THE PROMISE OF HAPPINESS. Erin Kaye

the doctor’s told her she mustn’t.’

      Their mother blinked and said, as though she’d not heard this last exchange, ‘It’s so frustrating not being able to do all the things I used to take for granted.’ She looked at her hand, the thumb joint red and swollen, and suddenly Louise was struck by how much her mother had aged since she’d last seen her. Now that she looked more closely she noticed how grey her mother’s hair had become and how lined her face was. Sitting perched on the chair she seemed shrunken somehow, as though she was slowly disappearing.

      ‘I know, Mum,’ said Joanne, her voice softening. ‘But it’s best not to try. You only end up hurting yourself.’

      Louise swallowed the shock like a dry, hard crust. Up until now she had clung to an image of her mother as she had always been – capable, reserved, self-effacing. The constant, steady backdrop to a happy childhood. Louise remembered sleeves rolled up on wash day revealing taut arms stronger than they appeared; slender pink hands, slimy with sudsy water, hauling clothes out of the twin tub, the water grey from previous washes. She remembered a slim, resolute woman who moved through her narrow life with purpose and busyness, ever watchful for extravagant waste and moral laxness.

      She recalled the relentless, tight-fisted management of household finances so that there was always just enough money for Christmas and a week-long summer holiday in a grotty boarding house in Ballycastle. And the going without on her mother’s part that this rigorous budgeting required.

      Her mother shifted in her seat, and winced. She flexed the fingers on her right hand and looked at the deformed knuckles with a scowl on her face. ‘The doctor’s put me on a new drug but he says it’ll take weeks, months even, before I notice any difference. Maybe I need another one of those injections …’

      ‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ said Louise, feeling a sudden rush of compassion for her mother – and a creeping sense of guilt. Balancing the cup and saucer on her knee, she reached over and patted her mother’s knee. ‘I’ll be able to help out more now.’ Why hadn’t Joanne, or Sian, warned her that her mother’s health had deteriorated so?

      Thinking of their younger sister, Louise said, ‘Where’s Sian and Andy tonight?’

      Joanne replied, ‘Oh, she and Andy had to go to some meeting about that eco-development at Loughanlea.’ Joanne fiddled with the tiny shell buttons on her cardigan, her small feet neatly tucked together under her knees. She seemed restless, on edge and she radiated what Louise could only describe as ill-will. ‘As Chair of Friends of Ballyfergus Lough, Sian said it was really important that she was there for tonight’s meeting,’ she went on, and then added rather formally, ‘She sends her apologies.’

      ‘That’s okay. I’ll see her tomorrow.’ Louise held her breath while her mother shakily lifted the cup to her lips, its dainty handle sandwiched awkwardly between her forefinger and swollen thumb. She managed to take a sip and return the cup to its place on the saucer without a spillage. Louise relaxed while Joanne, still on edge, let out air like steam.

      ‘She ought to have been here to welcome you. But you know Sian. Saving the world comes before her own family.’

      ‘Oh, Joanne,’ said Louise, scolding gently, ‘I’m sure she would’ve been here if she could. And I don’t mind. It’s better for Oli this way. Meeting too many people all at once would just overwhelm him.’

      Joanne raised her eyebrows and looked out the window, unconvinced. Louise, wanting to avoid further discord, ploughed on with a change of subject, ‘Anyway, how’s the redevelopment of the old quarry at Loughanlea coming on? It must be nearly finished.’ The disused cement works, located just a few miles outside Ballyfergus on the western shore of the Lough, had blighted the landscape for over two hundred years. Four years ago ambitious plans for its regeneration had finally received the green light from the authorities.

      ‘According to Sian,’ said Joanne, ‘most of the major construction work’s completed. As well as the mountain bike centre, they’re building a scuba diving centre, a bird watching centre, a heritage railway centre and God knows what all else. And when it’s finished, the eco-village will have over four hundred homes. It’ll cover the northern part of the peninsula.’ She was referring to a wing-shaped spit of land formed from basalt excavated from the quarry and dumped into the Lough.

      ‘And when’s Sian and Andy’s house going to be ready?’

      ‘September, I think. Theirs is going to be one of the first to be completed.’

      Louise nodded thoughtfully. She’d been so wrapped up in her own plans she’d almost forgotten that Sian was about to move home too, albeit not halfway across the UK.

      Her mother tutted loudly, shook her head and set the cup and saucer down noisily on the table. ‘I don’t know what Sian’s thinking about, buying a house with a man she’s not even married to. Don’t get me wrong, your father and I are very fond of Andy.’ She folded her arms across her chest. ‘But we don’t approve of this living together business.’

      Louise rolled her eyes at Joanne who said, ‘Everyone lives together before getting married nowadays, Mum.’

      ‘You didn’t,’ she snapped.

      Joanne thought for a moment. ‘Well, maybe I should have. You can’t really know someone until you live with them.’

      ‘And a fat lot of good it did me,’ said Louise, looking into her cup. She sighed, took a sip of tea and added, ‘Mind you, I imagine an eco-village, whatever that is, will be right up Sian and Andy’s street.’

      ‘Oh, you should hear the two of them banging on about it,’ said Joanne, diving back into the conversation with sudden energy. ‘They’re like religious zealots. What they don’t know about sustainable living isn’t worth knowing.’

      ‘They’re always on at your dad and I to grow our own food,’ interjected her mother, nodding, ‘and make compost out of our used tea bags.’ She snorted. ‘I think they forget that your father and I are in our seventies.’

      Her mother’s uncharacteristic ridicule took Louise slightly by surprise. ‘Well, the whole project sounds very exciting,’ she said feebly, feeling a little guilty at her participation in the mean-spirited mockery, albeit gentle, of Sian and her fiancé. ‘And it’s good that Sian and Andy are involved. You need passionate people to get something like that off the ground.’

      Joanne pulled the edges of her cardigan together. ‘Hmm … I’m just glad she found someone like Andy who shares her views, that’s all.’ But she said it like she was affronted, rather than pleased.

      ‘Andy’s lovely,’ said Louise. ‘He really is.’

      Her mother nodded. ‘Yes, he is a decent fella.’ A pause. ‘In spite of his … ideas.’

      ‘Well,’ said Louise, ‘there’s nothing wrong with being concerned about the environment.’

      Joanne snorted dismissively like Louise didn’t know what she was talking about. She folded her legs and said, snippily, ‘It’s not what they do that bothers me. It’s going round telling the rest of us how to live that grates. It drives Phil nuts.’

      Joanne had been married to handsome Phil Montgomery for fifteen years. A little flash of envy pricked Louise. She wished she had a husband and everything that went with it – the sharing of worry and responsibility, the freedom to have as many kids as they pleased, the security of two incomes, the social inclusion. But envy was a destructive emotion – she tried to put these thoughts out of her mind.

      ‘Wait till Sian starts on you,’ said Joanne, raising her eyebrows and running the flat of her palm down a smooth tanned leg. ‘You’ll know all about it then.’ She stood up suddenly, while Louise was still formulating a reply and slung her bag over her shoulder. ‘Well, I suppose I’d better take my lot home and give you a chance to get Oli to bed. Oh, how could I forget? The keys to your flat!’ She pulled a yellow plastic key fob from the bag and passed it to Louise. ‘It was the best one I could find.