The WWW Club Read online

  The

  WWW Club

  a novel of sex and bon bons

  anita notaro

  For

  my new husband

  Ger

  —all my prayers are for good health for both of us

  to enjoy a long and happy marriage.

  Table of Contets

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-one

  Twenty-two

  Twenty-three

  Twenty-four

  Twenty-five

  Twenty-six

  Twenty-seven

  Twenty-eight

  Twenty-nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-one

  Thirty-two

  Thirty-three

  Thirty-four

  Thirty-five

  Thirty-six

  Thirty-seven

  Thirty-eight

  Thirty-nine

  Forty

  Forty-one

  Forty-two

  Forty-three

  Forty-four

  Forty-five

  Forty-six

  Forty-seven

  Forty-eight

  Forty-nine

  Fifty

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  By Anita Notaro

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  One

  Another day, another diet. It was a sour waking thought on an otherwise marshmallowy-sweet morning. Diets meant only one thing to Eleanora Simpson: pain. And God knows she’d inflicted enough torture on herself in the past ten years to last her a lifetime. She yanked the duvet up around her neck and tried not to think about her latest fad. The phone rang.

  “Hello?” None of her friends would dream of ringing her this early on a Saturday. She was the only early-riser she knew. As usual she predicted an emergency.

  “Ellie, are you still in bed? You sound sleepy.”

  “Oh, hi, Orla.” No need to panic, if there had been any trouble Orla wouldn’t have bothered with pleasantries. “Yep, imagine, still dossing at nine …” she leaned over to check … “thirty-seven on a Saturday. Outrageous, isn’t it?”

  Her older sister’s lip curled and her eyes narrowed. Ellie didn’t have a video phone, it was just that she’d seen that expression a million times, mostly directed at her. At this stage she could sense it even if she was in another country.

  “Well, you should be up. I’ve just been for a walk out by Sandy-cove. Dublin looks beautiful, the sea is like glass and there’s no pollution evident.” Orla fancied herself as a bit of a poet so she rarely spoke in plain English. “Maybe you should try some exercise instead of all those faddy diets you’re always on.”

  “Actually, I was just thinking of a diet.”

  “Which one?” In spite of herself Orla was interested.

  “Atkins.”

  “I’ve heard it’s amazing.”

  “Not for me. The first two weeks are cruel. Everything I like is a no-no. Besides, if I never see another greasy fried egg it’ll be too soon.”

  “Well then, what about the cabbage-soup diet? It delivered amazing results for Joanna next door.”

  “Have you actually tried slurping gallons of dirty water several times a day?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Well, it’s disgusting. I tried it six months ago and lost nothing at all the first week. But the curtains in my kitchen still reek of boiled greens. No, I’ll pass on a repeat, thank you. Anyway,” she sat up in bed, fully awake, “I’ve just heard of an amazing new one called the avocado and Rice Krispies gut-cleansing regime. I’m going to investigate that later today.”

  “Well, getting out of bed would be a start.” Orla was back to her normal self. “I’m just ringing to ask you to please call Mum. She hasn’t heard from you in ages and I’m fed up listening to her moaning.”

  “Right, will do.”

  “I can’t do everything, you know.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll call her this morning.”

  “Please do.” Orla’s tone was frostier than Mr. Whippy’s van.

  “Bye then.”

  “Bye bye. And e-mail me a copy of that avocado thing.”

  “Will do. Bye, Orla.” Ellie hid under the duvet then peeped out a minute or two later, just to be sure the coast was clear. When Orla lectured—and she did it all the time—it always felt as though she was right there in the room with you and that feeling had persisted even when she’d gone to Australia for a year. Still, Ellie knew she’d got off lightly this time.

