It Starts with Us: A Novel (2) (It Ends with Us)

“I can’t believe you let me sleep for that long.” It’s been ten minutes, and my stomach is still rolling from embarrassment. “Did you finish reading the whole journal?”

“I stopped after I read about our first kiss.”

That’s good. That’s not too embarrassing. But if he would have read about the first time we had sex while I was sleeping in the seat next to him, I’m not sure I could have recovered.

“This is so not fair,” I mutter. “You have to do something mortifying so the scales even out, because right now I feel like I’ve completely ruined our night.”

Atlas laughs. “You think me doing something to mortify myself will make you feel better about tonight?”

I nod. “Yes, that’s the law of the universe. Eye for an eye, humiliation for humiliation.”

Atlas taps his thumb on his steering wheel as he massages his jaw with his free hand. Then he nudges his head toward his phone, which is sitting in the cupholder. “Open the Notes app on my phone. Read the first one.”

Oh, wow. I was kidding, but I snatch up his phone so fast. “What’s your password?”

“Nine five nine five.”

I enter the numbers and then glance over his home screen while I have it open. Every app is tucked neatly into a folder. He has zero unread texts and one unread email. “You’re a neat freak. Who has one unread email?”

“I don’t like clutter,” he says. “Side effect of the military. How many unread emails do you have?”

“Thousands.” I open the Notes app and click on the most recent one. As soon as I see the two words at the top, I drop the phone, pressing it facedown on my thigh. “Atlas.”

“Lily.”

I can feel my embarrassment being swallowed up by a warm wave of anticipation falling over me. “You wrote me a Dear Lily letter?”

He nods slowly. “You were asleep for quite a while.” When he glances at me, his smile falters, like he’s worried about whatever it is he wrote. He faces forward again, and I can see the roll of his throat.

I lean my head against the passenger window and begin to read silently.

Dear Lily,

You’re going to be mortified when you wake up and realize you fell asleep on our first date. I’m a little too excited for your reaction. But you seemed so tired when I picked you up, it actually makes me happy to see you getting some rest.

This past week has been surreal, hasn’t it? I was beginning to think I may never be a part of your life in any significant way, and then poof, you show up.

I could go on and on about what that run-in meant to me, but I promised my therapist I’d stop saying cheesy shit to you. Don’t worry, I plan on breaking that promise many times, but you asked if we could take things slow, so I’ll give it a few more dates.

Instead, I think I’m going to steal a page from your playbook and talk about our past. It’s only fair. You let me read some of your most intimate thoughts at such a vulnerable point in your life, I figure it’s the least I can do to give you some insight into my life at that time.

My version is a little grittier, though. I’ll try to spare you the worst of the details, but I’m not sure you can fully know what your friendship meant to me without knowing what I went through before you came along.

I told you some of it—about how I ended up in the position I was in, living in that abandoned house. But I had felt homeless a lot longer than that. My whole life, really, even though I had a house and a mother and, occasionally, a stepfather.

I don’t remember what things were like when I was young. I have this fantasy that maybe she was a good mother once upon a time. I do remember a day trip we took to Cape Cod where we tried coconut shrimp for the first time, but if she was a decent mother outside of that one day, that one meal, that part of her never became a core memory for me.

My core memories were stretches of time spent alone, or just trying to stay out of her way. She was quick to anger and quick to respond. For the first ten or so years of my life, she was stronger and faster than me, so I spent the better part of a decade hiding from her hand, from her cigarettes, from the lash of her tongue.

I know she was stressed. She was a single mother working nights to try and provide for me, but as many excuses as I made for her back then, I’ve seen my fair share of single mothers navigate life just fine without resorting to the things my mother did.

You’ve seen my scars. I won’t go into the details, but as bad as it was, it got even worse when she was on her third marriage. I was twelve when they met.

Little did I know, the age of twelve would be my only peaceful year. She was always gone because she was with him, and when she was home, she was actually in a decent mood because she was falling in love. Funny how love for a partner can make or break how some people treat their own children.

But twelve turned into thirteen turned into Tim moving in with us, and the next four years of my life were hell on earth. When I wasn’t making my mother angry, I was making Tim angry. When I was home, I was being yelled at. When I was at school, the house was being destroyed by their fights, and I’d be expected to clean up after them when I got home.

Life with them was a nightmare, and by the time I was finally strong enough to take up for myself, that’s when Tim decided he didn’t want to live with me anymore.

