Sam starts crying. 'I want to go to Bali and find Daddy.'

'Daddy's having a break,' I say to comfort him. 'To tell you the truth, I'm not sure how long he's going to be away.'

Bella looks at Sam and then at me. 'Then maybe we should go to Bali and bring him home,' she says.

Later, when the kids have gone to bed, I phone Gloria for the third time in a day.

'Why didn't you just tell them about him and Alana?' she says.

'Yeah, right, and break their little hearts? I'm not that cruel.'

'But Max obviously is.'

'Anyway, I'm seriously thinking about moving away from the city -'

'To where, exactly?'

'The coast.'

'Get a grip, girl. The coast is where all washed-up actors disappear to.'

'The country, then.'

'The country's worse. Come on, Luce. Is this because of the dog poo commercial?'

'I didn't get it, did I?'

'Sorry, hon.'

'Hell, Gloria. I'm a loser. I can't even nab a gig scooping dog shit. I remember when my life was one big carousel of limos, premieres, charity balls and six-star hotels.'

I was sought after once upon a time. I was loved. Max loved me, for starters. I had fans, stalkers even. Once this man sent me a photograph of myself walking out of my front door. That's stalking in my book. Men wanted to sleep with me. Women wanted to be me, red hair and all.

'I'm leaving,' I say, 'starting a new life.'

'There'll be other commercials,' Gloria tells me.

'I don't want other commercials.'

'Luce, stay in the city. You love the city. What am I saying? You're not living anywhere near civilisation as it is, all the way out there in the 'burbs. But at least you've got more chance of success than you'll have living in some hick town three hundred kilometres away.'

'I should give up this acting crap. You saw those people at the Actors' Studio the other night, Glors. I'm not in their league. I'm past it. A has-been. No one's hiring women like me.'

'Of course they are. You just need sexing up.'

'I'm not twenty-one anymore. I should bow out gracefully and disappear somewhere with the kids.'

'Don't be ridiculous,' she says, then goes quiet before saying, 'Did you google Dominic?'

I shake my head, not that she can see me. 'No.'

'Thought as much. I've been in touch with him -'

'I know. I've received three emails from him. I knew it was due to your handiwork.'

'What did he say? Are you catching up? Tell me everything.'

'He said he was thinking of me, told me to call him.'

'And?'

'I didn't reply. My life's complicated enough.'

Day 22.

I wake up at three in the morning crying, and continue until six-thirty, when I have to get out of bed and be brave for the children.

Mum calls in with some red gerberas and asks how I'm doing.

'Terrible,' I reply, putting the pretty flowers in a grubby, dusty vase.

'You're going to have to tell the children about Alana eventually.'

'Hopefully he'll die in some really bizarre accident and I won't have to,' I say.

Mum looks doubtful. 'What about the builders?'

'What about them? They won't be here for days because of the rain.'

'Lucy, you've got to get this place finished.'

'Why me? Why do I have to do it?'

'Because you're the only one here, love.'

It's eleven o'clock in the morning. There's no rain, the sun is shining and there's not a builder in sight. According to my calculations, as long as there's not a downpour again today, Patch should (here's hoping) be back on-site tomorrow. So I head out for some retail therapy.

Driving to Bondi Westfield, I make the mistake of going through the cross-city tunnel and get stuck in the most God-awful traffic. By the time I reach the shopping centre car park, I'm stressed beyond belief.

I walk briskly from shop to shop, only stopping to pull out Max's American Express card and buy fabulous frivolities - a pink Spencer & Rutherford bag that's gorgeous but completely impractical; a pair of pink-and-maroon suede Alannah Hill eight-centimetre-high slingbacks. And seriously, when am I ever going to have occasion to wear a red rabbit-fur poncho? I also buy a complete new tennis ensemble. I can't hit a ball but I might as well look good trying.

I even eye a new Cartier watch, hesitating for a moment before giving it back to the salesgirl. Maybe next time. Not so with the DKNY green suede coat and black Prada pants.

I'm trying on an exquisite Collette Dinnigan sequined top that goes nowhere near fitting me, when a blonde skeletal sales assistant taps me on the shoulder and says, 'Maybe you wouldn't be so depressed if you weren't wearing such ugly boots.'

Excuse me! Am I wearing a neon sign that says I'm depressed? Are my antidepressants sticking out of my bag, on show for the world to see? I don't even take antidepressants. I'm not depressed. I turn around to see the giraffe from the party at the Actors' Studio. She doesn't bother with the dressing room, just strips off in front of one of the shop mirrors and stands there checking out her physique in a black satin bra and boy briefs. I glare at her, but she's too self-absorbed to notice other people exist. Now, I'm depressed.

Sipping a skinny soy latte in a cafe, I calculate that I've spent over $5800, and feel guilty, guilty, guilty and furious, furious, furious.

Exhausted, I arrive home to find a message from Max.

'Lucy, it's me. I've had a call from American Express.

Been on a shopping spree, have we? How are Bella and Sam? We'll talk soon.'

I play the message no less than fifteen times before realising that Max's phone is working. He's just not taking my calls.

'I'm drinking all your Grange, you C-U-Next-Time prickhead!' I scream when the voicemail clicks in yet again. 'And I'm giving all of your clothes to charity. That's right. All of them.'

