Goodbye To All That, And The Usefulness Of Lists.

Okay, that's it with the weight gain plan. I am sick of Complan already.

It tastes like liquidised wallpaper paste, so I'm going to have to come to terms with being a headless child. And Max will just have to accept me as I am - unless he's already decided he prefers blonde James Blunts, in which case gaining a couple of stone won't help.

Anyway, I am not going to think about that today. Marriage is off the agenda, despite William and Kate's attempt to distract us all from the spending cuts. I shall bury myself in my work instead.

It's got to be preferable to sitting around stewing about my home life, even though the dreaded Vicky's back. She isn't wearing a neck collar, so I can only assume that I misdiagnosed her condition. I do have another go at finding out what's she up to, though. I haven't entirely given up on my powers of detection.

"What exactly is it that you're working on now, Vicky?" I say. Subtle is my middle name.

"Something special for Andy," she says. "Confidential."

Huh. Andy. And what a hypocrite! Vicky hasn't even been made to sign a bloody confidentiality agreement, since she complained to The Boss that my suggestion was offensive.

"Everything that goes on here is confidential," I say. "You can tell us."

She won't divulge anything else, though - so Greg's going to have to stalk her, if we're to have any chance of discovering what's going on.

I'm thinking of stalking Max, too. Maybe I'll follow him the next time he "pops to Sainsburys" and check that he isn't stopping off at Ellen's for a quickie instead. In the meantime, I could always start keeping a list of the evidence that suggests that he's having an affair.

I like lists. They're deeply reassuring. In fact, I'm sure I used to make them when I was trying to decide if a boy liked me or not. I shall get my old diaries out again tonight, and check what method I used.

When I mention this to Johnny in an email, he seems pretty pleased about it.

"Then you'll see that I was your first love," he says. "And probably The One."

"I don't believe in The One," I say. "It's only my single friends who do. And, last time I looked at my diaries, you got a mention as my first exhibitionist, but I'm sure I didn't say anything about love."

"You said you'd written Molly Loves Johnny For Ever."

"That was Luvs," I say. "Totally different thing. Fuelled by teenage hormones, too many Babychams, and The Real Thing."

Johnny spends the next few emails trying to persuade me that we all need some romance in our lives, and pointing out that my life with Max is hardly the stuff of Mills and Boon. It seems that even he is not immune to the bloody Royal Wedding.

I study Max's expression for signs of a romantic disposition while he watches TV tonight. It's hard to tell much from the side of someone's head, so I eventually give up trying to read his mind, and start flicking through the diaries instead.

I soon come across some old lists, though they're not exactly illuminating. For a start, I have no idea who half of them refer to, this one being a good example:

Kev Likes Me/ Likes Me Not. 

Pros
He looked at me when I trod on his foot while getting on the school bus.
He answered me when I asked if he was playing footie after school: "No."
He gave me his chewing gum wrapper to put into the bin.
He called me Short-arse twice.

Cons
He didn't ask me out.
He looked at Julie Firman's tits all the way home.
He called me Short-arse twice.

Who the hell was Kev? I have no idea, but he sounds a bit of an idiot.

The lists are interspersed with pages and pages of differing versions of my signature - my first name, combined with the surname of whichever boy was in favour at the time, including David Cassidy and Marc Bolan. (Neither of these two went well with Molly.)

Molly Hunter doesn't make an appearance - although it doesn't sound too bad, now I come to think of it. If I was called that, I'd probably make a brilliant stalker. And it's a definite improvement on Kate Wales.

Beware The Activities Of The Furniture Spooks.

This is probably going to be a bit garbled, as I'm not exactly thinking straight. God knows what possessed me to go to bed so early last night.

Not only did I miss the chance to snoop out of the window to see if anyone else got out of the car when Max finally arrived home, but I also missed my opportunity to phone Sam and pretend I needed to speak to Max. Now it's too late to pull that one.

I wish I could find the Valium that Dad left here. I could really do with something to calm me down. Whoever said knowledge is power was absolutely bloody right, and Max is even more uninformative than usual today.

If he worked for MI5 or 6 I'd understand it, but I can't see someone who works in the furniture industry being privy to many state secrets. Unless one of them is the exact amount by which the public sector is routinely charged over-the-odds for desks and filing cabinets.

When we get up this morning, I decide to act normal and see what I can find out that way.

"How was your weekend?" I ask.

"Oh, okay."

I wait a bit, in case Max is just pausing for breath, but when nothing else is forthcoming, I have another try:

"So what did you guys get up to?"

