CAN WE GO HOME NOW?

The characters, places and situations of Doc Martin are owned by Buffalo Pictures. This story makes no claim of remuneration or ownership, nor do I make any attempt to infringe upon any rights of the owners or producers.

STOP READING. Spoiler alert for Season 7, Episode 8.

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I know I owe you all a chapter for REMEMBRANCE and it shall be forthcoming soon.

CAN WE GO HOME NOW?

I thought at one time that my life in London was ideal, almost perfect. I was at the top of my field as the Chief of Vascular Surgery at the most prestigious hospital in London, in England actually. I had colleagues with whom I could relate professionally.

I chose not to have friends as that only complicated life, I thought. More than that, it typically brought disappointment at best, usually accompanied with hurt. Family ties were distant and that is what I preferred. I never ever wanted to think of my ghastly parents again. I had an aunt who was a psychiatrist at Broadmoor and an aunt in Cornwall. I suppose it would be good to see my Aunt Joan in Portwenn, but maybe that is even best left as it is. Then something occurred that turned my ideal life into hell, a living hell. How could have I have known then that my ideal life was actually a private torment? How could I have known that the ultimate catastrophe for a surgeon would turn out to be a path of enlightenment?

My living quarters in London was perfect. I had a luxury flat on the 12th floor of a building very close to the hospital where I worked. Most days I could walk. It was furnished in Scandinavian furniture upholstered in white damask. I arranged my office in one of the bedrooms with a large walnut desk and matching cabinets. Interesting that above and behind my reading chair was a golden statue of the Buddha. Opening the curtains it always reflected the morning sun. The walls were adorned with pacific scenes of water and plants in paintings from Asia. I slept in a king size bed, considering that it was perfectly normal for only one person to ever inhabit a bed that size.

People might have said, upon entering my living space, that it was quite sterile. But my ideal was for people not to enter there, so bugger their thoughts, if such thoughts they might have had.

My kitchen was also perfect,, suiting my every need. I actually liked to cook, but my eating habits were quite spartan so there was seldom much food in my large refrigerator, and even though my cooker was top of the line, I really only needed one burner. I kept everything clean and tidy so with stainless steel everywhere my kitchen could be compared to a surgical suite.

Perfect kitchen. Perfect life. What more could a person want?

Now several years hence I am sitting in my house in Portwenn, Cornwall. Yes, the same village where my Aunt Joan lived who I mentioned before. The house doubles as my surgery as I am the only practicing physician in town. It is drafty in winter and the roof is constantly needing attention. Every floor creaks here and there when you walk on it. The plumbing is always going awry. I had my privacy in London. In Portwenn there is none. The townsfolk who come to surgery think the house, at least the first floor, is open for all. And the kitchen, ah the kitchen. Entering there on seeing the cabinets and table, one thinks he may have entered a pub in 1964. The refrigerator is minuscule and the cooker is barely adequate.

The bedroom is half the size of my London domicile. The bed seems half the size too. I did insist on a new mattress. No telling what infestations were lying beneath the surface of the old one. While I have been staying in the small quarters apart from Louisa I realized something about the beds of Portwenn. They have been slept in so much they have a trough down the middle. I suppose the advantage is in winter when two bodies can roll toward the middle to keep warm.

Considering all that has occurred to bring me to this godforsaken English coastal outpost and looking around at the total lack of Scandinavia in my physical enviroment, why do I have a feeling of contentment that I have never felt before? While the journey that brought me here is not simple, the answer to that question is. The answer is the fact that my beautiful wife asked me this afternoon, "Can we go home now?" I am home because home is being with with the two people sitting at this supper table tonight. Wherever my wife, Louisa and our son James are, that is home. Perhaps one day we shall have a proper doctor's residence, but I know now, like that flat in London, without people who care for each other, it is simply a shell.

I was brought out of my woolgathering by a knocking at the surgery door.

"Martin," Louisa said squeezing my arm, "Someone is at the door."

"Oh, no not tonight."

But they wouldn't let up so I answered and it was Mr. Collins concerned about his wife's asthma, and the fact that they had not refilled the prescription for the nebulizer medicine. Fortunately I had some and was able to dismiss him quickly. As I walked back to the kitchen I noticed the light from the sun was perfectly focused on the golden Buddha statue in my office.

When I returned to the kitchen Louisa was tearing a sheet of paper into pieces and binning it.

"What was that, Louisa?"

"It's the agenda you brought me so we could sort things. I've placed it where it belongs. I am home and it is where I intend to remain. The sorting we have to do does not need a written agenda. Let's eat our supper. Thank you for buying the lamb chops. They look delicious."

We ate without much talk. That was my preference, of course. My loquacious wife would have carried on with sundry topics, especially given the happenings of the past two days. James Henry was enjoying his pasta and tomato sauce. When I cut pears and brought cheese, we did start talking.

"Martin, why do you think it takes a crisis for us to realize what we have together?"

"I've no idea Louisa, but think on it. It took James being born in a pub for me to see where I needed to be. Mrs. Tishell shook our world when she kidnapped our son."

"I was so stupid and blind. I couldn't see how hard you were trying, really trying, to make things work. I need to tell you Martin, that your only task is not simply pleasing me. We will do this together. Oh, and I promise I will be here in the morning and the day after that and like I said on our wedding day, as long as we live."

"Louisa, I know I can be difficult to live with."

"Oh, yeah, true Martin, but you don't take top prize for that just yet. I know I can be a royal pain in the arse."

Suddenly we simply stopped and looked at each other. We saw in each other's eyes the love and thankfulness we felt. It was an unspoken pinpoint of memory that brought the years of our relationship into one flash of awakening.

Abruptly Louisa shouted, "Dam, this bloody table is in the way." In an instant she was behind me and embracing me. Damp cheeks were touching and our eyes were closed as we savored the grace of this moment.

Of course all of this is well and good in a romance novel. Not so well and good that while our eyes were closed James turned the bowl of pasta upside down on his head and grinning widely said, loud enough for the neighbors to hear, "DAAAAAAAA."

We looked at our son baptized in tomato sauce and we looked at each other. And we laughed.

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This is a bit unorthodox. No betas. No rewrites. It came and I wanted to send it to you.

It is a one-off. Now it's your turn.