City Lives by Patricia Scanlan

trouble,’ Maggie protested. She felt a bit of a heel for making such a fuss about coming down.
    ‘No trouble. I did it while I was waiting for you to arrive. It was better than twiddling my thumbs all morning,’ Nelsie responded tartly.
    ‘I did have to bring the children swimming,’ Maggie pointed out defensively.
    ‘I’m sure missing it once in a blue moon wouldn’t be a tragedy.’ Nelsie sniffed. ‘Anyway, you’re here now and I’m off. I’ll be home around seven,
if that’s all right with you.’
    ‘Seven’s fine,’ Maggie said irritably but her acerbity was wasted on her mother, who was putting on her good tweed coat and jaunty green beret.
    ‘There’s a quiche in the fridge for tea,’ she called out and then she was gone, her small sprightly figure hurrying across the gravel to the car with her two cake tins swinging
in a string bag.
    ‘You’ve no business being late on fête day,’ Harry McNamara said drolly from his chair beside the fire, ‘swimming or no.’
    Maggie laughed. ‘Mother’s something else.’
    ‘Mind, you haven’t been down in a while, you’d think you lived at the other end of the country instead of an hour’s drive away,’ her father remonstrated.
‘Stick the kettle on there and make us a cup of tea, like a good girl.’ He settled himself more comfortably in his chair and picked up the paper.
    Silently Maggie went to the sink and filled the kettle. What did her parents think, that she lolled around every morning painting her nails? She had three children of school age, a husband who
did not pull his weight and a career that would be rapidly going down the tubes now that her editor was leaving.
    No-one understood the pressure she was under. Was her mother right? Should she leave aside her writing career until her children were older? What had started out as a joy and a release was
rapidly becoming a burden. The pressure of a deadline was intense. But she knew better than anyone how important it was to build up her name as a writer. Her first two novels had sold well, maybe
her third,
Betrayal
, would be her breakthrough. If she could just have some money at her back to become more independent of Terry it would be worth the slog. It was good having her own
money. Her royalty cheques were on the rise. She was due one any day now. That would lift her spirits, she comforted herself as she waited for the kettle to boil.
    She glanced around the homely farmhouse kitchen with its great pine dresser full of crockery, nestled in the alcove beside the fire. The big square pine table and chairs had been there in the
centre of the room since she’d been a child. The fireplace, with its gleaming brass fender, had two small red-cushioned seats at either side of the chimney-breast. Her parents’
armchairs stood at either side of the fire, old and worn but more comfortable than the grandest suite. The perfect place to curl up for a snooze.
    On Sundays Nelsie lit the fire in the front parlour, but, apart from Sundays, life was mostly lived in the snug, warm, aroma-filled kitchen that had hardly changed from her childhood.
    She’d like a kitchen like this in her dream cottage, Maggie decided as she cut two thick slices of tea brack and smeared them with butter. She might as well join her father in a cup of tea
before going out on the hunt for eggs. After lunch, while her father had a snooze, she’d take the kids for a long walk on Brittas and inhale some good healthy sea air. When she’d
finished her tea she buttoned up her jacket and went out to the children.
    ‘Mammy we found three eggs,’ Shona shrieked excitedly as the hens squawked, running here and there across the farmyard. Maggie smiled and relaxed. Searching for eggs always brought
back happy memories of her childhood. She was here now with her children, her computer was at home, it was their time.
    ‘Great, let’s see if we can find any more. Look over there in the old nest by the gate,’ Maggie urged and