The Adultery Club by Tess Stimson.
An eye opener for me as it discussed adultery from the wife(Melinche), the husband(Nicholas) and the female adulter(Sara)
Why haven't this book been given any award is beyond me.
Whatever the case is, apart from some RA paragraphs, the underlying meaning of the story was to let people know how very different marriage and love and lust were.
Anyway some snippets:
Father of Sara: There have been days when I've woken up and your mother has irritated me just by still breathing. There have been weeks, months even- when we could scarcely stand to be in the same room as each other. But you work through it. You build a life together and you stick with it, no matter how hard it gets at times. You don't dig up a garden every 5 minutes and replant with something else if the flower you picked out hasn't bloomed, do you? You make your choice, you water and feed it.
Marriage is about commitment and compromise. A compromise with each other - with what you thought i was going to be.
Trace (Melinche's ex-husband) : When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different.
Melinche: When you've loved each other as much as Trace and I have done, and when those feelings have been cut off in their prime and never given the chance to grow and chance into a different sort of love, the softer, less concentrated kind of love you find in marriage, moderated by time and familiarity; never given the chance to fade to white nothingness and gently disappears - when you have had that kind of love, can you ever go back and share something less ?
Melinche: Come on Evie, it's your turn to say Grace
Evie: I don't know what to say
Melinche: Just say what I always do, sweetheart
Evie (respectfully bowed her head): God, why on earth did I invite all these bloody people to dinner ?
(Evie is a small 6 year old kid btw)
Sophie: Mummy? When's the right time to get married ?
Sophie: Evie says she's never going to get married, she says you have to kiss boys if you get married. Mummy, when is it ok to kiss someone ?
Melinche: (When your husband isn't looking)
Kit: When they are rich and handsome as sin (hear hear!)
Melinche: KIT! You have to date someone a bit first Sophie, people use dates to get to know each other.
Evie: On the first date, you tell each other lies, and that usually gets people interested enough to come back for a 2nd date. Even boys have something interesting to say if you listen long enough.
Evie is really a quirky little kid.
Kit: Temptation isn't a crime. Did you really think you could sail through to your golden wedding anniversary without the odd little slip now and again ?
Melinche: I wish I knew when it started. Which is our last true memory, before the lies began. If there were others before her. IF he is planning to stay.
Melinche: I married him and created this family with him. He isn't perfect; he isn't necessarily the man I could have loved most in the world. Not necessarily my soul mate. But he is my husband. I didn't throw anything away even for Trace.
The irony is that to fight for him effectively I must do nothing.
Lousie: Have you considered talking to the girl ?
Melinche: I couldn't! What on earth would I say ?
Lousie: You tell her you haven't quite finished with your husband yet, and if she doesn't mind, you'd like him back.
Nicholas: There is a point every adult child reaches when they unconsciously begin to prepare for their parent's deaths. You ache for your loss, but it is the natural order of things. Nature renders us heartlessly resilient when necessary.
Stultum est queri de adversis, ubi culpa est tua: Stupid to complain about misfortune that is your own fault.
Nicholas: Can't we at least talk? What about the children? Did you think about what this will -
Melinche: Did you ?
Nicholas: We used to be thrilled and relieved to have found simpatico company in our retreat. We used to be at that stage in a relationship when one does not need the ameliorating presence of others. (And I like this statement)
We were each enough for the other Sara: Sex is not just an important aspect of our relationship: it defines it.
Sara's dad: Sometimes a man makes a mistake, Sara. He gets carried away. And when there are children involved, you owe it to them to think twice before you tear their lives apart. I know you love this man, but are you sure, are you really sure that their marriage is over ? Because if you are not, you're ruining an awful lot of lives for nothing.
Malinche: Anger can take you a frighteningly long way. Far from everything you thought you knew about yourself.
Malinche: Why are you doing this? You don't even like Nicholas. You have pushed and pushed me to be with Trace. Why this?
Kit: Because someone has to make you face the truth. You can't keep burying your head - and your heart- in the sand forever. You can't just move on to Trace as if the 2 men are interchangeable. This isn't real.
Sara: You have Trace now. You don't need Nicholas any more. Can't you let him go? Can't you let him be happy with me?
Melinche: I am not stopping him.
Sara: But he needs to know you've moved on, You have to tell him-
Melinche: I don't, have to do anything.
Sara: I am sorry. I just don't understand, your marriage was dead, you have a new life now-
Melinche: What makes you think my marriage was dead?
Sara: But- Bur there's Trace.
Melinche: No, there isn't. For a few weeks Trace tried to fill in the gap. He tried to. Nothing, actually, can med the rip in my heart that losing my husband to you has made. Nothing.
Melinche: Do you have any idea what you've done ? The damage you caused ? Do you know what it's like to listen to your child sob herself to sleep in the next room because her father's left and she thinks that somehow it must be her fault ? You have taken away from my children the one thing I wanted to give them more than anything else: a happy and stable home. A mother wouldn't smash 3 little girls' childhood just for the sake of a quick roll in the hay.
Again, the author reminded us about marriage (and how hard it could be)
Melinche: Marriage is hard work. If you don't both put everything you have into making it a success, it fails. Sometimes it's wonderful and romantic and everything you dreamed it would be when you stood at the altar and made your vows to love and cherish till death do you part. And sometimes, it's dull and frustrating and difficult and you can scarcely bear the sight of each other. It only takes one trip, one stumble and it can all come crashing down.
This part made me think.
Melinche: You marry a man and give him children and tell yourself it doesn't matter that you are not so young now, that your body isn't as taut, your face as clear, because he loves you anyway. You let your guard down: You let him see you sniveling with a cold or with you hair in rat's tails because you haven't had time to wash it, and you think it doesn't matter. You put him at the centre of your life, at the centre of your heart where he should be; and then overnight, it's all gone. Gone.
(So I can't seem to decide which is for the best ? To let someone be in the center of your life or to let no one be the center of your life, instead letting them know as far as you are concern, you are the center of your own life ? Because it reminded me how tiring it was to be the center of people's lives, yet at the same time how desolate it could be when you are not.)
Melinche: I realize last week that no matter what you've done, I'm happier being unhappy with you than when I am happy with anyone else.
Melinche: This is 2nd chance Nicholas. I can't promise I'll always be able to look at you and not see her. I can't promise I won't take it out on you sometimes. Throw it back in your face. We both have to find a way to live with the past.
And so I think this would be lengthy enough to let people know how's the whole story like.
If at any point of time you are lost, lest you fear. Coz those parts were meant for me.
The author has smartly talked about men in several perspectives.
Of that from a kid.
Of that from a wife.
Of that from an adulter.
More importantly, of that of a female.
It's not a deep insight of what is it like to have a crisis in marriage but nonetheless it's telling enough to see how various people react and feel in times of crisis like this.
Sad to say in modern society now, before we can even reach a marriage crisis like this, it already happened in relationships where we thought love ruled. Where being 24/7 with your partners doesn't guaranteed no affairs. Right, I have typed for too long, neck aching.
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