Chapter - 28 | It Ends with Us

-Eight
After Ryle left me his keys this afternoon; I debated going back to our
new apartment. I even had a cab pull up to the building, but I
couldn’t force myself out of the car. I knew if I went back there today,
I’d probably see Allysa at some point. I’m not ready to explain the
stitches on my forehead to her. I’m not ready to see the kitchen where
Ryle’s harsh words cut through me. I’m not ready to walk into the
bedroom where I was completely destroyed.
So instead of returning to my own home, I took the cab back to
Atlas’s house. It feels like my only safe zone right now. I don’t have to
confront things when I’m hiding out here.
Atlas has already texted me twice today checking on me, so when I
get a text a few minutes before seven o’clock in the evening, I assume
it’s from him. It’s not; it’s from Allysa.
Allysa: You home from work yet? Come up and visit us, I’m already bored.
My heart sinks when I read her text. She has no idea what
happened between me and Ryle. I wonder if Ryle even told her he left
for England today. My thumb types and erases and types some more
as I try to come up with a good excuse as to why I’m not there.
Me: I can’t. I’m in the emergency room. Hit my head on that shelf in the
storage room at work. Getting stitches.
I hate that I lied to her, but it’ll save me from having to explain the
cut and also why I’m not home right now.
Allysa: Oh no! Are you alone? Marshall can come sit with you since Ryle is
gone.
Okay, so she knows Ryle left for England. That’s good. And she
thinks we’re ﬁne. This is good. That means I have at least three
months before I have to tell her the truth.
Look at me, sweeping shit under the rug just like my mother.
Me: No, I’m ﬁne. I’ll be ﬁnished up by the time Marshall could even get here.
I’ll come by tomorrow after work. Give Rylee a kiss for me.

I lock the screen on my phone and set it on my bed. It’s dark
outside now, so I immediately see the scroll of the headlights as
someone pulls into the driveway. I instantly know that it isn’t Atlas,
because he uses the driveway to the side of the house and parks in the
garage. My heart begins to race as fear rushes through me. Is it Ryle?
Did he ﬁnd out where Atlas lives?
Moments later, there’s a loud knock at the front door. More like
pounding. The doorbell also rings.
I tiptoe to the window and barely move the curtains over far
enough to take a look outside. I can’t see who’s at the door, but
there’s a truck in the driveway. It doesn’t belong to Ryle.
Could it be Atlas’s girlfriend? Cassie?
I grab my phone and make my way down the hallway, toward the
living room. The pounding on the door and the chime of the
doorbell are still going off simultaneously. Whoever is at the door is
being ridiculously impatient. If it is Cassie, I already ﬁnd her
extremely annoying.
“Atlas!” a guy yells. “Open the damn door!”
Another voice—also male—yells, “My balls are freezing up! They’re
raisins, man, open the door!”
Before I open the door and let them know Atlas isn’t home, I text
him, hoping he’s about to pull in the driveway and deal with this
himself.
Me: Where are you? There are two men at your front door and I have no idea
if I should let them in.
I wait through more presses of the doorbell and more pounding,
but Atlas doesn’t immediately text me back. I ﬁnally walk to the door
and leave the chain bolted, but unlock the deadbolt and open the
door a few inches.
One of the guys is tall, about six feet or so. Despite the youthful
look to his face, his hair is salt and pepper. Black with a little bit of
gray sprinkled in. The other one is shorter by a few inches, with sandy
brown hair and a baby face. They both look to be in their late
twenties, maybe early thirties. The tall one’s face twists into confusion.
“Who are you?” he asks, peeking through the door.
“Lily. Who are you?”
The shorter one pushes in front of the taller one. “Is Atlas here?”