My mother chose him. I was forced to leave. They didn’t have to ask twice; I was more than ready to go, but that’s because I had somewhere to go.

Until I didn’t. I was gone three months before the friend I was staying with moved with his family to Colorado.

At that point, I had no one and nowhere else to go, and no money to get there if I did, so I was forced to go back to my mother and ask if I could come back home.

I still remember the day I showed back up to that house. I had barely been gone three months, and the place was already falling apart. The yard hadn’t been mowed since the last time I’d done it before being kicked out. All the window screens were missing, and there was a gaping hole where the doorknob used to be. By the looks of the place, you would think I’d been gone for years.

My mother’s car was in the driveway, but Tim’s wasn’t. It looked like her car had been there for a while. The hood was propped open, and there were tools scattered near it, along with at least thirty beer cans someone had shaped in the form of a pyramid against the garage door.

Even the newspapers had piled up on the cracked concrete walkway. I remember picking them up and setting them on one of the old iron chairs to dry out before I knocked on the door.

It felt weird knocking on the door of a house I had lived in for years, but on the off chance Tim was home, I wasn’t about to open the door without permission. I had a house key still, but Tim had made it very clear that he’d turn me in for trespassing if I ever tried to use it.

I couldn’t have used it even if I wanted to. There was no doorknob.

I could hear someone making their way across the living room. The curtain on the small window at the top half of the front door moved, and I saw my mother peek outside. She stared for a few seconds, unmoving.

She eventually opened the door a few inches. Far enough that I could see that, at two o’clock in the afternoon, she was still in her pajamas, which were an oversized Weezer T-shirt one of her exes had left behind. I hated that shirt because I liked that band. Every time she wore it, she ruined them a little more for me.

She asked what I was doing there, and I didn’t immediately want to give her my reasons. Instead, I asked her if Tim was home.

She opened the door a bit more and folded her arms so tightly together, it made one of the band members on her shirt look decapitated. She told me Tim was at work and asked what I wanted.

I asked her if I could come inside. She contemplated my question and then looked over my shoulder, her eyes scanning the street. I don’t know what she was checking for. Maybe she was afraid a neighbor would witness her allowing her own son to visit.

She left the door open for me while she went to her bedroom to change. The house was eerily dark, I remember. All the curtains were drawn, creating a sense of confusion on what time of day it was. It didn’t help that the clock on the stove was blinking, and the time was off by over eight hours. If I still lived there, that’s something else I would have fixed.

If I still lived there, the curtains would have been open. The kitchen counters wouldn’t have been covered with dirty dishes. There wouldn’t have been a missing doorknob, or an unkempt yard, or days’ worth of soggy newspapers piling up. I realized in that moment that I was the one who had been keeping that house together all the years I was growing up.

It gave me hope. Hope that maybe they realized I was an asset rather than an inconvenience, and they would allow me to return home until I finished high school.

I saw a doorknob kit on the kitchen table, so I picked it up and inspected it. The receipt was beneath it. I looked at the date on the receipt, and it was purchased over two weeks prior.

The doorknob was the right fit for the front door. I didn’t know why Tim hadn’t installed it if he’d had it for two weeks, so I found the tools in a kitchen drawer and opened the package. It was several minutes before my mother came out of her room, but by the time she did, I already had the new doorknob in place on the front door.

She asked what I was doing, so I twisted the knob and opened the door a little to show her it worked.

I’ll never forget her reaction. She sighed and said, “Why do you do shit like this? It’s like you want him to hate you.” She snatched the screwdriver out of my hand and said, “Maybe you should go before he realizes you were here.”

Part of the reason I could never get along with anyone in that house was because their reactions always seemed misplaced. When I would help out around the house without being asked, Tim would say it was because I was antagonizing him. When I wouldn’t help with something, he’d say it was because I was lazy and ungrateful.

“I’m not trying to upset Tim,” I said. “I fixed your doorknob. I was just trying to help.”

“He was going to do it as soon as he had the time.”

Part of Tim’s problem was that he always had the time. He never kept a job more than six months and spent more time gambling than he did with my mother.

“Did he get a job?” I remember asking her.

“He’s looking.”

“Is that where he is right now?”

I could see in her expression that Tim wasn’t out job hunting. Wherever he was, I was sure it was putting my mother even more in debt than she already was. Her debt was probably the straw that broke the camel’s back and got me kicked out in the first place. When I found a stash of maxed-out, past-due credit card bills in her name, I confronted Tim about them.

