by Juliette Fay
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
ABOUT JULIETTE FAY
A CONVERSATION WITH JULIETTE FAY
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
Praise for Deep Down True
“When I wasn’t inside the world of this book—because this is a book that you enter instead of merely read—I longed to be. I love it for its intensely human characters and for the way the author grants them their flaws as generously as she celebrates their daily decencies, their persistent hopefulness, their moments of personal grace.”
—Marisa de los Santos, New York Times bestselling author of Love Walked In and Belong to Me
“Enormously readable and hugely relatable!”
—Kelly Corrigan, New York Times bestselling author of The Middle Place and Lift
“Engrossing, touching, and immensely satisfying. The truth shines on every page. I’d almost be willing to go back to junior high if I could sit at Juliette Fay’s lunch table!”
—Beth Harbison, New York Times bestselling author of Thin Rich Pretty
And for
Shelter Me
“[Fay] does a beautiful job capturing the ebb and flow of single motherhood, from small miracles and little annoyances to the big ordeals . . . tinged with searing insight and often hilarious wry humor.”
—The Boston Globe
“The concerns of single motherhood after sudden tragedy come vividly to life, and as Janie learns to appreciate everyday miracles, readers will be charmed.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Juliette Fay can hit the high notes of emotion with unexpected moments of redemption and wry humor.”
—Jacqueline Sheehan, author of Lost & Found
“Shelter Me is a richly told story that offers a keyhole into the pain and searing grief losing a loved one brings to a family. That pain is balanced against humor and the need to care-take life’s day-to-day demands and relationships until one day, you realize you have the capability to love again. Fay writes with vivid dialogue and conjures up characters that feel real enough to be sitting in your kitchen.”
—Lee Woodruff, New York Times bestselling author of In an Instant and Perfectly Imperfect
A PENGUI BOOK DEEP DOWN TRUE
JULIETTE FAY’s first novel, Shelter Me, was a 2009 Massachusetts Book Award Book of the Year, a Target 2009 Bookmarked Club selection, a Good Housekeeping Book Pick, and was chosen for the American Booksellers Association’s Indie Next List. Juliette received a bachelor’s degree from Boston College and a master’s degree from Harvard University. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband and four children. Deep Down True is her second novel.
PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto
Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell,
Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)
Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, II Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632,
New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
First published in Penguin Books 2011
Copyright © Juliette Fay, 2011
All rights reserved
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to octual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is ertirely coincidental.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Fay, Juliette.
Deep down true / Juliette Fay.
p m.
“A Pamela Dorman/Penguin book”—T. p. verso.
eISBN : 978-1-101-48618-4
I. Divorced women—Fiction. 2. preteens—Fiction. 3. Domestic fiction. I. Title.
[DNLM: 1. Love stories. gsafd]
PS3606.A95D44 2011
8I3’.6—dc22 2010038552
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
http://us.penguingroup.com
For my parents,
CAROL DIGIANNI AND JOHN DACEY,
who’ve blazed their trails through hard times to happiness,
and whose love and enthusiasm is always a given
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
THE FIRST FLICKERS OF DEEP DOWN TRUE WERE sparked at Jonas Clarke Junior High School during the years 1974-77. I still have occasional moments of post-traumatic stress from the experience. I would like to thank Rhea Nowak, Amy Smith, Jean Volante, and Alexandra Fisher, friends who never, to my knowledge, betrayed me. Thanks also to Kassia Sing, who was that all-too-rare combination of popular and nice. I’m sure there were others, but in my attempt to block out as much of that time as possible, I have inadvertently forgotten their names. My apologies and my thanks.
Thanks also to my sisters, Jennifer Dacey Allen and Kristen Dacey Iwai, the best of companions and co-conspirators, who have always known how to crack me up, even on really unfunny days. And to Linda Dacey, my stepmother, who traversed that fine line between intervening and interfering, and who quietly lobbied for a more reasonable clothing allowance for us. The life-or-death importance of this was lost on my father, being a man and being as uninterested in fashion as an otherwise socially appropriate person could possibly be.
