When I left my marital home with my large cream suitcase, I think part of me must have been aware that the current tenants were due to leave in three weeks, though I didn’t know I was being quite so practical. I stayed with my friend Erika until the cottage was free again. She’s a good person to be sad with. We watched loads of DVDs and ate chocolate biscuits, and I took very long baths.
The kindest way to describe this cottage would be ‘shabby but sweet’. The outside is painted Mediterranean blue, and it has big twinkly windows that overlook the sea. That’s why I bought it: I wanted to look out at the sea and see it change colour. I wanted that vastness, that unbuilt space. It’s a bit like living next to a golf course, only nicer.
I look out the window at the sea while I try to decide whether to encourage readers to ‘experiment’ and personally decorate some of their bathroom tiles. It’s a sunny, blustery May afternoon; the sea is bouncing around, and the foliage on one of Dublin’s sturdy palm trees is waving in the breeze beside the beach. My neighbour’s wind-chimes are tinkling, and this is the sort of moment when I wish I owned a cat. I could pick it up and cuddle it and find the favourite spot behind its ears.
Tea. I need a cup of Earl Grey. I get up and pad, shoeless – I am wearing a pair of thick, soft pink socks – to the kitchen. When the tea is made and in my favourite wide-rimmed cream cup – a present from my extremely successful friend Fiona, who regularly visits Paris to discuss software – I decide to phone Aunt Marie. I want to ask her about DeeDee.
After I have told Marie that April won’t be flying back from California to feel uncomfortable in her front room, I say, with studied nonchalance, ‘Marie, you know Great-Aunt DeeDee…’
This is met with silence: a strange, hissing silence. I feel like I have lifted a seashell to my ear. ‘Hello?’ I say, wondering if she’s still on the line.
‘What do you want to know about her?’ Marie says brusquely.
‘Well, I was just… just wondering if anyone knows what happened to her.’
‘Of course they don’t,’ Marie replies, as if this is a blatantly idiotic question.
‘Has anyone tried to find out?’ I persist.
I hear a deep intake of breath. Then Marie says, ‘Sorry, Sally, I have to go. I have a lasagne in the oven.’
‘But –’
Marie sighs sharply. ‘I don’t know what happened to DeeDee. No one does. We don’t talk about her any more.’
‘Why?’
‘Because there’s no point. She’s gone,’ Marie says flatly. ‘Thanks for your call, dear. Bye.’ She hangs up the phone.
This is unusual. Marie is far from perfect, but she’s not usually rude. What on earth happened to DeeDee? And why doesn’t Marie share my curiosity? Perhaps DeeDee was just a feckless, uncaring, horrible person. Maybe that’s why no one misses her.
I go to the kitchen and fetch a chocolate biscuit, then head reluctantly back to my article about bathroom accessories. It seems that DeeDee will remain a mystery – for the moment, anyway. I’ll have to ask Mum about her. Perhaps she’ll be more forthcoming.
I start to type frantically, because someone might pop by for tea at any moment. My friend Erika says I should have been a geisha. Even Diarmuid regularly drops in for Earl Grey and almond cookies. We never mention the mice, naturally. When he’s sitting on our sofa – it is still our sofa, since we bought it together – I can’t help noticing that he’s a handsome man with great biceps and lovely broad shoulders. And his stomach is so flat and toned. I know I’m describing him as though he were a horse or something, but one of Diarmuid’s attractions is that he has a great body, and he’s very good in bed. Come to think of it, I really miss that too.
He’s not tall – about five foot ten – and he’s kind of stocky, but in a nice way; it’s muscle, not fat. His bum is firm and looks great in jeans. His face is well proportioned, and he has a strong jawline and thick black eyebrows to go with his wavy dark hair. His eyes always seem a bit distant, but maybe it’s because deep down he’s quite shy. When he gets up to leave, I always feel a pang of regret. Just for a moment I forget how lonely I was with him; all our differences seem so small, compared to his big strong arms around me.