He didn’t like being confronted. He preferred the preteen version of me he met to the near adult I grew into. He liked the version of me he could push around without being pushed back. The version of me he could manipulate without me calling him out.

That version of me left between the ages of fifteen and sixteen. Once Tim realized he couldn’t threaten me physically anymore, he tried ruining my life in other ways. One of those ways was leaving me without a place to live.

I eventually swallowed my pride and came right out with it. I told my mother I had nowhere to go.

My mother’s expression wasn’t just void of empathy, it was full of annoyance. “I hope you aren’t asking to move back in after everything you did.”

“Everything I did? You mean when I called him out because his gambling addiction put you in debt?”

That’s when she called me an asshole. Or ass whole, rather. She always said that word wrong.

I attempted to plead with her, but she quickly resorted to the person I was used to. She hurled the screwdriver at me. It was so sudden and unexpected because we weren’t even arguing at that point, so I wasn’t able to duck in time. It hit me right above my left eye, in the center of my eyebrow.

I rubbed my fingers across the cut, and they came away smeared with blood.

All I did was ask to move home. I didn’t disrespect her. I didn’t curse at her. I simply showed up and fixed her front door and tried to reason with her, and I ended up with a bloody gash.

I remember staring at my fingers, thinking, “Tim didn’t do this. My mother did this.”

For so long, I had blamed Tim for everything that went wrong in that household, but everything wrong with that household started with her. Tim simply amplified what was already an awful environment.

I remember thinking that I would rather be dead than back with her. Up until that moment, there was a part of me that still held something for her. I don’t know if it was a sliver of respect, but I was somehow able to appreciate that she had kept me alive when I was younger. But isn’t that the most basic thing a parent should do when they decide to bring a child into the world?

I realized at that point I had been giving her too much credit. I always blamed our lack of a bond on her being a single mother, but there were a lot of busy single mothers out there who somehow still bonded with their children. Mothers who took up for their children when they were being mistreated. Mothers who wouldn’t look the other way when their thirteen-year-old came away from a punishment with a black eye and a busted lip. Mothers who didn’t allow their husbands to force their school-aged child into homelessness. Mothers who didn’t throw screwdrivers at their children’s heads.

Despite realizing what an uncaring human she truly was, I made one last attempt to pull humanity out of her. “Can I at least get some of my stuff before I leave?”

“You don’t have anything,” she said. “We needed the space.”

I couldn’t look at her after that. It was as if she wanted nothing more than to erase me from her life, so I vowed in that moment to help her do just that.

The blood was dripping into my eye when I was walking away from the house.

I can’t tell you what the rest of that day was like. To feel so incredibly unwanted, unloved, alone. I had no one. Nothing. No money, no belongings, no family.

Just a wound.

We’re impressionable when we’re younger, and when you’re told you are nothing for years on end by everyone you should mean something to, you start to believe it. And you slowly start to become nothing.

But then I met you, Lily. And even though I was nothing, when you looked at me, you somehow saw something. Something I couldn’t see. You were the first person in my life to show an interest in who I was as a human. No one had ever asked me questions about myself the way you did. After those few months I spent getting to know you, I stopped feeling like I was nothing. You made me feel interesting and unique. Your friendship gave me worth.

Thank you for that. Even if this date leads nowhere and we never speak again, I will always be grateful to you for somehow seeing something in me that my own mother was blind to.

You’re my favorite person, Lily. And now you know why.

Atlas

My throat is so thick with burgeoning tears, I can’t even verbally respond to what I just read. I set the phone on my leg and wipe at my eyes. I hate that he’s driving right now, because if we were parked, I’d throw my arms around him and hug him tighter than he’s ever been hugged. I’d probably kiss him, too, and pull him into the backseat, because no one has ever said such heartbreakingly sad things in such a sweet way to me before.

Atlas reaches across the seat and grabs his phone. He drops it back into the cupholder, but then he reaches for my hand. He threads his fingers through mine and squeezes my hand while staring straight ahead. That move causes a commotion in my chest. I wrap my other hand over the top of his, and holding hands like this reminds me of all the bus rides when we’d just sit in silence, sad and cold, holding on to each other.

I stare out the window, and he stares straight ahead, and neither of us says a word on our drive back to the city.

We stop and grab to-go burgers just two miles from my flower shop. Atlas knows I don’t want Emerson to be up too far past her bedtime, so we eat in the parking lot of Lily Bloom’s. Our conversation since getting back into the city and ordering burgers has been much lighter. It isn’t lost on me that I’m not mortified anymore. Him being vulnerable with me seemed to be the reset button I needed for our date to get back on track.