This time, I drive to a different charity bin - I don't want to risk running into the mad old biddy from last week. I take malicious pleasure in casting all of Max's clothes into the bin, bag by bag. Driving home, I feel triumphant. Well, a little sad too, but mostly triumphant.

Emma calls and asks Bella, Sam and me over to dinner. I like Emma but we're not close. Still, she's invited us over when we still have no kitchen and no husband/father, so I take a bottle of wine from the cellar and we walk the four minutes to her house. The meal is delicious, though I'm so tired and overwrought that I make terrible company.

'Barry and I have been through tough times,' Emma confides to me in the kitchen as she whips the cream for dessert. 'But we've worked through it, you know? You and Max can too.'

I nod. Sure, let's not think about the fact he's off having the time of his middle-aged life with a teenager.

'Get this,' Emma says, shaking a wooden spoon in front of me. 'Barry told me that my aggressive personality was rendering him impotent, said he needed to feel powerful, in control.'

I look at her for a minute, trying to imagine Barry saying those words. He's at least six foot three and weighs a hundred kilos.

'I know, I know. But men are such babies,' she says. 'We've come to a compromise - he's stopped questioning me about the house and my cooking and, in return, I've stopped trying to micromanage his career, which he's absolutely hopeless at, by the way. But life's a compromise, isn't it?'

She licks the spoon, shrugs her shoulders and pours me another glass of wine.

'You have to do what you have to do,' I say, recalling Nadia's comment about the Subservient Wives Club.

'Exactly.'

Because I know this line of conversation will lead to further discomfort - my own - I take the coward's way out and get hideously drunk. Okay, not so drunk that I blather on about Max and how he and his stupid red surfboard have left me, but drunk enough to start singing 'Billy Don't Be a Hero' and other choice hits of the seventies and eighties.

Eventually, Bella demands to be taken home.

Day 23.

Last night was so embarrassing. I'll have to send Emma and Barry a thankyou card and apologise for my behaviour. Perhaps they'll think I drink two bottles of wine every Monday night. Which I don't.

I jump from strategy to strategy, thought to thought. What happens when Max eventually comes home? If he comes home?

My first idea is to make him pay for what he's done. If Max thinks that the worst I can do is give all of his clothes to charity, he's got a huge reality check coming. Not that I'd sever his penis with a kitchen knife a la Lorena Bobbitt, or even replace his shampoo with Nair hair remover (great idea though, Lucy!), but I will drag him through the courts. By the time I'm finished with Max, he and Alana will be eating fish fingers and mashed potatoes for the rest of their lives.

But then I think, do I really want to go through a messy divorce? What about Bella and Sam? What if, when I see Max, he's truly sorry for what he's done?

Then I start to feel sorry for myself. What have I done to deserve this? Did I make him feel emasculated, ineffectual, weak, powerless and feeble? Did I stop him taking his rightful place as the almighty and powerful protector of his family? I consider that theory for a few moments before dismissing it as the bullshit it is.

But maybe we can work everything out - assuming he ditches the trollop. It's a given that Bella and Sam would be happier having their dad living at home. And let's face it: divorce would be difficult for all of us. No, Max and I should definitely tough it out, at least while Bella and Sam are at school. If he still feels the same way in ten years, then he can leave.

We'll still be young(ish) and can live out our selfish fantasies then. I say 'our' but I actually mean 'his'.

Shit! To hell with Max! What I need to do is take these renovations by the proverbial and get them finished! Except that Patch and his boys haven't turned up. It's a sunny winter's day with not a rain cloud in sight, so I wonder what their excuse will be this time.

I ring Patch's mobile and go straight through to his voicemail. 'Just wondering what your movements are today, Patch,' I say brightly into the phone, thinking, bloody well get over here and finish building my house, NOW.

I want my home back. I want a working kitchen. I want to cook food on a stovetop and have my fridge in the room where it's supposed to be.

'I tell you, Tuesdays come around just a little too quickly for my liking,' I say to Gloria as we head to tennis. But at least I have a snazzy new outfit to prance around in.

At the coffee urn, I say hi to Reggie, a quiet young woman I vaguely know. She normally partners her mother, who isn't here today.

'Chatting with the prostitute?' Gloria says after Reggie walks out to the court.

'You're going straight to hell, you know.'

'What? Reggie and her mother manage a brothel in Darlinghurst. Maybe they don't actually perform intimacies, but you know what they say: the fruit doesn't fall far from the tree.'

'You're an idiot.'

'I'm just saying, you never really know what's going on in people's lives until you get a private investigator involved.'

We head outside, and I trip over my feet and scuff my new racquet. Gloria is still in agent mode, trying to talk me into auditioning for a home renovation show, in two days' time.

'I don't want to host a renovation program,' I say, 'it's an overcrowded market.'

'Settle. Think back to when they used Noni's house as a guinea pig for Better Homes and Gardens.'

It turns out Gloria's scammed a renovation audition for me only because she agreed I'd do Celebrity Blind Date, which is taping tomorrow.

'Gloria, I can't do that. I'm busy. It's too soon. I've got nothing to wear.'

'Please, do it as a favour to me. Catriona Rowntree bowed out. Turns out she's married, pregnant, otherwise detained.'

'But I'm married!'