I'm reading this book, and there is a love scene in which I don't understand the usage of the word "type".
Here I quote a large chunk containing the word in question:
The whole affair was the precise opposite of what I figured it would
be: slow and patient and quiet and neither particularly painful nor
particularly ecstatic. There were a lot of condomy problems that I did
not get a particularly good look at. No headboards were broken. No
screaming. Honestly, it was probably the longest time we’d ever spent
together without talking.
Only one thing followed type:
Afterward, when I had my face resting against Augustus’s chest,
listening to his heart pound, Augustus said, “Hazel Grace, I literally
cannot keep my eyes open.”
“Misuse of literality,” I said.
“No,”
he said. “So. Tired.”
His face turned away from me, my ear pressed
to his chest, listening to his lungs settle into the rhythm of sleep.
After a while, I got up, dressed, found the Hotel Filosoof stationery,
and wrote him a love letter: …
(from The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green)
Best Answer
The expression is [to] follow type.
It means to run true to form, to occur in a predictable way.
It is uncommon nowadays, perhaps considered a little rarefied. I haven't found it in any dictionary other than All Dictionary, where it seems to be used incidentally; perhaps 'follow form' was intended.
The associated sense of 'type' is given by dictionaries, eg AHDEL:
OALD, I think (but it keeps misdirecting me to 'type I': but ODO/OALD is usually what the 'Google Dictionary' quotes) has the definition and synonyms
So 'follow type' would be 'conform to the expected pattern'; it is idiomatic in that padding words are not included (contrast *'follow pattern').
Again, rare nowadays.