We’ve been discussing all the places we’ve traveled. He has me beat by a long shot, considering the time he spent in the Marines. He’s been to five different countries, and the only place I’ve been outside of the country is Canada.

“You’ve never even been to Mexico?” Atlas asks.

I wipe my mouth with a napkin. “Never.”

“Did you and Ryle not have a honeymoon?”

Ugh. I hate the sound of his name in the middle of this date. “No, we eloped in Vegas. Didn’t have time for a honeymoon.”

Atlas takes a sip of his drink. When he looks at me, his eyes are piercing, like he’s hoping to unpack the thoughts I’m not saying. “Did you want a wedding?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. I knew Ryle never wanted to get married, so when he said we should go to Vegas and get married, I saw it as a window of opportunity that might close. I guess I felt like eloping was better than not marrying him at all.”

“What if you get married again? You think you’ll do it differently?”

I laugh at that question, and nod immediately. “Absolutely. I want it all. Flowers and bridesmaids and shit.” I pop a fry into my mouth. “And romantic vows, and an even more romantic honeymoon.”

“Where would you go?”

“Paris. Rome. London. I have no desire to sit on a hot beach somewhere. I want to see all the romantic places in Europe and make love in every city and take pictures kissing in front of the Eiffel Tower. I want to eat croissants and hold hands on trains.” I drop my empty container of fries into the sack. “What about you?”

Atlas reaches for my free hand, and he holds it. He doesn’t answer me. He just smiles at me and squeezes my hand, like what he wants is a secret that’s too soon to spill.

Holding his hand feels like such a natural thing. Maybe because we used to do this so much as teenagers, but sitting in this car with him and not holding his hand feels more out of place than holding hands does.

Even with the hitch I put into our date by falling asleep, the entire night has felt easy and comfortable. Being near him is second nature. I trace a finger over the top of his wrist. “I need to go.”

“I know,” he says, rubbing his thumb over mine. Atlas’s phone pings, so he reaches for it with his free hand and reads the incoming text. He sighs quietly, and the way he drops his phone back into the cupholder makes me think he’s irritated with whoever just texted him.

“Everything okay?”

Atlas forces a smile, but it’s a pathetic attempt. I see right through it, and he knows it. He breaks eye contact and looks down at our hands. He flips mine over until it’s faceup, and he begins to trace the lines in my palm. His finger feels like a lightning rod, zapping electricity from my hand throughout the rest of my body. “My mother called me last week.”

That confession takes me aback. “What did she want?”

“I don’t know, I ended the call before she could tell me, but I’m pretty sure she needs money.”

I thread our hands together again. I don’t know what to say to him. That has to be hard, not hearing from your mother for almost fifteen years, and then she finally reaches out when she needs something. It makes me so grateful that my mother is a huge part of my life.

“I didn’t mean to drop that on you when you’re in a hurry. We should save some conversation for our second date.” He smiles at me, and it instantly flips the mood. It’s remarkable how his smile can dictate the feelings occurring inside my own chest. “Come on, I’ll walk you to your car.”

I laugh because my car is literally two feet away. But Atlas rushes around the front of his car and opens my door, then helps me out. And then, with one step each, we’re at my car.

“Fun walk,” I tease.

He flashes a brief smile, and I don’t know if he means for it to be seductive, but I’m suddenly warm all over, despite the cold weather. Atlas peeks over my shoulder, nudging his head toward my car. “Do you have more journals in there?”

“Just had the one on me.”

“Shame,” he says. He leans a shoulder against my car, so I do the same, facing him.

I have no idea if we’re about to kiss. I wouldn’t object, but I also just ate onions after sleeping for over an hour, so I doubt my mouth is at its most appealing right now.

“Do I get a redo?” I ask.

“A redo of what?”

“This date. I’d like to be awake for the next one.”

Atlas laughs, but then his laugh dissipates. He stares at me for a beat. “I forgot how fun it is being around you.”

His words confuse me because fun is not what I would call our time together back then. It was sad, at best. “You think those times were fun?”

He lifts a shoulder in a half shrug. “I mean, it was the lowest point of my life, sure. But my memories with you from back then are still some of my favorites.”

His compliment makes me blush. I’m glad it’s dark.

But he’s right. It was a low point in both of our lives, but being with him was still somehow the highlight of my teenage years. I guess fun is the perfect way to describe what we made of it. And if we somehow had fun together at such a low point in both of our lives, it makes me wonder what we could be like at our highest.