I don’t want to tell them no, because then they’ll know I’m here
alone. I don’t necessarily hold much trust in the male population this
week.
The phone in my hand rings and all three of us jump from the
unexpectedness of it. It’s Atlas. I swipe the answer button and bring it
to my ear.
“Hello?”
“It’s ﬁne, Lily, they’re just friends of mine. I forgot it was Friday, we
always play poker on Fridays. I’ll call them now and tell them to
leave.”
I look back at the two of them and they’re just standing there,
watching me. I feel bad that Atlas feels like he has to cancel his plans
just because I’m crashing at his house. I shut the door and unlock the
deadbolt, then open the door again, motioning them inside.
“It’s ﬁne, Atlas. You don’t have to cancel your plans. I was about to
go to bed anyway.”
“No, I’m on my way. I’ll have them leave.”
I still have the phone pressed to my ear when the two men enter
the living room.
“See you soon,” I say to Atlas and then end the call. The next few
seconds are awkward as the guys assess me and I assess them.
“What are your names?”
“I’m Darin,” the tall one says.
“Brad,” the shorter one says.
“Lily,” I say to them, even though I already told them my name.
“Atlas will be here soon.” I move to close the door and they seem to
relax a little. Darin heads into the kitchen and helps himself to Atlas’s
refrigerator.
Brad takes off his jacket and hangs it up. “Do you know how to play
poker, Lily?”
I shrug. “It’s been a few years, but I used to play with friends in
college.”
Both of them walk toward the dining room table.
“What happened to your head?” Darin asks as he takes a seat. He
asks it so casually, like it doesn’t even cross his mind that it might be a
sensitive subject.

I don’t know why I have an urge to give him the naked truth.
Maybe I just want to see how someone will react when they ﬁnd out
my own husband did this to me.
“My husband happened. We got into a ﬁght two nights ago and he
head-butted me. Atlas took me to the emergency room. They gave me
six stitches and told me I was pregnant. Now I’m hiding out here until
I ﬁgure out what to do.”
Poor Darin is frozen, halfway between standing and sitting. He has
no idea how to respond to that. Based on the look on his face, I think
he’s convinced I’m crazy.
Brad pulls out his chair and takes a seat, pointing at me. “You
should get some Rodan and Fields. The amp roller works wonders for
scarring.”
I immediately laugh at his random response. Somehow.
“Jesus, Brad!” Darin says, ﬁnally sinking into his seat. “You’re worse
than your wife with this direct sales shit. You’re like a walking
infomercial.”
Brad raises his hands in defense. “What?” he says innocently. “I’m
not trying to sell her anything, I’m being honest. The stuff works.
You’d know that if you’d use it on your damn acne.”
“Screw you,” Darin says.
“It’s like you’re trying to be a perpetual teenager,” Brad mutters.
“Acne isn’t cool when you’re thirty.”
Brad pulls out the chair next to him while Darin begins shufﬂing a
deck of cards. “Have a seat, Lily. One of our friends decided to be an
idiot and get married last week, and now his wife won’t let him come
to poker night anymore. You can be his ﬁll-in until he gets a divorce.”
I had every intention of hiding out in my room tonight, but these
two make it hard to walk away. I take a seat next to Brad and reach
across the table. “Hand me those,” I say to Darin. He’s shufﬂing the
cards like a one-armed infant.
He raises an eyebrow and pushes the deck of cards across the table.
I don’t know much about card games, but I can shufﬂe cards like a
pro.
I separate the cards into two piles and scoot them together,
pressing my thumbs to the ends, watching as they beautifully
intertwine. Darin and Brad are staring at the deck of cards, when

