THE SEX DIARY: My date was 27 with abs like a Greek statue. I straddled him on a bench by the Thames…

On the night I met Eliot, a man young enough to be my son, I was feeling reckless. Although my marriage had been over for more than a year, I was not yet divorced. In fact, technically, we weren’t even separated.

Six months after we split, my husband had returned to stake a claim on our house, so we were living unhappily together in the family home in London with our three children and one cockapoo. My ex had taken the attic room and we alternated nights on and off from domestic duties like a pair of fighting cats.

Neither of us had started seeing other people, although I’d had one dating app meet-up where the man had bored me to tears with a droning history of French cycling and I’d been too polite (and clueless) to leave.

This particular night, I hadn’t been in the mood to go out at all but my friend had persuaded me, with the help of a lot of wine. It was summer and, at a certain hour, the bar we’d been drinking at turned into a dance venue. While I was dancing, I did not worry about the state of my divorce. Everyone on the dancefloor was younger than me, but in the dim light I thought I could pass for younger than my near half-century. And even if I couldn’t, I tried not to care.

Annabel Bond met her much younger date Eliot beneath the London Eye in London before they headed for a drink at a pub by the river

There, through the gloom, was Eliot, celebrating his friend’s 27th birthday. He had a handsome face and his colourful shirt flapped open to reveal a set of abs that wouldn’t look out of place on a Greek statue. He held out his hand and we wheeled into each other’s vicinity, dancing together for the rest of the night. At some point he said: ‘Oh, there’s something I forgot to tell you! I used to play football semi-professionally.’

I laughed. I’d forgotten to tell him nearly everything about my life, replying to his question, ‘Do you live alone?’ with a vague shake of the head. He was committed to meeting again and took my number. I laughed again.

Never going to happen, I thought. I was 48, more than 20 years older than him. I know that dating a much younger man is almost a rite of passage for the 40-something divorcee these days, but it felt as if I was doing something groundbreaking — and terrifying.

When we finally arranged to meet beneath the London Eye a few weeks later, I felt as if I was getting ready to give a speech in public, with the same terror of being found out as a fraud. That said, I did not know exactly what I was hiding, except my age, and honestly, shouldn’t getting to midlife be a triumph?

Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft in the 1967 film The Graduate, in which younger college leaver Benjamin is seduced by the older Mrs Robinson, a friend of his parents

Writer Annabel Bond describes her much younger date Eliot as having a set of abs that wouldn’t look out of place on a Greek statue

The last time I had a date with a man I really liked was with my husband, 16 years beforehand. Back then, my 32-year-old stomach was flat, my neck was smooth and my cellulite significantly reduced.

Nevertheless, here I was at the appointed time, under the Ferris wheel, in my carefully chosen jeans and silver sandals, a Disney plaster hastily wrapped around my toe.

Eliot would deduce either that I was a crazy Frozen fan, or that I had a young daughter, but it was the only plaster in the house.

I was worried I wouldn’t recognise Eliot. It had been dark in the bar and I hadn’t been wearing my glasses when we’d kissed goodbye.

But when he strode up and touched me lightly on the shoulder, he was dazzling. His eyes were a startling greenish hazel I would later embarrassingly describe to him as river-washed stones. His face was as fresh as a Listerine mint; he looked even younger than his 27 years.

He took my hand and we walked to a pub on the river. He ordered a bottle of wine and we drank it fast. I was nervous but exhilarated. I talked too much, drank too much and after darkness fell, I straddled him on a bench overlooking the Thames.

I can’t believe I was so brazen, but for the first time in ages I felt young and alive. Men have enjoyed this feeling for years, dating younger women; I reasoned that now it was my turn.

I leant forward and kissed him. Kissing has always been one of my favourite things. It had certainly gone missing in my marriage: kissing just for itself, not as the first step towards sex. For me, it is just as intimate as sex, all that exchange of pheromones and rocketing serotonin.

You can tell a lot about a man from the way he kisses. Eliot was excellent at it. Many men are not; they tend towards too much thrusting tongue, not enough lips. Eliot had full soft lips, and for someone so strong he was very gentle. He kissed me as if I were a peach.

At one point I broke off to say in a drunken confession: ‘I have to tell you something. I have kids!’

‘How many?’ he asked.

‘Three! And a dog.’

He took it without a blink. Later he admitted he’d googled me on the first night we met, after I’d typed my whole name into his phone. The alcohol had dimmed my age-gap insecurities, but not extinguished them. I was tipsy enough to point out, rather obviously: ‘You know I am waaaay older than you.’

‘Yessss,’ he said.

‘And are you OK with that?’ Here, I showed unusual restraint and managed not to list all my physical insecurities by name, adding only: ‘You could get anyone.’ I meant, anyone younger.

‘You are hot,’ he said.

It was clear he wasn’t ticking off his Mrs Robinson fantasies then. He’d told me earlier he thought I was in my 30s on the dancefloor.

We kissed some more. I could feel the bunched hardness of his chest underneath his shirt. I untucked it. I could not get over his hard muscles and the softness of his skin. The width of his arms as he wrapped them around my neck.

By now, I was not concerned with passers-by, although he was, and stopped me before we got to the point of no return.

‘Are we going to get a hotel?’ he asked.

‘I can’t! Not tonight,’ I said. The kids were expecting me back.

‘Next weekend then,’ he said.

I agreed of course; it was impossible not to. But in reality there was no way I was going to get my mother-of-three late-40s body naked in front of such a perfect physical specimen. The idea was laughable. Nevertheless, I hugged myself all the way home. I’d cancel him tomorrow.

Names have been changed