  She leapt out of bed, shouting her newest affirmation, as instructed by the latest GMTV guru. “I feel fantastic and it’s … fuck, fuck, fuck,” she yelled as she stubbed her toe on the horrible brass bed that her sister had “given” her when she wanted rid of it. The bed was way too big and didn’t suit the room but Ellie never had the courage to refuse Orla. “I feel fantastic and it’s … ouch.” She rubbed between her toes. “It’s going to be a good day.” She limped toward the kitchen.

  It was going to be a good day, she could feel it, even if the feeling was unset-jelly wobbly. Unfortunately for Ellie, there were four types of day—good, shaky, bad and positively nightmare.

  Good days always started with hot water and lemon followed by porridge with skimmed milk and a thin slice of brown bread with a scraping of low-fat spread. Recently, those days were rarer than a granny at a Westlife concert. On shaky days the porridge was usually left to congeal after a couple of mouthfuls. Is there anything more unpleasant than the sight of a heap of coagulating, rubbery oats throbbing under its slimy skin? Ellie wondered. It’s right up there with walking on runny dog pooh in your flimsiest new sandals, or having to clean out the salad drawer in your fridge after discovering all your healthy options wearing fur coats. Ugh! Shaky days also meant fiber intake was greatly reduced as she abandoned the brown cardboard and tucked into the real thing. Proper toast had to be white and thick, golden in the center and slightly burned at the edges. And it absolutely had to be smothered in real butter, preferably cold and hard so the contrast between the soft, warm bread and the smooth, salty butter was maximized.

  In a funny way she liked shaky days, even though they invariably meant that she lived on a see-saw. Much better than bad days, or nightmare ones, like yesterday. But she wasn’t going there, so she dressed quickly in comfies, and splashed water on her pale face. At least her brown eyes were clear, courtesy of a good night’s sleep. She scrunched her dark hair back and headed out to get her fix.

  “Mornin’, Ellie, great day.” Not even Ida Delahunt, the local tragedy queen, was going to put her off today.

  “Hi, Ida. Yes it is gorgeous.” Ellie made a run for it.

  “Did you hear on the radio about that poor—”

  “And best of all it’s Saturday, no kids for two whole days.” Ellie kept moving. She’d learned the only way to avoid hearing bad news was to totally ignore anything Ida started to say.

  “Ah now, go on, you love that job of yours. Besides, I saw you the other day minding that little foreign child again. What is he, Russian or something queer like that?” The older woman was momentarily distracted. “You dote on children.”

  “Only when I can hand them back at the end of each day.” Ellie laughed and made her escape, continuing the short trip to the twenty-four-hour shop in her local filling station. She loved working with c
hildren but couldn’t stand it when parents talked non-stop about theirs as so many did to her, so she avoided a couple of yummy mummies in the store, just to be on the safe side.

  With the newspaper safely tucked under her arm she returned home, ate a quick bowl of porridge simply to re-fuel, then made fresh coffee and settled down in her tiny sunroom to savor what her favorite columnist had to say.

  Just as she was beginning to think about food again the phone rang.

  “Hi, Ellie, it’s only me.”

  “Hi, Maggie.”

  “Well, what did you think?”

  “Not as good as usual. I was just thinking that he hasn’t written directly about his wife in ages. He also seems a bit more cruel about women in general.”

  “I know what you mean, although he’s always had a mean streak.” Maggie thought for a second. “But he’s cruel in a gay guy kind of way and they’re always horrible but spot on and anyway, that’s why we love him so much. And the bit about the nose job was so true. A girl in my office—”

  “Which bit was that?” Ellie interrupted. “My mobile rang twice while I was trying to read it.”

  “Hang on, I have it here.” Maggie skimmed through the paragraphs.

  “At the school gate the other morning, it struck me that there is just as much competition between mothers as there is in any male-dominated workplace. First up, it seems as if you have to look like a model to drop your kids off, even if you don’t get out of the car. You’ve probably noticed the blond ponytails and baseball-cap-clad thirty-somethings driving their top-of-the-range four-wheel drives around Dublin, but take a good look at the gates of a school next time you’re passing and you’ll see they’ve taken the competition to a whole new level—designer jeans, belly tops from BT2 and Orla Kiely handbags are derigueur. A snow-white dog bounding around in the boot helps too—pure bred, of course.

