He will point out that I should listen to him, try and act with a bit more decorum and stop being so bloody opinionated. And he’ll say, ‘look at your mother’. Which will make it all one hundred times worse because I know she doesn’t want me to be like her.

She wants me to be happy all the time, not just now and again.

I have no choice. I have to grab the one lifeline that has been thrown my way.

Noah.

‘Are you still there, Rosie? You’ve gone very quiet.’

‘Yes, Mum. Just thinking.’ He’s going to have to be a miracle worker. In fact, when I tell him I’m on a deadline he’ll probably do what Dad would. Laugh and walk away.

I am doomed.

‘Well, darling, mustn’t keep you. Don’t forget to save the date for the party, and you have got to bring your new man! I insist: there you go, I’ve written him on the list. Will you be coming over next weekend? You can bring him with you then if you want?’

She has to be kidding. ‘Sorry, Mum. I’m working.’ All weekend, and the next one. ‘But I’ll ring.’

Okay, so, I need to get my act together. I am going to have sex again, at least once, before I turn into somebody who doesn’t care.

I am also going to show Dad that he has a daughter to be proud of, one he can show off, who is worth coming home for. And maybe this time he’ll hang around a bit longer – at least for the entire party.

The sigh escapes before I can stop it. Last year he left at the same time as the final guests, well ten seconds later for appearance’s sake.

I’d got a bit over-excited and loud apparently. Now before you jump to conclusions, I was not rat-arsed. I was just having a lively debate with one of his friends about how a certain massive retailer isn’t helping small bookshops, like the one I work in, survive.

His friend was a bit like Dad, and ‘always right’, and I am a bit like Dad in that I won’t back down if I know I’m right. And I was.

Dad’s parting words before he left the house were that I needed to calm down, that I was too opinionated, too unladylike, embarrassing.

Robbie tried, in a very polite way, to stand up for me. Which didn’t help.

Dad never really liked Robbie that much. They didn’t have much in common. If I find a new, better boyfriend then they might even have things they can talk about. Things they agree on.

Hopefully not that I need to be quiet though. I can’t be. I’ve tried.

‘I have got to do it!’

I have to do it. I have no choice. And quickly.

My palms are all sweaty, and slightly itchy as I eye up my mobile phone.

Noah bloody Adams is not my type, but he could be the answer. In fact, he’s my first and last resort.