He still believes I was, in fact, and I have never denied it. Actually, I’ve encouraged him to retain this impression. Because Diarmuid doesn’t have a very high opinion of himself when it comes to women. He told me that he never made the first move because he was scared of being rejected. I did the very thing he was waiting for. I told him he was beautiful. And, even though it was a rather odd thing to say to a stranger at a party, it gave him the courage to ask me out and eventually marry me. Of course, he must have fancied me too; but I’m sure Diarmuid has fancied piles of women at parties and never even spoken to them. He was waiting for reassurance that he wasn’t going to make an arse of himself – and I gave it to him with one chance remark.
And the stupidest thing of all is that it’s a sentence I wanted to say to someone else at a party before, but didn’t. Though Diarmuid is attractive, I would never call him beautiful. Beautiful is a big, extravagant word. To call a man beautiful implies that, in one glance, you have seen a sweetness of spirit – something that transcends other desirable attributes, such as a nice body or luxuriant hair or a wide, kind smile – something that speaks directly to your heart. And you can’t understand how this has happened, how someone has become so precious to you in an instant; how, in some ridiculous golden way, he seems like part of the home you’ve been searching for.
I never even talked to the Beautiful Stranger I saw at the other party, so for all I know he could have been a right bollocks. And this incident seems typical of the way I live my life. I’ve always gone for the simplest choices – the ones that are most convenient and don’t make waves or cause controversy.
‘You look deep in thought,’ Zak says, handing me a mug of hot chocolate – he and Fiona use their cappuccino machine to make a nice thick froth. ‘You didn’t even notice me. What were you thinking about?’
He smiles, that ridiculously wide smile. It should make him ugly, but it doesn’t. There’s a goodness about Zak that radiates from his smile, and from his small, deep-set eyes. It’s even in his hands; they are broad, and the fingers are long and sensitive. Sometimes I love him myself, in a sort of detached way; I don’t want him for myself, but I’m glad he’s there to make me and everyone else feel warmer. Softer. Accepted. He is comfortable in his own skin; he is trusting and kind and almost obsessive about telling the truth. ‘How can we really know people if they lie to us?’ I remember he said that once, shortly after he and Fiona married. ‘Even small white lies erode something. They’re disrespectful.’
I decide not to tell Zak I was distracting myself from his slow sperm by tracing the provenance of my marriage. ‘Actually, I was wondering about sofas,’ I reply. ‘There are too many designs and colours to choose from these days.’
Zak just sits there, as if he’s waiting for me to tell him something else – as if, in some way, he already suspects a secret. Fiona is looking at him and then at me. I wish I could make everything right for them. I wish life wasn’t so bloody complicated.
‘I’d better go,’ I say, as I finish the frothy chocolate.
‘It’s late. I’ll drive you,’ Zak says.
Fiona and I exchange careful glances.
‘Go on,’ she says, smiling. ‘You look tired.’ The placid hormones seem to have kicked in again. She looks serene and calm.
Zak appears to have got a new car. People who care about cars expect you to notice these things. ‘What a lovely car!’ I say to him. ‘What lovely comfortable seats.’
He tells me what the car is. He talks about its special features and presses some buttons to illustrate technical details. ‘My goodness, Zak,’ I say, while he goes on about its advantages as a family vehicle.
What I’m really thinking about is the Beautiful Stranger – the man I thought I had erased from my memory. I haven’t thought about him since I married Diarmuid – and it’s just as well, because I found out he got married five months after I saw him at the party. But now, as Zak talks about cooling systems and hydraulics, it’s as if the Beautiful Stranger has returned to me. I remember how we exchanged those long, heated glances, stared at each other with longing – surely it was longing – and then looked away. My feelings for him are so foolish. I can’t believe I still remember it all in such detail. I even found out his name. It’s Nathaniel. Shortly after his marriage he moved to New York. I will probably never meet him again.
