Chapter Eleven
I curl up in my bed and stare at it.
I’m almost finished with it. There aren’t very many more entries.
I pick up the journal and place it on the pillow beside me.
“I’m not going to read you,” I whisper.
Although, if I read what’s left, I’ll be finished. Having seen Atlas
tonight and knowing he has a girlfriend and a job and more than
likely a home is enough closure I need on that chapter. And if I just
finish the damn journal, I can put it back in the shoebox and never
have to open it again.
I finally pick it up and roll onto my back. “Ellen DeGeneres, you
are such a bitch.”
Dear Ellen,
“Just keep swimming.”
Recognize that quote, Ellen? It’s what Dory says to Marlin in Finding
Nemo.
“Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming.”
I’m not a huge fan of cartoons, but I’ll give you props for that one. I like
cartoons that can make you laugh, but also make you feel something. After
today, I think that’s my favorite cartoon. Because I’ve been feeling like
drowning lately, and sometimes people need a reminder that they just need to
keep swimming.
Atlas got sick. Like really sick.
He’s been crawling through my window and sleeping on the floor for a few
nights in a row now, but last night, I knew something was wrong as soon as I
looked at him. It was a Sunday, so I hadn’t seen him since the night before, but
he looked awful. His eyes were bloodshot, his skin was pale, and even though it
was cold, his hair was sweaty. I didn’t even ask if he was feeling okay, I
already knew he wasn’t. I put my hand on his forehead and he was so hot, I
almost yelled for my mother.
He said, “I’ll be fine, Lily,” and then he started to make his pallet on the
floor. I told him to wait there and then I went to the kitchen and poured him a
glass of water. I found some medicine in the cabinet. It was flu medicine and I
wasn’t even sure if that’s what was wrong with him, but I made him take some
anyway.
He laid there on the floor, curled up into a ball, when, about half an hour
later he said, “Lily? I think I’m gonna need a trash can.”
I jumped up and grabbed the trash can from under my desk and knelt down
in front of him. As soon as I set it down, he hunched over it and started
throwing up.
God, I felt bad for him. Being so sick and not having a bathroom or a bed
or a house or a mother. All he had was me and I didn’t even know what to do
for him.
When he was finished, I made him drink some water and then I told him to
get on the bed. He refused, but I wasn’t having it. I put the trash can on the
floor next to the bed and made him move to the bed.
He was so hot and shaking so bad I was just scared to leave him on the
floor. I laid down next to him and every hour for the next six hours he
continued getting sick. I kept having to take the trash can to the bathroom to
empty it out. I’m not gonna lie, it was gross. The grossest night I’ve ever had,
but what else could I do? He needed me to help him and I was all he had.
When it came time for him to leave my room this morning, I told him to go
back to his house and I’d be over to check on him before school. I’m surprised he
even had the energy to crawl out of my window. I left the trash can next to my
bed and waited for my mom to come wake me up. When she did, she saw the
trash can and immediately held her hand to my forehead. “Lily, are you okay?”
I groaned and shook my head. “No. I was up all night sick. I think it’s over
now, but I haven’t slept.”
She picked up the trash can and told me to stay in bed, that she’d call the
school and let them know I wasn’t coming. After she left for work, I went and
got Atlas and told him he could stay with me at the house all day. He was still
getting sick, so I let him use my room to sleep. I’d check on him every half hour
or so and finally around lunch he stopped throwing up. He went and took a
shower and then I made him some soup.
He was too tired to even eat it. I got a blanket and we both sat down on the
couch and covered up together. I don’t know when I started feeling comfortable
enough to snuggle up to him, but it just felt right. A few minutes later, he
leaned over a little and pressed his lips against my collarbone, right between my
shoulder and my neck. It was a quick kiss and I don’t think he meant for it to
be romantic. It was more like a thank-you gesture, without using actual words.
But it made me feel all kinds of things. It’s been a few hours now and I keep
touching that spot with my fingers because I can still feel it.
I know it was probably the worst day of his life, Ellen. But it was one of my
favorites.
I feel really bad about that.
We watched Finding Nemo and when that part came up where Marlin
was looking for Nemo and he was feeling really defeated, Dory said to him,
“When life gets you down do you wanna know what you’ve gotta do? . . . Just
keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming,
swimming.”
