Chapter 21

Finally I'm back on Cornish soil. Everything here is calmer, slower, quirkier, older, but when I breathe in I can also notice that the air is a lot cleaner than everything I've breathed in a long time. The price you have to pay for the clean air, however, is that there are hardly any job opportunities. Big business always means pollution, and no pollution means no business.

I look around. I remember my previous encounters and arrivals on this station. Since I am grown up, arrivals were mostly awkward.

When I was working here, I always hated to come back from my occasional visits to London. London, where I should have been but have failed to meet the high standards that a London job requires. I was coming back to my exile.

During my student years I only came back when I wanted to introduce my then-fiancée to my aunt. Edith was complaining the whole time asking why I was dragging her into these backwaters and that I should finally grow up and emancipate myself from those hindering family bonds. Aunt Joan immediately disliked Edith and had no problem showing it in her Ellingham way. It was a horrible stay.

My last pleasant memories arriving here date back to when I would have been eleven years old, arriving for the last time for my summer holidays at the farm. I had been excited during the whole train ride and had been eagerly looking for my aunt the moment I came out of the train.

I'm looking out for a different aunt now.

Louisa is rushing towards the exit.

"Wait. I haven't seen her yet?" I try to slow her down.

"What? Who? I thought we should find a taxi."

"Ruth promised to pick us up. Can you see her?"

Louisa stops abruptly and slowly – very slowly – turns around to face me, and I know that this isn't a good sign at all. I hate Louisa's temperamental outburst, but when she grows quiet, it really becomes dangerous.

She looks at me, straight at me, looks me full in the eye for a long time. I gulp and fear the worst. I hug James tightly. He is the only thing that can save me from a really nasty scene.

In a low voice, slightly shaking, but very pronounced, she addresses me.

"Are you saying she knows I'm coming and I didn't? You told her before you told me?"

"I needed someone to pick us up, so naturally…"

Louder now she interrupts me, still trying hard to compose herself enough not to yell at me. "So who else knows we're coming? You haven't informed by any chance the whole village and only forgot to tell me about it? Hmmm?"

"Don't be silly," I loudly retort, "why would I want the village to know?"

"Or me, come to think of it. Maybe because I'm still the little inbred villager for you, hm? Not sophisticated enough to be talked to, hm? After all, I do not own a medical degree, so why bother consulting me about anything, hm?"

"Rubbish! What has medicine got to do with this?"

"Martin, you only take people seriously when they are from your own profession. The rest are just…just…second-class citizens for you. Including me."

"Now you are being ridiculous!" I answer back more loudly than I wanted to. While James is looking timidly at me, but still clings onto me, I hear a familiar voice behind me.

"I thought I'd recognised the yell." Aunt Ruth chose exactly this moment to turn up. "I thought I'd just follow the argument, and I would surely find you."

"It's not as if we are hard to miss on this empty platform. Where have you been? You're ten minutes late?"

"Well, as you know, in the country we get up with the chickens, but chicken aren't what they used to be."

"You overslept."

"That's another way of putting it." My aunt was never one for emotional outburst, well, except for the one occasion when I could diffuse her worries about Lupus, and if she is happy to see us now she has a funny way of showing it.

"You look awful. Married life doesn't seem to suit you."

"We're not married." I state.

"A mistake I didn't make." Louisa grumbles and I look at her worriedly. "So let's get going. It won't get any better standing here."

Louisa picks up her bag, which I had dropped during our argument, and looks towards my aunt with fury in her eyes.

"Don't look daggers at me. I told him it was a stupid idea." Aunt Ruth calmly declares, not at all impressed by Louisa's foul mood. "You know how he is. You know – about the good advice and the deaf ears?"

"You can say that again." Louisa keeps grumbling. "Big deaf ears."

By now, I just want to get away, although I doubt that it will be any better when we're at the farm. At least, I can take a shower there, which would be some improvement.

I carry our son to the car, while Louisa is making space. My aunt turns to me and nods in my direction.

"Can he walk?"

"Who?"

"Him." This time she definitely nods towards James.

"He has a name and he can walk just fine."

"So why isn't James walking and you're carrying him around like a sack of potatoes?"

"It's quicker and he's tired."

"If you keep doing that for the next fifteen years, you'll be in trouble. Here we are. Taxi to Portwenn."

Ruth opens the car. While I try to secure James into the backseat as safely as I can without a child seat, Louisa bends down and hisses into my ear. "How can you let your aunt talk about James that way? Do something!"

"But I did."

"No, you bloody well didn't!"

"I didn't hear you say anything, for that matter."

"She's your aunt."

"I'm not responsible for my aunt's opinions."

"You have to decide which side you're on." I finally managed to get James reasonably well into the safety belt. "I'll sit in the back with him." Louisa declares and pushes me with her elbow to make way.

I stow away Louisa's and James' luggage into the boot and sit next to my aunt. She starts the motor and we're off towards the farm. A few minutes pass, during which Ruth peeks over at me occasionally.

"The last attempt?"

"What?"

"For reconciliation?"

"Rubbish."

"Well, I wouldn't need my psychological degree to make the connection between your state and the state of your affairs. When a man stops shaving, the relationship is on its last leg."

"The airline lost my luggage and our relationship is just fine." I declare to end this unpleasant debate.

"In your dreams." I hear Louisa mutter.

Ruth is but too glad to pick it up, nods towards the backseats and triumphantly declares: "Seems to be a matter of opinion."

"Yeah, but not yours."

"Thank you very much. I could say 'I told you', but that's too cheap."

"Then don't." I am on the verge of losing my patience. It is really none of my aunt's business and our state of affairs is certainly no subject for idle chit-chat.

"However, I must grant you that the two of you lasted longer than I thought you would. I wouldn't have given you one year, to be honest. I was really almost willing to revise my opinion. Almost."

"You seem to have a lot of confidence in us."

"It just takes one look to see that you have nothing in common – except for the child."

"James." Louisa chimes in from behind. "The child has a name, and that is James."

"OK, James. Not that you have any other children to mistake him for, have you? I wonder why that is when you have a blissfully happy relationship. However, you managed to stay together for the child's sake quite a long time and most of the times you even gave the impression of a reasonable happy couple." Ruth grows silent for a moment to concentrate on turning around a narrow corner. "As far as couples can be happy, that is." She concludes when the road is straight again.

"And you are an expert on this." I sarcastically add.

"Well, expert enough to have told you before you even moved to London." She energetically pulls at the wheel to get around the next bend just in time. Her way of driving is frightening. "I'm just glad that I didn't have to revise my opinion. I hate being wrong."

It's Louisa's time to add fuel to the flames. "Must be an Ellingham thing."

"Yes, didn't you know?" Ruth snaps back, unimpressed. "You should have taken your time to get to know the man before you get yourself pregnant."

"STOP…" I yell, and immediately try to lower my voice, "…it. We haven't come down here for couple therapy. I just thought we could stay at your place, without any lectures. Maybe you'd better bring us to a hotel."

"You're joking. I instructed Al to prepare three rooms. I already guessed you might want separate accommodation and you were just too proud to admit to it."

My face falls as the last thing I want are separate beds, but I'm not sure if Louisa feels the same, and the fact that she keeps quiet isn't helping much with my doubts.

Ruth pulls into the farm yard.

"Besides we're already here. I guess Al has prepared breakfast. You must be starving after the long journey, and bickering on an empty stomach is never good."

"We are not here for bickering!" I declare.

"In that case, you improvised brilliantly. In any case, breakfast can't do any harm."

To be continued…