It Starts with Us (It Ends with Us #2)(50)
When Atlas turns to me again, I can see the hard set of his jaw and the veins in his neck when he says, “How am I supposed to be civil around him, Lily?” There’s guilt in his voice when he whispers, “I should have been there for you. I should have done more.”
I can understand the anger, but Atlas has absolutely nothing to feel guilty for. I wasn’t at a point in my life where Atlas could have said or done anything to change my views of Ryle. I had to get to that point on my own.
I walk closer to Atlas and press my back into the wall across from him. He does the same on the opposite wall until we’re facing each other. He’s working through a lot of emotions right now, and I want to give him the space to do that. But I also have a lot to say about the guilt Atlas is holding on to.
“The first time Ryle hit me, it was because I laughed at him. I was tipsy, and I thought something was funny that wasn’t funny, and he backhanded me.”
Atlas has to break eye contact after hearing me say that. I don’t know if he wants these details, but I’ve been wanting to say all this to him for a long time. He remains still against the wall, but it looks like it’s taking everything in him not to run straight to wherever Ryle is right now. His eyes are sharp when he looks back at me, waiting for me to finish.
“The second time, he pushed me down the stairs. That argument started because he found your number hidden in my phone case. And when he bit me on my shoulder… You’re right. It was because he read the journals and found out my tattoo was because of you, and that the magnet I kept on my refrigerator was from you.” I look down briefly because it’s hard seeing how much this is affecting him. “I used to think the things I did somehow warranted his reactions. Like maybe if I wouldn’t have laughed, he wouldn’t have hit me. Maybe if I didn’t have your number in my phone, he wouldn’t have gotten angry enough to push me down a flight of stairs.”
Atlas isn’t even looking at me anymore. His head is leaned back against the wall, and he’s staring at the ceiling, taking everything in, frozen in his anger.
“Every time I would start to take on the guilt and justify Ryle’s actions, I would think about you. I would ask myself what your reaction would have been compared to Ryle’s. Because I know it would have been different. If I would have laughed at you under the same circumstances that I laughed at Ryle, you would have laughed with me. You never would have backhanded me. And if any man on this planet gave me their phone number as a way to protect me from someone they feared was dangerous, you would appreciate them for that. You wouldn’t have pushed me down a flight of stairs. And if the journals I let you read were about another boy in high school besides you, you would have teased me. You probably would have highlighted lines you thought were cheesy and laughed about them with me.”
I stop speaking until Atlas brings his focus back to mine, and then I finish. “Every time I would doubt myself and think that what Ryle did to me was in any way deserved, all I had to do was think about you, Atlas. I think about how differently each scenario would have been if it were you, and that helped me remember that none of it was my fault. You’re a big part of the reason I got through it, even though you weren’t there.”
Atlas silently soaks up everything I’ve said for maybe five seconds, but then he closes the distance between us and kisses me. Finally. Finally.
His right hand curls around my waist as he tugs me against him, his tongue sliding gently and warmly against my lips, coaxing his way past them. His left hand snakes its way through my hair until he’s molding his palm to the back of my head. A spool of yearning begins to unravel inside me.
He doesn’t kiss me with any trepidation. His mouth meets mine with confidence, and mine responds to his with relief. I pull at him, wanting his warmth to sink into me. His mouth and his touch are familiar since we’ve done this dance before, but completely new at the same time because this kiss is made up of a whole new set of ingredients. Our first kiss was made of fear and youthful inexperience.
This kiss is hope. It’s comfort and safety and stability. It’s everything I’ve been missing in my adult life, and I am so happy Atlas and I have each other again, I could cry.
Chapter Twenty-One Atlas
There have been a lot of things in my life that have made me angry, but nothing filled me with rage like seeing Lily’s tattoo and the faded scars that circled it in the shape of a bite mark.
How any man can do that to a woman, I’ll never understand. How any human can do that to a human they’re supposed to love and want to protect, I will never understand.
But what I do understand is that Lily deserves better. And I get to be the one to give her better. Starting with this kiss that we can’t seem to stop. Every time we pause to look at each other, we go right back to kissing like we have to make up for all the lost time in this one kiss.
I trail kisses down her jaw until I meet her collarbone. I’ve always loved kissing her there, but until I read her journal, I didn’t know she was aware of how much I loved kissing her there. I press my lips to her tattoo, determined to make sure she remembers the good parts of us in all the future kisses I’m going to give her in this spot. If it takes a million kisses for her not to think about the scars that surround her heart tattoo, then I’ll kiss her there a million and one times.
I press kisses up her neck, then her jaw. When I’m looking at her again, I slide the shoulder strap of her dress back in place because as much as I could stay right here for hours, I’m supposed to be taking her to a wedding. “We should go,” I whisper.