Atlas grabbed my hand when Dory said that. He didn’t hold it like a
boyfriend holds his girlfriend’s hand. He squeezed it, like he was saying that
was us. He was Marlin and I was Dory, and I was helping him swim.
“Just keep swimming,” I whispered to him.
—Lily
Dear Ellen,
I’m scared. So scared.
I like him a lot. He’s all I think about when we’re together and I feel worried
sick about him when we’re not. My life is beginning to revolve around him and
that’s not good, I know. But I can’t help it and I don’t know what to do about
it, and now he might leave.
He left after we finished watching Finding Nemo yesterday and then when
my parents went to bed, he crawled in my window last night. He had slept in
my bed the night before because he was sick, and I know I shouldn’t have done
it, but I put his blankets in the washing machine right before I went to bed. He
asked where his pallet was and I told him he’d have to sleep on the bed again
because I wanted to wash his blankets and make sure they were clean so he
wouldn’t get sick again.
For a minute, it looked like he was going to go back out the window. But
then he shut it and took off his shoes and crawled in the bed with me.
He wasn’t sick anymore, but when he laid down I thought maybe I had
gotten sick because my stomach felt queasy. But I wasn’t sick. I just always feel
queasy when he’s that close to me.
We were facing each other on the bed when he said, “When do you turn
sixteen?”
“Two more months,” I whispered. We just kept staring at each other, and my
heart was beating faster and faster. “When do you turn nineteen?” I asked,
just trying to make conversation so he couldn’t hear how hard I was breathing.
“Not until October,” he said.
I nodded. I wondered why he was curious about my age and it made me
wonder what he thought about fifteen-year-olds. Did he look at me like I was
just a little kid? Like a little sister? I was almost sixteen, and two and a half
years apart in age isn’t that bad. Maybe when two people are fifteen and
eighteen, it might seem a little too far apart. But once I turn sixteen, I bet no
one would even think twice about a two-and-a-half-year age difference.
“I need to tell you something,” he said.
I held my breath, not knowing what he was going to say.
“I got in touch with my uncle today. My mom and I used to live with him
in Boston. He told me once he gets back from his work trip I can stay with
him.”
I should have been so happy for him in that moment. I should have smiled
and told him congratulations. But I felt all of the immaturity of my age when I
closed my eyes and felt sorry for myself.
“Are you going?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I wanted to talk to you about it first.”
He was so close to me on the bed, I could feel the warmth of his breath. I also
noticed he smelled like mint, and it made me wonder if he uses bottled water to
brush his teeth before he comes over here. I always send him home every day
with lots of water.
I brought my hand up to the pillow and started pulling at a feather sticking
out of it. When I got it all the way out, I twisted it between my fingers. “I don’t
know what to say, Atlas. I’m happy you have a place to stay. But what about
school?”
“I could finish down there,” he said.
I nodded. It sounded like he already made up his mind. “When are you
leaving?”
I wondered how far away Boston is. It’s probably a few hours, but that’s a
whole world away when you don’t own a car.
“I don’t know for sure that I am.”
I dropped the feather back onto the pillow and brought my hand to my side.
“What’s stopping you? Your uncle is offering you a place to stay. That’s good,
right?”
He tightened his lips together and nodded. Then he picked up the feather I’d
been playing with and he started twisting it between his fingers. He laid it back
down on the pillow and then he did something I wasn’t expecting. He moved
his fingers to my lips and he touched them.
God, Ellen. I thought I was gonna die right then and there. It was the most
I’d ever felt inside my body at one time. He kept his fingers there for a few
seconds, and he said, “Thank you, Lily. For everything.” He moved his fingers
up and through my hair, and then he leaned forward and planted a kiss on my
forehead. I was breathing so hard, I had to open my mouth to catch more air. I
could see his chest moving just as hard as mine was. He looked down at me
and I watched as his eyes went right to my mouth. “Have you ever been kissed,
Lily?”
I shook my head no and tilted my face up to his because I needed him to
change that right then and there or I wasn’t gonna be able to breathe.
Then—almost as if I were made of eggshells—he lowered his mouth to mine
and just rested it there. I didn’t know what to do next, but I didn’t care. I
didn’t care if we just stayed like that all night and never even moved our
mouths, it was everything.
His lips closed over mine and I could kind of feel his hand shaking. I did
what he was doing and started to move my lips like he was. I felt the tip of his
tongue brush across my lips once and I thought my eyes were about to roll back
in my head. He did it again, and then a third time, so I finally did it, too.