"Not much," he says. "Do you want to use the shower first?"

This international man of mystery stuff is so annoying. God knows whether Max was staying at Sam's, or shagging Ellen in public somewhere - I just can't tell. Which is pathetic, given how good I am at detecting when other people are lying.

I knew that Lucas North was no good right from the first episode of Spooks. In fact, Max and I had an argument about it, when I forgot my promise to stop telling him what I think's going to happen next, and now he says I ruined the rest of the series.

My honesty detector might be malfunctioning when it comes to getting a reading from my husband, but it's back on form once I arrive at the office. I know Greg's lying as soon as he says he jogged to work, for example.

"How do you know that?" he says. "You been stalking me?"

"No," I say. "Didn't need to. You must have put those on in the lobby."

I point at his feet, and Greg looks incredulous, until he notices my shoes. They are soaked, whereas his trainers are bone dry. And it's pissing down outside.

"Oh, well," he says. "It was worth a try. I wanted to encourage you to get fit in readiness for our little jaunt to check on the loonies of Florence Road. Can't afford any passengers on such a dangerous mission, and I'm the only one with youth on my side, after all."

Luckily for him, the phones start ringing before I can reply. They don't stop until mid-afternoon, when Greg rushes out to buy himself "a healthy snack." I don't have an excuse to go out as my so-called lunch is waiting for me in the staff kitchen. More's the pity.

Marie-Louise calls while I'm trying to force myself to drink yet another mug of bloody Complan.

"What is going on, Molly?" she says.

That's what I'd like to know, too - though I hope Marie and I aren't talking about the same thing. I don't think she's even met Max, although anything's possible, I suppose.

"What d'you mean?" I say.

"Why are so many appointments going missing from the diary? Andrew has given me a verbal warning this morning - or, at least, that's what I think it was. In amongst the swearing."

"I don't know, Marie. Greg and I wondered that while you were off sick. We thought it wasn't you."

"I can't prove that, though - can I? I am the Diary Secretary, after all."

Marie sounds as if she's on the verge of tears - again - although she calms down a bit when I suggest she should print a copy of the diary every time she makes a change, as a half-soaked insurance policy.

After she has promised me not to resign, and has rung off, I fill Greg in on what has happened.

"Well, there's nothing else that we can to do to help today," he says. "Seeing as our prime suspect hasn't come to work again."

"If it is Vicky, how are we going to catch her out?" I say. "Assuming she doesn't drop dead of her self-inflicted hair-flicking injury?"

"Self-inflickted. Good one," says Greg. "And, in answer to your question: slowly, slowly, catchee monkey."

God knows what he's on about, but I'm pretty sure he's attempting a Burmese accent. Aung San Suu Kyi's release has gone right to his head.

He offers me a fortune cookie.

"These are your healthy snack?" I say.

"Brain food," he says. "Maybe they'll give us a clue as to what's really going on."

"I don't think I want to risk it," I say. "Just in case the cookie thinks I'm curious about something else."

The last thing I want to know is that I'm married to the Lucas North of Northwick, after all. "Bunkbed emergency" does sound a bit like code, now I come to think of it.

How To Turn An MP's Staffer Into A Domestic Goddess. Whether She's Willing Or Not.

The Boss is in a towering rage today, oh joy. I can only assume it's because Vicky has rung in sick. Or, rather, she says she's sick when I phone to find out where she is, though she doesn't tell me what is wrong with her. Probably a cricked neck from all that hair-flicking.

Andrew's also annoyed about the whole Phil Woolas thing. Harriet Harman's not exactly his favourite person at the moment, but he's most furious with the local Party.

"Why?" I ask. "What have Joan and the others got to do with it?"

"I told them to make a complaint about the LibDems' election expenses in Northwick, didn't I?" he says. "But the buggers wimped out. As usual."

"Well, you won anyway," I say.

"Though God knows how," says Greg, rather quietly - but Andrew still hears him. Ears like a bat, that man.

"Pair of comedians, you two, aren't you? he says. "There's no way that bastard Smithson could have afforded all those leaflets within the allowed spending. And as for how much the yellow peril paid for postage and deliveries - well, that'd have taken them miles outside the limit."

For once, The Boss may have a point. It certainly looked bad when Greg estimated the cost just after Election Day, but it's hardly worth crying over spilt milk now, is it? It's not going to help Phil Woolas. Or his staff, for that matter.

