He shakes his head with a slow smile. You'd better be right. If the phone rings, I'm unpluggining it, I swear to God-“ You'd do that to your five-year-old sister?“ I gasp in mock outrage. For one whole night alone? Jesus, Maya, I'd sell her to the gypsies!

Never before have I imagined my life without him—like this house, he is my only point of reference in this difficult existence, this unstable and frightening world. The thought of his leaving home fills me with a terror so strong, it takes my breath away. I feel like one of those seagulls covered in oil from a spill, drowning in a black tar of fear.

Family: the most important thing of all. My siblings may drive me crazy at times but they are my blood. They’re all I’ve known. My family is me. They are my life. Without them I walk the planet alone. Forbidden, Tabitha Suzuma

...and my loneliness, always my loneliness - that airless bubble of despair that is slowing stifling me.

Even though I'm surrounded by pupils, there is the invisible screen screen between us, and behind the glass wall I am screaming - screaming in my own silence, screaming to be noticed, to be befriended, to be liked.

He is my soul mate, my fresh air, the reason I look forward to getting up every morning.

And I know how he feels–it’s so good it hurts.