I tumble out of the car gratefully as soon as I reach the cottage. ‘Thanks, Zak, that was really good of you,’ I say. This isn’t a time to offer him a cup of tea. Even though I’m determined to keep Fiona’s secret, something might slip out. When I push the car door closed, it slams dramatically. ‘Sorry about that!’ I smile, leaning into the open window. ‘It’s a beautiful car, Zak. Thanks so much for the lift.’
He smiles back and says, ‘You’re welcome.’ Then he drives off happily. He’s very smiley these days; he says the thought of the new baby makes him all soppy. I love that he’s the kind of man who can be soppy. I fear for him. If only I could protect him and Fiona – and of course poor Erika, with her demented passion for Alex.
I used to feel that way about my parents, too, when I was little. I wanted to turn back time so that they could love each other like they used to. I wanted to rewrite history so that when Mum met Al, the man who became her lover, she just looked at him and walked off quickly in the other direction. I wanted her to see that she didn’t need someone else. She had Dad and me. She had our lovely, rambling old house in the hills outside San Francisco. She had the big fat chocolate cookies I used to bake for us all; the laughter when I ran into the lawn sprinkler on those baking summer days.
Most of all, I wanted her to know that she had been happy before she met Al. But then sometimes I got to thinking that maybe she hadn’t been happy, and we just hadn’t noticed. So I lived with the feeling that one day Dad and I would wake up and find her gone. Gone without even a goodbye.
The minute I’m inside my cottage I decide to make myself a cup of tea, but when I’m walking to the kitchen I knock over my handbag. The notebook I found in my parents’ attic falls onto the floor, and a photograph spills out of it. It must have been tucked away at the back.
I pick up the photo. It’s a black-and-white picture of a woman smiling at the camera, a big, beaming smile. The photo is faded, but her smile isn’t. She’s a big-framed, attractive woman, the kind who isn’t fat but will never look slender. She looks elegant, though you can see that she might walk in a sturdy, substantial fashion, her wide hips swaying under her low-cut cotton dress. She has a brave face – you can see it in her firm jawline and her strong eyebrows, the straight look in her eyes – and she has had to be braver than she expected. She is smiling even though she is sad. I don’t know how I know this, but I do. She has longings she can’t speak about; longings she feels no one will understand.
I get a queasy feeling in my stomach as I turn the picture over. I see the old gum and small, torn bits of paper: it was once in a photograph album, but it was removed. And in tidy black pencil on the back, someone has written, ‘DeeDee’.
Chapter Eight
‘We could live together in a camper van,’ Erika is informing me. ‘Lots of people live in camper vans.’
‘You and me?’ I enquire. ‘Because, to be quite frank, I’m not sure I’m that keen on the idea.’
I am talking into my mobile phone and walking along Grafton Street. I’m going to a reception organised by a woman called Greta, who has done lots of favours for me in the past, such as sending me on freebie furniture-related trips to Italy and London. Greta has her own PR company and is military and motherly, and frequently rather fierce.
‘Not you and me!’ Erika splutters. ‘I’m talking about me and Alex. If he leaves his wife, he’ll need somewhere to live… Yes, it’s Thursday.’ For a moment I wonder why Erika is telling me this; then I realise she must still be the receptionist at International Holdings. The staff there keep asking her the most basic questions. It’s as if they regress to infancy as soon as
they approach her desk.
‘Couldn’t he live in your flat?’ I enquire.
‘No, of course he couldn’t!’ she says, as if the suggestion is idiotic. ‘It can’t look as if he’s just gone from one woman to another.’
‘But that’s what would have happened, isn’t it?’
‘Not really,’ she says firmly. ‘If he leaves his wife, it’s because they don’t love each other. He wouldn’t even have looked at me if he was satisfied with his marriage.’
‘Why couldn’t he just rent a house?’
