Slow Dance

by Rainbow Rowell

If Shiloh could talk to her teenage self now, she’d point out that deciding wasn’t any good if you weren’t deciding correctly—or even in the neighborhood of correctly.

Almost no one in the world did anything right. Everyone’s hair was too long or too short. Everyone was too loud or too quiet. Nothing was the right color. Music was embarrassing. Movies were confusing. Shiloh hated it. She hated it all.)

To keep it going, all Shiloh had to do was keep her self-consciousness at bay. (Her self-consciousness and her bone-deep desolation.) (She could be desolate tomorrow. And the next day. She could table her ennui.)

Shiloh hadn’t been able to conceive of a life without Cary . . . until that’s what she had. A whole life without him, years and years, with no sign of that ever changing. This night was an aberration. This dance. Shiloh closed her eyes and kept her shoulders loose. She kept track of everywhere that Cary was touching her.

cells get replaced in the human body every seven years. So that’s two full iterations since 1992. You don’t have any cells left that remember me.” “I’m pretty sure my cells remember you, Shiloh.”

She pulled Cary even closer, too close for gazing. With her arms around his neck and her cheek right next to his. It was a truly astonishing amount of intimacy. (Maybe worse than eye contact.) Shiloh couldn’t be this close to Cary and also talk, so she didn’t talk. She closed her eyes. She corralled her nervous system.

I didn’t want that to be the thing that people know me by, like, forever. The bald girl. Like Sinéad O’Connor. So that I’d never look normal with hair again.”

“No. I . . . I think I’ve just gotten used to talking to people who don’t matter. And then I looked at you and remembered what it felt like to care about someone.” “Shiloh . . .” He squeezed her waist. “I’ve really missed you.” “You’re lucky you have such a good head,” she said again. “Such a good face . . .” She touched his cheeks. His nose. His chin. He wasn’t sure what game she was playing. He wasn’t sure this was a game. Shiloh looked like she might cry. Cary leaned forward and kissed her.

He’d always known that if he started kissing Shiloh, he wouldn’t be able to stop. That was one of the reasons that kissing her had always been such a bad idea. You can’t date your best friend in high school. Cary couldn’t have dated Shiloh. There was nowhere for them to go with each other. The minute they started, they’d be at the finish line. He already knew her so well. He already loved her so much.

But somehow he was still with Shiloh, still connected to her. When she looked up at him, he could see she’d been crying. He didn’t think twice—he kissed her.

“We should have sex,” Shiloh said. She was lying in his arms, on the bed in her dorm room. They’d been kissing for hours. They’d been kissing all day. They’d been kissing like they’d both realized that they should have been kissing all along. Cary was feeling a little drunk from it. “What?” “We should have sex. I’ve never done it.”

“I know you’re out of practice, Shiloh, but the point of bringing men home isn’t to argue with them.”

He kissed her, and she realized that she was always going to kiss him back. That she would have kissed him back at thirteen. At fifteen. After any day of school. At prom. At graduation. When they’d said goodbye last summer. At no point would Shiloh ever have refused him. At no point could she.

Shiloh would rather not live in an Ikea showroom. She liked old things and bright colors. She liked having too many throw pillows and too many coffee mugs. She liked rugs. And macramé wall hangings. She liked everything to be a little too much.

“Uhhh, maybe I’d believe that if I hadn’t seen you filming a romantic comedy at my own wedding reception. Like, seriously. It was my wedding, but you guys got voted Cutest Couple.”

“We’re in league. You suckers are never getting rid of me. I am going to burden you with so many dangerous secrets.”

Shiloh was an expert in playing Chutes and Ladders or dolls or even reading bedtime stories with one part of her brain, while another part of her brain whirred away on whatever was weighing on her at the moment . . .

You need to aim for the pins when it’s your turn to bowl.”

This was Cary. He was naked. They were both naked, it was distracting—it was mortifying. She felt like screaming. She felt like knocking something over. She was happy, but too full. Happy in a way that scratched. She couldn’t take this all at once.

And then Shiloh was pregnant and breastfeeding, and she stopped wanting sex. She’d still have it. And she usually enjoyed it once they got rolling. But her desire felt buried under a heavy blanket of snow. (Her

“Did you really vote for Ralph Nader?” She buried her face under his arm. “Why did he tell you that?” “What were you thinking?” “It made sense at the time! I’m sorry, okay?” Shiloh poked Cary’s belly. “Did you vote for W?” He brought his arms down around her. He was laughing. “No. I voted for Al Gore. Like a sane person.”