When Diarmuid leaves, I always want someone to phone or drop by and show me I’m happy to be single, but they never do. It’s suddenly like a desert. Of course, at times like this you know you could ring someone yourself, but you also know they’ll probably be in the middle of something – they’ll be in the supermarket or a meeting, or changing a nappy, or really preoccupied and unusually abrupt. That’s the weird thing about life: sometimes you can hardly get a moment to yourself, and sometimes you’re forgotten. When you ache with all your heart for a certain person to call you – when that call would make all the difference – they probably won’t phone till three days later, when you have five people in the sitting-room and the neighbour’s cat has just pooped on the carpet. It’s just something you have to get used to. Tough titties, as my friend Fiona would say.
Fiona isn’t very sentimental, even though she’s sensitive – and not just about herself. My friend Erika, however, is sentimental. She is also a floating secretary. This doesn’t mean she spends her time decorously poised above Dublin with a shorthand notepad; it means that, when various large corporations need temporary help for a variety of reasons, she’s one of the people they call upon. And they call upon her a lot – which is just as well, because she doesn’t make much money from her papier-mâché cats. She loves making and painting them – each one has his or her very own personality – but they take quite a while to get ‘just right’, and people don’t pay all that much for them. In an ideal world, Erika could stay at home with her mashed-paper animals and not have to find her way intrepidly to her desk. Sometimes she makes it sounds like Arctic exploration. Apparently the floors in many modern office blocks are almost identical and devoid of distinguishing features; her landmarks are things like red storage-boxes and water-coolers and photocopiers. Sometimes she even leaves little ‘You are here’ notes for herself.
Erika is small and blonde and has a sweet, turned-up nose and a slightly dazed expression, which is extremely attractive to men. Especially to someone called Alex. Alex is why Erika is on the phone right now. I was just typing, ‘These zebra-patterned soap dishes are available from…’ when she called.
‘Alex said he doesn’t want to leave his wife,’ she says. ‘Not yet, anyway. Because she may leave him first, and that would be so much easier.’
‘Oh.’
‘His wife is getting very friendly with her yoga teacher. They even go out for herbal tea after classes.’
‘I see.’
‘He told me yesterday. We only met for half an hour because Alex had to collect his daughter from her tai chi class.’
‘Oh, dear.’
‘I didn’t mind.’ Erika suddenly sounds brave and adamant. ‘I had things to do myself. I… I had two marmalade-coloured cats to finish – a bride and groom. I’m making them as a wedding present for Fiona’s cousin.’
‘Oh. Good.’ And it is good. Erika adores making bride and groom cats; she loves painting on the tuxedos and long white dresses. The thing is, hardly any shops seem to want them. Most of them are sold to people she knows.
‘I’ve just read an article about how important it is to have your own life,’ Erika says. ‘Even if you meet your soulmate, you need to have your own life.’
‘Yes,’ I say, knowing that at any minute she is going to try to quote Kahlil Gibran.
‘As Kahlil Gibran wrote, “The olive and the… the… ”’ There is a long pause. ‘I’ve forgotten what exactly, but anyway, they don’t grow in each other’s shade.’ Erika hasn’t got a great memory for quotations and jokes; when she’s telling one of the five jokes she knows, she usually gets to the punch line way before she’s mentioned any of the details that would make it funny. Diarmuid thinks she is a bit daft, but in a nice way that he doesn’t quite get but can tolerate. And Er
ika has never really told me what she thinks of Diarmuid, which probably means she isn’t that keen on him.
She is certainly very keen on Alex. I saw him once. He was in a bookshop, signing copies of his latest self-help offering. At this point I should probably mention that Alex writes hugely popular books about having healthy relationships. He was very tanned and earnest-looking and fairly muscular around the shoulders; his blue-grey eyes seemed kind and tired, but you could see how they might blaze with raw passion. I didn’t buy the book. I just looked at him sniffily and walked by. I wanted him to see I knew he was a fraud – just like I am. He writes books about having wonderful relationships, and I write articles about having a wonderful home.