When I tell people that middle school was the worst three years of my l
ife, I often hear groans of agreement. As far as I can tell, it hasn’t gotten any easier. Adolescents are an interesting bunch, prone to acts of both great generosity and great ferocity, and you never know which is coming at you till it’s in your face. The flickers of this story were blown into flames when I first heard Rosalind Wiseman, author of Queen Bees and Wannabes, speak, and further fueled when I read her book. Thanks, Rosalind, for helping me make sense of the culture I so fearfully inhabited all those years ago and for unwittingly giving me guidance with the characters of Deep Down True.
There’s the part of fiction writing that’s the “dreaming up” part, and with any luck this is done alone (or at least someplace where nobody’s asking for help making a bracelet out of duct tape or for rides to their friends’ houses). And then there are all the other parts—reviewing, editing, fact-finding, shepherding, encouraging, deal making, publishing, promoting, selling, begging, bugging, consoling, celebrating. With any luck these are done in the company of people like:Alison Bullock, Megan Lucier, Catherine Toro-McCue, Julia Tanen, and Anne Kuppinger, dear friends who read every scrap, often in several iterations, and gave me their unvarnished opinions while simultaneously making me feel smart and well liked. Catherine is a psychiatric nurse who had lots of good information, insights, and resources on eating disorders.
Sandra Dupuy, Tracey Palmer, and Art Hutchinson, excellent writers with whom I’ve spent many hours in coffee shops and on self-inflicted “retreats” challenging one another to do better.
Dr. Michael Putt, who keeps our teeth healthy and has been a wonderful consultant on everything from drill bits to dental-office politics. Dr. Paul Allen, my brother-in-law and go-to guy on what it’s like to be a medical student. And Keiji Iwai, my other brother-in-law, whose photographic know-how is second only to his generosity with his time.
Patricia Campanella Daniels, a dear friend who gave me the grand tour of northeastern Connecticut and whose husband, Eric Daniels, made sure I got the sports references right.
Julia Tanen, one of my oldest friends and managing director at KCSA Strategic Communications, who tirelessly promotes my work and generously shared the depth of her personal knowledge of bulimia.
Pamela Dorman and Julie Miesionczek, editor and assistant editor, who worked so hard to get this book into the best possible shape.
Theresa Park, my agent and friend, who brilliantly stewards my career and is really fun to hang out with. And the fabulous Park Literary team of Abigail Koons, Emily Sweet, and Yahel Matalon. Amanda Cardinale, you’ll be missed!
Quinn, Nick, Liam, and Brianna Fay, who have their hands full raising their father and me, and who still haven’t gotten sick of my doing some “book thing” or other several times a week. Brianna has been my foreign-language consultant on teenager-speak, answering countless questions that begin with “How would you say . . . ?”
And Tom Fay, my husband and BFF, whose love, support, and endless enthusiasm for my work (“Here, sign this book, I think I can get it to Ben Affleck!”) makes me feel lucky every day.
CHAPTER 1
IN JEANS THAT FIT FOUR POUNDS AGO BUT NOW squeezed her in a mildly intrusive manner, Dana stood at her kitchen counter pinching foil over a tray of lasagna and waiting on hold, the phone wedged against her shoulder. Her gaze skimmed the obituaries in the local paper, but Dermott McPherson’s name did not appear—not this time anyway. Mr. McPherson was the reason she’d made the lasagna, though it wasn’t actually for him. He probably wasn’t eating much. It was for his family, who were understandably distraught over their loved one’s terminal illness. Dana didn’t know them. She belonged to Comfort Food, a group who cooked for families in crisis.
When it was her turn, Dana prepared meals that would, she hoped, sustain them as hands were held and medication dispensed, bedding changed and phone calls placed. She often thought of her own mother’s quick descent into a gray, fetid-smelling infirmity, with lungs that seemed to shrivel almost visibly. Dana would have appreciated a well-made meal. Nothing fancy, just something better than rubbery pizza and half-flat soda. A small connection to a world outside the thick humidity of death.
Her father’s exit had been swift and clean by comparison. There’d been no hospital stays or grieving friends, or even a casket to choose. But Dana didn’t like to think about that.
“Cotters Rock Dental Center,” said a voice in her ear. “May I—”
Startled from her somber reverie, Dana flinched, and the phone clattered to the floor. She grabbed it up quickly. “Kendra, I’m so sorry! I hope that didn’t make an awful noise in your ear.”
“That’s all right,” said the receptionist.
“I’m so embarrassed. I really apologize.”
“I’m fine. May I help you?”
