I'm shoving piles of Max's clothes into garbage bags when the phone rings. It's Gloria.

'Are you sure you don't want to try out for Celebrity Circus, Luce? The wheel of death is really connecting with the twenty- to thirty-nine-year-olds out there.'

'Give up, Gloria.'

'Australian Fear Factor?'

'There is no way on this earth I'm letting some crazy guy talk me into eating rotten bull's balls or any other dead animal's genitalia.'

'You're making it hard for yourself, Lucy. You should at least try these things - I, myself, wouldn't be averse to a bit of ball action of any description right now. Besides, reality TV is not going to disappear, so the sooner you get used to the fact your future involves playing poker, eating witchetty grubs or parading half-nude in a fishbowl, the sooner you'll get real television work again.'

'Don't you think it's slightly odd that families gather round their television on Sunday nights to watch C-grade celebrities cram as many maggot-infested dead scorpions into their mouths as possible?'

'Give the audience what they want, that's my motto,' says Gloria, then takes a deep breath. 'Look, you know I'll keep putting you forward for commercials, Luce, but you have to make an effort.'

'Speaking of which, have you heard anything about the dog commercial?'

Gloria hesitates. 'Not yet.'

'That's not a good sign, is it?'

'I'm sure you'll get it.'

'You're such a bad liar.'

'I'm not. It's just that a lot of people auditioned. You know how it is. There's a tinnitus ad coming up. I'll see what buttons I need to push to get you an audition.'

'Great! I'll make sure I keep an ear out for your call. Can't wait.'

'Now, now, there are other people in the world -' she starts, but I hang up on her.

Instead of continuing to pack up Max's clothes, I check my email messages. There are none from Max, surprise, surprise, but there are two more from Dom. I don't know how I feel about that, except that I remember I forgot to tell Gloria off for putting him in contact with me.

To: LucySpringer@xbox.com.

From: DomDelahunty@littlepond.net.

Hey Lucy, okay, perhaps I was being too subtle with Hey Lucy, okay, perhaps I was being too subtle with my first email. Did you not get the hint that I want you to email me, or, better yet, pick up the phone?Gloria's filled me in on what's been going on and it sounds like you could do with the company of an old friend who knew you before The Young Residents and hasn't seen you espousing the virtues of broccoli.

I think that someone could be me. Come on, girl, call me. Dom xx To: LucySpringer@xbox.com.

From: DomDelahunty@littlepond.net.

Lucy, remember the end-of-year Christmas bash Lucy, remember the end-of-year Christmas bash where I knocked my head and you took me to hospital? Thought you might like to know I've still got a scar on my chin. Every time I shave, I think of you and smile. Well, not every time, but most . . . Call me. Dom xx

I don't delete the emails but I don't reply either.

Late that night, I toss and turn in bed, wondering, remembering and cursing. Dom probably has a wife and children of his own, and it makes me kind of sad that I missed out on all of that. Not that I wanted to be the mother of his children - I was never given the opportunity. Besides, I have my own. I'm just sad that more than a decade has sailed by and I don't know him anymore.

Day 20.

Patch arrives at 7.15 am. He's wearing scruffy Levi's, a faded red Chairman Mao T-shirt and brown Blundstones. It's not his usual workday attire.

'With all the damage the torrential rain has caused, we're not going to be able to work here for a couple of days until after the rain stops,' he says, looking at me expectantly. 'It's because your ground is made of clay and clay retains water.'

'But we've got no kitchen,' I say, bursting into tears.

Patch awkwardly puts his arms around me. He smells fresh. 'I'm sorry,' he says, and makes a hasty exit. It's 7.18 am.

So now I'm mopping up the floors (again!) while my teeth whiten. Yes, I'm wearing whitening strips on my choppers - feels like chewing gum, looks much worse. Why? Because I'm insecure and have succumbed to the advice of Petrea, aka Ms September, the bronzed woman at the Actors' Studio the other night who flashed her gleaming white teeth at me at every opportunity. 'White teeth give you a competitive edge every time, Lucy.' She looked like George Hamilton with boobs the way she was carrying on.

I have a feeling these strips aren't exactly what Petrea uses to achieve that enviable look, but I can't exactly embark on cosmetic dental surgery when I haven't even trialled my three-thousand-dollar toilet.

'Mum,' Sam says, walking into the room, 'Fred told everyone at school I have nits because I scratch my head a lot.'

'Tho thtop sthcratching your head.'

Sam stands in front of me furiously scratching at his scalp. 'I can't. What's on your teeth?'

I cover my mouth with my hand. 'Thothing.'

I quickly examine his head. Relief. No lice.

'Whoth Fred anyway?'

'A new kid. He can drink chocolate milk through a straw up his nose.'

Tonight I'm having dinner with a group of school mums. Though I hesitated before accepting the invitation, not fancying having to tell people Max has left me, I decided to go because I really need to put in some effort with the mums. Morning conversations at the school gate aren't much chop, Saturday soccer has deteriorated into a sombre occasion, and I really didn't make a good impression at Sam's concert.

As I still can't reach Alana, I reluctantly agree to let Mum have Bella and Sam sleep at her house, which is probably a good thing. When Sam's not furiously scratching at himself, he's blaming me because soccer's been cancelled due to rain.

'It's not my fault,' I tell him. 'Contrary to popular belief, I'm not God.'

Meanwhile, Bella's becoming more agitated because her dad's not here and hasn't called.

I try distracting them by taking them shopping, but even new Nintendo games don't keep them quiet for long. So yes, the break at Mum's will do us all good.

