THE DAILY MALE - continues...

I go to my cupboard and sniff his shirt, like the answer lurks somewhere in its armpit. I contemplate cutting off one of the sleeves and sending it to him like some sinister Cosa Nostra warning: 'Next time it’ll be your arm...'

Feels more like my arm’s been cut off - or any other stupid, childish, over-dramatised, non-sensical, self-indulgent pity fest you can think of.

I have an invitation to go to a cocktail party, but I contemplate staying home alone to wallow in my misery. Slashing my wrists with a Stanley knife sounds like a plan or maybe I’ll drink a bottle of vodka, finish off the Pringles and go to bed to watch Desperate Housewives, 'desperate' being the operative word. I go to the party.

When I get in, I check the TV listings and notice that Newcastle United were playing Zulte Waregam in the UEFA Cup. That might explain what he’s doing tonight.

Mindful of the fact that I haven’t eaten and will therefore have to add ‘night starvation’ to my list of sufferings, I stick a potato in the oven. This is one of the potatoes I bought for him. I never buy potatoes for myself. Fattening carb-ridden white pasty doughy things.

It sits squat and lonely on its piece of foil in the oven with the broken light which he’d promised to fix several times and didn’t. O melancholy potato, borne of the womb of our blessed Mother Earth, why am I eating you alone? Forgive me, dear reader. It’s the vodka talking.

My deadline to call him, previously set at 6 p.m. then extended to 7, 8, 9 and 10 p.m. passes, and eventually, not being able to bear it a moment longer, I prepare a text:

'Hiya! Hope you’re OK. Do we have a problem? x’

It takes me half an hour to compose these nine words, and me a writer… I don't send it. I go instead to my wardrobe for another deep sniff of his shirt and check to see if my lucky ladybird is still patrolling my bedroom window. She is not. I eventually find her lying dry and lifeless on the bedroom floor. Dead as a dodo and stiff as my next drink.

I retire early to seek oblivion and sleep fitfully with my mobile phone clutched like a life raft in my tense little hand.

Next morning, I rise early and set off for Edinburgh on business. Sitting on the Easybus to Luton half way up the M1, I finally receive a text from him.

‘Hi hun enjoy yr day in Edinbruh. Call me when you have time. Speke to u l8tr. Xx'

Cheeky F*cker! But my soul soars and despite the road works, traffic delays and the possibility of me missing my flight, I am as happy as a pig in shit. I revel in the receipt of his heavenly missive and manage to control myself for THREE HOURS before replying.