Eleanor & Park

by Rainbow Rowell

As soon as he touched her, he wondered how he’d gone this long without doing it.

(Conversations with her dad were like whiplash; they didn’t always hurt right away.)

“Don’t be mad at me,” he said, sighing. “It makes me crazy.”

Whenever he saw Eleanor, he couldn’t think about pulling away. He couldn’t think about anything at all. Except touching her. Except doing whatever he could or had to, to make her happy.

“Eleanor…” “Stop. Don’t say my name like that. It only makes it worse.” “Makes what worse?” “Everything,” she said.

“I don’t like you,” he said. “I need you.”

“I don’t like you, Park,” she said, sounding for a second like she actually meant it. “I…”—her voice nearly disappeared—“think I live for you.”

“I don’t think I even breathe when we’re not together,” she whispered.

She never felt like she belonged anywhere, except for when she was lying on her bed, pretending to be somewhere else.

But Park’s face was like art. And not weird, ugly art either. Park had the sort of face you painted because you didn’t want history to forget it.

Eleanor was right: She never looked nice. She looked like art, and art wasn’t supposed to look nice; it was supposed to make you feel something.

She was all he could see.