Chapter Twenty

I tried salvaging my phone before I fell asleep last night, but it was no use. It was in two completely separate pieces. I set my alarm so I could get up early and stop and get a new one on my way in to work today.

My face doesn’t look as bad as I feared it would. Of course, it’s not something I could hide from Allysa, but I’m not even going to try and do that. I part my hair to the side to cover up most of the bandage Ryle had placed over my eye. The only thing visible from last night is the cut on my lip.

And the hickey he gave me on my neck.

Fucking irony at its best.

I grab my purse and open the front door. I stop short when I see the lump at my feet.

It moves.

It’s several seconds before I realize that lump is actually Ryle. He slept out here?

He pulls himself to his feet as soon as he realizes I’ve opened the door. He’s in front of me, pleading eyes, gentle hands on my cheeks. Lips on my mouth. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. ”

I pull back and scroll my eyes over him. He slept out here?

I step out of my apartment and pull my door shut. I calmly walk past him and down the stairs. He follows me the entire way to my car, begging me to talk to him.

I don’t.

I leave.

• • •

It’s an hour later when I have a new phone in my hands. I’m sitting in my car at the cell phone store when I turn it on. I watch the screen as seventeen messages appear. All from Allysa.

I guess it would make sense that Ryle didn’t call me all night, since he knew what kind of shape my phone was in.

I start to open a text message when my phone begins ringing. It’s Allysa.

“Hello? ”

She sighs heavily, and then, “Lily! What in the hell is going on? Oh my God, you can’t do this to me, I’m pregnant! ”

I start my car and set the phone to Bluetooth while I drive toward the store. Allysa is off today. She’s only got a few days left before she gets a jump start on her maternity leave.

“I’m okay, ” I tell her. “Ryle is okay. We got into a fight. I’m sorry I couldn’t call you, he broke my phone. ”

She’s quiet for a moment, and then, “He did? Are you okay? Where are you? ”

“I’m fine. Heading to work now. ”

“Good, I’m almost there myself. ”

I start to protest, but she hangs up before I have the chance.

By the time I make it to the store, she’s already there.

I open the front door, ready to field questions and defend my reasons for kicking her brother out of my apartment. But I stop short when I see the two of them standing at the counter. Ryle is leaning against it and Allysa has her hands on top of his, saying something to him that I can’t hear.

They both turn to face me when they hear the door close behind me.

“Ryle, ” Allysa whispers. “What did you do to her? ” She walks around the counter and pulls me in for a hug. “Oh, Lily, ” she says, running her hand down my back. She pulls back with tears in her eyes, and her reaction confuses me. She obviously knows Ryle is responsible, but if that’s the case, it seems she would be attacking him, or at least yelling.

She turns back to Ryle and he’s looking up at me apologetically. Longingly. Like he wants to reach out and hug me, but he’s scared to death to touch me. He should be.

“You need to tell her, ” Allysa says to Ryle.

He instantly drops his head in his hands.

“Tell her, ” Allysa says, her voice angrier now. “She has the right to know, Ryle. She’s your wife. If you don’t tell her, I will. ”

Ryle’s shoulders roll forward and his head is fully pressed against the counter now. Whatever it is Allysa wants him to tell me has him so agonized, he can’t even look at me. I clench my stomach, feeling the angst deeper than my soul.

Allysa spins toward me and puts her hands on my shoulders. “Hear him out, ” she begs. “I’m not asking you to forgive him, because I have no idea what happened last night. But just please, as my sister-in-law and my best friend, give my brother a chance to talk to you. ”

• • •

Allysa said she’d watch the store for the next hour until another employee comes in for their shift. I was still so upset with Ryle, I didn’t want him in the same car with me. He said he’d send for an Uber and meet me at my apartment.

My entire drive home I agonized over what he could possibly need to tell me that Allysa already knows. So many things went through my head. Is he dying? Has he been cheating on me? Did he lose his job? She didn’t seem to know the details of what happened between us last night, so I have no idea how this relates to that.

Ryle finally walks through my front door ten minutes after me. I’m sitting on the couch, nervously picking at my nails.