When our tongues touched for the first time, I kind of smiled a little, because
I’d thought about my first kiss a lot. Where it would be, who it would be with.
Never in a million years did I imagine it would feel like this.
He pushed me on my back and pressed his hand against my cheek and kept
kissing me. It just got better and better as I grew more comfortable. My favorite
moment was when he pulled back for a second and looked down at me, then
came back even harder.
I don’t know how long we kissed. A long time. So long, my mouth started to
hurt and my eyes couldn’t stay open. When we fell asleep, I’m pretty sure his
mouth was still touching mine.
We didn’t talk about Boston again.
I still don’t know if he’s leaving.
—Lily
• • •
Dear Ellen,
I need to apologize to you.
It’s been a week since I’ve written to you and a week since I’ve watched your
show. Don’t worry, I still record it so you’ll get the ratings, but every day we get
off the bus, Atlas takes a quick shower and then we make out.
Every day.
It’s awesome.
I don’t know what it is about him, but I feel so comfortable with him. He’s
so sweet and thoughtful. He never does anything I don’t feel comfortable with,
but so far he hasn’t tried anything I don’t feel comfortable with.
I’m not sure how much I should divulge here, since you and I have never
met in person. But let me just say that if he’s ever wondered what my boobs feel
like . . .
Now he knows.
I can’t for the life of me figure out how people function from day to day
when they like someone this much. If it were up to me, we would kiss all day
and all night and do nothing in between except maybe talk a little. He tells
funny stories. I love it when he’s in a talkative mood because it doesn’t happen
very often, but he uses his hands a lot. He smiles a lot, too, and I love his smile
even more than I love his kiss. And sometimes I just tell him to shut up and
stop smiling or kissing or talking so I can stare at him. I like looking at his
eyes. They’re so blue that he could be standing across a room and a person
could tell how blue his eyes were. The only thing I don’t like about kissing him
sometimes is when he closes his eyes.
And no. We still haven’t talked about Boston.
—Lily
Dear Ellen,
Yesterday afternoon when we were riding the bus, Atlas kissed me. It wasn’t
anything new to us because we had kissed a lot by this point, but it’s the first
time he ever did it in public. When we’re together everything else just seems to
fade away, so I don’t think he even thought about other people noticing. But
Katie noticed. She was sitting in the seat behind us and I heard her say,
“Gross,” as soon as he leaned over and kissed me.
She was talking to the girl next to her when she said, “I can’t believe Lily
lets him touch her. He wears the same clothes almost every day.”
Ellen, I was so mad. I also felt awful for Atlas. He pulled away from me
and I could tell what she said bothered him. I started to turn around to yell at
her for judging someone she doesn’t even know, but he grabbed my hand and
shook his head no.
“Don’t, Lily,” he said.
So I didn’t.
But for the rest of the bus ride, I was so angry. I was angry that Katie
would say something so ignorant just to hurt someone she thought was beneath
her. I was also hurt that Atlas appeared to be used to comments like that.
I didn’t want him to think I was embarrassed that anyone saw him kiss me.
I know Atlas better than any of them do, and I know what a good person he is,
no matter what his clothes look like or that he used to smell before he started
using my shower.
I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek and then rested my head on his
shoulder.
“You know what?” I said to him.
He slid his fingers through mine and squeezed my hand. “What?”
“You’re my favorite person.”
I felt him laugh a little and it made me smile.
“Out of how many people?” he asked.
“All of them.”
He kissed the top of my head and said, “You’re my favorite person, too, Lily.
By a long shot.”
When the bus came to a stop on my street, he didn’t let go of my hand when
we started to walk off. He was in front of me in the aisle and I was walking
behind him, so he didn’t see it when I turned around and flipped off Katie.
I probably shouldn’t have done it, but the look on her face made it worth it.
When we got to my house, he took the house key out of my hand and
unlocked my front door. It was weird, seeing how comfortable he is at my house
now. He walked in and locked the door behind us. That’s when we noticed the
electricity in the house wasn’t working. I looked out the window and saw a
utility truck down the street working on the power lines, so that meant we
couldn’t watch your show. I wasn’t too upset because it meant we would
probably just make out for an hour and a half.
“Does your oven run off gas or electricity?” he asked.
