It was as I helped prepare food for my beloved godmother’s wake that the bombshell was dropped.
Butter knife in hand, her daughter told me that the wonderful woman whose life we were about to celebrate had an extramarital affair with her own cousin’s husband – and that it had gone on for 40 out of the 50 years she’d been married.
‘Mum told me about two years ago,’ said her daughter, pouring us each a glass of wine. ‘She thought she was going to die at that point and couldn’t bear going to her grave never having told anyone.’
I drew up a list of 17 girlfriends who had, over the years, hinted that they knew about such things and asked them in an email entitled ‘Can You Tell Me How To Have An Affair?’ to submit their top tips on how to get away with it.
The replies were very enlightening…
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