Poppy’s just finished a degree in costume design and yesterday afternoon she had the final presentation of her work at college. When it was over, she went out to celebrate and didn’t get back to the castle until the early hours of this morning.

I was in bed, but still awake, so she came into my room to tell me drunkenly about her day. On the way out she spotted an animal glove puppet I’d bought at the weekend.

It’d been a spontaneous purchase. I’d been browsing and when I saw this otter puppet I bought it because it made me laugh. You might remember that last summer I was ticcing a lot about having a love affair with an otter.

With a mischievous laugh Poppy put the puppet on and turned towards on me. She jumped excitedly onto my bed and made the Mr Otter puppet kiss me. My tics went berserk but Poppy went on harassing me with Mr Otter for some time. When our laughter finally eased off she wobbled off to bed.