A home to come back to every day of their lives. Where they would all belong or long to be. A place on the Jellicoe Road.

One of Sir Topher's rules was to never indulge in sentimentality, never return for what was left behind.

Your friends are at the house.' I sit up, straight. 'Who'? 'I don't know. Weird people. The Sullivan girl, whose father got the Gosford police to pick you up.' 'Siobhan?' 'And another one who's making cups of tea for everyone, and keeping the boy who's telling Luca fart jokes away from the girl who says he's "the last bastion of patriarchal poor taste".' 'Justine, Thomas and Tara.' And the drug fiend, Jimmy, is keeping Mia calm and the Trombal boy's rung about ten times. I don't like his manner on the phone.' 'You won't like any guy's manner on the phone.

The head nerd of the Cadets is my partner and when it's over he asks me for my number. I'm very flattered and he looks a bit crestfallen when I say no. "It's because they don't have coverage out here," Griggs tells him. "No," I say, looking up at Griggs. "It's actually because my heart belongs to someone else." And if I could bottle the look on his face, I'd keep it by my bedside for the rest of my life.

Lucian was beginning to get used to hearing her small observations at night. More than anything, he realized he liked her voice in the dark. It made him feel less lonely.

You're judging her by her literacy," Tara says. "You're a literacist." "You've made that up.

She was the most beautiful woman in the world. If she was alive I'd probably be a better person.