67 pages • 2 hours read
It Ends with Us
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Chapters 13-16Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 13 Summary
Ryle visits Lily at her flower shop again. They sleep together there and as they lie together afterwards, Ryle’s mother calls. Lily asks about her, as well as Ryle’s father. His parents live in England, and Ryle has already told them about Lily. She asks about the brother that passed away and learns his name was Emerson.
Chapter 14 Summary
Since it’s his day off, Ryle and Lily have decided to have dinner together and spend the night together. Ryle is in good spirits because he has a rare surgery scheduled for the next week and jokes about how special his hands are. Lily has been drinking while making their dinner, and Ryle makes the mistake of taking a tray from the oven without gloves. Tipsy, Lily laughs when Ryle’s hand gets burned, and he drops the casserole. In response, he shoves her and she runs into a cabinet door handle. Lily immediately knows his reaction was excessive, stating, “My tears, my heart, my laughter, my soul. Shattered like broken glass” (185). Lily immediately makes the connection to her father’s abuse when Ryle starts apologizing. “I don’t hear Ryle’s voice this time,” she says, “All I hear is my father’s voice” (186). She grows angry enough to push him onto the glass. She feels guilty after, given that Ryle performs surgery with his hands, and convinces herself that Ryle is different from her father. This allows her to let him soothe her and sleep with her. Ryle swears he won’t hurt her again. Lily tells him that if he does hurt her again, she’ll leave him. They both declare their love for each other.
Chapter 15 Summary
Ryle, Allysa, and Marshall are eating at the restaurant where Lily saw Atlas. Ryle and Lily have made up a lie to cover the incident. As they talk, Atlas comes over and Lily finds out that Atlas is the chef of that restaurant. Atlas sees Lily’s black eye and Ryle’s bandage, and confronts Lily about it when she goes to the restroom. Lily explains that it was an accident and Atlas angrily tells her she sounds like her mother, making excuses for her father. Lily tells Atlas that she’s now more scared of him than Ryle and she leaves, finding Ryle outside. Atlas leaves the restroom and attacks Ryle. They fight and Atlas throws Ryle out after Ryle says Atlas was someone Lily “pity fucked” (198). Lily and Ryle head back home, and while at first Ryle doesn’t want to hear Lily’s explanation, Lily eventually clears up that there’s nothing between her and Atlas. She also hadn’t told Atlas about what happened between her and Ryle. In return, Ryle tells her that thinking of her being unfaithful to him is painful “and if it hurts this much now, [he’s] terrified to think of what it could do to [him] a year from now” (202). Lily assures him that she loves him.
Chapter 16 Summary
Atlas comes to Lily’s shop to apologize not for what he sees as defending her, but for comparing her to her mother. He leaves his number inside Lily’s phone, just in case she might need it, even though Lily tells him she won’t. Lily reflects that she still feels some attachment to Atlas. She tries to clarify to Atlas that she didn’t sleep with him all those years ago out of pity. In response, Atlas says her clarification isn’t needed, because “[he] know[s] that wasn’t a pity fuck. [He] was there” (207). Before he leaves, he gives her a gift he’d gotten her long ago: an autographed book by Ellen DeGeneres with the inscription Atlas says just keep swimming.
Chapters 13-16 Analysis
The cycle of domestic violence comes to the forefront in these chapters as an incident where Ryle hits Lily calls into question their relationship and brings to the fore the link between Ryle and Lily’s father. During the incident, Lily tipsily laughs at Ryle’s hand getting burned and Ryle responds unthinkingly by hitting her. Lily’s memories of her father underscore the pattern of violence followed by apology. Lily realizes she doesn’t want to believe that this is more than an accident, but she rationalizes that she doesn’t want to project her resentment towards her father to Ryle. At the same time, Lily recognizes the familiar script in lying to Allysa and Marshall to cover what happened. She also lies to Atlas, whom she runs into again at the restaurant. Unlike Allysa and Marshall, Atlas’s own familiarity with abuse, and with Lily, allows him to correctly guess what’s happened.
While Lily attempts to rationalize Ryle’s behavior through her intoxication and Ryle’s burn and repeats that he won’t do this again, the narrative suggests that Ryle’s outburst is part of a pattern. The novel makes it clear from the evening when they first met that Ryle has a temper. The beginning of their relationship also shows how Ryle took liberties with Lily. Allysa’s caution, too, and her uneasiness with the fledgling relationship, further serve as warning signs. Additionally, after Atlas and Ryle fight and Atlas throws Ryle out, Ryle yells out of his frustration. He demonstrates his self-centeredness by telling Lily he didn’t want a relationship or the complexities that come with it, instead of discussing his insecurities. This behavior contrasts with Atlas’s behavior when he goes to apologize to Lily the day after. While Ryle made light of Lily’s relationship with Atlas as a “pity fuck,” Lily tries to clarify. Atlas brushes off Lily’s clarification. Unlike Ryle, whose insecurities have emerged, Atlas knows how much he meant to her.
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