“What’s it like being this self-confident?” I lean into him and he wraps me carefully in a hug. “I’ve been trying to call you.”

“I know. I just needed to get myself sorted. I thought you’d understand.” Then he goes still. “But if I’m too late, and you continued on with the Sasaki Method— ”

“Relax. The Sasaki Method is a success, because I fell in love.” I tip my face up and I get the kiss I’ve ached for every minute of every day since he left. What a privilege, to be so young. I have my entire life to know him, to laugh at him, to let him care for me in his sweet, clumsy ways. I can teach him how to give, and he can urge me to take.

I can have this kiss for the rest of my life, if I’m really careful.

The music changes, he takes my hand in his and we walk to the dance floor. “Oh, look,” Teddy says to me, pointing discreetly. Renata is holding a square ring box behind her back. When they slowly move around, we see that Aggie has a ring box, too.

“It’s a race to propose.” He smiles. “Who will win, do you think?”

“I think they’ll call it a draw.” I’m smiling, too, when he kisses me again. And again. We only break apart when we hear someone clearing their throat.

It’s Mrs. Whittaker. She leans in and tells me with feeling, “Well done. Oh, hello dearie,” she says with her eyeline behind us. “What a fancy … costume.”

“I am only thirty minutes late.” It’s a breathless Melanie, dressed in a traditional Japanese yukata, teamed with an elaborate fifties beehive. She looks back at her watch. “Okay, more like forty-five minutes late. What the hell is going on here?” She’s noticed Rose and Jerry, mingling with the residents. She definitely notices Teddy’s hand on my waist. “I really didn’t think you’d show up.”

“I came back to rescue Ruthie. But I think the tortoises are going to rescue her, and this place. Their little way of saying thank you.”

“My Sasaki Method. What a waste of a brilliant concept.” She points at our joined hands. “Ruthie Midona, you wrote a list that would not describe Teddy in a million years.”

“Lists aren’t always right.” When I say that, they both make identical theatrical gasps.

“So you decided to charm her for good. All the cheese you can eat. I was all set to pick out a bridesmaid’s dress, and you had to just come along and ruin everything.” Melanie unknowingly says something very hurtful to him, but Teddy doesn’t flinch. Maybe one hug with his sister has balmed that wound.

He tells her, “Nothing’s ruined. Ruthie’s world is going to remain exactly the same.”

I have something to tell them. “I’m leaving Providence. You’ve both given me some really good advice. It’s time for me to see the world outside this place.”

“So you’re not planning on staying here until you die anymore?” Teddy asks with hope.

“No, I think I need to find something new for myself.” I think of my forum, my clothes, the tortoise-littered paths I’ve walked a thousand times. “It’s going to be scary, but I want to do it.”

We are all distracted by the scene unfolding on the dance floor: two elderly women, offering each other rings. The semicircle around them breaks into applause.

“We’ll help you,” Melanie says without thought. That’s the kind of friend she is. She walks toward the Parlonis and begins taking photos.

“And will you help me, too?” I ask Teddy. “I mean, I can probably do it by myself, but if you were there, I wouldn’t be so nervous when I go to the Reptile Zoo with my internship application.”

His smile is brilliant. “Yes, I am going to help. I will do everything for you. It’s my turn to give. So let me.” He cups my jaw in his warm, tattooed hands, and as his lips touch mine, the mirror ball glitters me blind. I’m dazzled, I know I am. And I don’t ever want it to end. And for a long time, it doesn’t.

In the lull of silence between songs, Melanie screams in horror: “Oh my God, Teddy got his hair cut.”

EPILOGUE

I’d know that door knock anywhere, always in the same pattern and cadence. “Coming.” I open my door and Teddy’s there, holding grocery bags in each hand and my mail in his mouth. “I couldn’t use my key,” he says through his teeth.

“What have we got here?” I take the envelopes out of his mouth. Now he’s freed up to give me a hello kiss, and he sure does.

