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Following the death of their mother sensible journalist Dan and irresponsible layabout Toby are looking after their thirteen year old brother Jamie, who has not spoken to them in six months. Against the advice of their critical aunt Debbie they attend Jamie's parents' evening and Toby is surprised to find the form teacher Miss Pemberton is the girl he slept with last night. The brothers are hurt that Jamie will speak to Miss Pemberton and not them but Dan feels closer to Jamie after giving up the opportunity to cover a Celine Dion concert to be with him.
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Dan's dizzy colleague Poppy turns up, homeless and wanting to stay. Dan is reluctant but Toby is enthusiastic when she brings her all-girl exercise class to the flat. After a while Poppy gets on Dan's nerves and he tries to get her to leave but is Toby, who actually succeeds - though not in the way Dan had wanted.
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Dan falls for Polish shop assistant Blanka, who can speak no English, and the phrases Poppy gives him from her Polish ex-boyfriend are hardly appropriate. Dan asks Blanka to dinner and is making headway but the romantic evening is wrecked by the language barrier and Blanka's peanut allergy. Elsewhere Toby makes money out of Jamie's skill at the video arcade.
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Dan throws a birthday party for Jamie but gets his age wrong and gives him a jacket which Auntie Debbie reckons makes him look like a Dutch porn star. Nor does Toby help by revealing that he has had Jamie's eyebrow pierced and frantically summoning Miss Pemberton to ask if he has given her a sexually transmitted disease. And with Poppy getting drunk and throwing herself at Jamie's school-friends only Auntie Debbie's present seems likely to salvage the party.
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Poppy arranges a blind date for Dan with the garrulous Katherine but it involves his pretending to be a doctor and when he comes clean she dumps him. Toby meanwhile is impressed by the dating profile of macho hunk Guy Bolton and sets out to 'accidentally' meet him and become his best friend but loses out when Guy takes a shine to Poppy. Thus both brothers end up alone and back home being consoled by Auntie Debbie.
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Toby is initially horrified when Miss Pemberton tells him that he has impregnated her but decides to become more responsible and even proposes to her - though she turns him down. In fact the supposed pregnancy turns out to be a false alarm, allowing him to revert to his old childish ways again. Jamie, meanwhile, becomes traumatized by Poppy's insistence that they watch zombie movies together.
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Dan decides Toby should get a job and recruits him to assist sandwich seller Alfonso. New head of resources Terri takes a saucy interest in Toby and, when Dan falls sick with the flu caught from Jamie, she gives him his brother's old job. Toby is of course hopeless and in order to reinstate Dan and revert to his old idle ways takes drastic action.
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The boys' drunken father, travel writer Aidan Bennett, who deserted them years ago, returns and wants to stay whilst he pens his new book. Poppy, Jamie and Toby are delighted but Dan feels aggrieved and is vindicated after a disastrous fishing trip. Aidan moves on but for whatever reason at least Jamie starts speaking again.
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