Jason remained rooted to the spot, hidden behind the thick trunk of the tree. The voices from the park continued drifting closer to him, but he had stopped hearing individual sentences. All that remained were fragments.
"Convenient"
"He actually thought he had a chance."
"She only kept him around because he was useful."
Useful. The word echoed louder than all the laughter combined. His fingers slowly curled into fists.
For one fleeting moment, every muscle in his body screamed at him to walk over there. To ask them if it was true. To ask why. To ask Amanda what exactly he had done to deserve becoming the punchline of someone else’s joke. His foot even shifted forward. Just one step. Then he stopped.
The thought struck him before he could take another. What exactly would change? Would they suddenly apologize? Would Amanda magically admit she was wrong? Would yesterday disappear? The answer came almost immediately. No. If anything, confronting them would only give them another story to laugh about later.
"Did you see Jason today? He actually came to argue with us."
Jason slowly loosened his clenched fists. His nails had dug deeply enough into his palms to leave faint crescent marks behind. Without another glance toward the park, he turned around.
His footsteps were slow. Not because he was tired. Because every step felt strangely heavy. The road he had jogged along only minutes earlier looked completely different now. The breeze still blew gently through the trees. Birds still chirped somewhere above. The morning sunlight still filtered through the leaves, painting patches of gold across the pavement. Nothing had changed. Yet somehow, everything had.
His phone vibrated inside his pocket. A cheerful notification appeared across the screen.
Workout Paused. Distance: 0.27 km
Jason stared at it blankly
Two hundred and seventy meters
That was it. He had barely started. His thumb hovered over the screen for a second before pressing End Workout.
The application congratulated him for completing his "exercise."
He almost laughed.
"Yeah. What an achievement."
He slipped the phone back into his pocket. There was no point running anymore. His body had wanted exercise. His mind wanted silence.
The convenience store soon came into view. Sarah was outside arranging bottled drinks on a display rack when she noticed him approaching. Her eyes widened.
"Jason?" She looked past him as though expecting to see someone chasing him. "...You’re already back?" A playful smile appeared on her face. "Don’t tell me one kilometer finally defeated you."
Normally, Jason would’ve laughed. He would’ve made some self-deprecating joke. Instead, he kept walking. His eyes remained fixed on the ground as he passed the store without slowing down. Not even a greeting. Not even a glance.
Sarah’s smile gradually disappeared. She watched him continue toward the apartment building.
"Jason?"
He didn’t respond. The apartment door closed behind him a few moments later. Sarah remained standing where she was, brows knitting together in confusion.
"That’s..." She quietly looked toward the road he’d come from.
"...Not like him."
The apartment was silent. Painfully so. Jason stood just inside the doorway without moving. The same room. The same couch. The same table. Nothing had changed since yesterday. Except him.
His eyes slowly drifted toward the bouquet resting on the table. The flowers looked almost untouched. Fresh. Beautiful. A gift that had never become a gift.
He walked over. Picked them up. For a long moment, he simply stared. Then his fingers tightened around the stems. One petal drifted to the floor. Then another. He began pulling them off one by one, not violently, almost mechanically. Each petal floated downward in silence until they formed a scattered blanket of color around his feet. The bouquet became emptier. So did he.
By the time he reached the final flower, only broken stems remained in his hand. He looked at them for another second. Then tossed them aside. The dry sound of them hitting the floor echoed through the apartment.
Jason laughed. A short laugh. Then another. Before long, it became impossible to tell whether he was laughing because something was funny, or because stopping would’ve hurt even more.
"...Useful."
He shook his head.
"What a joke." Another laugh escaped him.
"I really thought..." He rubbed a hand over his face.
"...I actually thought she cared."
He looked around the empty apartment as though searching for the version of himself from yesterday.
"You idiot. You absolute idiot. You bought her lunch. You skipped your own meals. You spent hours helping with assignments. You answered every text within seconds. You kept convincing yourself that if you were just a little kinder just a little more patient she’d eventually see you."
He laughed again. This time it sounded hollow.
"Convenient." The word tasted bitter.
"I wasn’t special. I wasn’t important. I was just...convenient."
Jason slowly reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. His thumb found Amanda’s contact almost automatically. Their chat filled the screen. Months. No, years. Thousands of messages. Most of them started by him.
Good morning. Have you eaten? Are you home? Did you sleep well?
He kept scrolling. The further back he went, the more he realized how one-sided everything had always been. His smile faded.
"How did I never notice?"
He opened the gallery next. Amanda smiled back at him from countless photographs. Pictures from cafés. Campus events. Birthdays. Selfies she’d asked him to take. There wasn’t a single photo where they looked like a couple. Just a girl smiling, and a boy standing beside her, mistaking proximity for affection.
Jason pressed Select All.
His thumb lingered over the delete icon. Just for a second. Then he tapped it.
Delete 147 photos?
"Yes."
The screen emptied. One by one, every memory disappeared. Next came the chat. His finger pressed Clear Conversation.
No hesitation
No countdown
Just gone
Finally, only her number remained. Jason stared at it longer than everything else. Deleting pictures was easy. Deleting messages was easier. But deleting the number felt final. His thumb slowly moved toward the screen. Just before it landed on the screen—!
Ding!
A soft electronic chime echoed through the apartment. A translucent pink screen abruptly materialized before his eyes. Jason’s pupils shrank. His phone slipped from his hand.
Clack.
It struck the wooden floor. He didn’t even notice it, something else had his attention. His eyes remained fixed on the floating window. Words slowly appeared.
[Congratulations]
[All activation requirements have been fulfilled]
[Wealth Rebate System successfully activated]
[A/N]
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