JUST NO WAY THIS IS GOING TO WORK!

Separate houses, time apart, fundamental differences – fears are mount for Ben and Jen’s marriage

- KIM SNYDERS

IF YOU love something set it free, the old saying goes. If it comes back to you, it’s yours. If not, it was never meant to be.

So if that’s the case it seems Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck were meant to be, right? They loved each other, they set each other free, they came back to each other.

There were two weddings, there was a honeymoon, there was a blended family, there was a love nest (or love mansion, in their case). There were gushings of love, there was PDA, there were hopes of happily ever after.

The world was rooting for them: Bennifer 2.0 were #relationship goals, proof that everyone deserved a second chance and could make a go of it even if 20 years had passed and much water had flowed under the bridge of life.

An epic comeback story, that was Jen and Ben.

Sure, he looked miserable a lot of the time, but that was Ben: Mr Resting Sulk Face, Mr I’m a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here.

He was fine, Jen assured us. All was well in Bennifer land.

But was it? Is it? Right now there’s one story dominating the celeb world and that’s the state of their marriage.

We recently went through a whole 47 days without a single sighting of J Lo and Ben together – and given that they were almost always together it sent alarm bells clanging. Then he was seen without his wedding ring – it’s a sign, people said, a sign!

They did pop up together at a restaurant as gossip churned, but it wasn’t the same. It seemed forced, a show, a case of trying too hard.

And the bottom line is this: the love story of the decade seems in danger of imploding.