  “‘I’m so wrecked,’ I heard Joanne tell Lucy and Sophie yesterday (not their real names). ‘I was at the gym at six, then made cookies for Grace’s bring-and-buy day, and I just have to take Rover for a walk before I meet the girls for coffee in the Four Seasons. Tom, of course, flew to New York this morning so he was no help. And the vacuum is on the blink and my Filipino girl is acting up again. I’m exhausted. Oops, that’s my phone, oh no, it’s one of the women from the fund-raising committee … gotta go, ciao.’”

  “That sounds just like you.” Ellie laughed.

  “No, it’s Toni, listen, here comes the nose bit.”

  “‘My God, she looks fantastic, I’m so jealous. And here’s me in my rags.’ Lucy yanked at her Mariad Whisker pinafore.

  ‘I know,’ Sophie replied. ‘Still, her husband’s fab, he paid for a nose job for her for Christmas and left her a patio heater as a surprise under the tree, boxed up, of course. Me, all I got was a very small package from Cartier and a voucher for that place in Blackrock where I go to get my collagen injections.’”

  Maggie giggled. “God, I wonder if that’ll be us any day soon?”

  “Absolutely. Well, Toni anyway. Is she still meeting us for brunch?”

  “Yep, The Unicorn at one. And Toni is not seriously thinking of having anything done to her nose, although she did mention botox twice the other night when we were in Arnotts.” Maggie nibbled at a stale crisp. “I’m starving.”

  “You definitely have a tape worm.” Ellie stretched lazily. “Anyway, I’d better jump in the shower. See you later.”

  “Bye bye.” She was gone.

  As she lathered herself Ellie thought about her good pal Margaret Owens, or Maggie as they’d christened her years earlier. Their older sisters had been pen pals but because of the age gap and distance between their homes they hadn’t really spoken much until they’d met at a party eleven years ago, despite Ellie’s family having visited Maggie’s gang in the West a couple of times. On that particular night Ellie had been abandoned by her boyfriend and Maggie had simply agreed to go along as a spare because of the free drink she knew would be on offer. After a shy start they’d sat in a corner and drank everything they could lay their hands on, comparing notes on how often they’d tricked their older sisters. Maggie’s story about decanting her sister’s mega-expensive night cream into another jar then refilling it with Nivea, a dollop of fresh whipped cream and some of her mother’s perfume was the best ever.

  “But didn’t the whipped cream go sour?” Ellie wanted to know as they giggled together in a corner, men forgotten.

  “I kept adding another few drops of perfume every couple of days,” Maggie said with a grin. “She just kept lashing it on her face. Mind you, she did have a rash a few weeks later.”

  “I bet your skin was glowing, though?” Ellie asked and they were off again. They’d become firm friends.

  At almost thirty Maggie was nearly six years younger than Ellie and worked as a legal secretary in a big Dublin law firm, the kind that have whole walls of glass as part of their offices and receptionists that could wither an entire flower arrangement with one glance. Everyone loved Maggie. Part of her success was that she looked as if you could trust her—and you could. She was a sort of girl-next-door meets Irish colleen crossed with a Riverdance high kicker, with freckles and tumbling auburn curls and green eyes and a cute nose. Quite a combination, or so men seemed to think. Maggie was never short of a date, although they didn’t always stick around for long. Men seemed to be slightly in awe of her. One boyfriend had told her on his way out the door that she was just too nice. Ellie made her go to assertiveness classes after that and it had helped—slightly. Maggie was the Audrey Hepburn of the gang, not in looks but because of her kind nature. She wouldn’t hurt a fly.

