8st 12 1/2(have lost 3lb 8oz literally overnight – must have eaten food which uses up more calories to eat it than it gives off e.g. v. chewy Lettuce), alcohol units 4 (modest), cigarettes 21 (bad), Instants 4 (not v.g.).
4.30 p.m. Just when Perpetua was breathing down my neck so she didn't end up late for her weekend in Gloucestershire at the Trehearnes' the phone rang.
'Hello, darling!' My mother. 'Guess what? I've got the most marvellous opportunity for you.'
'What?' I muttered sulkily.
'You're going to be on television,' she gushed as I crashed my head on to the desk.
'I'm coming round with the crew at ten o'clock tomorrow. Oh, darling, aren't you thrilled?'
'Mother. If you're coming round to my flat with a television crew, I won't be in it.'
'Oh, but you must,' she said icily.
'No,' I said. But then vanity began to get the better of me. 'Why, anyway? What?'
'Oh, darling,' she cooed. 'They're wanting someone younger for me to interview on "Suddenly Single": someone pre-menopausal and Suddenly Single who can talk about, well, you know, darling, the pressures of impending childlessness, and so on.'
'I'm not pre-menopausal, Mother!' I exploded. 'And I'm not Suddenly Single either. I'm suddenly part of a couple.'
'Oh, don't be silly, darling,' she hissed. I could hear office noises in the background.
'I've got a boyfriend.'
'Never you mind, I said, suddenly glancing over my shoulder at Perpetua, who was smirking.
'Oh, please, darling. I've told them I've found someone.
'No.'
'Oh, pleeeeeease. I've never had a career all my life and now I'm in the autumn of my days and I need something for myself,' she gabbled, as if reading from a cue card.
'Someone I know might see. Anyway, won't they notice I'm your daughter?'
There was a pause. I could hear her talking to someone in the background. Then she came back and said, 'We could blot out your face.'
'What? Put a bag over it?' Thanks a lot.
'Silhouette, darling, silhouette. Oh, please, Bridget. Remember, I gave you the gift of life. Where would you be without me? Nowhere. Nothing. A dead egg. A piece of space, darling.'
The thing is I've always, secretly, rather fancied being on television.
Saturday 20 May
9st 3 (why? Why? from where?), alcohol units 7 (Saturday), cigarettes 17 (positively restrained, considering), number of correct lottery numbers 0 (but v. distracted by filming).
The crew had trodden a couple of wine glasses into the carpet before they'd been in the house thirty seconds, but I'm not too fussed about that sort of thing. It was when one of them staggered in shouting, 'Mind your backs,' carrying an enormous light with flaps on it, then bellowed, 'Trevor, where do you want this brute?' overbalanced, crashed the light through the glass door of the kitchen cupboard and knocked an open bottle of extra virgin olive oil over on to my River Cafe cookbook that I realized what I'd done.
Three hours after they arrived, filming had still not begun and they were still boshing around saying, 'Can I just cheat you this way a bit, love?' By the time we finally got going, with Mother and I sitting opposite each other in semidarkness, it was nearly half past one.
'And tell me,' she was saying 'in a caring, understanding voice I'd never heard before, 'when your husband left you, did you have' – she
was almost whispering now – 'suicidal thoughts?'
I stared at her incredulously.
'I know this is painful for you. If you feel you're going to break down we can stop for a moment,' she said hopefully.