I'm the last of the mad ones.

Were you playing with Stuart?" she asked. The question was loaded. I was a filthy, filthy woman, and even the five-year-old knew it.

Do you ever sing in the car?" "Generally not. But I am driving a police car." "I think people would like a singing policeman. Makes life seem more like a musical. Like Foot-tastic." "You can talk for a long time about nothing." "I certainly can, you charming man!

Every time you try to flirt with her, a puppy dies.

New start or not, there was a line to be drawn, and that line was singing musicals to yourself as serious psychological motivation.

I had one class in the morning, the mysteriously named "Further Maths". It was two hours long and so deeply frightening that I think I went into a trance.

This wasn't a position she wanted to be in. And yet . . . yet she knew that she was going to do it anyway.