'Thanks for picking me up,' I say to Nadia on the way to dinner.

'Under the circumstances, Luce . . . I mean, with Max away and everything . . .'

We sit down at the reserved table for eight at the local Thai restaurant.

Emma is the next to arrive. She bounces up and gives me a big hug and kisses me on the cheek. 'How you doing?' she asks, her South African intonation unmistakable. Emma's complexion is flawless. She'd have to be in her mid-thirties, but you'd never know it. I can't find one wrinkle on her unblemished face and, believe me, I've searched.

'Not bad,' I say, now truly alarmed that the kids have been telling stories at school about me.

Within half an hour, seven women are drinking riesling and chatting about rostered sex lives. It's a bit of a change from the actors' party the other night, with people doing lines of coke at the bar and popping ecstasy tabs like they were peppermints. I notice there are more fat people here than at that party (or maybe there's just a higher proportion of weighty people at this particular restaurant). There's also a lot of conservative navy-blue skirts and sensible flat shoes. Black, of course.

'I've told him it's two nights off, one night on,' says Lizzie, a buxom brunette whose clothing choices do little to minimise her enormous cantaloupes.

'You actually schedule sex?' Nadia asks.

'Yep, that way he leaves me alone to read my book in bed two nights out of three. It's great.'

Nadia's intrigued. 'What about when you want to have sex? Can you ask for it?'

'Please! Enough is enough,' says Lizzie, her bosom heaving. 'He's satisfied, to a point, and I'm willing to go along with it because I get peace and quiet.'

'I read somewhere you should make yourself available for sex with your husband whether you're in the mood or not,' says Emma.

Lizzie snorts. Several women gasp. I wonder whether that was my mistake with Max.

'You don't actually believe that, do you, Emma?' asks Lizzie.

'I know it sounds -'

'Archaic?' Lizzie says helpfully.

'Maybe, but apparently we should adjust to the way our husbands perform and simply trust them -' Emma continues.

'Like our mothers did?' Nadia says.

'Men these days feel powerless, emasculated -'

'Please,' says Lizzie.

'She has a point,' says Dee. 'It's a gender-confused world.

Men are wimps; women have become she-men. You know, there's a huge movement of women who want a return to family values.'

'I know,' agrees Lizzie, twirling her wineglass. 'It's all about keeping the family together.'

'Protecting the children,' adds Emma.

'Save me,' Nadia whispers to me, as she reaches across my chest for the nearly empty wine bottle.

'Is she serious?' I ask.

'Absolutely. It's all part of the Subservient Wives Clubs that are springing up.'

Clearly, I'm not in the club. I glance at my watch. It's only 8.40 pm. Everyone takes a sip from their wineglass, contemplating their own suburban lives. No one asks me about Max, and I daren't ask after anyone else's husband because it might mean they'll mention mine. Gazing around the table, I notice there isn't enough wine, especially if we're to continue discussing our sex lives, or lack thereof.

'Who's for more wine?' asks Emma.

Relieved I'm not the only one who wants more, I volunteer to walk to the bottle shop with Emma. Once there, we agree to buy four bottles, then settle on six.

'Everything okay?' Emma asks during our walk back to the restaurant. 'If there's anything you need . . .'

Armed with a full glass of pinot gris, I relax and try to forget about she-men, Max, the house and my flailing career.

But, of course, I think about Max.

The last time we had dinner with school parents was at a trivia fundraiser four months ago. Max thought he was so clever, jumping up and shouting out the answers before our team could discuss the question and agree on an answer. To pay him his due, he did get them all right, up until the last one concerning an eighties band. An aficionado of seventies' and eighties' music, I knew the answer immediately and put it to the table. Max disagreed, shouting out, 'Wham!' Victory was snatched from our grasp when another table won with the right answer: A Flock of Seagulls.

'So tell me,' says Wendy, who's sitting at the far end of the table and has barely said a word all night. (Mind you, I wouldn't want to draw attention to myself either if I lived in leggings that emphasised my eleventh toe.) 'Is Mr Cutts really an alcoholic?' Bryan Cutts teaches Year Four maths.

'Absolutely,' says Lizzie. 'My kids say he smells of beer in the morning and drinks from a silver flask during the day. He hides it in his middle right-hand desk drawer.'

'No,' says Emma.

'True,' says Lizzie, making a cross over her heart with her right index finger. 'Children don't make up stories like that.'

'Seems like a nice guy,' I chip in.

'Yeah, nice but a drinker,' Dee says.

I drain my glass and zone out, wondering if, in a couple of years when the kids go to new schools, this group of women will remain in contact. Unlikely, when there's nothing much to talk about besides Mr Cutts' drinking habits and whether Miss Wise (Year One) really is a member of the Children of God sect. (I don't believe she is.) 'His wife left him, didn't she?' says Camel-toe Wendy, still banging on about Bryan Cutts, poor bastard.

'Years ago,' says Dee, refilling her glass.

I feel sorry for Mr Cutts, thinking how I'd probably be taking a flask of vodka to school if I had to teach thirty-one screaming nine-year-olds day in, day out.

'How are the renovations coming along, Lucy?' Dee asks.

'Could be better. Tradesmen defecating in paint pots, that sort of thing.'

Dee stares at me in horror. I mentally slap myself. This is exactly how rumours get started. If I choose not to correct what I've just said, it'll be all over the school by Monday morning. 'Did you hear? Lucy's builders poo in the paint pots.' Bella would never talk to me again.