there’s another knock on the door. This time the door swings open
without pause and a guy walks in dressed in what looks like a very
expensive tweed jacket. There’s a scarf wrapped around his neck, and
he begins to unwind it as soon as he slams the door behind him. He
nudges his head in my direction as he walks toward the kitchen. “Who
are you?”
He’s older than the other two, probably in his mid-forties.
Atlas deﬁnitely has an interesting mix of friends.
“This is Lily,” Brad says. “She’s married to an asshole and just found
out she’s pregnant with the asshole’s baby. Lily, this is Jimmy. He’s
pompous and arrogant.”
“Pompous and arrogant are the same thing, idiot,” Jimmy says. He
pulls out the chair next to Darin and nudges his head at the cards in
my hands. “Did Atlas plant you here to hustle us? What kind of
average person knows how to shufﬂe cards like that?”
I smile and begin to pass cards out to each of them. “I guess we’ll
have to play a round to ﬁnd out.”
• • •
We’re on our third round of bets when Atlas ﬁnally walks in. He closes
the door behind him and looks around at the four of us. Brad said
something funny right before Atlas opened the door, so I’m in the
middle of a ﬁt of laughter when Atlas locks eyes with me. He nods his
head toward the kitchen and begins walking in that direction.
“Fold,” I say, laying my cards ﬂat on the table as I stand up to follow
him. When I get to the kitchen, he’s standing where he isn’t visible to
the guys at the table. I walk over to him and lean against the counter.
“You want me to ask them to leave?”
I shake my head. “No, don’t do that. I’m actually enjoying it. It’s
keeping my mind off things.”
He nods and I can’t help but notice how he smells like herbs.
Rosemary, speciﬁcally. It makes me wish I could see him in action at
his restaurant.
“You hungry?” he asks.
I shake my head. “Not really. I ate some leftover pasta a couple
hours ago.”

My hands are pressed into the counter on either side of me. He
takes a step closer and puts one of his hands over mine, brushing his
thumb across the top of it. I know he doesn’t mean for it to be
anything more than a comforting gesture, but when he touches me, it
feels like a whole lot more. A rush of warmth moves up my chest and I
immediately drop my eyes to our hands. Atlas pauses his thumb for a
second, like he feels it, too. He pulls his hand away and backs up a
step.
“Sorry,” he mutters, turning toward the refrigerator, pretending to
look for something. It’s obvious he’s trying to spare me from the
awkwardness of what just happened.
I walk back to the table and pick up my cards for the next round. A
couple of minutes later, Atlas walks over and takes the seat next to me.
Jimmy shufﬂes out a round of new cards to everyone. “So, Atlas. How
do you and Lily know each other?”
Atlas picks up his cards one at a time. “Lily saved my life when we
were kids,” he says, matter-of-fact. He glances over at me and winks,
and I drown in guilt for the way that wink makes me feel. Especially at
a time like this. Why is my heart doing this to me?
“Aw, that’s sweet,” Brad says. “Lily saved your life, now you’re saving
hers.”
Atlas lowers his cards and glares at Brad. “Excuse me?”
“Relax,” Brad says. “Me and Lily are tight, she knows I’m kidding.”
Brad looks at me. “Your life might be complete crap right now, Lily,
but it’ll get better. Trust me, I’ve been there.”
Darin laughs. “You’ve been beat up and pregnant and hiding out at
another man’s house?” he says to Brad.
Atlas slaps his cards on the table and pushes back in his chair.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he yells at Darin.
I reach over and squeeze his arm reassuringly. “Relax,” I say. “We
bonded before you got here. I actually don’t mind that they’re
making light of my situation. It really does make it a little less heavy.”
He runs a frustrated hand through his hair, shaking his head. “I’m
so confused,” he says. “You were alone with them for ten minutes.”
I laugh. “You can learn a lot about someone in ten minutes.” I try
to redirect the conversation. “So how do you all know each other?”

