Mother of the Bride by Marita Conlon-Mckenna

Brian’s mother wore that fitted black dress?’
    â€˜I know she was trying to look classy and slim, but it drained her and put years on her. Katie told me she almost cried when she saw the wedding photos.’
    â€˜Now that we are starting to organize things, it’s exciting,’ confessed Helen. ‘It’s all so different from our wedding, which was a small affair with about thirty relations and friends along . . .’
    â€˜The girls do things differently than our day. Sure, I was only twenty when Tom and I got married. We hadn’t a clue!’
    â€˜Paddy and I were the same. Everybody thought we were mad getting married when I was barely twenty-three. His parents were dead set against it, and kept telling us that we were too young and poor. By the time I was Amy’s age we had the three kids.’
    â€˜Bet you wouldn’t change it!’ teased Fran.
    â€˜Not a day of it,’ insisted Helen. ‘Not a day.’
    â€˜Well, anything you need a hand with, I’m here ready and willing,’ Fran offered. ‘I love weddings. I just love them.’
    â€˜Fran, I’ll take you up on it,’ Helen promised, grabbing her keys and wallet. ‘Listen, I’d better go. I’m collecting Mum and taking her to Poppies for lunch.’
    â€˜How is Sheila?’
    â€˜Great, getting deafer and a bit more demanding, but she’s stillliving at home. We’ve home help coming in twice a week, and then I’m around.’
    â€˜You’re so good, Helen!’ praised Fran. ‘My mother nearly drove me cracked!’
    Helen smiled, remembering the hours Fran spent in her kitchen ranting about her mother, who’d had the family all demented with her demands – up until she’d died ten years ago.
    â€˜Do you want to have lunch in my place on Friday?’ Helen asked.
    â€˜Great. I’ll see you then, MOB.’
    â€˜MOB?’ What was Fran on about?
    â€˜Mother of the Bride!’ Fran waved. ‘Enjoy it.’
    Helen smiled. She was really going to enjoy it. It wasn’t every day a daughter got married, and she was going to revel in the whole experience.

Chapter Thirteen
    Helen parked her car outside the old house, bracing herself to go inside. Three times a week she visited her mother, conscious that it must be lonely for her still living here in the old house, with so many of her old neighbours and friends gone or living in retirement or nursing homes. As Sheila grew older the demands were greater, and she relied on Helen more and more for everything. Helen did her best, and brought her out shopping and for drives and walks, and often had her to stay at the weekends. Getting old was no fun, but Sheila Hennessy was still full of spirit and determined to be independent and live in her own home.
    The family home where Helen had grown up looked run-down and unkempt, the grass long and covered with fallen leaves. The front windows and front door were both in need of repainting. She remembered a time when this house had been one of the finest on the street. Her mother had always insisted on having a border of colourful seasonal bedding plants running to the front door, the lawn immaculately clipped and the hedge trimmed.
    This house on Willow Grove had been home for so long to Helen and her three brothers. They’d had a great childhood, and she musthave swung on the rusting gate thousands of times. Along with her brothers, Tim and David and Brendan, she’d raced and chased up and down the road here, and played rounders and football with the rest of the kids, and endless games of elastics and hopscotch with her best friends, Marianne and Claire. It had always seemed safe, and she could never have imagined a better place to live. Her bedroom was the one up over the garage, with the Virginia creeper rambling beneath the window sill. Number thirty-two looked shabby and neglected now, a complete contrast to the