“Gas,” I said, a little confused that he was asking about our oven.
He kicked off his shoes (which were really just a pair of my father’s old
shoes) and he started walking toward the kitchen. “I’m going to make you
something,” he said.
“You know how to cook?”
He opened the refrigerator and started moving things around. “Yep. I
probably love to cook as much as you love to grow things.” He took a few things
out of the refrigerator and preheated the oven. I leaned against the counter and
watched him. He wasn’t even looking at a recipe. He was just pouring things
into bowls and mixing them without even using a measuring cup.
I had never seen my father lift a finger in the kitchen. I’m pretty sure he
wouldn’t even know how to preheat our oven. I kind of thought most men were
like that, but watching Atlas work his way around my kitchen proved me
wrong.
“What are you making?” I asked him. I pushed my hands on the island
and hoisted myself onto it.
“Cookies,” he said. He walked the bowl over to me and stuck a spoon in the
mixture. He brought the spoon up to my mouth and I tasted it. One of my
weaknesses is cookie dough, and this was the best I’d ever tasted.
“Oh, wow,” I said, licking my lips.
He set the bowl down beside me and then leaned in and kissed me. Cookie
dough and Atlas’s mouth mixed together is like heaven, in case you’re
wondering. I made a noise deep in my throat that let him know how much I
liked the combination, and it made him laugh. But he didn’t stop kissing me.
He just laughed through the kiss and it completely melted my heart. A happy
Atlas was near mind-blowing. It made me want to uncover every single thing
about this world that he likes and give it all to him.
When he was kissing me, I wondered if I loved him. I’ve never had a
boyfriend before and have nothing to compare my feelings to. In fact, I’ve never
really wanted a boyfriend or a relationship until Atlas. I’m not growing up in
a household with a great example of how a man should treat someone he loves,
so I’ve always held on to an unhealthy amount of distrust when it comes to
relationships and other people.
There have been times I’ve wondered if I could ever allow myself to trust a
guy. For the most part, I hate men because the only example I have is my father.
But spending all this time with Atlas is changing me. Not in a huge way, I
don’t think. I still distrust most people. But Atlas is changing me enough to
believe that maybe he’s an exception to the norm.
He stopped kissing me and picked up the bowl again. He walked it over to
the opposite counter and started spooning dough onto two cookie sheets.
“You want to know a trick to cooking with a gas oven?” he asked.
I’m not sure I really ever cared about cooking before, but he somehow made
me want to know everything he knew. It might have been how happy he looked
when he talked about it.
“Gas ovens have hot spots,” he said as he opened the oven door and put the
cookie sheets inside. “You have to be sure and rotate the pans so they’ll cook
evenly.” He closed the door and pulled the oven mitt off his hand. He tossed it
on the counter. “A pizza stone helps, too. If you just keep it in the oven, even
when you aren’t baking pizza, it helps eliminate the hot spots.”
He walked over to me and placed his hands on either side of me. The
electricity kicked on right as he was pulling down the collar of my shirt. He
kissed the spot on my shoulder he always loves kissing and slowly slid his
hands up my back. I swear, sometimes when he’s not even here I can still feel
his lips on my collarbone.
He was about to kiss me on the mouth when we heard a car pull into the
driveway and the garage door start to open. I jumped off the island, looking
around the kitchen frantically. His hands went up to my cheeks and he made
me look at him.
“Keep an eye on the cookies. They’ll be finished in about twenty minutes.”
He pressed his lips to mine and then released me, rushing to the living room to
grab his backpack. He made it out the back door right when I heard the engine
to my father’s car shut off.
I started gathering all the ingredients together when my father walked into
the kitchen from the garage. He looked around and then saw the light on in the
oven.
“Are you cooking?” he asked.
I nodded because my heart was beating so fast, I was scared he’d hear the
trembling in my voice if I responded out loud. I scrubbed for a moment at a
spot on the counter that was perfectly clean. I cleared my throat and said,
“Cookies. I’m baking cookies.”
He set his briefcase down on the kitchen table and then walked to the
refrigerator and pulled out a beer.
“The electricity has been out,” I said. “I was bored so I decided to bake while
I waited for it to come back on.”