I stand up and start to pace as he slowly walks to the chair and takes a seat. He leans forward, clasping his hands in front of him.

“Please sit down, Lily. ”

He says it pleadingly, like he can’t take seeing me worry. I return to my seat on the couch, but I scoot to the arm, pull my feet up, and bring my hands to my mouth. “Are you dying? ”

His eyes stretch wide and he immediately shakes his head. “No. No. It’s nothing like that. ”

“Then what is it? ”

I just want him to spit it out. My hands are starting to shake. He sees how much he’s freaking me out, so he leans forward and pulls my hands from my face, holding them in his. Part of me doesn’t want him touching me after what he did last night, but a piece of me needs the reassurance from him. The anticipation of what I’m about to find out is making me nauseous.

“No one is dying. I’m not cheating on you. What I’m about to tell you isn’t going to hurt you, okay? It’s all in the past. But Allysa thinks you need to know. And. . . so do I. ”

I nod and he releases my hands. He’s the one up and pacing now, back and forth behind the coffee table. It’s as if he’s having to work up the courage to find his own words and that’s making me even more nervous.

He sits in the chair again. “Lily? Do you remember the night we met? ”

I nod.

“You remember when I walked out onto the roof? How angry I was? ”

I nod again. He was kicking the chair. It was before he knew marine-grade polymer was virtually indestructible.

“Do you remember my naked truth? What I told you about that night and what caused me to be so angry? ”

I lean my head down and think back to that night and to all the truths he told me. He said marriage repulsed him. He was only into one-night stands. He never wanted to have kids. He was mad about a patient he’d lost that night.

I start nodding. “The little boy, ” I said. “That’s why you were mad, because a little boy died and it upset you. ”

He blows out a quick breath of relief. “Yes. That’s why I was mad. ” He stands up again and it’s like I see his entire soul crumble. He presses his palms against his eyes and fights back tears. “When I told you about what happened to him, do you remember what you said to me? ”

I feel like I’m about to cry and I don’t even know why yet. “Yes. I told you I couldn’t imagine what something like that will do to that little boy’s brother. The one who accidentally shot him. ” My lips start to tremble. “And that’s when you said, ‘It’ll destroy him for life, that’s what it’ll do. ’ ”

Oh, God.

Where is he going with this?

Ryle walks over and drops down to his knees in front of me. “Lily, ” he says. “I knew it would destroy him. I knew exactly what that little boy was feeling. . . because that’s what happened to me. To Allysa’s and my older brother. . . ”

I can’t hold in the tears. I just start crying and he wraps his arms tightly around my waist and lays his head on my lap. “I shot him, Lily. My best friend. My big brother. I was only six years old. I didn’t even know I was holding a real gun. ”

His whole body begins to shake and he grips me even tighter. I press a kiss into his hair because it feels like he’s on the verge of a breakdown. Just like that night on the roof. And while I’m still so angry at him, I also still love him and it absolutely kills me to find this out about him. About Allysa. We sit quietly for a long time—his head on my lap, his arms around my waist, my lips in his hair.

“She was only five when it happened. Emerson was seven. We were in the garage, so no one heard our screams for a long time. And I just sat there, and. . . ”

He pulls away from my lap and stands up, facing the other direction. After a long stretch of silence he sits down on the couch and leans forward. “I was trying to. . . ” Ryle’s face contorts in pain and he lowers his head, covering it with his hands, shaking it back and forth. “I was trying to put everything back inside his head. I thought I could fix him, Lily. ”

My hand flies up to my mouth. I gasp so loudly, there’s no way to hide it.

I have to stand up so I can catch a breath.

It doesn’t help.

I still can’t breathe.

Ryle walks over to me, taking my hands and pulling me to him. We hug each other for a solid minute when he says, “I would never tell you this because I want it to excuse my behavior. ” He pulls back and looks me firmly in the eyes. “You have to believe that. Allysa wanted me to tell you all of this because since that happened, there are things I can’t control. I get angry. I black out. I’ve been in therapy since I was six years old. But it is not my excuse. It is my reality. ”

He wipes away my tears, cradling my head against his shoulder.

