“When the doors closed behind me I felt like a bird had got inside my chest and was beating its wings trying to get loose, and it wasn't leaving much room for me to breathe.”

“I didn't understand right away what she meant. But her words soaked through my skull like warm oil, behind my eyes, down my spine and into the empty space inside me.”

“I know that sentence is long and has too many joining words in it but sometimes, when I'm angry, words burst out of me like a shout, or, if I'm sad, they spill out of me like tears, and if I'm happy my words are like a song. If that happens it's one of my rules not to change them because they're coming out of my heart and not my head, and that's the way they're meant to be.”

“I wasn't going to let things happen to me any more. I was going to make them happen.”

“She reminded me of the sea; the way she came dancing towards you, wild and beautiful, and just when she was almost close enough to touch she'd rush away again.”

“Maybe if the empty space inside her was filled with love there'd be no room for sad and dark things.”

“It's like waking up and finding there's a war on. Nothing's the way it used to be and it's difficult to get your balance. That's why I held Billy's hand.”