Someone like him, with a reputation as a sharp dresser, was expected to maintain appearances. Sooner or later, one of the tabloids was going to write something about his falling on hard times. He could imagine the headline: ABSOLUTELY BRASSIC, MATE!

Some paps were already trying to get photos of him looking scruffy. Abs did his best to keep up his grooming regime, he was still getting facials and his hair done at the salon of a celebrity hairdresser in London, and he was still going to the gym – the membership was off-peak these days – but he couldn’t afford it for much longer.

Trouble is, Abs wouldn’t last five minutes doing a proper job in an office, a shop or even – he shuddered – a factory. All he knew how to do was be Abs. He was good at that.

It all went wrong after someone in the Welsh police tipped off the press that he was questioned in connection with the disappearance of Rhiannon Jenkins.

Plans for his spin-off show were immediately canned, and then Tobias, who was the producer of Laid In Essex! in those days, took him to lunch – not at some expensive place, but a café down a side street in Chelmsford – and told him they weren’t renewing his contract.

‘We just want to try out some fresh faces.’

‘I can be the bad boy on the show,’ Abs pleaded, while Tobias checked his phone as if he had other places to be. ‘Make me the bad boy.’

‘We’ve got bad boys on the show, Abs. We’ve got Wayne and we have AJ.’

‘It’ll be a great twist.’ Abs spread his arms, trying to paint a picture. ‘Everyone thinks I’m cool, a nice guy, but I turn out to be a love rat.’

Tobias put down his phone and said gravely, ‘You’re implicated in the disappearance of a woman, Abs. That’s not the kind of bad boy we’re after on the show. Laid In Essex! is family entertainment.’

It wasn’t long till the big-name sponsorship deals dried up, and fashion companies and charities dropped him like a rock. Advertisers quietly removed him from their campaigns.

Worse, much worse than that, was that it ended his relationship with the love of his life, Kelsey DeMarco. He didn’t even care about his lifestyle or the money; the only thing he wanted was to get back on the show so he could be with Kelz. She wouldn’t give him the time of day unless he was as famous as she was.

Walking towards the party venue in Brentwood, Abs took out his phone. Hoping for good news from his agent, praying this would be the day when the work started coming in again.

‘Abs.’ Vince answered after six rings, but at least he’d picked up this time. ‘Nice to hear from you.’

‘I was just ringing to find out if there was anything on the horizon?’ As if he didn’t ring every day, every single day, to ask the exact same thing.