In the future, I'll be braver, she told herself. In the future, I will always speak my mind, eloquently, passionately.

She used to pride herself on her refusal to see two sides of an argument, but increasingly she accepts that issues are more ambiguous and complicated than she once thought.

Sometimes I wish that I hadn't learned how to crochet," I say, and Alice laughs. Obviously she thinks I'm joking, which is maybe for the best.

As soon as she'd met him at the arrivals gate on his return from Thailand, lithe and brown and shaven-headed, she knew that there was no chance of a relationship between them. Too much had happened to him, too little had happened to her.

As the possibility of a relationship had faded, Emma had endeavored to harden herself to Dexter's indifference and these days a remark like this caused no more pain than, say, a tennis ball thrown sharply at the back of her head.

He's laughing me into a stupor, she thought. I could heckle, I suppose, I could throw a bread roll at him, but he's eaten them all. She glanced at the other diners, all of them going into their act, and thought is this what it all boils down to? Romantic love, is this all it is, a talent show? Eat a meal, go to bed, fall in love with me and I promise you years and years of top notch material like this?

He could feel her laughter against his chest, and at that moment he thought that there was no better feeling than making Emma Morley laugh.