It Ends with Us

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

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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.