His Loyalty Hit 87%, So I Left

I can see a loyalty score over everyone's head.

When it falls below sixty percent, that person leaves.

The day my father cheated, his score fell from sixty-nine to twenty-three.

The day my sister ran away from home, hers fell to seven.

So when I grew up and started dating, I always left in time.

Then I met Beckett Hale.

His score for me was always one hundred percent. I believed I had finally found something real.

Then, on our daughter's third birthday, he didn't come.

When he walked in that night, the number over his head had dropped from one hundred to eighty-seven.

I understood that it was time to start planning to leave again.

...

I looked at the eighty-seven over Beckett's head and wondered, for a moment, whether something was wrong with my eyes.

We had dated for five years and been married for five. For ten years, that number had never once moved from one hundred.

He noticed me looking at the top of his head and smiled. "What are you looking at? You're a million miles away."

"Nothing," I said. But my chest felt heavy, as if something were pressing on it.

Wren still had her party hat on. She was holding the boxed doll Beckett had brought her, and her eyes were curved into little crescents from smiling.

"Mommy, look! Daddy got me a birthday present!"

I knelt down and touched her cheek. "It's beautiful."

She sat down on the rug and began working at the box. The number over her head read one hundred percent, as it always had.

So there was nothing wrong with my eyes. Something was wrong with Beckett.

I had told him about Wren's birthday a month ago, and he had promised to be there. A week ago I reminded him that he had missed it last year, and that this year he needed to be home. He said he would.

Last night, before bed, Wren held his hand and asked him not to be late. He tapped her nose and told her he wouldn't be late for anything.

Then, a little after six this evening, he texted that something had come up at work and he couldn't make it.

What could have come up? Why did it have to be him?

I didn't ask. I only asked him to come home as soon as he could.

He did. It was just past eight when he knocked. He was carrying the oat latte I always order, a box of macarons from the bakery I love, and the Barbie set he had promised Wren.

Nothing about him seemed different. He kissed my forehead as he came in, gave Wren her present, then lifted her up and kissed her cheek.

If not for the number over his head, I would have believed he had simply been working late.

He said he was tired, dropped his suit jacket on the couch, and went to shower.

I picked up the jacket to hang it, and I found a long hair on the collar.

My hair is short. It wasn't mine.

I looked toward the bathroom. The door was closed, and I could hear the water running.

I thought, quietly, that I should start packing.