My father sat down at the table and spent the next ten minutes asking me
questions about school and if I’d thought about going to college. Occasionally
when it was just the two of us, I saw glimpses of a how a normal relationship
with a father could be. Sitting at the kitchen table with him discussing colleges
and career choices and high school. As much as I hated him most of the time, I
still longed for more of these moments with him. If he could just always be the
guy he was capable of being in these moments, things would be so much
different. For all of us.
I rotated the cookies like Atlas had said to do and when they were finished, I
pulled them out of the oven. I took one off the cookie sheet and handed it to my
father. I hated that I was being nice to him. It almost felt like I was wasting
one of Atlas’s cookies.
“Wow,” my father said. “These are great, Lily.”
I forced a thank-you, even though I didn’t make them. I couldn’t very well
tell him that, though.
“They’re for school so you can only have one,” I lied. I waited until the rest
of them cooled and then I put them in a Tupperware container and took them
to my room. I didn’t even want to try one without Atlas, so I waited until later
last night when he came over.
“You should have tried one when they were hot,” he said. “That’s when
they’re the best.”
“I didn’t want to eat them without you,” I said. We sat on the bed with our
backs against the wall and proceeded to eat half the bowl of cookies. I told him
they were delicious, but failed to tell him they were by far the greatest cookies I’d
ever eaten. I didn’t want to inflate his ego. I kind of liked how humble he was.
I tried to grab at another one, but he pulled the bowl away and put the lid
back on it. “If you eat too many you’ll make yourself sick and you won’t like my
cookies anymore.”
I laughed. “Impossible.”
He took a drink of water and then stood up, facing the bed. “I made you
something,” he said, reaching into his pocket.
“More cookies?” I asked.
He smiled and shook his head, then held out a fist. I lifted my hand and he
dropped something hard in the palm of my hand. It was a small, flat outline of
a heart, about two inches long, carved out of wood.
I rubbed my thumb over it, trying not to smile too big. It wasn’t an
anatomically correct heart, but it also didn’t look like the hand-drawn hearts.
It was uneven and hollow in the middle.
“You made this?” I asked, looking up at him.
He nodded. “I carved it with an old whittling knife I found at the house.”
The ends of the heart weren’t connected. They just curved in a little, leaving
a little space at the top of the heart. I didn’t even know what to say. I felt him
sit back down on the bed but I couldn’t stop looking at it long enough to even
thank him.
“I carved it out of a branch,” he said, whispering. “From the oak tree in
your backyard.”
I swear, Ellen. I never thought I could love something so much. Or maybe
what I was feeling wasn’t for the gift, but for him. I closed my fist around the
heart and then leaned over and kissed him so hard, he fell back onto the bed. I
threw my leg over him and straddled him and he grabbed my waist and
grinned against my mouth.
“I’m gonna carve you a damn house out of that oak tree if this is the reward
I get,” he whispered.
I laughed. “You have to stop being so perfect,” I told him. “You’re already
my favorite person but now you’re making it really unfair to all the other
humans because no one will ever be able to catch up to you.”
He brought his hand to the back of my head and rolled me until I was on
my back and he was the one on top. “Then my plan is working,” he said, right
before kissing me again.
I held on to the heart while we kissed, wanting to believe it was a gift for no
reason at all. But part of me was scared it was a gift to remember him by when
he leaves for Boston.
I didn’t want to remember him. If I had to remember him, it would mean he
wasn’t a part of my life anymore.
I don’t want him to move to Boston, Ellen. I know that’s selfish of me
because he can’t keep living in that house. I don’t know what I’m more afraid
might happen. Watching him leave or selfishly begging him not to go.
I know we need to talk about it. I’ll ask him about Boston tonight when he
comes over. I just didn’t want to ask him last night because it was a really
perfect day.
—Lily
Dear Ellen,
Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming.
He’s moving to Boston.
I don’t really feel like talking about it.
—Lily
Dear Ellen,
This is going to be a big one for my mother to hide.
My father is usually pretty cognizant of hitting her where it won’t leave a
visible bruise. The last thing he probably wants is for people in the town to
know what he does to her. I’ve seen him kick her a few times, choke her, hit her
on the back and the stomach, pull her hair. The few times he’s hit her on the
face, it’s always just been a slap, so the marks wouldn’t stay for long.
But never have I seen him do what he did last night.
It was really late when they got home. It was a weekend, so he and my mom
went to some community function. My father has a real estate company and
he’s also the town mayor, so they have to do things in the public a lot like go to
charity dinners. Which is ironic, since my father hates charities. But I guess he
has to save face.
