The Truth Club (8 page)

‘Sally, I know this really good therapist who –’

‘Look, Fiona, I can’t
afford
to see a therapist right now,’ I snap,
my mouth full of creamy calories. ‘I have to write imploring letters to the bank manager about my overdraft as it is. You wouldn’t believe the things I say to him about cash flow.’

‘Make it a priority,’ Fiona says. ‘It
is
a priority. I’d lend you the
money.’

I take another bite of cake and chomp it thoughtfully. ‘Maybe.
I don’t know. I’ll think about it.’ But what I’m thinking is that I’ve
tried therapy, and I just ended up talking about things that happened
years
ago when I was a kid in California and it looked like my parents were about to divorce. I can’t see how talking about my parents is going to help me decide about Diarmuid.

‘Not all therapists get you to talk for ages about the past,’ Fiona tells me. ‘At least talk to me, Sally. You’re unhappy. I can see it.’

This would be the ideal moment to cry. I
should
cry. I want to,
but I somehow can’t. I don’t feel I deserve to cry, because this
situation with Diarmuid is entirely of my own making. He is the
one who deserves to cry. He is the one who has been left to share
a house with Barbecue Barry. He is the one who has to eat alone
tonight because I wouldn’t alter my arrangements.

Instead I sigh, deeply and dramatically.

‘What are you sighing about?’

‘About Diarmuid. About how unfair I’ve been to him.
Sometimes I wish he’d been able to marry Becky.’

‘Who’s Becky?’ Fiona leans forward.

‘A girl he loved. They met when he was fourteen and she was
twelve. They went out for five whole years.’

‘And where is she now?’

‘In New Zealand. Her family moved there. She and Diarmuid
kept in contact for a while, and then she got engaged to a guy
over there. It broke Diarmuid’s heart – I’m sure it did, though he
hardly ever speaks about it. His mother says they were an ideal couple.’

‘Diarmuid’s mother sounds like a right old bag,’ Fiona snorts,
and I do not disagree.

‘She’s never really liked me,’ I say, through cake. I am now on my second helping. The icing is a kind of creamy chocolate fudge
and extremely tasty. ‘She even has a silver-framed photo of Becky
in the sitting-room. She’s in a canoe, looking all outdoorsy and cute. Diarmuid’s mother calls her “the daughter I never had”.’

‘That’s outrageous!’ Fiona splutters. ‘You’re her daughter-in-law. She could be a bit more…
tactful.
’

I know she is right to be annoyed. Diarmuid’s mother, Madge,
has never treated me as though I belong in her family. Any time
I’m in a room with her, she greets me, talks for a few moments
and moves on to someone else. Diarmuid has to keep reminding her to introduce me to their friends and relatives. When he does,
she exclaims, ‘Oh, yes, of course – this is Sally. Diarmuid’s…’ And
there is always a small pause before she adds, ‘Wife.’ I’ve often
asked Diarmuid to have a word with her about it, but he hasn’t
done it yet. He’s really worried about hurting her feelings,
because apparently she is very ‘sensitive’ and doesn’t mean to be
rude, so I ‘shouldn’t take it personally’. I don’t really believe him,
because I haven’t noticed her being like that with anyone else.

I’m amazed at how much I’ve tolerated Madge’s behaviour.
Maybe it’s because, deep down, I think she’s right. Becky is the
person Diarmuid should have married.

And I think he knows it too.

Chapter
Four

I
am staring at
the aquamarine curtains in Diarmuid’s bedroom.
I think of it as Diarmuid’s bedroom even though it is still,
theoretically, ours. I took ages choosing those curtains. I wanted them to be textured and soft, and they are. They are also lined in
thick cream cotton. It’s expensive lining, because I wanted the curtains to last and not get bleached by sunlight. Everything in this room was chosen with such care and such concern about its
durability – apart from the man sleeping beside me. I rushed into
my marriage, because I thought no one else half decent would want me, and I was scared of being alone.

Diarmuid must have felt that way too. He still does. He as
much as admitted it just ten minutes ago, before he fell into what
seems to be a restive sleep: he twitches every so often, and his face
does not hold that childlike softness of forgetting. ‘You can’t believe how lonely I’ve been.’ That’s what he muttered, just
before his head deepened on the pillow. ‘I need someone to
hold… someone to love.’ And then his eyes closed and he drifted
away from me. I wish I knew where he’s gone. I wish I knew so
much more about him than I do.

I am still in a daze. I can’t believe what has just happened.
There is something dreadful and lovely about it. Just for a while,
when I walked into this room again, I felt such relief that he had
made my mind up for me, that all the indecision was over. And
now I don’t know what I’m feeling any more. All I know is that I
may be pregnant. I do not carry my diaphragm around in my handbag. And I know I must have chosen this, because I let it h
appen. I must have wanted
something
to happen to help me
make my mind up about my marriage.

