I felt myself melting into the shadows like the negative of a person I'd never seen before in my life.

I felt very still and empty, the way the eye of a tornado must feel, moving dully along in the middle of the surrounding hullabaloo.

I started adding up all the things I couldn't do.

I wanted to be where nobody I knew could ever come.

England offers new comforts. I could write a novel there.

So I kiss him, and there is the great dark sea ahead.

As I lay on my back in bed staring up at the blank, white ceiling the stillness seemed to grow bigger and bigger until I felt my eardrums would burst with it.