It’s the exact opposite of the thoughts I had about Ryle last week. I’ve experienced the lowest of lows with Atlas, and he has never been anything but incredible and respectful to me. Yet, the man I chose to be my husband somehow disrespected me in ways no one deserves… all while we were at such a high point in our lives.

I’m grateful for Atlas because I know he’s the standard I now hold people to. He’s the standard I should have held Ryle to from the very beginning.

There’s a convenient gust of cold air that sweeps between us. It would be the perfect excuse for Atlas to pull me to him, but he doesn’t. Instead, the quietness builds between us until there’s only one thing left to do. Either kiss or say goodnight.

Atlas brushes a strand of my hair from my forehead. “I’m not going to kiss you yet.”

I hope my disappointment isn’t obvious, but I know it is. I practically deflate in front of him. “Is it my punishment for falling asleep?”

“Of course not. I’m just feeling inferior after reading about our first kiss.”

I sputter laughter. “Inferior to who? Yourself?”

He nods. “Teenage Atlas through your eyes was quite the charmer.”

“So is adult Atlas.”

He groans a little, like he already wants to change his mind about the kiss. The groan makes things feel a little more serious. He moves fluidly away from the car until he’s standing right in front of me. I press my back against my car door and look up at him, hoping he’s about to kiss the hell out of me.

“Also, you asked me to take things slow, so…”

Dammit. I did do that. I said very slow, if I remember correctly. I hate myself.

Atlas leans forward, and I close my eyes. I feel his breath scattering across my cheek right before he presses a quick kiss against the side of my head. “Goodnight, Lily.”

“Okay.”

Okay? Why did I say “okay”? I’m so flustered.

Atlas laughs softly. When I open my eyes, he’s backing away from me, heading to the driver’s side of his car. Before he leaves, he rests his arm on the roof of the car and says, “I hope you get some sleep tonight.”

I nod, but I don’t know if that’s going to be possible. I feel like every bit of caffeine I’ve consumed today has just kicked in all at once. I won’t be able to sleep after this date. I’m going to be thinking about the letter he let me read. And when I’m not thinking about that, I’m going to be replaying our first kiss in my head all night long, wondering what part two is going to feel like.

“Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming…”

The familiar sounds of Finding Nemo are coming from Allysa and Marshall’s living room when I open the door to their apartment.

When I pass by the kitchen, Marshall is standing in front of the refrigerator with both doors wide open. He nods a greeting, and I wave, but I don’t make small talk with him because I’m aching to hug Emerson.

When I enter the living room, I’m shocked to find Ryle on the sofa. He didn’t mention he would be off work tonight. Emerson is asleep on his chest, and Allysa is nowhere around.

“Hey.”

Ryle doesn’t look up to greet me, but he doesn’t have to look up for me to know something is bothering him. I can see the firm set of his jaw—a dead giveaway that he’s angry. I want to pick up Emerson, but she looks peaceful, so I leave her on Ryle’s chest. “How long has she been asleep?”

Ryle is still staring at the television, one of his hands protectively on Emmy’s back, the other behind his head. “Since this movie started.”

I recognize the scene, which lets me know it’s been about an hour.

Allysa finally walks into the room, breathing life into it. “Hey, Lily. I’m sorry she’s asleep; we tried so hard to keep her awake.” We give each other a two-second glance. She silently apologizes that Ryle is here. I silently tell her it’s okay. They’re siblings—I can’t expect him not to show up when he knows she’s babysitting his daughter.

Ryle motions for Allysa. “Can you put Emerson on her pallet? I need to talk to Lily.”

The curtness in his voice alarms both me and Allysa. We give each other another look as she pries Emerson off Ryle’s chest. The ache to hold her only grows wider as Allysa lays her on the pallet.

Ryle stands up, and for the first time since I walked in, he makes eye contact with me. He gives me a once-over, noticing the outfit and the heels I’m wearing. I can see the slow roll of his throat. He nudges his head upward, indicating he wants to speak to me on the rooftop balcony.

Whatever conversation this is, he wants complete privacy.

He exits the apartment to head to the roof, and I look toward Allysa for guidance. Once Ryle is out of earshot, she says, “I told him you had an event tonight.”

“Thanks.” Allysa swore she wouldn’t tell Ryle about my date, but I can’t figure out why he’s so angry if he doesn’t know where I’ve been. “Why is he upset?”

