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  The Truth Club

  Grace Wynne-Jones

  Published by Accent Press 2007

  Copyright © 2005 Grace Wynne-Jones

  ISBN 1905170661/9781905170661

  The right of Grace Wynne-Jones to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior written permission from the publisher: Accent Press, The Old School, Upper High Street, Bedlinog, Mid Glamorgan, CF46 6SA

  Printed and bound in the UK

  Cover design by Joëlle Brindley

  Grace Wynne-Jones was born and brought up in Ireland and has also lived in Africa, the US and England. She has a deep interest in psychology, spirituality and healing and she also loves to celebrate the strangeness and wonders of ordinary life and love. She has frequently been praised for the warm belly-laugh humour and tender poignancy in her writing and has been described as ‘a novelist who tells the truth about the human heart’.

  Her feature articles have appeared in many magazines and national papers in Ireland and in England and her radio play Ebb Tide was broadcast on RTE 1. Her short stories have been published in magazines in Ireland, England and Australia, and have also been broadcast on RTE and BBC Radio 4. She is the author of four critically acclaimed novels: Ordinary Miracles, Wise Follies, Ready Or Not? and The Truth Club. Some of her fiction has also been translated into German, Russian and Indonesian. She has written and broadcast many radio talks and is also the producer and presenter of two forthcoming radio documentaries. She has been included in the book Sunday Miscellany A Selection From 2004 – 2006 (New Island). She also contributed to the travel book Travelling Light (Tivoli).

  Please visit her website for more information:

  www.gracewynnejones.com

  For Maura

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A big thank you goes to my agent Lisa Eveleigh for all her support, encouragement and help with this book. Loads of thanks also go to Hazel Cushion and Bob Cushion of the wonderful Accent Press and to Joelle Brindley for the lovely jacket artwork. I also send my brother Patrick Wynne-Jones a big printed hug for his kindness and understanding.

  Thanks too go to Eve Dolphin, Leo Rutherford, Richard Offutt, Julie Turner, Philip Casey, Lin Kirk, Gwynnie, Leo Rutherford, Liz, John, Joe Keveny, John Cantwell and Karen Ward, Alison Walsh, Tana Eilis French, the Ulster Bank and the friendly folks at Teignmouth Library, and to Alberto Villoldo for his inspiring teachings about healing and Shamanism. Love and light is sent to my various ‘helpers’ and to the characters in this novel who taught me so much. I also thank my lovely relatives and pals in the U.K. and Ireland and U.S.A. for being so supportive. My dear friend and former neighbour, Maura Egan, passed away in 2004. She was a wonderful woman who will be sorely missed by her family and many friends in Little Bray. I so enjoyed our chats and cups of tea and I was so grateful for her kindness.

  PRAISE FOR THE TRUTH CLUB:

  ‘…Grace Wynne-Jones has written an entertaining, intelligent and genuinely funny story…this is a great read, especially for commuters...guaranteed to shorten any journey.’ THE IRISH TIMES

  ‘It (‘The Truth Club’) manages to achieve something that most chick ‘lit’ doesn’t. It makes you want to read past the half-way point. And most unusually, you even find yourself wanting to read right to the end, as opposed to finishing it out of a sense of tidiness, as you would the last biscuit on the plate…there are shades of an intense Anne Tyler novel about it, especially in Sally’s intimate assessment of her relationship with her husband, which is mature and insightful…If ‘The Truth Club’ were a dessert, it would be a tiramisu: multi-layered, and definitely substantial, with some surprising elements to it. Ultimately satisfying…’ EVENING HERALD

  ‘The terrain of ‘The Truth Club’…is the fragility of the human heart, the conflicting loyalties that relationships bring, the choices that we make or simply fail to....a delicate exploration of being human.’ THE IRISH EXAMINER

  ‘...a novel which by turns had me laughing (aloud) entranced and, by the end a little bit wiser than I was at the beginning. In ‘The Truth Club’ Grace Wynne-Jones has produced a book in which the eclectic characters almost leap from the pages…the book also contains a perfect man, Nathaniel, who ‘almost always’ says the right thing…’ IRELAND ON SUNDAY

  ‘In the latest crop of chick-lit beach reads…Grace Wynne-Jones comes out top with her quirky new novel ‘The Truth Club’. Her characterisation is always amusing and the plot is delivered with warmth and a healthy sense of the ridiculous…it’s Ms Wynne-Jones’s cutesy sense of humour that makes this book so tasty.’ THE SUNDAY INDEPENDENT

  ‘It is a tour de force.’ KATIE FFORDE

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Chapter Forty-two

  Chapter Forty-three

  Chapter Forty-four

  Chapter Forty-five

  Chapter Forty-six

  Chapter One

  Something weird happened yesterday when I was talking to my sister April on the phone. She said, ‘I wonder what happened to Great-Aunt DeeDee.’

