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.

Thank you for reading and reviews are much appreciated.

WARNING! This is a post-Series 6 story. If you have not seen Doc Martin Series 6, this story may ruin any number of surprises for you as it begins just at the end of series 6 - Episode 8. Therefore, proceed at your own peril…

Once more I watched the taxi drive down the hill as my mouth went dry in fear and horror. It stopped at the bottom though and Louisa climbed out in her wedding dress, the first one. Suddenly she was by my side holding my hand and another time walking away dragging her roller case, the rear view of her hiding the six-month bump of pregnancy. Then I watched her ride down Fore Street on her bike, which changed into a crashed taxi on the moor, and then she was on the operating table, while I snaked a cannula into the arteries in her brain.

I gasped, startled, and jerked awake my heart thudding audibly. Louisa lay sleeping peacefully next to me, making little snores from her mouth as she did each night. I rubbed my forehead and my hand came away covered with perspiration. I sagged against the pillow trying to get myself under control. My shirt and pants were damp, and though the room felt cool, I was far too warm. I pushed down the covers but that did little help in reducing my temperature. In glowing green digits, my clock read three twenty-five.

I knew these symptoms, as I had them too many times. I held a hand out and I saw my fingers juddering in the dim light. I needed a drink of water so slowly eased from the bed, putting my robe and slippers on. But the faucet in our bath made a screech when you opened the cold tap slowly, so I'd have to go downstairs so as not to disturb Louisa and James.

James lay on his back clutching a dinosaur and the toy frog. I pulled his blanket up to his chin and he grinned in his sleep. Touching his head his skin temperature felt normal, so I turned and slowly, avoiding the two loose treads on the stairs, went down to the kitchen.

Eleanor was sitting at the kitchen table, head down over a magazine. "Martin," she said, "you're up early."

I got to the sink with a glass, filled it, and drank it off in one go, washing the budding bolus of vomitus back down my esophagus.

"You were thirsty," Eleanor whispered. She was wearing a garish robe which looked like something Morwenna might wear, and likely did. My mother-in-law's hair was pulled back in a rough ponytail, not unlike Louisa's yet frizzed up, in a huge snarl. She grinned at me. "I must look a sight."

"Why are you up?" I asked.

"Too much coffee on the plane and the train. I had two glasses of wine down at the Crab, knowin' I'd be wound up like a top," she sighed. "But didn't help, at all. You?"

"Thirsty."

"Why not drink water from upstairs? You've got an on suite loo. I had to come down here to use the pot."

"Um," I paused.

"You and me, we're not gonna' be friends, are we?"

Eleanor Glasson was as different from my mother as night and day, and it was hard to say which was darker. For the moment I assumed that she was towards the lighter end of the spectrum. "Our bath taps make loud noises. Didn't want to wake them – James and Louisa."

She looked up at me and I could smell cigarette smoke. "I don't want you smoking in the house."

Her hands flew up in the surrender sign. "Don't shoot copper," she laughed. "I had a gasper out on the front terrace. Lovely view."

I nodded.

She sighed. "You know, Louisa and me, we weren't always like this. We used to be mates, well as much as a mum and single child can be." She yawned saying, "But me and her dad, well…" she snapped her fingers, "just like that we'd go from love birds to two cats in a bag – snarlin' and hissin' to beat the band." Eleanor looked away. "And look where all that got us."

I set the glass on the counter. "Why did you come, uhm, back?"

Her mouth fell open in shock. "Well to see my daughter! You called and said she was havin' a brain op! You think I'd stay in Spain after hearin' that! Jesus, Martin! You must think I have no kind feelings at all for the girl!"

"No, just…"

"Just what, exactly?"

I didn't want to get into at half three in the morning. "None of my business." I turned to leave.

"Martin, no don't go. You're, well, you're family now. Married to Louisa, father to her son; my grandson. That makes you my son-in-law."

I tried not to grunt in dismay.