Darin leans forward and points at himself. “I’m the sous chef at
Bib’s.” He points at Brad. “He’s the dishwasher.”
“For now,” Brad interjects. “I’m working my way up.”
“What about you?” I say to Jimmy.
He smirks and says, “Take a guess.”
Based on the way he dresses and the fact that he’s been called
arrogant and pompous, I’d have to assume . . . “Maître d’?”
Atlas laughs. “Jimmy actually works in valet.”
I glance back at Jimmy and raise an eyebrow. He tosses three poker
chips down and says, “It’s true. I park cars for tips.”
“Don’t let him fool you,” Atlas says. “He works in valet, but only
because he’s so rich he gets bored.”
I smile. It reminds me of Allysa. “I have an employee like that. Only
works because she’s bored. She’s actually the best employee I have.”
“Damn straight,” Jimmy mutters.
I take a look at my cards when it’s my turn and toss in the three
poker chips. Atlas’s phone rings and he pulls it out of his pocket. I’m
raising the pot with another chip when he excuses himself from the
table to take the call.
“Fold,” Brad says, slapping his cards on the table.
I’m watching the hallway Atlas just disappeared down in a hurry. It
makes me wonder if he’s talking to Cassie, or if there’s someone else
in his life. I know what he does for a living. I know he has at least
three friends. I just know nothing about his love life.
Darin lays his cards on the table. Four of a kind. I lay down my
straight ﬂush and reach forward for all the poker chips as Darin
groans.
“So does Cassie not usually come to poker night?” I ask, ﬁshing for
more information on Atlas. Information I’m too scared to ask him
myself.
“Cassie?” Brad says.
I stack my winnings up in front of me and nod. “Isn’t that his
girlfriend’s name?”
Darin laughs. “Atlas doesn’t have a girlfriend. I’ve known him for
two years and he’s never mentioned anyone named Cassie.” He begins
passing out new cards, but I’m trying to absorb the information he

just gave me. I pick up my ﬁrst two cards when Atlas walks back into
the room.
“Hey, Atlas,” Jimmy says. “Who the hell is Cassie and how come
we’ve never heard you talk about her?”
Oh, shit.
I’m completely mortiﬁed. I tighten my grip around the cards in my
hands and try to avoid looking up at Atlas, but the room grows so
quiet, it would be more obvious if I didn’t look at him.
He’s staring at Jimmy. Jimmy is staring at him. Brad and Darin are
staring at me.
Atlas folds his lips together for a moment and then says, “There is
no Cassie.” His eyes meet mine, but only for a brief second. But in
that brief second, I can see it written all over his face.
There never was a Cassie.
He lied to me.
Atlas clears his throat and then says, “Listen, guys. I should have
cancelled tonight. This week has been kind of . . .” He rubs his hand
over his mouth and Jimmy stands up.
He squeezes Atlas on the shoulder and says, “Next week. My place.”
Atlas nods appreciatively. The three of them begin to gather their
cards and poker chips. Brad pries my cards from my ﬁngers
apologetically because I’m unable to move as I clutch them tightly.
“It was lovely meeting you, Lily,” Brad says. I somehow ﬁnd the
strength to smile and stand up. I give them all hugs goodbye and after
the front door closes behind them, it’s just me and Atlas in the room.
And no Cassie.
Cassie’s never even been in this room, because Cassie doesn’t exist.
What the hell?
Atlas hasn’t moved from his spot near the table. Neither have I.
He’s standing ﬁrm with his arms folded across his chest. His head is
slightly tilted down but his eyes are boring into me from across the
table.
Why would he lie to me?
Ryle and I weren’t even an ofﬁcial couple yet when I ran into Atlas
at that restaurant the ﬁrst time. Hell, if Atlas had given me any reason
to believe there was a chance between us that night, I know without a

doubt that I would have chosen him over Ryle. I barely even knew Ryle
at that point.
But Atlas didn’t say anything. He lied to me and told me he’d been
in a relationship for an entire year. Why? Why would he do that unless
he didn’t want me to think I had a chance with him?
Maybe I’ve been wrong all this time. Maybe he never even loved me
to begin with and he knew that inventing this Cassie person would
keep me away from him for good.
Yet, here I am. Crashing at his house. Interacting with his friends.
Eating his food. Using his shower.
I can feel the tears begin to sting my eyes and the last thing I want
is to stand in front of him and cry right now. I walk around the table
and rush past him. I don’t make it far when he grabs my hand. “Wait.”
I stop, still facing the other direction.
“Talk to me, Lily.”
He’s right behind me now, his hand still wrapped around mine. I
pull it away from him and walk to the other side of the living room.
I spin and face him just as the ﬁrst tear rolls down my cheek. “Why
did you never come back for me?”
He looked prepared for anything to come out of my mouth other
than the words I just spoke to him. He runs a hand through his hair
and walks to the couch, taking a seat. After blowing out a calming
breath, he carefully looks over at me.
“I did, Lily.”
I don’t allow air to move in or out of my lungs.
I stand completely still, processing his answer.
He came back for me?
He folds his hands together in front of him. “When I got out of the
Marines the ﬁrst time, I went back to Maine, hoping to ﬁnd you. I
asked around and found out which college you went to. I wasn’t sure
what to expect when I showed up, because we were two different
people by then. It had been four years since we saw each other. I knew
a lot about both of us had probably changed in those four years.”
My knees feel weak, so I walk to the chair next to him and lower
myself. He came back for me?
“I walked around your campus the whole day looking for you.
Finally, late that afternoon, I saw you. You were sitting in the