  I said, ‘I thought she was dead.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ April replied. ‘She went missing. Just left home, when she was in her early twenties, and told no one where she was going. No one’s heard from her since.’ Then April added something that was entirely typical of her. She said, ‘You know that, Sally. For God’s sake, where have you been for the last thirty-five years?’ She was asking where I’ve been all my life, since I am thirty-five, though I’m often told I look younger. That’s one of the things I cling to – that people say I look younger. I don’t see it myself. When I look in the mirror I see honey-coloured hair, brown eyes, highish cheekbones, and wrinkles and crow’s-feet and grey hairs.

  ‘Of course I’ve heard of DeeDee,’ I said. ‘But only a few times. Nobody ever seems to talk about her.’

  ‘Well, they wouldn’t, would they?’ April said. ‘After what she did.’

  ‘What did she do?’

  ‘I don’t know, but I get the impression people are really pissed off with her.�
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  ‘How do you know all this?’ I demanded. I’m the one who is supposed to be privy to the family secrets.

  ‘I’ve known it for years,’ April replied, without going into detail. ‘Look, could you tell Aunt Marie I can’t get to her big do? I can’t believe she expects me to fly over from California for a finger buffet. I have my own life.’

  She knew, of course, that I wasn’t going to say this verbatim to Aunt Marie. She knew I would find a way to be more tactful. Aunt Marie, who is my mother’s sister, feels she needs to corral family members every few years and frog-march them into some sort of intimacy. Somehow we all fit into Aunt Marie’s front room, though it’s quite a squeeze. I usually end up saying, ‘Oh, really? How interesting!’ to the various younger relatives who are involved in important-sounding courses. I seem to come from a family that has a great involvement in further education. Then, of course, there are the ones who are methodically working their way up the Civil Service; they sound impressive too, especially the ones who have to make regular trips to Brussels. And there’s a cluster of lovely bright young women who have married nice decent men and are having children or expecting them, and are teachers or social workers or aromatherapists.

  I’d absorb more of what they were telling me if I weren’t so fixated on trying to make a good impression myself. In some ways these gatherings feel like school reunions, at which we check up on one another and measure one another’s achievements. But in another way they are nothing like school reunions, which are softened by genuine affection and curiosity and giggles about daft things in the past. Many of the people in Aunt Marie’s front room are almost strangers. It says a lot for the force of her character that we show up at all. We are not the sort of large extended family that gathers for the fun of it. It’s not that we don’t like each other; it’s just that we have other things to do, and other people to do them with.

  I am beginning to dread Marie’s next big get-together, because my separation from Diarmuid is bound to crop up in conversations, and there is no way I can make that sound impressive. At the last gathering I had just met him, and my parents must have mentioned it to someone, because suddenly the room was buzzing with the news that ‘Sally has found a man!’ Naturally I had found men before, but people had never got quite so excited about it. I suppose it was because I was over thirty and they felt I had better get a move on in the marriage stakes.

  They were, of course, thrilled when I walked down the aisle. They gave me things like alarm clocks that make tea, and hostess trolleys, which are all now carefully stored in the smart suburban house that Diarmuid and I bought together and where he still lives. The main thing I seem to have gained from my marriage is a very comfortable orange sofa that’s too big for my small sitting-room. I enjoy lying on it when I watch TV.

  My phone conversation with my sister ended when she said she had to go to a meeting. April was ringing from an office in San Francisco. She is twenty-four and she has started to look Californian – I know this from the very occasional photos she sends our parents; she hasn’t come back to Ireland since she left three years ago. Her hair is sun-bleached blonde, her skin is golden-brown and her small snub nose looks cuter than ever. Her smile still has that steely, determined look to it, but her teeth are whiter. She has also acquired that wiry, lean look people get when they jog regularly and visit the gym and do Pilates. I have, naturally, not told her that I force myself to get exercise by occasionally walking an imaginary dog called Felix along a nearby beach. She is an important person in real estate, or it could be banking; it’s hard to keep track of her career. Not too long ago she was involved in the vacation industry. April is a young hotshot manager, so her skills are easily transferable.

  I, on the other hand, am a freelance journalist who has somehow ended up specialising in interior decoration and pets, with the occasional article on refugees and other worthy social issues. Since my separation, I also sometimes interview people who write self-help books and grill them on the secrets of a contented marriage. I make a kind of living from it, but freelance journalists aren’t that well paid; and the big thrill of seeing my name in the paper above articles about bathroom tiling has, to tell the truth, sort of waned. Another thing is that loads of people want to be freelance journalists, because it’s supposed to be so interesting, so you can’t afford to be too bolshie with editors, because there’s a horde of young eager beavers who would be more than willing to replace you. In an ideal world, April would regularly say, ‘Oh, I wish my job was as interesting as yours,’ but she doesn’t. She has her own lovely sea-view condominium, a sports car and loads of handsome men taking her out for sushi. She is happy – and I keep feeling she shouldn’t be, because she never seems to want to talk about anything that really matters. Come to think of it, my parents are rather like that too.