‘I feel such a fraud!’ Is Erika telepathic? ‘I keep telling Alex I don’t mind waiting. I keep telling him that I understand, that I want almost nothing from him. But I do! I… I want us to go to the supermarket together. I want to watch DVDs with him and… and eat crisps. I… I want to kiss his eyelashes.’
I don’t know what to say to this. Even though I’ve had quite a sobering romantic career, this is not a longing I have had to deal with. Maybe I should have wanted to kiss Diarmuid’s eyelashes. Maybe that’s what is missing.
‘Oh, Sally, I’m sorry.’ Erika sighs forlornly. ‘I shouldn’t be going on like this. I should be asking you about Diarmuid.’
‘I’m very glad you’re not,’ I say. ‘If you did, I wouldn’t know what to say.’
There is a long pause. Then Erika says, ‘Alex said something else. He said he loved me but he thought it might be best if we didn’t meet again. Ever.’
‘Oh, dear.’
‘Alex says he thinks we’re all heated up, and if we get together we’ll burst into flames and that will be it.’ Erika’s voice sounds distant and lonely, as though it’s coming from the bottom of the sea. ‘I said I understood.’ She is sobbing now. ‘I said he was right. And… and then Alex said he wasn’t so sure. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe we both need the combustion. Maybe we both need our lives to be totally different.’
I hold my breath. Totally different. The words seem to tug at my heart.
‘So then I had to be the one who was strong, and I said that lives don’t become totally different just like that. It takes patience and planning and probably years of therapy.’
I suddenly want to disagree, but I don’t. I suddenly think that maybe you can reach a point of desperation when things have to change; that maybe you can take a big leap and end up somewhere different, even if you’re not quite sure how you got there.
‘So how did you leave it, then?’
‘He said he’ll be in town on Thursday.’
‘He wants to meet you?’
‘Yes,’ she sighs. ‘Yes, I suppose he does.’
‘And are you going to meet him?’
‘I don’t know. I want to. I feel like… like maybe the whole thing can teach me something.’
Erika is forever thinking that things can teach her something. She thinks that life is one great big university, and that when she understands love better none of this stuff will bother her any more. But Alex has done relationship courses and he’s got relationship certificates, and it hasn’t made any difference.
After Erika hangs up, I get back to the article. I tell people to decorate their tiles with enamel paint, and I virtually order them to collect shells and make collages. I add that their shower curtains must be ‘boisterous’ and their bath mats ‘sensuous’. As for flooring, I mention exotic stone slates that need to be imported from Hyderabad. So many people go on, these days, about how to make your house nicer. But it seems to me that they – and I include myself in the bunch – don’t talk much about how to make a home.
Somehow the word ‘home’ always reminds me of the house we had when I was little – the old, shabby one where the cushions were faded and the carpets were frayed, and dust motes danced in the light. There was a curved drive and tall trees and a big lazy lawn that never got mowed enough. That was how we lived. We all sort of pottered around, and Dad practised his cello and went off and gave concerts every so often. Sometimes pets died, and I was inconsolable – the world was virtually torn from me when I laid guinea pigs and dogs and hamsters in their final resting-places; but most of the time I was happy, and I didn’t even know it.
The doorbell rings. I consider ignoring it. Somehow I have to make time to finish this article and visit my great-aunt Aggie, who is old and frail and weird these days, living in a nursing home and convinced that her room is full of sheep.
I decide to ignore the doorbell. I just don’t have time to answer it. But I do creep over to the window and peep out between the curtains.
It’s Diarmuid – and he’s seen me. He’s waving and smiling and looking rather pleased with himself. I assume this is because he’s carrying a large bunch of flowers, and they clearly weren’t bought in a garage. They are beautiful, and they are swathed in soft pink paper, with a ribbon round them.
I open the door and let him in.
Chapter Two
I’ve put Diarmuid’s flowers in a large glass vase, and they’re on the mantelpiece. They are clearly expensive, because they include blossoms that look as though they belong in Hawaii.
‘Thank you so much, Diarmuid,’ I say again, as I hand him a blue mug of Earl Grey and put a plate of almond biscuits on the coffee table.
