Who Does Lily Bloom End Up With In It Ends With Us?

This article contains discussions of sexual assault, domestic abuse, and domestic violence.

In August of 2024, audiences flocked to the movie theater to catch the long-awaited film adaptation of Colleen Hoover's bestselling 2016 novel "It Ends With Us," a tear-jerking, often harrowing story of a relationship that seems perfect until it's very much not. (No, really, they did flock; the movie made a huge splash at the 2024 box office.) Onscreen, the story's protagonist, Lily Blossom Bloom — Hoover is, if nothing else, extremely literal with her character names, considering that Lily owns a flower shop — is played by Blake Lively, who also produced the movie; the man who sweeps her off her feet, neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid, is played by Justin Baldoni. (Baldoni directed the movie as well.) So what happens in "It Ends With Us" between Lily and Ryle? How do they meet, what twists and turns does their relationship take, and — spoiler alert — what drives them apart for good?

Baldoni and Lively's film sticks pretty closely to Hoover's book, so let's outline everything that happens in both versions ... but there's also a literary sequel called "It Starts With Us," which was obviously also penned by Hoover. With that in mind, let's go through Lily's romantic life semi-chronologically — just like the book and film do — and discuss Ryle, Lily's other great loves, and where she ends up at the end of "It Ends With Us" ... and the end of "It Starts With Us." (Spoilers ahead for Lily's entire story!)

At the beginning of both versions of "It Ends With Us," we catch up with Lily Blossom Bloom as she heads back to Boston in the aftermath of her father's funeral ... and she's not in a particularly solid state of mind. It's more than just losing a parent for Lily, because her relationship with her father Andrew Bloom (played in the film's flashback scenes by "Grey's Anatomy" staple Kevin McKidd) was extremely difficult. (More on that shortly.) Looking for a quiet place to think, Lily heads up to a rooftop of a random highrise and looks out at the city ... but she's disturbed pretty quickly by Ryle, who makes a very loud entrance onto the rooftop terrace of what Lily ultimately learns is his apartment building. (It's loud because Ryle slams the door open and kicks a chair.) 

After Ryle finishes tormenting the furniture, he realizes Lily's there, and it's an understatement to say that he comes on strong. Lily demurs, but she can't help her immediate attraction to Ryle ... and the two almost kiss before Ryle gets a page from the hospital calling him in to perform an emergency surgery. Lily, at this point, thinks she may never see Ryle again and turns her attention to her flower shop, connecting quickly with a would-be patron named Allysa (an extremely charming Jenny Slate in the film) who ends up working for Lily — but when she discovers that Ryle is actually Allysa's brother, Ryle ends up in Lily's life all over again. Despite Lily's initial hesitance and the fact that Ryle claims he just wants something "casual," the two fall for each other pretty quickly, but before long, someone from Lily's past resurfaces.

Throughout both the book and film of "It Ends With Us," the narrative flashes back to Lily's life as a teenager, which is how we learn that her father routinely physically abused her mother (played by Amy Morton). Beyond Lily's family life, though, we learn about the young protagonist, played by Isabela Ferrer in those flashbacks, and her connection with Atlas Corrigan ("Colony" standout Alex Neustaedter). One day, Lily, looking out of her bedroom window, notices that a young man — Atlas — is living in the abandoned house next door to the wealthy Bloom household, and after she cautiously interacts with Atlas on the schoolbus, Lily and Atlas basically become inseparable. While her parents are at work, Lily invites Atlas into her home to take showers, gives him her father's clothing, and makes sure he's eating enough; ultimately, Lily learns that Atlas ran away from home after his mother defended his abusive father, bonding them further.

Lily and Atlas fall in love and sleep together, but when Lily's father finds them in bed together, it's one of the film — and novel's — most upsetting moments. Dragging Atlas from his daughter's bed, Lily's father beats Atlas so severely that the young teenager is hospitalized, and from that point on, he disappears from Lily's life. Atlas is always a part of Lily's heart, though; she has a tattoo of a heart on her collarbone that represents the way that she once loved him, and he does return to her life as an adult ... right when Lily needs him the most.