Allysa shrugs. “No idea. He seemed fine when he showed up an hour ago.”

I know better than anyone how Ryle can seem fine one second and absolutely the opposite of fine the next. But I usually know what’s setting him off.

Did he find out I went on a date? Did he find out it was with Atlas?

Once I’m on the roof, I locate Ryle leaning over the ledge, looking down. My stomach is already in knots. My heels click against the floor as I make my way over to him.

Ryle glances at me briefly. “You look… nice.” He says it in a way that makes it seem like an insult rather than a compliment. Or maybe that’s just my guilt.

“Thank you.” I lean against the ledge, waiting for him to speak up about whatever is bothering him.

“Did you just get back from a date?”

“I had an event.” I go along with Allysa’s lie. There’s no point in being honest with him, because it’s too soon to know if this thing with Atlas is going anywhere yet, and the truth would only upset Ryle more. I press my back against the ledge and fold my arms over my chest. “What is it, Ryle?”

He waits a beat before he finally speaks. “I’ve never seen that cartoon before tonight.”

Is he just trying to make small talk or is he angry about something? I’m confused by this whole conversation.

Until I’m not.

I swear, I can be such an idiot sometimes. Of course he’s upset. He once read all my journal entries. He knows how much that movie means to me after having read everything I wrote about it, but I guess now that he’s finally seen it, he’s connected the dots. And by the looks of it, he’s added some dots of his own.

He turns now, facing me with an expression full of betrayal. “You named our daughter Dory?” He takes a step closer. “You chose my daughter’s middle name because of your connection with that man?”

I feel an immediate pulsing in my temples. That man. I break eye contact with him while I think of how to properly communicate this. When I chose the name Dory as Emerson’s middle name, I didn’t do it for Atlas. That movie meant something to me long before Atlas came into the picture, but I probably should have thought twice about it before going through with naming her that.

I clear my throat, making room for the truth. “I chose that name because the character inspired me when I was younger. It had nothing to do with anyone else.”

Ryle releases an exasperated, disappointed laugh. “You’re a real piece of work, Lily.”

I want to argue with him, to further prove my point, but I’m getting nervous. His demeanor is bringing back every fear of him I’ve ever held. I try to defuse the situation by escaping it.

“I’m going home now.” I start to head toward the stairs, but he’s faster than me. He moves past me, and then he’s in between me and the door to the stairwell. I take a nervous step back. I slip my hand in my pocket in search of my phone in case I need to use it.

“We’re changing her middle name,” he says.

I keep my voice firm and steady when I respond. “We named her Emerson after your brother. That’s your connection to her name. Her middle name is my connection. It’s only fair. You’re reading too much into it.”

I try to sidestep around him, but he moves with me.

I glance over my shoulder to measure the distance between myself and the ledge. Not that I feel like he’d throw me over it, but I also didn’t think he’d be capable of shoving me down a flight of stairs.

“Does he know?” Ryle asks.

He doesn’t have to say Atlas’s name for me to know exactly who he’s talking about. I feel the guilt swallowing me, and I’m worried Ryle can sense it.

Atlas does know Emerson’s middle name is Dory, because I made it a point to tell him. But I honestly didn’t name my daughter for Atlas. I named her for me. Dory was my favorite character before I even knew Atlas Corrigan existed. I admired her strength, and I only named her that because strength is the one trait I hope my daughter has more than anything else.

But Ryle’s reaction is making me want to apologize, because Finding Nemo does mean something to both Atlas and me, and I knew it when I ran after Atlas on the street to tell him about her middle name.

Maybe Ryle deserves to be angry.

Therein lies our issue, though. Ryle can be angry, but that doesn’t mean I deserve everything that accompanies his anger. I’m falling back into that same trap of forgetting that nothing I could do would warrant his extreme past reactions.

I may not be perfect, but I don’t deserve to fear for my life every time I make a mistake. And this may have been a mistake that deserves more discussion, but I don’t feel comfortable having a conversation about it with Ryle on a rooftop without witnesses.

“You’re making me nervous. Can we please go back downstairs?”

Ryle’s entire demeanor changes as soon as I say that. It’s like he punctures against the sharp insult. “Lily, come on.” He moves away from the door and walks all the way to the other side of the balcony. “We’re arguing. People argue. Christ.” He spins away from me, giving me his back now.

Here comes the gaslighting. He’s attempting to make me feel crazy for being scared, even though my fear is more than warranted. I stare at him for a moment, wondering if the argument is over or if he has more to say. I want it to be over, so I open the door to the stairwell.

