I just stood there, open mouthed.

“He doesn’t want a child, so I’m going to go it alone. No more men for me. It’s the modern way, you know, and at least I’ll have a bit of money, thanks to you and our film.”

Well, I was aghast. Was this my chance? After all, he’d caught her on the rebound, why shouldn’t I? The second bounce, the double whammy. The possibilities of the situation were only just beginning to sink in when a publicist came over to get Lucy for an interview. She was in far more demand than I was this evening, by the way, even though I was the top-billed writer. Hardly surprising, really. She was gorgeous and in a sexy frock and I was Mr Beardy in an unironed dinner jacket. I know who I would have wanted to interview.

Suddenly she was leaving.

“Well… goodbye, Sam,” she said.

I made my decision. Well, it was more of an impulse than a decision. Let’s face it, I was desperate. I had one chance.

“Lucy,” I said. “Come back to me! Please, please come back. I’ll do anything. I made the stupidest mistake of my life, but I didn’t mean it. Tell me how I can make it up! Please, I love you…”

“Sam,” she said. “Don’t be absurd. We can’t go back. I’m pregnant with another man’s baby.”

Then inspiration struck. Maybe I could get her back after all.

“I’ll look after it!” I blurted. “I’ll help bring it up. I’ll be its father.”

And I meant it too. I’d love to bring up Lucy’s child. I don’t care who else’s it would be. Lucy’s child would be part of her and there’s nothing about Lucy that I would not love.

It was a stunning thing to say. I felt winded, suddenly everything seemed to be in slow motion, like I wasn’t actually there but was sort of hovering above it all, watching. The publicist kept tugging at my arm. She can’t have heard what Sam said, or if she had she didn’t care. Publicists at premières have to be very single-minded. After all, you only get one shot at a thirty-second grab on Greater London Radio.

“Sam,” I said. “You didn’t even want children of your own, let alone somebody else’s.”

Perhaps it was just the noise of the crowd but my voice sounded very strange to me. Sam looked absolutely desperate, wild even, like Rasputin, although I think that was mainly the beard. The crowd around us were getting louder, everybody calling for drinks and congratulating each other.

“Can’t a man make a mistake, for fuck’s sake?!” Sam shouted, inevitably choosing the very moment when the room went quiet.

It was fate’s favourite practical joke. Kill the volume just when the idiot with long hair and a beard is shouting obscenities. Everybody turned to look. Lucy went red. God, I wanted to ravish her there and then.

For a second I thought she was going to hit me. Instead she just stared at me for a moment and then left with the publicist scuttling after her.

Dear Penny

This morning when I woke (I hadn’t thought I’d been asleep at all but I must have been, I suppose) there was a huge bunch of flowers on my doorstep.

This is what the card said:

If I have to serve a life sentence for what I did, can’t I at least serve it with you?

Which is not a bad line, I must say, and I swear if he ever uses it in a script I’ll kill him.

I am of course very confused. So much is happening at once. I do love Sam, of course I love Sam, but I can’t just pick things up as if nothing has happened.

Can I?

Except of course something has happened. Something really extraordinary. Sam has offered to help me bring up my child. He loves me, there can be no better proof of that. I do believe that my joy is complete.

I’ve just received an email from Lucy. She will have me back. We are to be a family. I have never in my entire life been so happy as I am now.

Dear Penny

Today has been a very upsetting day, although now that it’s over I feel curiously strong.

I’m not pregnant. Dr Cooper says that I was pregnant, at least he thinks I was, but I’m not any more. He says that I’ve suffered a very early miscarriage, which is very common, if indeed I was pregnant at all. Whatever the problem is with me and fertility, it’s not yet solved. Sam came with me to the doctor and afterwards we sat in the car and cried a little together. After that we went and got pissed.

Dear Sam

Lucy and I have been back together for six months. The happiest six months of my life, despite the fact that we’ve just been through our second IVF cycle and failed it. The doctors said that there were some signs of it having begun to work (they know this from the blood tests) but that ultimately Debbie and Dick Two could not hang on. Lucy was very upset, of course, we both were, but we’re OK. We had a wonderful holiday in India afterwards, no replacement, of course, but still absolutely fantastic and something we’ve always wanted to do.

I’m writing this sitting on the bed in a lovely little room in a country hotel in Dorset. Lucy is wearing nothing but a silk slip and is making my heart ache with love and desire. She’s packing up a knapsack with champagne, chocolates and a big rug. It’s a beautiful warm summer evening. In an hour or so we’ll creep out into the night and make our way up the hill to the great and ancient chalk giant’s penis. It might work, it might not. Either way, I can’t wait.