Something that makes "It Ends With Us" a little different from traditional literary and film depictions of violence is just how perfect Ryle does seem at first, which makes his first act of violence much, much more shocking. After Lily and Ryle start dating, everything is going, by all metrics, exceptionally well — Ryle is certainly quite the romantic and loves making a big gesture — and one morning in Ryle's apartment, Lily wakes up to find that he's making her an elaborate breakfast. That's when everything takes a turn. While taking part of the meal out of the oven, Ryle forgets oven mitts and seriously burns his hand, and Lily laughs as a knee-jerk reaction before trying to help. Ryle, infuriated at her laughter — which he later says is because he has an important surgery coming up — hits her, and in both versions, he convinces Lily that it was a freak accident and that he was simply drawing his hand away from the hot pan quickly and caught her by mistake.

This isn't the only instance of abuse in the book and film. Atlas, who reconnects with Lily as an adult, becomes an issue between with Ryle in that he flies into multiple jealous frenzies; after hitting her, he also throws her down the stairs and later tells her that she tripped. The worst scene, though, is almost certainly when Ryle tries to violently sexually assault Lily, who manages to escape and leave their home. So what does Atlas have to do with all of this? Why does Ryle fly into (truly inexcusable) rages over Lily's first love?

Ryle's — again, fully inexcusable and horrific — behavior over Atlas all comes down to the fact that, unbeknownst to both Lily and Ryle, Atlas Corrigan (played as an adult by Brandon Sklenar) lives in Boston and runs a popular restaurant called Root. (In the book, the restaurant is called "Bib's," which is an acronym for "Better in Boston," a phrase that young Atlas used to say as a sort of mantra in Lily's presence; it's not fully clear why they changed it for the film, but in the movie, the name is still related to Lily, as it refers to a scene where the two teenagers plant a garden together and talk about how plants take root and become strong.) Before Ryle ever hurts Lily, the couple take Lily's mother Jenny to Root without knowing that Atlas owns the extremely popular and acclaimed establishment, and when Lily sees him during dinner, she's shocked but pleased. 

On the same day that Ryle first hits Lily, they make the decision to still go out for dinner with Allysa and her husband Marshall (played by Hasan Minhaj) at Root, and when Atlas sees Ryle's bandaged hand and Lily's conspicuous black eye, he flies off the handle and hits Ryle. This immediately adds to the tension between Lily and Ryle, and when Atlas stops by Lily's shop, he slips a piece of paper with his phone number inside her phone case, telling her to get in touch if she ever needs him. The discovery of this paper is what causes Ryle's worst attack — the aforementioned attempted sexual assault.

Before we get to Ryle's final and worst assault — and what Lily does next as it pertains to Atlas — we need to backtrack a bit. After Ryle hits Lily for the first time (claiming it was a total accident) and Atlas offers his phone number to Lily (which she pointedly does not decline), Lily decides to tell Ryle that the reason she's particularly hurt, both physically and emotionally, by his apparent attack because of her parents' history. Ryle is, in the moment, understanding, but he also repeats his behavior, making it clear that he doesn't really hear Lily.

Despite this, while Lily and Ryle visit Allysa and Marshall at the hospital after Allysa has her baby, Ryle proposes ... and Lily accepts, at which point the two elope. The incident on the staircase and the attempted sexual assault happen after they get married, and after the latter, Lily flees her and Ryle's home and goes to Root, looking for help from Atlas. He brings her to the hospital to treat her many injuries, at which point she discovers that she's pregnant with Ryle's baby. 

Lily stays with Atlas for a little while and decides to keep the baby, though, from this point on, she does not reconcile with Ryle. In fact, when Lily approaches Allysa about the abuse and confesses everything to Ryle's sister, who has become her closest friend, Allysa tells Lily something truly shocking about Ryle's past.

