Recently, I have caught myself thinking of Mr Bastard more often than I used to. The odd memory here and there, usually when my guard is down and I feel insecure. I'd much rather think of Mr Husband, from whom I have become so disconcertingly disengaged, if only to stifle the guilt, but Mr Bastard floats over the thick gelatinous sea of my painful past and refuses to sink down.

I must be quite clear that I do not miss him at all, nor do I hate him. What I remember, in fact, has little to do with him as a person, and more to do with the odd accoutrements of people's secret lives. What we see is most definitely not what they get.

I spoke to Mrs Bastard a few times, and only twice out of my own volition. The kindest thing she ever said to me was that I disgusted her - adding that her husband disgusted her even more; a strange thing to say, considering that she took him back every single time he wavered and packed his suitcases, leaving me distraught, to go back to the marital home.

On one particular occasion, as I was being pummelled with her cut-glass accent about what a 'total' marriage wrecker I was (I was single but obviously still responsible for the whole of the blame), I pointed out that I knew Mr Bastard had, in fact, been seeing another woman and not me.

'How many women does he sleep with, then? He still performs with me most nights', she screamed.

I would have laughed had I not been hurting so much. Mr Bastard's priapic shenanigans did not surprise me, but I could not help noticing how men use the 'I no longer sleep with my wife' card every time they not only want to get into your knickers but also get hold of your heart.

I suppose the hopelessness of a man who sleeps in the spare room is guaranteed to pull the right emotional strings; it also explains and justifies his lust for extra-conjugal sex; finally, it gives the lover the misplaced certainty that their relationship must be mutually exclusive. A romantic hat-trick.

I have lived with my conviction that nobody sleeps in the spare bedroom (apart from me, that is) - no matter how bad their marriage is - until a few days ago, when the jungle tam-tam of the 'Girlfriends United' network brought upon me the confidence and private confessions of most of them.

'Of course we don't sleep together', said one. 'He has been sleeping on the sofa for the last three years!'

Quite apart from the fact that I was impressed that she had the master bedroom all for herself, it suddenly occurred to me that if the WIFE says they no longer have sex, then the husband cannot be lying when he admits to the same sleeping arrangements.

'It happens, then. It really happens', I repeated, still skeptically.

'Of course it does. I have two other friends in the same situation', she answered.

'You have been seeing another man for the last three years. He has been seeing another woman for even longer. Why do you still share the same house?' I ask, and I am genuinely confused.

'Because it's convenient. It suits us both.'

I think of Mr Husband, and Mr Lost, lost – over the years - by a woman, although not reported as missing, and found, rather suddenly, by me.

I shall not settle into a convenient situation, forever looking for the available bed to share with one of the children, avoiding and escaping the last vestige of what was supposed to be the most intimate kind of relationship.

After Mr Bastard's lies, I had filed playing musical beds as an urban myth, with the very rare exception; instead, it seems to be an existing and well established practice. Very often, it seems, we allow the comfort of holding together the rotten structure of family appearances to overrule inconvenient desires and passions.

There must be a way out.