‘Because if we had a camper van, we could go on trips,’ Erika replies. ‘Alex loves the idea of us going on trips in our little home – staying in Provence and Tuscany, falling asleep to the sound of the waves on a Wexford beach. He’d like to spend at least part of the summer travelling. He could bring his laptop along; he doesn’t really need an office. Of course, sometimes he’d bring the kids along and I’d stay behind. It’s only fair… Four thirty-five.’
I assume that someone has just asked her the time. At least I’m not late for the reception; it doesn’t start until five.
‘So you’d keep your flat?’ I ask.
‘Oh, yes,’ Erika says. ‘Though I’d have to get someone to share it with me, to help pay the rent while I’m away with Alex.’
‘But you only have one bedroom.’
‘I could use the utilities room. It’s quite cosy.’
Erika’s utilities room is mainly taken up with a washing machine, but I decide not to mention this. There is an excitement in her voice, a real exhilaration. She disappears to take a series of calls. I see a woman wheeling a pram and feel a surge of anxiety. What will Fiona do if Zak discovers their impending baby isn’t his? It will be awful keeping such a big secret. I’ve already been rehearsing what to say when I peer into the cot.
Erika comes back on the line and starts telling me about the different kinds of camper vans you can buy. She’s been looking it all up on the Internet. She has a computer on her desk. When people approach she has to hit ‘Minimise’, so she can give the impression that she is deeply, if temporarily, committed to International Holdings. The other day she pressed the wrong button and somehow ended up with a screen that blared, ‘Single and sexy? Visit our chat room for fun, no strings attached!’ just as a man called Jon was about to ask her what month it was.
‘Sally? Sally, are you still there?’ Erika is saying. Though I haven’t really been listening to her, I presume she wants me to comment on which sort of camper van might be preferable. I must get off the subject.
‘So… you and Alex have discussed all this?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Erika says. ‘He’ll rent a house later on, in the autumn. Divorce is very expensive; living in a camper van for a while would save him loads of money. And then he could sell it again if he wanted to.’
‘Well… I suppose it could be quite practical,’ I say. Then I add cautiously, ‘But are you sure he really wants to leave his wife, Erika? So many of them sound as though they want to, then don’t do it.’
‘Of course he does!’ she virtually shouts. ‘I can’t even believe you’re saying that.’
I decide not to apologise. Erika needs to realise that what I’ve said is not that outlandish.
‘Anyway, his wife may leave him first,’ Erika declares defensively. ‘She’s spending more and more time with her yoga teacher.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I sometimes follow them.’
‘What?’
‘I sometimes follow them after class. They go to a park and talk.’
I’m not quite sure how to reply to the news that Erika stalks Alex’s wife, so it’s just as well that someone comes to her desk and asks her to type a letter. ‘I hope you don’t mind,’ I hear a deep, hesitant voice saying. ‘It would be a great help. It’s not that long. Thanks, Erika. I hope you can read my handwriting.’ From the sound of his tentative tone, I suspect that this is Lionel, one of Erika’s more junior bosses, who doesn’t have his own secretary. She has told me about him. He virtually cringes any time he has to ask her to do anything; it’s as if he doesn’t realise she is actually employed to do things like type letters.
‘Don’t worry, Lionel, you have the best handwriting in the building,’ Erika says in a motherly tone. Lionel is probably blushing to the roots of his hair. I must find out if he’s married, because I suspect he has a major crush on Erika. She keeps finding chocolate biscuits on her desk, and I bet they’re from him.
As Erika gets on with her letter, I push my way down Grafton Street to the sound of buskers playing violins, guitars and trombones. The street is packed with shiny, manicured people with designer shopping bags. Shouldn’t some of them be in offices? The building I’m heading for is down one of these side-streets. A very modern new store is showcasing ‘top young design talent’. According to the swanky press release, the whole ground floor will be full of lamps with complex surfaces and flowing organic shapes, edgy twenty-first-century silver and sensually therapeutic textiles. The overall effect will be ‘amusing, intimate, ironic and intriguing’. Greta certainly knows how to talk things up.