“When you ran after me last night, I swear I had no intention of hurting you. I was upset and angry. And sometimes when I feel that much emotion, something inside of me just snaps. I don’t remember the moment I pushed you. But I know I did. I did. All I was thinking when you were running after me was how I needed to get away from you. I wanted you out of my way. I didn’t process that there were stairs around us. I didn’t process my strength compared to yours. I fucked up, Lily. I fucked up. ”

He lowers his mouth to my ear. His voice cracks when he says, “You are my wife. I’m supposed to be the one who protects you from the monsters. I’m not supposed to be one. ” He holds me with so much desperation, he begins to shake. I have never, in all my life, felt so much pain radiating from one human.

It breaks me. It rips me apart from the inside out. All my heart wants to do is wrap tightly around his.

But even with everything he just told me, I’m still fighting my own forgiveness. I swore I wouldn’t let it happen again. I swore to him and to myself that if he ever hurt me again, I would leave.

I pull away from him, unable to look him in the eye. I walk toward my bedroom to try and take a moment to just catch my breath. I close my bathroom door behind me and grip the sink, but I can’t even stand up. I end up sliding to the floor in a heap of tears.

This isn’t how this was supposed to be. My whole life, I knew exactly what I’d do if a man ever treated me the way my father treated my mother. It was simple. I would leave and it would never happen again.

But I didn’t leave. And now, here I am with bruises and cuts on my body at the hands of the man who is supposed to love me. At the hands of my own husband.

And still, I’m trying to justify what happened.

It was an accident. He thought I was cheating on him. He was hurt and angry and I got in his way.

I bring my hands to my face and I sob, because I feel more pain for that man out there, knowing what he went through as a child, than I feel for myself. And that doesn’t make me feel selfless or strong. It makes me feel pathetic and weak. I’m supposed to hate him. I’m supposed to be the woman my mother was never strong enough to be.

But if I’m emulating my mother’s behavior, then that would mean Ryle is emulating my father’s behavior. But he isn’t. I have to stop comparing us to them. We’re our own individuals in an entirely different situation. My father never had an excuse for his anger, nor was he immediately apologetic. The way he treated my mother was much worse than what’s happened between Ryle and me.

Ryle just opened up to me in a way that he’s probably never opened up to anyone. He’s struggling to be a better person for me.

Yes, he screwed up last night. But he’s here and he’s trying to make me understand his past and why he reacted the way he did. Humans aren’t perfect and I can’t let the only example I’ve ever witnessed of marriage weigh in on my own marriage.

I wipe my eyes and pull myself up. When I look in the mirror, I don’t see my mother. I just see me. I see a girl who loves her husband and wants more than anything to be able to help him. I know Ryle and I are strong enough to move past this. Our love is strong enough to get us through this.

I walk out of the bathroom and back into the living room. Ryle stands up and faces me, his face full of fear. He’s scared I’m not going to forgive him, and I’m not sure that I do forgive him. But an act doesn’t have to be forgiven in order to learn from it.

I walk over to him and I grab both of his hands in mine. I speak to him with nothing but naked truth.

“Remember what you said to me on the roof that night? You said, ‘There is no such thing as bad people. We’re all just people who sometimes do bad things. ’ ”

He nods and squeezes my hands.

“You aren’t a bad person, Ryle. I know that. You can still protect me. When you’re upset, just walk away. And I’ll walk away. We’ll leave the situation until you’re calm enough to talk about it, okay? You are not a monster, Ryle. You’re only human. And as humans, we can’t expect to shoulder all of our pain. Sometimes we have to share it with the people who love us so we don’t come crashing down from the weight of it all. But I can’t help you unless I know you need it. Ask me for help. We’ll get through this, I know we can. ”

He exhales what feels like every breath he’s been holding in since last night. He wraps his arms tightly around me and buries his face in my hair. “Help me, Lily, ” he whispers. “I need you to help me. ”

He holds me against him and I know deep in my heart that I’m doing the right thing. There is so much more good in him than bad, and I’ll do whatever I can to convince him of that until he can see it, too.

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