Atlas was already in my room when they got home. I could hear them
fighting as soon as they walked through the front door. A lot of the conversation
was muffled, but for the most part, it sounded like my father was accusing her
of flirting with some man.
Now I know my mother, Ellen. She would never do something like that. If
anything, a guy probably looked at her and it made my father jealous. My
mother is really beautiful.
I heard him call her a whore and then I heard the first blow. I started to
climb out of my bed but Atlas pulled me back and told me not to go in there,
that I might get hurt. I told him it actually helps sometimes. That when I go in
there, my father backs off.
Atlas tried to talk me out of it, but finally I got up and went out into the
living room.
Ellen.
I just . . .
He was on top of her.
They were on the couch and he had his hand around her throat, but his
other hand was pulling up her dress. She was trying to fight him off and I just
stood there, frozen. She kept begging him to get off her and then he hit her right
across the face and told her to shut up. I’ll never forget his words when he said,
“You want attention? I’ll give you some fucking attention.” And that’s when
she got real still and stopped fighting him. I heard her crying, and then she
said, “Please be quiet. Lily is here.”
She said, “Please be quiet.”
Please be quiet while you rape me, dear.
Ellen, I didn’t know one human was capable of feeling so much hate inside
one heart. And I’m not even talking about my father. I’m talking about me.
I walked straight to the kitchen and I opened a drawer. I grabbed the biggest
knife I could find and . . . I don’t know how to explain it. It was like I wasn’t
even in my own body. I could see myself walking across the kitchen with the
knife in my hand, and I knew I wasn’t going to use it. I just wanted something
bigger than myself that could scare him away from her. But right before I made
it out of the kitchen, two arms went around my waist and picked me up from
behind. I dropped the knife, and my father didn’t hear it but my mother did.
We locked eyes as Atlas carried me back to my bedroom. When we were back
inside my room, I just started hitting him in the chest, trying to get back out
there to her. I was crying and doing everything I could to get him out of my
way, but he wouldn’t move.
He just wrapped his arms around me and said, “Lily, calm down.” He kept
saying it over and over, and he held me there for a long time until I accepted
that he wasn’t gonna let me go back out there. He wasn’t gonna let me have
that knife.
He walked over to the bed and grabbed his jacket and started putting on his
shoes. “We’ll go next door,” he said. “We’ll call the police.”
The police.
My mother had warned me not to call the police in the past. She said it
could jeopardize my father’s career. But in all honesty, I didn’t care at that
point. I didn’t care that he was the mayor or that everyone who loved him
didn’t know the awful side of him. The only thing I cared about was helping
my mother, so I pulled on my jacket and went to the closet for a pair of shoes.
When I stepped out of my closet, Atlas was staring at my bedroom door.
It was opening.
My mother stepped inside and quickly shut it, locking it behind her. I’ll
never forget what she looked like. She had blood coming down from her lip. Her
eye was already starting to swell, and she had a clump of hair just resting on
her shoulder. She looked at Atlas and then me.
I didn’t even take a moment to feel scared that she caught me in my room
with a boy. I didn’t care about that. I was just worried about her. I walked over
to her and grabbed her hands and walked her to my bed. I brushed the hair off
her shoulder and then from her forehead.
“He’s gonna go call the police, Mom. Okay?”
Her eyes grew real wide and she started shaking her head. “No,” she said.
She looked over at Atlas and said, “You can’t. No.”
He was already at the window about to leave, so he stopped and looked at
me.
“He’s drunk, Lily,” she said. “He heard your door shut, so he went to our
bedroom. He stopped. If you call the police, it’ll just make it worse, believe me.
Just let him sleep it off, it’ll be better tomorrow.”
I shook my head and could feel the tears stinging my eyes. “Mom, he was
trying to rape you!”
She ducked her head and winced when I said that. She shook her head
again and said, “It’s not like that, Lily. We’re married, and sometimes
marriage is just . . . you’re too young to understand it.”
It got really quiet for a minute, and then I said. “I hope to hell I never do.”
That’s when she started to cry. She just held her head in her hands and she
started to sob and all I could do was wrap my arms around her and cry with
her. I’d never seen her this upset. Or this hurt. Or this scared. It broke my
heart, Ellen.
It broke me.
When she was finished crying, I looked around the room and Atlas had left.