courtyard with a group of your friends. I watched you for a long time,
trying to work up the courage to walk over to you. You were laughing.
You looked happy. You were vibrant like I’d never seen you before. I
had never felt that kind of happiness for another person like I felt
when I saw you that day. Just knowing you were okay . . .”
He pauses for a moment. My hands are clenched around my
stomach, because it hurts. It hurts knowing I was so close to him and I
didn’t even know.
“I began walking toward you when someone came up behind you.
A guy. He dropped to his knees next to you and when you saw him,
you smiled and threw your arms around him. Then you kissed him.”
I close my eyes. He was just a boy I dated for six months. He never even
made me feel a fraction of what I had felt for Atlas.
He blows out a sharp breath. “I left after that. When I saw that you
were happy, it was the worst and best feeling a person could ever have
at once. But I believed at that point that my life was still not good
enough for you. I had nothing to offer you but love, and to me, you
deserved more than that. The next day I signed up for another tour
in the Marines. And now . . .” He tosses his hand up lazily in the air,
like nothing about his life is impressive.
I bury my head in my hands to take a moment. I quietly grieve what
could have been. What is. What wasn’t. My ﬁngers move to the tattoo
on my shoulder. I begin to wonder if I’ll ever be able to ﬁll in that
hole now.
It makes me wonder if Atlas ever feels like I felt when I got this
tattoo. Like all the air is being let out of his heart.
I still don’t understand why he lied to me after running into me at
his restaurant. If he really felt the things I felt for him, why would he
make something like that up?
“Why did you lie about having a girlfriend?”
He rubs a hand over his face and I can already see the regret
before I even hear it in his voice. “I said that because . . . you looked
happy that night. When I saw you telling him goodbye, it hurt like
hell, but at the same time I was relieved that you seemed to be in a
really good place. I didn’t want you to worry about me. And I don’t
know . . . maybe I was a little jealous. I don’t know, Lily. I regretted
lying to you as soon as I did it.”

My hand goes to my mouth. My mind starts to race just as fast as my
heart is racing. I instantly start thinking about the what-ifs. What if he
would have been honest with me? Told me how he’d felt? Where would we be
now?
I want to ask him why he did it. Why he didn’t ﬁght for me. But I
don’t have to ask him, because I already know the answer. He thought
he was giving me what I wanted, because all he’s ever wanted for me
was happiness. And for some stupid reason, he’s never felt I could get
that with him.
Considerate Atlas.
The more I think about it, the more difﬁcult it becomes to breathe.
I think about Atlas. Ryle. Tonight. Two nights ago. It’s too much.
I stand up and make my way back to the guest bedroom. I pick up
my phone and grab my purse and go back to the living room. Atlas
hasn’t moved.
“Ryle left for England today,” I say. “I think I should probably go
home now. Can you drive me?”
A sadness enters his eyes and when it does, I know that leaving is
the right thing to do. Neither of us has closure. I’m not sure we’ll ever
get it. I’m beginning to think closure is a myth, and being here right
now while I’m still processing everything that’s happening to my life is
just going to make things worse for me. I have to eliminate as much
confusion as possible, and right now, my feelings for Atlas top the list
of most confusing.
He presses his lips tightly together for a moment, and then he nods
and grabs his keys.
• • •
Neither of us speaks the entire drive to my apartment. He doesn’t
drop me off. He pulls into the parking lot and gets out of his car. “I’d
feel better if you let me walk you up,” he says.
I nod and we wade through even more silence as we ride the
elevator up to the seventh ﬂoor. He follows me all the way to my
apartment. I ﬁsh around in my purse for the keys and don’t even
realize my hands are shaking until my third failed attempt to open the

