Page 52 of What’s Left of Us

He’s moving as if he’s on autopilot, barely looking at me as he walks back to our stay.

“If you’re going to let me fuck you, I’m going to do it properly,” he says roughly. I don’t recognize the rasp in his voice, but it goes straight to the spot between my legs.

By the time we stumble into the rental and up the stairs, my entire body is trembling. It’s hard to tell whether it’s from the anticipation or the cold, but I don’t have long to wonder. Rather than turning for his bedroom, Atlas goes into the farthest bathroom. Without setting me down, he cranks the shower to high heat. Then his mouth is back on mine, hot and greedy, barely breaking away long enough for me to catch a breath before demanding more.

When his mouth trails down my neck, sucking the same spot on my collarbone, I tip my head back to smile at the ceiling. For one blissful moment, I am sixteen again—and everything feels exactly as it should.

Chapter 22

age sixteen

“Sorry Nat couldn’t come,” I said as I situated my sleeping bag. Without Nat’s stuff in here, we had a lot more room. That said, I was painfully aware of the fact Atlas and I were about to spend the night together. Alone. No snooping sisters watching our every move. No parents to worry over us.

I doubted Atlas told his parents Nat wasn’t going to be here, and mine were too busy lecturing Nat to remember that Phoebe decided not to come home for the weekend. The four of us had a tradition of camping in our backyard every fall, the last weekend of September, no matter the weather.

“I figured she would bail.” Atlas didn’t look at me as he spoke. He was stretched across his sleeping bag, one arm tucked under his head like a pillow. The other held his Nintendo Switch as he played some game I long gave up on trying to understand.

“Really?” I sat cross-legged on my sleeping bag and pulled a bag of pickle chips onto my lap. Before I opened it, I was again struck with the realization we were alone. This wouldn’t be the first time we fooled around, but it was the first time it felt inevitable.

We were completely alone out here, and the sliding back door made enough noise there would be plenty of warning before anyone interrupted us. If there was ever a night to be brave, it was now. And I’d had that mentality when I packed my backpack tonight, when I’d snuck into Nat’s room and rummaged through her sock drawer.

I swallowed, my throat so dry it hurt. Putting my chips to the side, unopened, I scooted closer to Atlas.

“Yeah, I feel like…” he trailed off then, looking up at me. Pausing his game, he tossed his Switch to the side and propped onto his elbow. “What’s going on with her?”

My cheeks flared. This wasn’t what I wanted to talk about. To be fair, I never really wanted to talk about my sister. It felt like too many things between us were a secret. I wasn’t supposed to talk about Michael or any of the guys she’d dated since they broke up. Or the fact that she’d had sex. Or that she liked to party or drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes. Or anything, it felt like.

But she was planning to be here as of this morning. Obviously something had happened since then—and obviously he noticed. The thing was, I didn’t know why Nat was currently in trouble. When I came home from Atlas’s swim meet, the confrontation was already over. Dad was gone , Mom was tending to Nat in the bathroom, and all that remained was a mess of bloodied glass in the kitchen.

Everything looked normal by the time Atlas arrived for backyard camping, and I was disgustingly proud that he couldn’t see the truth. He had no idea what had happened only hours earlier. To him, my family was as perfect as his, and I was desperate to keep it that way.

“You don’t have to tell me,” he said, but his brows furrowed.

“She’s just going through some stuff,” I said, the words rushing out. “I can’t say more. I promised her I wouldn’t share the specifics, but yeah…”

I trailed off lamely.

“You can talk to me, Vi,” Atlas said. He twined his fingers through mine, tugging gently until I came closer. “Even if you don’t tell me the specifics, you can always talk to me. You know that, right?”

Atlas Blake had a smile just for me. It was different from the one he gave other people, and I knew it because I’d spent countless hours watching him. His smile with friends was goofier, wider. His smile with his family was more forced, practiced. And his smile with other girls was reserved, polite but not inviting.

His smile for me always started the same. Slow, slightly crooked. Charming yet adoring. Sweet but undeniably sexy.

“I talk to you all the time,” I said, partly teasing. Then, dropping my attention to his lips: “What if I want to do something else?”

It was not a hard sell. Within minutes, I was straddling Atlas’s hips and he was looking up at me like I’d hung the moon. Outside, the night was quiet and a chill hung in the air. But inside this tent, I pretended the rest of the world did not exist.

After we’d been kissing for what felt like hours and minutes at the same time, I pulled back. I was trembling, not from arousal, but from nerves.

“I know we haven’t talked about it in a while,” I said. My voice was shaking so hard Atlas took my hands in his. “But I…I have a condom. If you want…”

I trailed off. I’d played this moment over in my head a hundred times, ever since I came up with the idea this afternoon. I was going to sound brave and untouchable, and I wasn’t going to care, regardless of his answer.

Now, I was a trembling mess. If he rejected me, I was going to nurse the hurt for weeks. Even though I knew that wasn’t fair to him, even though I’d do my best not to let it show.

Atlas tensed beneath me, lips parting. For several long, painful seconds, he did nothing but stare at me.

“We don’t have to,” I said, and thankfully, this sounded steadier. “If you don’t want to⁠—”