“Some twat with a Trot poster came up to me on the way in and yelled ‘Butcher!’ Traitor!’ at me. I stopped and mustered as much visual contempt as I could, then assured him that if we win the general election then don’t worry, thanks to wankers like him, there will always be another Tory government along afterwards. These people make me vomit.”

“I love the me I am with him. I’m the girl who has Dave. I’m Lauren, Dave’s girlfriend. I’m someone better than Lauren Smith, who no one noticed till Dave came along. The thing is, that girl isn’t me and I know it. But when I’m with him, I feel like I could be her. That if something in me was just–I don’t know, shifted a little or something, smoothed down–people would think of me the way they think of Dave, and everything would always be perfect. I would be perfect.”

“Every now and then, I’d meet a guy and think that we were getting along great, and suddenly I’d stop hearing from him. Not only did he stop calling, but if I happened to bump into him sometime later he always acted like I had the plague. I didn’t understand it. I still don’t. And it bothered me. It hurt me. With time, it got harder and harder to keep blaming the guys, and I eventually came to the conclusion that there was something wrong with me. That maybe I was simply meant to live my life alone.”

“Thank you, Adam,” I told him. “Thank you for tearing Tim into small Tim bits. Thank you for forcing me to drink one last cup of fairy bug-juice so I could have use of both of my arms. Thank you for being there, for putting up with me.” By that point I wasn’t laughing anymore. “Thank you for keeping me from being another of Stefan’s sheep—I’ll take pack over that any day. Thank you for making the tough calls, for giving me time.” I stood up and walked to him, leaning against him and pressing my face against his shoulder.“Thank you for loving me.”His arms closed around me, pressing flesh painfully hard against bone. Love hurts like that sometimes.”

“Aren’t they supposed to be hiring someone else to train me full-time anyway?”“Yes,” he said, getting up and pulling her to her feet along with him,“ and I’m worried that if you get into the habit of making out with your instructors, you’ll wind up making out with him, too.”“ Don’t be sexist. They could find me a female instructor.”“In that case you have my permission to make out with her, as long as I can watch.”

“Ooh that’s him!” my mom cried jumping up and down.“Why don’t you date him, mom? You seem to really like him,” I smiled.She stopped jumping. “Oh, I couldn’t. He’s much too young for me,” she laughed wickedly and went to get the door.“Haven’t you ever heard of cougars!” I yelled after her. Sloane and her mom Tammi”