I had no plans to be a writer. My teenaged bid for stardom was to be a pop star... which, ahem, didn't exactly work out.

Ok. don't panic. Don't panic. It's only a VISA bill. It's a piece of paper; a few numbers. I mean, just how scary can a few numbers be?

Jeez Louise. I know why rich people are so thin: it's from trekking around their humongous houses the whole time.

I'm allergic to family occasions. Sometimes I think we'd do better as dandelion seeds-no family, no history, just floating off into the world, each on our own piece of fluff.

We're playing Scrabble. It's a nightmare." "Scrabble?" He sounds surprised. "Scrabble's great." "Not when you're playing with a family of geniuses, it's not. They all put words like 'iridiums'. And I put 'pig'.

There's genuine pain in Eric's eyes. And I feel a stab of guilt. But you can't stay with people because of guilt.

But sometimes you have to be brave. Sometimes you have to show people what's important in life.