The Alleged Power Of Prediction, And Tactics In The Marital Blame Game

Gah, and double gah. Bloody men. Before he goes to work this morning, Max pops round to Ellen's to collect the car keys and comes back in a foul mood.

"What's the matter with you?" I say.

"That was really embarrassing," he says.

As it bloody well should be.

"Well, yes," I say. "I know. I'm not surprised you're ashamed you didn't ask me before lending Ellen the car again. Especially after last time."

"Not that. It was embarrassing having to ask her to come back early. And unnecessary."

I'm so incredulous, that I can't think of an appropriate reply before he leaves for work. I sit and fume for most of the day, and then decide to go into town. It'll do Max a power of good if I'm not at home when he arrives. Let's see how he likes wondering where I am for a change.

I'm wandering around the library when my mobile starts ringing. It's Max, so I decide to ignore it. He never answers his phone when he's late home, after all. This attitude lasts for about ten minutes and then I become a bit unnerved, and decide to go home, just in case. (I'm a bit of an amateur at this "suffer baby" technique.)

When I let myself in, I find the house in darkness. Surely Max can't have gone out again already? I'm already imagining him sitting round at Ellen's muttering about how unreasonable I am being about the car, when I spot a note on the kitchen counter.

"Molly, have taken your Mum to A&E. I think she's broken her wrist. Will call you from the hospital. Max."

Oh, dear God. Isn't that just typical? The first time I ever make myself unavailable, and ignore my phone, and then I miss news of Mum having an accident. Now I am consumed with guilt.

I dither about whether to try to phone Max to find out how Mum is, but decide against it in case I set off a series of explosions amongst the oxygen cylinders in Casualty. (I assume that's why hospitals ask you to turn off your mobile?)

I spend the next hour walking around in circles, staring at the phone and willing it to ring. It doesn't, but then the front door opens and Max walks in.

"How is Mum?" I say. "What happened? Is she okay? Where is she?"

"She's still waiting to be seen," he says. "But Ted's there with her, so he told me to come home and get something to eat. He'll phone me when she's been X-rayed."

It turns out that Mum didn't fall over in the snow as I'd assumed, but instead buggered over the legs of one of those bloody side tables.

"Oh, for goodness' sake," I say. "I kept warning her that those stupid tables were a total hazard and that she needed to be careful. Thank God we had the car back so you could take her to the hospital."

"Humph," says Max. "I don't know about that. But you need to be more careful."

I have no idea what he's talking about, seeing as Mum's the one who had the accident. And surely this has vindicated my insistence that we need full-time access to our car for emergencies?

"Why do I need to be more careful?" I say. "It's not me who's broken my wrist."

"No, but it was your fault," says Max, before walking out of the kitchen as if the subject is closed. It isn't, so I follow him along the hallway.

"How can it be my fault?" I say. "I didn't cause the accident - I wasn't even there!"

"No," he says. "But you definitely talked it up."

I'm not a little tempted to predict something nasty that might happen to a husband who always blames his wife.

Guilt In All Directions, And Josh Takes Centre Stage

Josh does not take well to Max and I taking the piss about the National Skateboarding Championships. In fact, he goes so far as to say that it is our failure to encourage his talents which has made him the way he is. Then he storms off into town with the lads.  Max laughs, while I fall into a guilt-ridden slough of despond. This isn't helped by the fact that I won't get a reply from Johnny until Monday at the earliest. God knows how many copies of my photo his PA will have disseminated around the typing pool by then. I will be his staff's equivalent of Mr Beales. My buttocks might even adorn their dartboard, as The Boss' face does ours.

I'm so miserable that even Max notices, and suggests we go and have a coffee somewhere - so we plod down to Caffe Nero, where I ingest so much caffeine that I give myself palpitations. Max wants to know if I think The Boss will give me a pay-rise, now that I can prove that I'm so badly paid in comparison to most other MPs' employees. I say I rate my chances of that at zero, to which Max says he has now developed palpitations as well. The way our working lives are going, we'll have to rely on Connie to keep us soon. And she's only here for the summer!

We decide we can't afford to buy anything other than a coffee now that Max's job is in such jeopardy, so we might as well go home again. I feel even more guilty about the £20 I spent on underwear this week. You can't take that back for a refund either, unlike your wife. If Max found out..... I can't bear to think about it.

So, an hour after we left the house on our first date in weeks, Max and I are heading back home. We walk along in silence most of the way, until we reach the underpass on the way out of town. We've just passed through one of its steepish, sloping arms, when we're stopped in our tracks by a loud rumbling noise. As we stand still in the central circle, a skateboarder suddenly shoots out of another of the arms, waves, spins a few times and then roars gracefully past us, out into the other arm that leads in the direction of our house. We manage to spot that it's Josh' friend, Robbie, but honestly - blink, and you'd have missed it. It was all over so fast - even though Robbie was going uphill on the exit.

The rumbling doesn't diminish as much as it should, though, given that Robbie should be a fair distance away by now. In fact, it's intensifying, though it isn't as rhythmic as the earlier sound. Max and I continue to stand still in the central area, in case we're about to get taken out by a runaway trolley or something. We seem to wait for ever until, eventually, another skateboarder appears. He is veering all over the place and wobbling furiously. It's Josh. And it's agonising.

Max and I look at each other, both close to hysteria, and then back at Josh who doesn't acknowledge us at all. He's too busy concentrating on wobbling his way slowly - very, very slowly - out of the underpass. Just before he's out of earshot, it all becomes too much. Max lets out an explosive volley of laughter, and I sink against the wall, shaking. I am close to needing an incontinence pad.

"Our son, the skateboard champion," Max says. We are terrible parents.