“Lily, wait.”

I pause because his voice is much calmer, which leads me to believe he might be capable of a verbal disagreement rather than an explosive fight tonight. He walks back over to me with a pained expression. “I’m sorry. You know how I feel about anything related to him.”

I do know, which is precisely why I’ve had such conflicting feelings about Atlas potentially being a part of my life again. The simple idea of having to confront Ryle with that information makes me want to vomit. Especially now.

“It upset me to find out that our daughter’s middle name might have been something you chose to deliberately hurt me. You can’t expect something like that not to affect me.”

I lean against the wall and fold my arms over my chest. “It had nothing to do with you or Atlas and everything to do with me. I swear.” Just mentioning Atlas’s name out loud seems to get it stuck in the air between us, like it’s a tangible thing Ryle can reach out and punch.

Ryle nods once with a tight expression, but it appears that he accepts that answer. I honestly don’t know if he should. Maybe I did do it subconsciously to hurt him. I don’t even know at this point. His anger is making me question my intentions.

This all feels so grossly familiar.

We’re both quiet for a while. I just want to go to Emerson, but Ryle seems to have more to say, because he moves closer, placing a hand on the wall beside my head. I’m relieved that he doesn’t look angry anymore, but I’m not sure I like the look in his eye that has replaced the anger. It’s not the first time he’s looked at me this way since our separation.

I feel my entire body stiffen at his gradual change in demeanor. He moves a couple of inches closer, too close, and dips his head.

“Lily,” he says, his voice a scratchy whisper. “What are we doing?”

I don’t respond to him because I’m not sure why he’s asking that. We’re having a conversation. One he started.

He lifts a hand, fingering the collar of my jumpsuit, which is peeking out beneath my coat. When he sighs, his breath moves through my hair. “Everything would be so much easier if we could just…” Ryle pauses, maybe to think about the words he’s about to say. The words I don’t want to hear.

“Stop,” I whisper, preventing him from finishing.

He doesn’t complete his thought, but he also doesn’t back away. If anything, it feels like he moves even closer. I’ve done nothing in the past that would make him think it’s okay to move in on me like this. I do nothing that gives him hope for us other than foster a civil coparenting relationship. He’s the one always trying to push my boundaries and straddle the line of what I’m okay with, and I’m honestly tired of it.

“What if I’ve changed?” he asks. “Really changed?” His eyes are full of a mixture of sincerity and sorrow.

It does nothing for me. Absolutely nothing. “I don’t care if you’ve changed, Ryle. I hope you have. But it’s not my responsibility to test that theory.”

Those words hit him hard. I see it when he has to take a moment to swallow whatever unkind response he knows he shouldn’t give me right now. He stops talking, stops looking at me, stops hovering.

He huffs, frustrated, and then backs away and makes his way toward the stairs, hopefully to his own apartment. He slams the door shut behind him.

I don’t immediately follow, for obvious reasons. I need space. I need to process.

This isn’t the first time he’s asked me what we’re doing—like our divorce is some long game I’m playing. Sometimes he’ll say it in passing, sometimes in a text. Sometimes he makes it a joke. But every time he suggests how senseless our divorce is, I recognize it for what it is. A manipulation tactic. He thinks if he treats our divorce like we’re being silly, I’ll eventually agree with him and take him back.

His life would be easier if I took him back. Allysa’s and Marshall’s lives might even be made easier by it, because they wouldn’t have to dance around our divorce and their relationship with him.

But my life wouldn’t be easier. There’s nothing easy about fearing for your safety any time you make a misstep.

Emerson’s life wouldn’t be easier. I’ve lived her life. There’s nothing easy about living in that kind of household.

I wait for my anger to dissipate before heading back downstairs, but it doesn’t. It just builds and builds with every step I descend. I feel like the reaction I’m having is too big for what just happened, or maybe that’s just how I’ve conditioned myself to feel when I’m around Ryle. Maybe it’s a combination of that and my lack of sleep. Maybe it’s the date with Atlas that I almost ruined. Whatever it is that’s making me react so intensely catches up with me right outside of Allysa’s apartment door.

I need a moment to collect my emotions before being near my daughter, so I sit on the floor of the hallway to cry it out. I like to shed tears in private. Happens quite regularly, unfortunately, but I’ve been finding myself getting overwhelmed a lot. Divorce is overwhelming; being a single mother is overwhelming; running a business is overwhelming; dealing with an ex-husband who still scares you is overwhelming.