  When Ellie arrived at lunch, the third member of the group was already there and, as usual, she was giving her all to the best-looking man in the room, in this case the only man in the place, a swarthy Spanish waiter who called himself Enrique—not the name chosen by his mother, Ellie suspected. She wanted to warn him he had no chance. What Pamela Fortune wanted she usually got, which was surprising given that she wasn’t model-girl material. And at forty she was no spring chicken.

  “She sort of looks like a hooker,” Maggie had remarked when they’d first met Pamela at a yoga class nine years ago and Ellie knew immediately what she meant. Pam was voluptuous, size sixteen to be exact. Her clothes were “out there” and her boobs were only marginally trailing behind. She was a separated mother of two boys and worked on the customer service desk at one of the larger Tesco stores. If Ellie had to sum her up in one word it would be “bold.” The word “shy” didn’t enter her vocabulary. You either loved her or hated her. Maggie and Ellie adored her, had done since that first ridiculous attempt at the sun salute. She was off men at the moment, had been for ages actually. When her husband left he’d taken all her self-confidence as well as her Bang & Olufsen stereo with him. Since then she’d become even more brash, swore like a fishwife and was still soft as putty inside.

  “Hi there, you’re late.”

  “Sorry.” Ellie flopped down, hot and bothered. She found it hard to get her act together most of the time. “I came with Maggie and bad and all as I am—”

  “Say no more. Where is she?” Pam grinned.

  “She’s just parking the car.”

  “Here’s Toni.” Pam waved furiously. “Great, now we can order wine and I can demolish the bread.”

  “Hi, guys.” Antonia Francescone was the most exotic of the four. Born in India where her father still lived, she was a cross between Iman Bowie and Samantha Mumba. Her mother was Italian, which explained where Toni got her style. She used her mother’s name. She was beginning to panic because she’d just turned thirty-four and hadn’t had a snog for six months, which she put down to the fact that she had the most unglamorous job in the world. She complained about her job as a nurse in a retirement home constantly: “The youngest man I meet every day is more likely to ask me for a bedpan than for a date.” Toni had been a friend of Pamela’s ex-husband and when he’d brought h
er home to dinner one night Pam decided she’d better become her best mate. Toni was way too attractive for her liking. Surprisingly, they hit it off immediately and even though Pam eventually lost the husband she definitely didn’t lose her new good pal. Toni was great in a crisis and had proved herself a loyal friend to Pam. She was an only child and her parents had spoilt her rotten, so that now she sometimes confused generosity with real caring. The others were mad about her, and her slightly bossy manner meant they did lots of things they probably wouldn’t have done otherwise, although they teased her about it endlessly.

  “Hi, Ellie. Hi, Pammy.”

  “Hi, Toni.”

  “And hi, Maggie.” Toni smiled as Maggie arrived.

  It was their typical little-girl greeting, started when they’d all shortened each other’s names years ago to make themselves feel younger.

  “And we’re off.” Pam was already ordering bottles of the house red and white and plastering some walnut-and-tomato bread with a garlic-and-olive paste.

  Lunch was mayhem as always. When they’d no important news to impart about men, talk invariably turned toward dieting.

  “How’s it going at WeightWatchers?” Toni asked Pam.

  “Don’t ask. What are you up to?”

  “That new low GI thing.” Toni wrinkled her nose.

  “Tried it, couldn’t figure out what the hell I was actually allowed to eat,” Ellie said with her mouth full. “The first sentence I read said that scientists created a scale on which to measure the speed at which carbohydrates affect blood glucose. I was so exhausted I had an éclair.” She sighed. “I’ve also given up on Atkins.”

  “I’ve just started food combining.” Maggie seemed bright and breezy.

  “Tried that too. I couldn’t stomach Chicken Korma with salad.” Toni grimaced.

  “I’ve just finished the ‘lose ten pounds in three days’ idea. I feel sick just thinking about it.” Pam made a face.

  “That bad?”

  “Bananas on Wednesday, eggs on Thursday and grapefruit yesterday.”

  “How much did you lose?” Maggie wanted to know.