We went to the kitchen and I helped her clean up her lip and her eye. She never
did say anything about him being there. Not one thing. I waited for her to tell
me I was grounded, but she never did. I realized that maybe she didn’t
acknowledge it because that’s what she does. Things that hurt her just get swept
under the rug, never to be brought up again.
—Lily
Dear Ellen,
I think I’m ready to talk about Boston now.
He left today.
I’ve shuffled my deck of cards so many times, my hands hurt. I’m scared if I
don’t get out how I feel on paper, I’ll go crazy holding it all in.
Our last night didn’t go over so well. We kissed a lot at first, but we were
both too sad to really care about it. For the second time in two days, he told me
he changed his mind and that he wasn’t leaving. He didn’t want to leave me
alone in this house. But I’ve lived with these parents for almost sixteen years. It
was silly of him to turn down a home in favor of being homeless, just because
of me. We both knew that, but it still hurt.
I tried to not be so sad about it, so when we were lying there, I asked him to
tell me about Boston. I told him maybe one day when I got out of school, I
could go there.
He got this look in his eye when he started talking about it. A look I’d never
seen. Sort of like he was talking about heaven. He told me about how everyone
has the greatest accents there. Instead of car, they say cah. He must not realize
that he sometimes says his r’s like that, too. He said he lived there from the ages
of nine until he was fourteen, so I guess maybe he picked up a little bit of the
accent.
He told me about how his uncle lives in an apartment building with the
coolest rooftop deck.
“A lot of apartments have them,” he said. “Some even have pools.”
Plethora, Maine, probably didn’t even have a building that was tall enough
for a rooftop deck. I wondered what it would feel like to be that high up. I asked
him if he ever went up there and he said yes. That when he was younger,
sometimes he would go to the roof and just sit up there and think while he
looked out over the city.
He told me about the food. I already knew he liked to cook but I had no idea
how much passion he had for it. I guess because he doesn’t have a stove or a
kitchen, so other than the cookies he baked me, he’s never really talked about
cooking before.
He told me about the harbor and how, before his mother remarried, she used
to take him fishing out there. “I mean, Boston isn’t any different from any
other big city, I guess,” he said. “There’s not a lot that makes it stand out. It’s
just . . . I don’t know. There’s a vibe. A really good energy. When people say
they live in Boston, they’re proud of it. I miss that sometimes.”
I ran my fingers through his hair and said, “Well, you make it sound like
the best place in the world. Like everything is better in Boston.”
He looked at me and his eyes were sad when he said. “Everything is almost
better in Boston. Except the girls. Boston doesn’t have you.”
That made me blush. He kissed me real sweet and then I said to him,
“Boston doesn’t have me yet. Someday I’ll move there and I’ll find you.”
He made me promise. Said if I moved to Boston, everything really would be
better there and it would be the best city in the world.
We kissed some more. And did other things that I won’t bore you with.
Although, that’s not to say they were boring.
They were not.
But then this morning I had to tell him goodbye. And he held me and kissed
me so much, I thought I might die if he let go.
But I didn’t die. Because he let go and here I am. Still living. Still
breathing.
Just barely.
—Lily
I flip to the next page, but then slam the book shut. There’s only
one more entry and I don’t know that I really feel like reading it right
now. Or ever. I put the journal back in my closet, knowing that my
chapter with Atlas is over. He’s happy now.
I’m happy now.
Time can definitely heal all wounds.
Or at least most of them.
I turn off my lamp and then pick up my phone to plug it in. I have
two missed text messages from Ryle and one from my mother.
Ryle: Hey. Naked Truth commencing in 3 . . . 2 . . .
Ryle: I was worried that being in a relationship would add to my
responsibilities. That’s why I’ve avoided them my whole life. I already have
enough on my plate, and seeing the stress my parents’ marriage seemed to
cause them, and the failed marriages of some of my friends, I wanted no
part in something like that. But after tonight, I realized that maybe a lot of
people are just doing it wrong. Because what’s happening between us
doesn’t feel like a responsibility. It feels like a reward. And I’ll fall asleep
wondering what I did to deserve it.
I pull my phone to my chest and smile. Then I screenshot the text
because I’m keeping it forever. I open up the third text message.
Mom: A doctor, Lily? AND your own business? I want to be you when I grow
up.
I screen-shot that one, too.
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