We spent as much money as we could, and got as little for it as people could make up their minds to give us. We were always more or less miserable, and most of our acquaintance were in the same condition. There was a gay fiction among us that we were constantly enjoying ourselves, and a skeleton truth that we never did. To the best of my belief, our case was in the last aspect a rather common one.
– Charles Dickens
Great Expectations, Chapter 34. Pip and his London friends keep up the appearance of living a happy and cheerful life by overspending on their lavish lifestyles. They seemed to be enjoying themselves. But as the older Pip as narrator reflects, this was an exercise in self-deception. Using the metaphor of the “skeleton truth,” he admits that this superficial exterior of enjoyment hid their real feelings of misery.