This week my visit to Aggie was unexceptional, until she started to say that the sheep were now floating. I didn’t know what to say to that, so I started to make up a story about how Diarmuid and I had gone into town for lunch last Sunday. I told
her it had been sunny enough to sit outside; we’d eaten pasta
and drunk fruity red wine, followed by wonderfully frothy
cappuccinos. And we’d talked for ages about all sorts of things –
our dreams, our hopes, and some of those scary feelings you think
no one will understand. Only Diarmuid had understood. I told Aggie that what was so great about him was that we could talk
about anything together; and when I got too serious he knew how to lighten things up, make me laugh. I was happy as I spoke about
this Sunday lunch, until I remembered it was just something I’d
made up. And then my heart filled with this incredible yearning, a
nd I thought,
If only what I was saying were true.
Because the man I was describing wasn’t Diarmuid. Diarmuid doesn’t know how to be that open. Any time I almost get him to tell me more
about himself, his deep secret self, this closed look comes over his
face and he changes the subject.

And I suddenly knew the pain I feel when this happens isn’t a
new pain. It’s an old pain, one that I’ve felt with April and my
parents. And so – in a weird, wrong way – it sometimes feels right,
because it’s familiar. But I also knew that, deep down, I hoped that
Diarmuid would prove to be the exception and that we would somehow find a way to reach each other and break down the
barriers. That we would discover a new, open kind of love, a more
real kind of love. One that I was desperate to believe in.

As Aggie went on about the floating sheep, I felt pangs of despair. She was the one who had offered me glimpses of this bigger kind of love, and now she was talking nonsense. I was about to do my usual ritual of shooing the sheep into the field
w
hen she said, ‘No, leave them. It’s nice to have them here.’ And
then this radiant look came over her face, and she said, ‘They’re
so, so
beautiful.’

I didn’t ask her why the sheep were so beautiful. I just couldn’t
face talking to her any more at that moment. I leaned forwards
and kissed her; and she said, very softly, ‘DeeDee can help you,
Sally. You’re so alike. So very similar.’ I just looked at her and squeezed her arm. Then I left the room.

After that weird conversation, I was pleased when Diarmuid just happened to be driving by when I was waiting for a bus. I welcomed the distraction, because I had started thinking about DeeDee again. I didn’t want to be similar to her. I began to wonder if Aggie was just being sly when she said those things. Maybe she thought that saying DeeDee could help me would make me want to look for her.

‘Hi there, Sally!’ Diarmuid actually managed to make it seem
like he was driving past just by chance, though now I know he
must have watched me walking down the road. ‘Would you like
a lift home?’

I accepted because I knew I could be waiting at the bus stop for
half an hour. In fact, Diarmuid’s ‘lift’ was very welcome – until I
realised he wasn’t driving me to my cottage. He was driving me
to ‘our’ house.

‘Diarmuid,’ I said, very calmly and evenly. ‘Where exactly are
we going?’

‘I’m driving you home,’ he said. ‘To your real home. This thing
has gone on far too long.’

I just sat there, numb with disbelief. This wasn’t like him. But then, so many things didn’t seem like him these days. Sometimes
he seemed like one of those paper samples of paint – the colour always looks so different when you actually get it on a wall.

‘Everyone says I’ve been too patient with you,’ he continued.
The word ‘everyone’ seemed to boom reproachfully. ‘If we’re
g
oing to save our marriage, we at least have to be under the same
roof.’

We drove on in silence. I felt I should put up some kind of fight,
but I didn’t know what to say. He pressed one of the gleaming
buttons on the radio, and the Corrs started singing ‘I Would Love T
o Love You’, which seemed very insensitive of them: even though
it’s a lovely song, I didn’t want to love Diarmuid like he loved me.
His view of love seemed entirely different from mine. I glowered
at Diarmuid and he smiled at me, and the Corrs sang about this love we had; and somehow the song became just about me and
Diarmuid, and how great it would be if all these barriers between
us could come crashing down and disappear.

For some reason, I suddenly remembered my mother’s voice –
the hushed tone, the genuine concern: ‘Do you think Sally will
ever find someone?’ I’d come over for Sunday lunch; afterwards,
when I was supposed to be watching television, I had got up to make myself a cup of tea and heard my parents talking in the kitchen. I stood stock-still in the corridor and waited for my father’s reply.

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Sometimes I worry that she’s turning
into the kind of woman who’s got some idea in her head about her
ideal man.’ There was the sound of clinking crockery. They were
washing up. ‘I really hope she isn’t ignoring the decent, good, unglamorous men who could love her. Sally needs love.’

‘We all need love,’ my mother said rather brusquely. And I knew
the conversation had become about them, so they would
immediately start discussing something else. On this occasion it had
been whether they should put the leftover chicken in the freezer.

I roused myself from this reverie and said sharply to Diarmuid,
‘I want to go back to my cottage.’ I said it far too late. We were virtually in ‘our’ driveway.

‘Let’s talk about that over dinner,’ he said. ‘I’ve got us some
beef with black bean sauce and green peppers – oh, yes, and extra
g
arlic.’ He smiled; I always ask for extra garlic with this
particular dish.