‘You’re welcome,’ he says. His ‘welcome’ has a slight American twang to it, because he spent five years working as a builder in Brooklyn. That’s one of the things we have in common: we’ve both lived in America. My family moved to California when I was nine and returned to Dublin when I was twelve. Diarmuid went to New York when he was twenty-one; he has loads of cousins out there. Sometimes he talks as though the Bronx is just down the road.
‘They really are lovely.’ I have already thanked him five times.
Diarmuid smiles at me with obvious pleasure. One of the advantages of separating from Diarmuid is that he is being kind and attentive again – only I wonder how long it would last if I went back to him. Because it wasn’t just the mice that made me storm out of the house with my cream suitcase. I was also furious because he had forgotten our first wedding anniversary. There wasn’t even a card. He had also taken to going out with friends to the pub, after his biology lectures, and returning home late without so much as a phone call. He just didn’t seem like the Diarmuid I had married. When I asked him if he still loved me, he said, ‘Well, I’m here, aren’t I?’ which to be frank didn’t offer me much reassurance. Then he held me close and said that the romantic part of love was just the icing. The cake, the nutritious part, was working as a team and building a home together. A family. He explained that he was doing the biology course for us, because he wanted to earn more money, so that we wouldn’t have to delay having children for too long and I could, if I wanted, give up journalism for a while and be a stay-at-home parent. And what I wanted to say, but didn’t say, was that I wanted more of the icing. I felt I was entitled to it. This cake he was talking about didn’t sound all that appetising.
‘You’ll feel differently when we have kids,’ he kept saying, but I’m not the sort of person who wants to use kids to keep me with someone. Diarmuid is very keen to be a parent – in fact, I sometimes wonder if that’s the main reason he married me – and he still thinks that a ‘kid’ would be the answer. That is why, despite our differences, he sometimes tries to get me into bed. He tries to get me to sit beside him on the orange sofa so that he’ll have easy access to the ultra-sensitive blissful spots just behind my ears. He knows that, once he really got into gear, he could make me forget little details like condoms. I think he must have a diagram of all my erogenous areas. I have never met a man who could press the right buttons quite so fast.
The argument that made me bolt was about spermicidal cream. One of the many dismaying aspects of my marriage is that some of the crucial details sound almost farcical. Diarmuid found some spermicidal cream in a drawer a
nd asked me why I had it, and I sort of mumbled and stuttered and said, ‘Oh… goodness… do I still have that?’ And then I blushed, and he said, ‘You’ve been using this, haven’t you?’ And I said, ‘Well, maybe just… just occasionally,’ and he hit the roof. Because, although we had never discussed it in detail, Diarmuid had formed the impression that we were ‘trying to start a family’. And I felt we should get to know each other better before we went straight into teething and nappies and leaky breasts. I wanted more of that icing.
That’s why I frequently used a diaphragm. I’d dart into the bathroom and attempt to insert the thing without it springing from my hands and bouncing against the wall.
‘What are you doing in there?’ he’d call out as he lay in our double bed, erect and waiting.
‘Oh… just washing,’ I’d shout back.
That’s how he formed the impression that I was, perhaps, over-fastidious about hygiene – though he’s pretty fastidious too. He is not the sort of man who says, ‘Let’s just do it now, on the kitchen table.’ He has a little wash too, and gargles with mouthwash; then he sprays himself with an aftershave called Ocean. Sometimes I wanted to say that it would be nice just to smell him – that it was all becoming a little too sanitised.
‘You lied to me!’ That’s what Diarmuid shouted when he found the cream – and then the diaphragm – at the back of the drawer.
‘No, I didn’t! We never discussed it!’ I screamed back.
This did not mollify him. As far as he was concerned, we had come to an agreement. He was so enraged that he turned on his heel and left the bedroom. That’s another thing I’ve discovered about Diarmuid: when he is bulging with anger, he doesn’t want to talk about it. And I desperately needed to talk about it. I needed to talk about all sorts of things. I felt I might burst with frustration.
The Truth Club Page 2