I found the brightness of the outdoors, rectangled through large glass panels.

Right now I felt like a person learning that a surgeon had left a pair of scissors inside her during a operation.

There are times when any amount of being within the world is like rubbing bare skin against sandpaper, when any form of motion is a kind of abrasion, leaving you raw and pink and vulnerable to the next thing. At these times I prefer to close my eyes and be still, still like the cups or candles or crackers on the table, nerveless and open. I closed my eyes and tried to think of the thing furthest from my situation.

I find it increasingly difficult to speak of my feelings at will.

She was truly happy for the first time in her life, and it felt just like living in a small room painted all white, with windows looking out onto impenetrable forest.

I did have a friend,' I said.

'And your friend trespassed upon you,' the Wally replied.