Let’s not start a pity party for Jennifer Aniston with this divorce – it’s not all been Brad luck

You know how sometimes you get an email and you just don’t want to open it. That’s how I felt this morning when an email popped into my inbox from my best friend, Victoria, with a single word in the header: “Jen”.

I knew at once it could only be bad news. And it was. Victoria’s message was brief and to the point.

“I’ve got to say… I saw that one coming. He had such cold eyes.”

I cross-checked with Google. Jennifer Aniston – Jen to those of us who wish we could be her real friends – is getting divorced again.

Like many other women I know, I’ve loved Jennifer Aniston since 1994, when I first saw an episode of Friends. She was perfectly cast as Rachel, the ideal girl next-door. For me, navigating single life in a London flatshare, Rachel was a more engaging role model than Bridget Jones. Single but never self-pitying. Always wise-cracking. With the hair that launched a thousand similar cuts. She was the kind of woman I wanted to be. On-screen and off.

In real life, Aniston was candid about her struggle with her weight and honest about her nose jobs. In her late twenties, she unfashionably admitted she wanted marriage and babies, just as I did – though I never dared say. She was not unattainably beautiful and yet she married Brad Pitt! She gave me hope that my dreams might also come true.

The end of Aniston’s marriage to Pitt only made me love her more. As she went through her break-up, I was mourning the end of a relationship I’d also hoped might be “the one”. If Aniston could get through her divorce from one of Hollywood’s most gorgeous men with such grace then I could get over my split from a short, faithless twit, with grace too.

Aniston became my Hollywood avatar as we went through the same life stages in tandem. As one of the few women in my friendship group who didn’t manage to hit all the usual life targets by 40, I was comforted to know I was in such good company. If Aniston could still think about having children, it wasn’t too late for me. Likewise, if she could tell the press where to stick their interest in her ovaries, I could be proudly childless too. If she was happy to be single, so was I.

But if she could get married in her mid-forties, then maybe I could. And so could Victoria. I’ve been looking back through some of our old emails and find Aniston crops up time after time as proof that “all is not yet lost”. That’s why the news of this divorce comes as such a blow.

Aniston and Theroux released a statement: “We are two best friends who have decided to part ways as a couple, but look forward to continuing our cherished friendship.” That doesn’t sound like a trial separation.

They were together for seven years in total. Three years engaged. Two-and-a-half years married. A long engagement is never a good sign. Perhaps it took that long to write the prenup, which I’m relieved to read is “cast iron”. Aniston won’t have shared her £100m fortune.

Read that again. Her £100m fortune. Before the press starts the pity party, there’s no sense in which the adjective “poor” should ever be appended to our Jen (even if she is 49 – practically dead in Daily Mail years).

She’s still gorgeous and talented. She still seems like she would be a good laugh. She’s still one of the highest paid actresses in Hollywood and she has a cast-iron prenup.

She’s got great friends. She spent her 49th birthday partying with a cast of A-list women in Malibu. And if she wants to get back on Celebrity Tinder, there are plenty of men to choose from. Chris Pratt? Ben Stiller? Now wouldn’t that be great? Anyone but Brad.

It’s impossible to find any article about Jennifer Aniston that doesn’t mention her first husband.

“They're both single!” Twitter users declared, and apparently everyone is rooting for a Jen-Brad reunion.

Not me.

As Victoria emailed, “WTF? Why do people even suggest it? More about everyone else’s deep-seated need for it to be 1999 again.”

If everyone really does want it to be 1999 again, I’ve got a better suggestion.

David Schwimmer.

Aniston’s former Friends co-star separated from his wife last year.

Come on Jen. These are difficult times for everyone. If you’re ever in the mood to marry again – and I can understand why you might never be – for the gaiety of all the nations, opt for Ross and Rachel together at last. Please! Third time’s a charm.

Christine Manby is a novelist