Women are elephants and watch the way you say that in front of them because they'll think you're calling them fat and there's no coming back from that moment. But they hoard. They say they don't, but they do. We think that if something's not spoken about again, it goes away. It doesn't. Nothing goes away just like that.

Are you an idiot, or an idiot?' Gargarin hissed. 'The first one. I really resent being called the second.

And it was this image that was stamped on the hearts and minds of all who were present that day. Of Froi of the Exiles holding the future of Lumatere in his hands.

I shrug. "I'll probably mention that I'm in love with you." He chuckles. "Only you would say that in such a I-think-I'll-wash-my-hair-tonight tone.

As I walk back to the school on my own, I realise I'm crying. So I go back to the stories I've read about the five and I try to make sense of their lives because in making sense of theirs, I may understand mine.

In the end, the sum of my vices is all me.

We're so different. You're an intellectual. I'm an idiot." "Don't say that," I yelled. "You're not an idiot, you stupid idiot.