Talking of ex-MPs' staff, Jen phones after lunch and sounds really depressed. She still hasn't got a job and is finding being unemployed very difficult.

"I've done all my cleaning by 10:00am," she says. "And I've even resorted to bloody baking this week - Nigella's got nothing on me. I've got Christmas puddings coming out of my ears.'

"Shut up about Christmas," I say. "But I can't believe someone hasn't snapped you up by now. What's going on?"

"Well, I did get offered one job," she says. "But I couldn't bring myself to take it."

"What on earth was it?" Jen is nothing if not multi-skilled. And adaptable - it comes with the territory.

"The new MP phoned to ask if I'd become his office manager," she says. "For Christ's sake. Talk about crass. And he was offering a lower salary."

"Probably to cover his excess election expenses, if The Boss's theory is right."

Andrew looks up, makes an obscene gesture that he usually reserves for use when he's driving, and then returns to the important business of eating Greg's lunch. (I was right about the Complan, even though I can't bear it either.)

"So have you had any interviews at all?" I say. If Vicky manages to get rid of one of us, it may be me that's job-hunting next.

"Loads," says Jen. "Trouble is, no-one can get their heads around what MPs' staff actually do. The breadth of our remit just boggles their minds, and there's never enough time to cover everything. And I think half of them only want to meet me to see what someone who works for an MP looks like in the flesh."

Bloody hell. I'd be unemployable on that basis. Better give the Complan another try.

The Unreal Woman, Or The Headless Child Bride.

I have got to stop The Boss eating my food. If I get any smaller, I'm going to disappear, and then all that will be left is a pile of clothing, mainly comprised of the five million layers of thermal underwear I've had to resort to now that the weather's become so much colder.

Over the last few days, I've been barely able to move my arms to type, and yesterday Greg would not shut up about Weebles.

"I didn't find that analogy funny when Max first thought of it," I said. "So you lack even the virtue of originality."

Well, you look as if you're wearing a fat suit," said Greg. "Can you even breathe with all that thermal underwear crushing your rib cage?"

"Yes, of course I can. I just have to take shallower breaths. Being skinny is no laughing matter - as you'd know if you ever went to the gym more than twice a year."

"Oooh - defensive behaviour. Another sign of burnout," said Greg. He didn't stop mocking me until I threatened to tell Miss Chambers who had put the dog poo through her letterbox.

Mind you, now I'm not sure that I wouldn't rather be a Weeble than the alternative.

When I get out of the shower this morning, I realise that I've forgotten my dressing gown - so I have to hurtle into the bedroom wrapped only in a towel. A hand towel, as Josh has used all the bigger ones.

Speed is of the essence as, not only is it bloody freezing in our house, but you never know who you're going to meet on the landing: none of Josh's friends seem to have homes to go to, if the number of bodies asleep on his bedroom floor most mornings are anything to go by.

On my way through the bedroom door, the towel catches on the handle, so by the time I'm fully inside the room, I'm totally starkers. And facing the full-length mirror. Oh, my God.

Honestly, if you chopped my head off, you'd think I was about twelve years old. Gok would have a fit if he saw me. He'd have to give up his obsession with the "real woman" thing, and find an alternative phrase. Probably "unreal."

I don't like this idea at all, so I ask Max:

"Do you think I look like a real woman?"

"What?" he says, while hopping about on one foot and trying to put a sock on the other. "What are you talking about?"

"Well, do I look like a woman - or a child?"

"Well, a woman, I suppose."

I suppose? What the hell's that supposed to mean?

"What about if you imagine me without a head?" I say.

Max rolls his eyes.

"Do I have to? Headless isn't exactly normal, is it?"

Now I've found the hand-mirror, too, and I'm twisting about trying to see my back view. Max has stopped getting dressed and is staring at me in disbelief.

"Max - stop looking at me like that! Just humour me for a minute. Woman - or child - when missing my head?"

"Well, um, child, I suppose," he says. Then he pulls a face.

"Oh, thanks," I say. "Is it that bad?"

"Well, it makes me feel like a bit of a pervert," he says. "Being married to a headless child."

So there you have it. I bet that's why we have no sex! I am going to Boots on my way home from work, and I'm going to buy up their entire stock of Complan and eat the whole lot at once. Or drink it, anyway.

I know Complan tastes disgusting, but at least it's unlikely that Andrew will want to help himself to any, so that'll help the pounds pile on. Then I won't need any thermal underwear and my body might match my bloody head for once. These real women have no idea how lucky they are.