THE YEAR’S PROGRESS
Tuesday 31 December 2013
*Pounds lost 17
*Pounds gained 18
*Twitter followers 797
*Twitter followers lost 793
*Twitter followers gained 794
*Jobs gained 1
*Jobs lost 1
*Texts sent 24,383
*Texts received 24,284 (good)
*Number of screenplay words written 18,000
*Number of words of screenplay rewritten 17,984
*Number of words of screenplay written and put back like were in first place 16,822
*Number of words of texts written 104,569
*People infestered by nits 5
*Total nits extracted 152
*Price per nit of professionally extracted nits ￡8.59
*Boyfriends lost 1
*Boyfriends gained 2
*Fires in house 4
*Existing children kept intact 2
*Children lost 7 (counting all occasions)
*Children found 7
*Total children 4
OUTCOME
Mr Wallaker – or Scott, as I occasionally call him – and I did not have a wedding, because neither of us wanted to get married again. But we did realize that neither of us had christened our children so decided to make it an excuse for a coming-together party at the big country house. That way, we decided, the children would be covered, like insurance, in case it emerged that the Christian God was the True God, even though both Mr Wallaker and I are slightly Buddhist.
The ceremony was performed in the chapel. The school choir sang, and Scott’s sons Matt and Fred – who are no longer in boarding school but at the Senior School – played ‘Someone to Watch Over Me’ on clarinet and piano. I cried most of the time. Greenlight Productions sent a bunch of flowers the size of a sheep; Rebecca had her hair done in an Afro with a lit-up sign saying ‘Motel’ and an arrow pointing down at her head; Daniel got drunk at the party and tried to get off with Talitha, leading to Sergei throwing a giant tantrum and storming off in a rage; and Jude – who had, obviously, got bored with Wildlifephotographerman’s devotion – got off with Mr Pitlochry-Howard and then had a terrible time getting out of it afterwards. Tom and Arkis sulked because we hadn’t invited Gwyneth Paltrow – even though Jake had once played with Chris Martin – and both flirted outrageously with the senior boys in the big band. Mum was still slightly annoyed that I hadn’t worn something more brightly coloured, but got over it because her coat-dress set was clearly nicer than Una’s, and Mr Wallaker is quite happy to indulge her by flirting outrageously and telling her off when she gets out of line, in a way which just makes her titter. Roxster – who had previously sent me a very nice text saying his heart was broken at the loss of his vomiting cougar, but there clearly was a Dating God as his new girlfriend had morning sickness – texted me on the day to say she wasn’t pregnant, it was just that he’d forced her to eat too much food, and she was really annoying. Which was nice.
And somewhere up above it all, I knew in my heart that Mark would be glad. That he really, really would not have wanted us to be alone and in a confused state. And that if it had to be someone, he would be glad it was Mr Wallaker.