“I brought a bunch of stuff you’re running low on.” He begins to unpack the bags into my fridge. “Did you finish your essay?”

“Yeah, I turned that in earlier. Now I’m sitting here thinking about something really hard.” I stack my textbooks away and sit back down at my laptop. “Have you ever had something that you held on to for a really long time for sentimental reasons?” I’m looking at my home page for my forum, Heaven Sent You Here.

“Sure, of course. Sentimentality is my bread and butter.”

I look at his tattoos and smile. “It’s time I admitted a secret. I was the administrator of a really big online forum.”

He’s finished unpacking the groceries and brings a wooden board over to the table. He’s made a tiny cheese platter. “What’s this forum? No. Don’t tell me. It’s for Heaven Sent.”

“Yeah. I’ve been running it with my friends since we were fifteen. But with the Pastor Pierce court trial, no one can feel the same way anymore. I think it might be time to close it down.”

Teddy leans over and cuts into the piece of cheese and hands me a preloaded cracker. When he sees the screen, he remembers something and laughs. “I’m a member of this.”

“What?”

“Back when we lived at Providence, I joined up so I could impress you. No wonder you were always watching the exact episode I needed to keep up. I just thought you were magical and perfect.”

“I’m okay with you thinking that.” I watch as he begins making another little cracker-and-cheese combo, knowing it’s for me. And sure enough, he’s putting it in my hand before I’ve eaten the first one. “Slow down.”

“I can’t slow down with you,” he argues. “You make me want to speed up everything.”

He’s been asking me to move in when my lease here ends. I do love my little studio apartment up on the fourth floor, and with the back pay from PDC I can afford it. But Teddy’s apartment is closer to college, and his bed is the comfiest place on earth.

His bed is like quicksand, though— if I get in, I can’t get out.

I nibble my thumb. “Do you think I should close it down? The other admins have told me it’s up to me. This was a lot of time. A lot of memories.” I look at the home page, which has barely changed since I was fifteen.

“I don’t think you need it anymore,” Teddy says. “You’ve let go of a lot since you left Providence, and it’s only been good for you.” He’s meaning how I’ve been seeing a therapist and I don’t need to recheck door handles until my palm is sore. “But you can leave it up. It won’t do any harm just sitting there.”

“It’s getting negative.”

I hate the posts about the actor on trial. It reminds me, too, that I’m going to have to be a witness in PDC’s case against Sylvia Drummond. It didn’t look good for her when the photographs of her disembarking the ship in a fancy outfit hit the news cycle. Her face was contorted in fury, and when she eventually called me, I was prepared to defend myself. And I had Teddy beside me, holding my hand through that call, and Rose Prescott by my other shoulder.

My parents are now sure that Sylvia was the one who took the church money.

“I got a text from Mel,” Teddy says with his mouth full of cheese. “She’s asked us to come and help set up for the Christmas party this year.”

“Of course we will.”

Mel ended up finding her dream job. She runs a full activity program for the residents of Providence, but it doesn’t stop there. She travels across six retirement sites, coordinating a variety of craft sessions, outings, and dance parties. Every workday for Mel is different. She loves old people. And most importantly, she visits both the wealthy residents of Providence, and the stripped-back struggling residences downtown, spreading her sparkle.

I say to Teddy, “It’ll be sad to go back, though.”

A quiet settles over us and when Teddy looks at me, he’s got memories in his eyes. He says gently, “She died happy, and it was because of you.”

Renata Parloni’s funeral was outrageous, and she would have loved it. Dubbed a HOT OR NOT magazine publishing pioneer by newspaper obituaries, her ceremony was attended by fashion designers, magazine moguls, and leggy models who peeked furtively at Teddy in his suit. He was too busy holding Aggie’s arm to notice, and besides, I was on his other arm.

When the priest said that Renata was survived by her wife, Aggie Parloni, a ripple of applause went through the room.