“This is Dana Stellgarten. Morgan and Grady’s mom? I need to make appointments for their checkups, if that’s okay.”
Out in the mudroom, there was a squeak of the door and the thud of a backpack dropping onto the tiles. “Excuse me for just a minute, please,” Dana murmured into the phone, then covered the mouthpiece with her palm. “Morgan?” she called.
“Yeah.”
“I thought you were going to Darby’s.”
“Well, now I’m not.” Morgan appeared in the kitchen and opened the refrigerator door. She stood staring in, as if there were some movie playing that only preteens could see, in among the condiments and containers of yogurt.
“I’m so sorry, I’ll have to call back,” Dana said into the phone. She focused on her daughter, backlit by the refrigerator light. “The plans changed?” she asked.
“Darby didn’t feel well.” Morgan’s fingers twitched abruptly into little quote marks.
“Did you reschedule for another day?”
Morgan twisted toward her mother. “No, Mom, we didn’t reschedule . It’s just hanging out. You don’t reschedule hanging out.”
“You seem . . . Are you angry with Darby?”
Morgan closed the refrigerator door with a thump. “I don’t get to be angry. She didn’t do anything wrong.”
“How did she tell you?” Now that Morgan was in sixth grade, Dana had learned it wasn’t what girls said to each other anymore. All the real information came from how they said it.
Morgan slumped into a kitchen chair, picked up a napkin, and twisted it into the shape and density of a swizzle stick. “She was standing with Kimmi, and I was like, ‘Hey, I’ll meet you after last period.’ And she looked at Kimmi.”
This was bad, Dana knew. Their eyes were their weapons now. “She looked at her?”
“Yeah. And she was like, ‘Oh, yeah, um, I don’t feel good. I think I should go home.’ So I said, ‘Are you sick?’ Then she looked at Kimmi again and said, ‘I’m fine. I just need some downtime.’”
She would rather be alone than with Morgan? thought Dana. A wave of protective anger swept over her, but she didn’t show it, knowing that it would confirm Morgan’s suspicions and make her feel even worse. Dana herself often needed to cling to the slim chance that things weren’t quite as disheartening as they seemed. “Honey, maybe she’s just overscheduled,” she offered.
“We’re not preschoolers, Mom.” Morgan rose and went up to her room. Dana let her alone. She knew that Morgan would open a textbook and curl over the page, narrowing her focus until all that existed in the world were Figure A and Subsection B.
“I’m taking Grady to practice!” Dana called up to Morgan a little while later. She loaded Grady and all his gear into the minivan and made a detour to drop off the lasagna, Caesar salad, Italian bread, and brownies at the McPhersons’ house.
“Ca’ I shay inna car?” asked seven-year-old Grady, sucking on his mouth guard.
“What?” Dana struggled to pick up all the containers of food. “I could use some help here.”
He yanked out the mouth guard. “I don’t wanna go to the door with you. It’s all, like, sad in there. And if a kid answers, he’s gonna hate me because my dad’s not sick and I don�
�t have to wait for some lady to dump off my dinner.”
Dana sighed and went to the door. No one answered. She placed the food on the front step in the cooler labeled COMFORT FOOD and went back to the car. As she was pulling away, a woman in jeans and a T-shirt came out with a toddler on her hip, glanced down at the cooler and then out toward the street. For a brief moment, she met Dana’s eyes and raised a hand in thanks. Dana waved back.
So young . . . she thought as she drove away.
Dana tried to attend as many of Grady’s football practices as she could. The coach scared her. He yelled at the unruly posse of second-graders as if they were candidates for the Navy SEALS. Dana wasn’t used to this. Until football, Grady had been coached mostly by weary fathers who sped down Interstate 84 removing their ties as they drove, trying to get to practice on time. They had no interest in yelling at other people’s children—they yelled enough at their own. They just wanted the kids to learn a few skills, have fun, and avoid bloodying each other.
Coach Roburtin—Coach Ro, as the kids called him—espoused a less limited philosophy. Football practice doubled as his own workout, and he charged around the field running laps with the boys and doing push-ups. He slapped the tops of their helmets when they weren’t listening, their little heads bobbing into their shoulder pads, a sight that made Dana’s own neck hurt. She’d heard he was unmarried and childless, had grown up in town and played football for Cotters Rock High. He was now a car salesman in nearby Manchester.