And then there’s that splinter of fear that creeps into my conscience when Ryle says something to suggest our divorce was a mistake. Because sometimes I do wonder if my life wouldn’t be so overwhelming if I still had a husband who shared some of the burdens of raising his child. And sometimes I wonder if I’m overreacting by not allowing my daughter to have overnights with her own father. Relationships and custody agreements don’t come with a blueprint, unfortunately.

I don’t know if every move I make is the right one, but I’m doing my best. I don’t need his manipulation and gaslighting on top of that.

I wish I were at home; I would walk straight to my jewelry box and pull out the list of reminders. I should take a picture of it so I always have it on my phone in the future. I definitely underestimate how difficult and confusing interactions with Ryle can be.

How do people leave these cycles when they don’t have the resources I had or the support from their friends and family? How do they possibly stay strong enough every second of the day? I feel like all it takes is one weak, insecure moment in the presence of your ex to convince yourself you made the wrong decision.

Anyone who has ever left a manipulative, abusive spouse and somehow stayed that course deserves a medal. A statue. A freaking superhero movie.

Society has obviously been worshipping the wrong heroes this whole time because I’m convinced it takes less strength to pick up a building than it does to permanently leave an abusive situation.

I’m still crying a few minutes later when I hear Allysa’s door open. I look up to find Marshall exiting the apartment carrying two bags of trash. He pauses when he sees me sitting on the floor.

“Oh.” His eyes dart around, as if he’s hoping someone else will help me. Not that I need help. I just needed a moment of respite.

Marshall sets the bags on the floor and walks over. He takes a seat across from me and stretches out his legs. He scratches uncomfortably at his knee. “I’m not sure what to say. I’m not good at this.”

His discomfort makes me laugh through my tears. I toss up a frustrated hand. “I’m fine. I just need to cry sometimes when Ryle and I fight.”

Marshall pulls up a leg like he’s about to stand up and go after Ryle. “Did he hurt you?”

“No. No, he was fairly calm.”

Marshall relaxes back to the floor, and I don’t know why, maybe it’s because he’s the unlucky one in front of me right now, but I unload all my thoughts on him.

“I think that’s the problem—that he actually had a right to be mad at me this time, and he was relatively calm about it. Sometimes we can argue, and it doesn’t lead to anything more than a disagreement. And when that happens, I start to question whether I overreacted by asking for a divorce. I mean, I know I didn’t overreact. I know I didn’t. But he has this way of planting seeds of doubt in me, like maybe things could have gotten better if I just gave him more time to work on himself.” I feel bad that I’m laying all this on Marshall. It’s not fair to him because Ryle is his best friend. “I’m sorry. This isn’t your issue.”

“Allysa cheated on me.”

Marshall’s words stun me silent for a good five seconds. “Wh-what?”

“It was a long time ago. We worked through it, but dammit, it hurt like hell. She broke my heart.”

I’m shaking my head in an attempt to process this information. He keeps talking, though, so I try to keep up.

“We weren’t in a good place. We were going to different colleges and trying to make long distance work, and we were young. And it wasn’t even anything big. She had a drunk make-out with some guy at a party before she remembered how amazing I am. But when she told me… I’ve never been so angry in my life. Nothing had ever cut me like that did. I wanted to retaliate: I wanted to cheat on her, so she’d know how it felt; I wanted to slash her tires and max out her credit cards and burn all her clothes. But no matter how mad I was, when she was standing right in front of me, I never, not for one second, thought about physically hurting her. If anything, I just wanted to hug her and cry on her shoulder.”

Marshall looks at me with sincerity. “When I think about Ryle hitting you… I get absurdly angry. Because I love him. I do. He’s been my best friend since we were kids. But I also hate him for not being better. Nothing you have done and nothing you could do would excuse any man’s hands on you out of anger. Remember that, Lily. You made the right choice by leaving that situation. You should never feel guilty for that. Pride is the only thing you should feel.”

I had no idea how heavily any of this was weighing on me, but Marshall’s words lift so much weight off me, I feel like I could float.

I’m not sure those words could mean more coming from anyone else. There’s something about getting validation from someone who loves Ryle like a brother that’s reaffirming. Empowering.

“You’re wrong, Marshall. You’re pretty damn good at this.”

Marshall smiles and then helps me to my feet. He picks up his trash bags and I head back inside their apartment to find my daughter and hug her so tight.