death by Chanel Rouge Noir & Expensive pots of beautifying cream

The book is not going well. My Greek Chorus were right with their Cassandra prophesies. "We said as much," they nag. But maybe they are write and my nice supportive Inner Gran is wrong? What if my blockbuster with film deal wrapped in is never written?

The bank were very unfriendly about the £8,000 bauble as they insist on referring to my ring and flabbergasted by the £700 shoes. I have been threatened with a CCJ which is not a Circus Carnival for Juveniles as you’d imagine but a nasty mark on your file that stains your good name and means no one will ever lend me money again. 'You will be a blight on your children’s life!' The Greek Chorus wail.

My husbands will feel jolly righteous because I’ll have to come clean to them about my incomprehensible behavior in the Burlington Arcade. This whole episode will be another black mark against my name. See why I don’t like getting out of bed? I always end up in the soup. Much better to stay in bed. I know how to do that with panache and aplomb. I am safe from stylessness in bed.

So yes the Husbands will make a great deal of fuss about all this and as ever I will make it all sound far worse than it is. I always do. Catholics love nothing more than a good shriving of the soul. It is my nature to highlight my mistakes and flaws to anyone fool enough to chastise me. The world is my confessional since the church brought in “reconciliation” to replace the private box. Now we must confess our sins face to face it makes every man on a stern disposition an instant priest in my eyes. I always said, the day they stopped sung Latin mass was the thin edge of the wedge. Almost everything introduced in the sixties led to bad taste and badly made clothes. Vatican 1 and 2 were no exceptions. Take away the bells, smells and spells and what are we left with as Catholics - a guitar and nuns with bad haircuts. So I shall confess all to my husbands. My penance will be harsh. It will take courage and for that I best stay in bed with a fortifying bottle of champagne - now can one get more Catholic than that?

I haven’t left the flat for four days. I have been living off an old tub of yogurt, espressos from my Gaggia, some out of date vitamin pills, and the last of my Valium script. On the up side I have lost 3.3 kilos whatever that is in old money. I preferred pounds. Stones and pounds were solid and satisfying. When people ring up I mute the television or music or dvd and talk my life up. I make out I am having the most luxurious pampering relaxing “me” time. “All curled up with books and magazines and doing a bit of internet shopping while my face pack sets,” I tell them. “Are you writing?” they ask. “Like a Trojan,” I assure them.

I tell no one that I am sans credit cards, sans credit rating and by day four sans yogurt. All that’s left in my refrigerator now are some Chanel Noir nail varnish and lots of pots of expensive face cream that make me red, spotty and peely. Yet despite the Health and safety warnings on them none of them is likely to lead to a successful overdose. Shame, I would look so pretty spread out in my peignoir, a few pearls strewn about, the new diamond ring and Louboutins. And with my literary skills think of the note!

Then I think of the note and I think knowing my luck it will be a bestseller that is turned into a film with a big star like Angelina Jolie attached. And I think it would look rather glamorous having “Death by Chanel and Expensive pots of beautifying cream” read out at my inquest. That would up the anti on my suicide note sales too. They’d probably auction it off for my charity that I have begun setting up. At the moment ACCESS ALL AREAS is just a mass of meetings, forms, brick walls, indifference and endless chats with branding experts but it’s heading in a generally forward-ish direction. The point it my suicide note could really be the lift my children’s charity needs. If only my charity had actually been launched. As it is my death will achieve nothing except to raise the spirits of my agent. I suddenly find a will to live. Ironically this will to live comes from my suicide note which just seems to write itself - unlike my book which remains a jumble of chapter headings and some bad syntax.

Then I remember that I am due to have dinner at the Wolseley with Gillian in an hour, followed by drinks at the Arts club on Dover Street with Claire, Gillian and Man of Bronze as Husband Number 3 likes to be referred to and then we are all of to a burlesque show at the Met bar on Park Lane. I find some coins and one of those vintage £5 notes you see so rarely around London these days. Cab drivers love them.

I find this cheering and life affirming after all my doldrums and rouse myself out of bed.