I’m on the right street and I’m early, so I decide to go into an Italian café and have a cappuccino. Van Morrison is playing in the big, slightly shaded interior; I get my cappuccino and sit on a lemon-coloured armchair by the window.
There are moments in my life when I feel perfectly contented, and this is one of them. The secret of happiness is to count your blessings and notice what you have, instead of what’s missing; and I have so many reasons to be grateful.
I stir my cappuccino and watch the thick whorls covered in chocolate powder. Becky is probably back in New Zealand by now, anyway. She was only over for a visit. I must cook Diarmuid a lovely meal – big fat steaks and broccoli and chips, his favourite – and get in a big box of Turkish Delight. I can’t believe how patient and understanding he’s been. It’s high time I appreciated him more. I was so relieved to marry him. I don’t know why I’ve allowed myself to have these doubts. Being single was so lonely.
Out of nowhere I think of Nathaniel, the beautiful blue-eyed stranger, but this time I don’t feel a pang of regret. He’s just a nice memory that floats back into my head every so often.
My mobile rings just as I’m lifting the cup to my lips. Feck it, anyway. Sometimes I wonder if it really is an advantage to be quite so accessible. I consider leaving it in my bag, but I realise it could be Diarmuid. I really want to speak to Diarmuid. He hasn’t phoned for days because he’s studying for exams. I hope he does well.
‘Sally, you have to stop asking Marie about DeeDee.’ It isn’t Diarmuid; it’s April. She feels no need to build up to a subject gradually.
‘How do you know I’ve been asking her about DeeDee?’ I frown. I also sit up straight and clench an armrest.
‘She told me when she rang yesterday. She was wondering whether she should change the date of the party so I could be there, but I told her I was fully booked up for the whole of September. I told her there were weddings and very important meetings and, of course, the conference.’
‘I see.’ April is a very good liar. She does it with real conviction.
‘Anyway, I got into her good books by saying I’d tell you to stop asking her about DeeDee. She brought it up because she knows I agree with her about things like that. There’s no point poking around in the past.’
‘But this is the present,’ I say, trying to keep the irritation from my voice. ‘If DeeDee’s alive, we could meet her now.’
‘Why should we want to?’ April asks, and for a moment I almost agree with her. Her minimalist view of life sometimes seems like a restful contrast to my own.
‘Aggie wants to meet her before she…’ I can’t bear to say ‘dies’, so I say, ‘It’s understandable, isn’t it – wanting to see your sister again?’
April doesn’t answer that. There are times when we talk when I could burst into tears. Instead she says, ‘So how are you
, anyway? Are you dating again?’
‘What on earth are you talking about?’ I splutter. ‘Of course I’m not dating again. I’m married.’
‘I think you should date again. It would get you out of yourself.’ April has clearly formed the opinion that I am an introspective, miserable person who spends her spare time hunting for music boxes in attics.
‘Look, I don’t want to date anyone, OK?’ I say fiercely. ‘I’ll probably go back to Diarmuid, but if I stay single, I… I want to keep loads of cats and… spend the weekends haring around the countryside on my mountain bike.’ I hope this extravagant declaration will silence her.
It doesn’t. She just laughs and says, ‘Oh, you are funny sometimes.’
‘I mean it!’ I spit.
‘Oh, come on. You’re not a mountain-bike type of person,’ she giggles. ‘Anyway, I’d better go; I’ve got a meeting. Talk to you soon.’ The line goes dead.
I sit there for a while in a sort of trance. Sometimes April’s phone calls feel like ambushes. They make me say strange things. No wonder she thinks I’m not a mountain-bike kind of person; she was too small to remember that there was a time when I wanted a mountain bike with all my soul. My best friend Astrid had one. It was about freedom and adventure. A mountain bike seemed like a window to a whole new world. The Wild West is still wild, despite its veneer of civility, and I was wild too – wild in my heart.
The Truth Club Page 8