  The conversation about DeeDee was typical. Even though April said she wondered what happened to DeeDee, she didn’t really want to go into details, ponder who DeeDee was and why she left; according to her, things are as they are, and it’s pointless analysing them. Sometimes I envy her blithe indifference, but most of the time it just makes me feel lonely, so it’s just as well I hardly ever talk to her. If you start talking about feelings to April, she always finds a way to make you feel foolish. When I tried to talk to her about the break-up of my marriage, for example, she said, ‘Oh, well, these things happen sometimes. You’ll find someone else. Go and have a facial. That always cheers me up.’ I think she was trying to be kind.

  DeeDee has been popping into my mind ever since my conversation with April. This is rather inconvenient, because I’m currently trying to write an article about bathroom accessories. Also, every so often I ask myself why I am writing about bathroom accessories when I have no real interest in the subject. Four years ago the editor of The Sunday Lunch, Ned Wainwright, said he wanted more articles for the ‘Home’ section, and I said, ‘Oh, what kind?’ with a big fake-interested smile. Freelance journalists can’t afford to be too fussy. I didn’t think I’d end up with a column – which, of course, was wonderful; is wonderful. I need the regular income, to pay for my mortgage and those extra little luxuries such as food, electricity and clothes. It’s just that, quite a lot of the time, I wish I were involved in something else. This happened with my marriage, too. I’m beginning to wonder if it’s a ‘psychological pattern’. Perhaps I’ll always have these dreams of elsewhere. Maybe I’ve inherited some of DeeDee’s feckless genes.

  As I said, since my break-up with Diarmuid I have interviewed a number of authors of self-help psychology books. Some of them say that people who aren’t compatible should part, and some of them say that people who aren’t compatible should work out why they aren’t compatible and try to make some appropriate changes; then, apparently, they may find they are far more compatible than they thought. Sadly, none of them offer advice on husbands who suddenly become obsessed with mice.

  That’s what happened with Diarmuid. He’s a carpentry teacher, and he wanted to be able to teach biology too; so he started this biology course, and the mice thing just took off. We hardly ever saw each other because he was so busy studying mice. Sometimes he brought them home for the weekend, and gradually they moved in permanently. I started to feel sorry for them. It’s not that I like mice all that much, but I hated seeing them in that cage. So one night, after a row and too much wine and wild, romantic music, I set them free in the tool shed. Diarmuid and I parted shortly after that. If we get divorced, I suppose the mice may be mentioned as a third party. He managed to lure them back using mature cheddar cheese. I still feel a bit angry with those mice. I feel, deep down, that they should have made a run for it.

  When I left, I told Diarmuid I needed time to think things over. I didn’t quite know what I was going to be thinking about, but it sounded like the sort of thing a woman bolting out the front door with a large cream suitcase should say. I liked the dramatic exit, but the whole effect was watered down somewhat because I had to keep retur
ning for things like my hair-dryer and my jumpers and my transistor radio. And, naturally, Diarmuid and I got chatting, and I ended up hugging him because he was sad; I was sad myself, which is why I let him kiss me and run his hands tenderly through my hair. He kept saying he was sorry about the mice, which I noticed were still in the spare room and looking pretty contented despite their lack of freedom. He even said he’d get rid of them, but I said we could talk about that another time. Because what I was realising was that, even if Diarmuid made lots of ‘appropriate changes’ to help our ‘compatibility’, I still wasn’t sure I’d want to go back to him.

  We separated over half a year ago, and I’m not any clearer about whether I should go back to him. I’m not even sure why I feel like this, because I’m thirty-five and old enough to know I’m not going to find the perfect man and he is such a decent, loving guy. I sometimes feel I don’t miss him enough. But I miss the home we bought together. It’s an ordinary suburban house, but it’s detached and in a leafy area, and it has a big garden with nice shrubs and trees and scented plants. We wanted to move to the country after we had our two kids, but for the time being we were happy to live in a house near the Dublin mountains. We could see the countryside through our bedroom window. The main bedroom has an en-suite bathroom. I bought lovely thick white towels. The carpets still have a new, bouncy feel to them. Diarmuid now shares our home with a tenant called Barry, who’s Australian and keeps wanting to have barbecues.

  I suppose I’d miss my marital home more if I hadn’t owned a house already. I bought this little cottage in my late twenties, before house prices became astronomical. I couldn’t afford to buy it now. Even though it only has one bedroom and the orange sofa takes up a lot of the sitting-room, it’s beside the sea and fairly close to central Dublin. When Diarmuid and I got married, we decided it was a good idea to keep my cottage and rent it out. We couldn’t have shared it, because it’s so ‘cosy’ – as the estate agents put it – that two people can barely fit in the kitchen.