"So I was thinking that you and me, we're opposites. I'm a free spirit, go where the winds take me sometimes. Javier…" her face drooped. "He was my man-friend; he used to say I was a Pixy-light, bobbin' to and fro." She pressed her hands together and stared up at me. "Javier, you'd have liked him. He was educated, not a clot like me. Read all sorts of fancy books. Taught guitar and sang. I guess that's what attracted me to him, was his voice," she smiled, "and his romantic ways."

"Really."

"You think I'm rubbish. You're standing there wondering how a Cornish wife and mother living in the back of beyond got hooked up with a dusky Spaniard, right?"

"No."

She shrugged. "The truth is I ask myself that too. Terry was no prize, and I suppose I wasn't either. But here I am."

"Not for me to judge. No."

She laughed. "But I know what you're thinking. Javier, Javier Rodriguez de Gonzalo, was a nice man. Handsome, rakish, and fun and when he flashed those dark eyes and those brilliant teeth at me, I was a goner. And he was about as different from Terry as you could get, plus he was about a foot taller. So off I went." She sighed. "It was fun while it lasted."

"Eleanor, listen, I'm no priest or vicar either." I could never understand what drove people into religious service for at the end it all seemed black magic, so-called miracles, and dogma, heaped pile on pile. We all ended up food for worms no matter our religion or lack of it.

She laughed. "You'd scare the living daylights of any church folk wouldn't you? Last time I was here I heard when you got up to give a eulogy for your poor dead aunt Joan it turned into a harangue about heart attacks, eating healthier, and…"

"True," I replied warily.

"And exercise. Plus you predicted that unless they all changed their evil ways of eatin' and drinkin' they'd all follow her into some early graves."

"I did," I sighed. "It was a moment when they might actually listen to me, for once."

"Had any heart attacks hereabouts since then?"

"Yes, a few. Morwenna, my receptionist, her granddad had one, well - two. The second killed him."

"Well I guess you should have yelled louder!" She shook her head. "So the kid's on her own; Morwenna."

"She gets by or seems to."

"Were you there? When the old duffer went?"

"Yes."

She sighed. "I bet that's pretty had. You don't strike me as the type of doc that wails and cries over his patients, gives nice pats on the head or gives out lollies to the kiddies. But when you lose one I bet you feel pretty rotten. No doctor can like that one damn bit."

"Er, no. He was eighty-six. War War II vet. So to die of a myocardial infarction at that age is beating the odds."

"Who was he?"

"William Arthur Newcross."

"Oh, yeah. I recall him. Big strong man, jutting chin – worked in the office up at the quarry. Am I right?"

I nodded.

"I think my Terry worked for him for a while." Eleanor shook her head. "Shame. But your receptionist, she's nice. Leastwise she was nice to me. Well anyway, now that I look back, I was pretty awful to Louisa and Terry, both."

"Yeah." I felt the same, at least about my wife. "I've…"

"What?"

"Listen," I looked at the clock. "It's nearly three forty-five. I'd best be…"

"Yeah." She picked up her magazine and opened it. "Look at her. I think she should have work done, don't you? Those baggy eyes, droopy chest and the skin around her neck? Ugh."

I sneered and went through the lounge.

"Martin?" Eleanor called.

"Yes," I sighed.

"I… I want you to know… that I came back, hopin' to change things with Louisa. I… and I hope you don't screw it up."

"I see."

She came to me and looked at me with her bright blue eyes. "Do you think we might get on? I mean her and me. You and me… um… we'll see."

"You can only try."

"I wasted an awful lot of time, you know."

"It's getting late."

"Or early," whispered Eleanor. Unexpectedly she hugged me and pressed her face to my shoulder. "Thanks Martin."

"Whatever for?"

"Second chances, mate. I been living my whole life on 'em. Now, off to bed, scoot."

I sighed a little. "You too… need rest."

She yawned hugely then patted my arm. "You too, luv. I think maybe our little chat done me good."

I stealthily got back into bed, hearing Louisa's mum come galumphing upstairs like a horse with a bad foot.

"Martin? Is that James?" Louisa asked sleepily starting to sit upright. "Things okay?"

"Shh. Go back to sleep, Louisa. Everything's fine."

She hugged me tightly after she settled herself back on the pillows. "Okay."

I lay awake for a very long time in the dark thinking about chances – first, last and none.