wristbands here. My heartbeat, my temperature, and everything I am no longer need to be monitored by you. Goodbye.

The door clicked shut behind me.

Outside, the first light of dawn was breaking. I stood at the corner and took a deep breath.

I was only 25. It was not too late to walk away.