'Can't you see, Ross? It's finally happened. You're being played.'

Can’t eat, can’t sleep, can’t get her on the iPhone – it must be love

I’VE FINALLY BEEN forgiven for persuading Honor to cheat her way to victory in the 50-metre dash at the Little Roedeans Montessori sports day. After a whole lot of to-ing and pretty much fro-ing, the school has agreed to take her back on what it calls a probationary basis, while Sorcha has agreed to me having, in future, strictly supervised weekend access until I can, like, prove my suitability as a father. So it’s very much a case of all’s well that ends well.

I've missed the little one. And, being honest, I've missed her mother too. And I don't mean in, like, thatway? See, I've come to accept that we're getting basically divorced – even though, if there was half a sniff, I'd be in there like swimwear. But I realise now that Sorcha's – I suppose – role in my life is going to be that of a really, really good friend, who threatens to cut off my visitation rights every time I do something wrong, like try to teach our daughter the kind of skills she's going to need to get ahead in the new Ireland.

But there we suddenly found ourselves, last Wednesday afternoon, me and the old STBX wife, sitting on a bench in Cabinteely Pork, watching Honor charge the other kids a 20 cent levy to use the swings.

Sorcha even saw the funny side of it. “That’s you,” she went, laughing in spite of herself, “brainwashing her into thinking that the world is suddenly a hostile place and that she has to be ruthless to survive.” I thought, er, this is the girl whose boutique in the Powerscourt Townhouse Centre went bust, owing 300 Ks to the Hilary Swank. She could have done with being a bit more that way herself.

I didn’t mention that, though. Instead, roysh, I brought up Daniella.

I was just there, “Babes, I really, really like this girl. And I’m not just saying that to make you jealous – which’d be my usual MO.” She sort of, like, rolled her eyes?

"Ross, I am soover you. I don't carewhat you do anymore? Who is she anyway?"

“She’s one of the birds off the Hunky Dorys ad campaign.”

Sorcha laughed – cruelly, you'd have to say. "Oh! My God! Er, whenare you going to grow up?"

I just, like, shrugged. "I knew this'd be your basic reaction. But it's honestly not like you think. There's, like, a real connectionbetween us?"

“Which one is she, Ross? On the poster.”

"Okay, being honest, she's the one with the huge ta-tas. But that's not the reason I'm a smitten kitten. Like I said, there's an actual chemistry." Sorcha smiled. She can read me like a – I suppose – book?

“She’s not returning your calls, is she?” I turned my head away, then looked over to the swings. Honor was trying to shove this little Chinese girl off. Sorcha suddenly let out a roar out of her. “Honor, she’s paid you for two minutes, now let her have them!” and then she turned back to me.

“Okay, don’t laugh,” I went, “but I think I suddenly know the meaning of the word lovesick. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I’m, like, constantly thinking about her. And this is going to sound majorly stalkerish, but I’ve rung her phone, like, 71 times in just over a week.”

She shrugged. “Maybe she lost it somewhere.”

"That's exactly what Ithought? Give her the benefit of the doubt and blah, blah, blah . . ."

"Or . . ." she went, then stopped, like she wantedme to ask what. I was like, "What?"

"Well, maybe she's just not intoyou, Ross." I laughed – you can imagine. "Not into me? Er, how is that possible?"

"Oh my God, you are sodefensive, Ross. I'm just saying, you're, what, 30 now?"

“And?”

“Well, there’s younger, better-looking goys on the scene.”

“I hope you’re not referring to Rob Kearney. I did a skills clinic with him, remember – five years ago in Clongowes? Wiped the floor with him – on his home patch as well. End of.”

"I'm not talking about Rob Kearney, Ross. All I'm saying is that you're not longer the goy who every girl in this town wants to try to, like, bewith?"

This news goes down about as well as you’d expect. I suddenly feel like I’ve been hit by the Luas. But at the same time, roysh, deep down I know it’s possibly true. I nodded. “Well, I was also thinking, maybe she’s been in some kind of accident – that’s why she hasn’t . . .”

"Stop it!" Sorcha suddenly screamed, a bit focking Izzy Stevens, if I'm being honest. "They're exactly the kind of excuses that I – and a thousand other girls – used to make for you. Can't you see, Ross? It's finally happened. You're being played. At last you'regoing through what you spent 13 years putting the rest of us through."

"Are you telling me that Daniella . . . usedme?" Sorcha laughed – this one was, like, sympathetic. "Ross, it's like you said to me when you scored my sister at my 21st birthday porty: hate the game, Baby, not the player."

I felt, I don’t know, suddenly cheap. “Well, maybe I’ll just try to ring her one more time . . .” Except she snatched my iPhone out of my hand. “You’re being pathetic, Ross.”

“Well, what if I just leave a message saying she’s bang out of order for treating me like that and that I never want to see her again.”

She went, "Oh my God, Ross – whereis your pride?" and that's when I suddenly copped – might have been from the look in her eye – that she knew a hell of a lot more than she was actually cracking on.

“Sorcha,” I went, “out with it.”

She was like, "Okay, I already knewyou'd been with one of the Hunky Dorys girls? Ross, it's all over West Wood."

“Exsqueeze me?”

“Look, I overheard her telling her friends about it yesterday in the re:fresh day spa. She was . . . Ross, she was critiquing your performance.”

"Oh my God, who even doesthat? That's disgusting . . . Okay, just tell me, was it, like, a positive or a negative review?"

“She joked at one point that the posters stayed up a hell of a lot longer than you.”

I just nodded and stared sadly into the distance. It looks like all of those people – mostly girls and their angry parents – who said I’d eventually get my comeuppance, are finally going to have their day.

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