door. Atlas calmly takes the keys from me and I step aside as he opens
the door for me.
“Do you want me to make sure no one’s here?” he asks.
I nod. I know Ryle isn’t here because he’s on his way to England,
but I’m honestly still a little scared to walk into the apartment by
myself.
Atlas walks in before me and ﬂips on the lights. He continues
walking through the apartment, ﬂipping on all the lights and walking
into each of the rooms. When he makes it back to the living room, he
slides his hands in his jacket pockets. He takes a deep breath and then
says, “I don’t know what happens next, Lily.”
He does. He knows. He just doesn’t want it to happen, because we
both know how much it hurts to say goodbye to each other.
I look away from him because seeing the look on his face right now
cuts straight to my heart. I fold my arms over my chest and stare at the
ﬂoor. “I have a lot to work through, Atlas. A lot. And I’m scared I
won’t be able to do it with you in my life.” I lift my eyes back to his. “I
hope you don’t take offense to that, because if anything, it’s a
compliment.”
He regards me silently for a moment, not at all surprised by what
I’m saying. But I can see there’s so much he wants to say. There’s a lot
I wish I could say to him, too, but we both know discussing the two of
us isn’t appropriate at this point. I’m married. I’m pregnant with
another man’s baby. And he’s standing in the living room of an
apartment that another man bought for me. I’d say these aren’t very
good conditions in which to bring up all the things we should have
said to each other a long time ago.
He looks at the door momentarily as if he’s trying to decide to
leave or speak. I can see the twitch in his jaw right before he locks
eyes with me. “If you ever need me, I want you to call me,” he says.
“But only if it’s an emergency. I’m not capable of being casual with
you, Lily.”
I’m taken aback by his words, but only momentarily. As much as I
wasn’t expecting him to admit it, he’s absolutely right. Since the day
we met, there has been nothing casual about our relationship. It’s
either all in or not in at all. That’s why he separated ties when he left

for the military. He knew that a casual friendship would never work
between us. It would have been too painful.
Apparently, that hasn’t changed.
“Goodbye, Atlas.”
Saying those words again tears me up almost as much as the ﬁrst
time I had to say them. He winces and then turns and walks to the
door like he can’t leave fast enough. When the door closes behind
him, I walk over and lock it, then press my head against it.
Two days ago I was asking myself how my life could possibly get any
better. Today I’m asking myself how it could possibly get any worse.
I jump back with the sudden knock at the door. It’s only been ten
seconds since he walked out, so I know it’s Atlas. I unlock it and open
it and I’m suddenly pressed against something soft. Atlas’s arms wrap
tightly around me, desperately, and his lips are pressed against the
side of my head.
I squeeze my eyes shut and ﬁnally let the tears fall. I’ve cried so
many tears for Ryle over the past two days, I have no idea how I still
have any left for Atlas. But I do, because they’re falling down my
cheeks like rain.
“Lily,” he whispers, still holding me tightly. “I know this is the last
thing you need to hear right now. But I have to say it because I’ve
walked away from you too many times without saying what I really
want to say.”
He pulls back to look down at me and when he sees my tears, he
brings his hands up to my cheeks. “In the future . . . if by some
miracle you ever ﬁnd yourself in the position to fall in love again . . .
fall in love with me.” He presses his lips against my forehead. “You’re
still my favorite person, Lily. Always will be.”
He releases me and walks away, not even needing a response.
When I close the door again, I slide to the ﬂoor. My heart feels like
it wants to give up. I don’t blame it. It’s suffered through two separate
heartaches in the course of two days.
And I have a feeling it’s going to be a long time before either of
those heartaches can even begin to heal.