After Lily decides to keep the baby and sits down with Allysa, she learns that Ryle's abusive behavior may trace back to a horrific event from his childhood. When Ryle was just six years old, he got ahold of the Kincaid family firearm and accidentally killed his and Allysa's older brother, Emerson, leaving him permanently traumatized — even though this particular situation was not Ryle's fault. Still, Allysa won't stand for the way Ryle is treating Lily and tells Lily, in no uncertain terms, that she will support Lily during her motherhood journey ... and that Lily should not, under any circumstances, take Ryle back.

Throughout Lily's pregnany, Ryle begs and pleads, but she never gives in, and she finally leaves him shortly after the birth of their daughter (whom she names Emerson after Ryle's brother). In the movie's most emotionally stirring moment, Lily confronts an apologetic Ryle directly, asking him how he would feel if anyone ever abused their baby girl; finally, he seems to understand that he and Lily cannot be together and that he desperately needs to seek help to deal with his abusive tendencies. Ryle agrees to a divorce, and after he leaves the hospital room, Lily tells her daughter, whom she nicknames Emmy, that hopefully the cycle of abuse experienced by both Lily's mother and Lily herself "ends" with them (referencing the title).

The way the movie and the book ends is slightly different, but the gist is the same: Lily and Ryle are officially over. In the film, Lily is at a farmer's market a few years after her split from Ryle with a young Emmy when she runs into Atlas as he shops for his restaurant; the two exchange a loaded glance after she tells him that she and Ryle aren't together anymore, but that's where the film ends. So what about in Colleen Hoover's book? The conclusion is a lot more complicated, and it also paves the way for the book's sequel.

In the book, the timeline isn't as clear but the narrative is much more definitive about the relationship she has with Atlas after splitting with Ryle ... but it also has an unsettling major detail that the movie wisely omits. Hoover's version has Lily fully co-parenting with Ryle, and one day, she happens to run into Atlas on the street. After dropping Emmy off with Ryle, she seeks Atlas out to tell him that her daughter's middle name — Dory — is a reference to "Finding Nemo," a movie that gave them both strength as teenagers (there's a whole Ellen DeGeneres subplot in the book that the movie also smartly cuts) — and it's clear that she wants to rekindle their romance. The reason this is unsettling, though, is because Ryle, who is physically abusive, has shared custody of Emmy ... and in her 2022 sequel, she explores the ramifications of this.

"It Starts With Us" picks up precisely where "It Ends With Us" leaves off, in that Lily runs into Atlas as she's bringing Emmy, now 11 months old, to see Ryle. Lily's life is, without question, very complicated; despite Ryle's requests to spend more time with Emmy, she's adamant that her daughter not spend overnights alone with Ryle until Emmy is old enough to speak (which is a devastating condition Lily has to set), but after her run-in with Atlas, the two eventually reconnect and take their budding relationship slowly. 

At the same time, Atlas — who gets point of view chapters in the sequel — is dealing with his own ghosts. After his restaurant is vandalized — and food is stolen — Atlas unexpectedly reconnects with his younger brother, who recently ran away from home and their abusive mother. As Atlas and Lily deal with their families, they run into more obstacles, including Ryle, who falls right back into his old patterns when he learns that Atlas and Lily are together. Eventually, Lily, Marshall, and Allysa have an intervention with Ryle, telling him that he can't seem Emmy anymore unless the visits or supervised and that he must attend anger management classes if he wants to be a part of her daughter's life; Ryle accepts these in the end. Six months after the main narrative, Atlas and Lily move in together, and the book ends as Atlas goes over his vows before their wedding.

"It Ends With Us" is streaming on Netflix now.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).

If you or someone you know is dealing with domestic abuse, you can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−7233. You can also find more information, resources, and support at their website.