Chapter 7 - The Doc V

"Thank you for dinner, Marty," Joan said. She wiped her lips with her tissue. "Best grilled fish I have had in quite a while."

"Thank you," I replied.

"And those spuds were excellent. What did you do to make them so tasty?"

"I rubbed coarse sea salt on the skins before baking."

She smacked her lips loudly. "Marvelous. Broccoli was excellent, as well."

I had steamed the broccoli so as not the ruin the necessary vitamins which over boiling would destroy and I could not abide limp veg from over cooking. "I'm glad you enjoyed the meal. Coffee?"

Joan smiled. "Yes, that would be nice."

I busied myself readying the espresso machine to brew two cups. I saw how my Aunt looked around the kitchen.

"You have made quite a life for yourself down here, Marty."

I cleared my throat. "Well… I…" I finished with a shrug.

Joan stood up then hugged me across the back. "Proud of you, nephew."

"Uhm… thank you."

She yawned. "Excuse me. Now, loo."

Joan went towards the toilet in surgery reception and as she went out of sight I felt myself relax. "Now Martin," I whispered to myself, "why has your aunt made you so anxious?" I knew bloody well what it was; waiting for the penny to drop. About the time the first cup of coffee was brewed, Joan returned.

She sat down at the kitchen table, crossed her hands and waited for me to serve her. "I should have brought a trifle, but you don't eat such things."

I took her coffee to her and then turned to take the tin of fairings from the cupboard. I put a few of the biscuits on a plate and set them before her.

"Fairings!" she exclaimed. "Did you bake these?"

"No. A patient's mother made them."

Joan took a biscuit in hand, hefted it, inspected it all around, sniffed at it, and then took a small bite. "Oh, these are lovely."

I watched as Joan took another bite.

"I'm thinking Mrs. Marrak baked these."

I was gob smacked by her deduction. "How in the Heaven's name did you determine that?"

Joan smiled. "Oh," she tapped her temple with a spotted finger, "When you are as old as I am you get a sixth-sense about these things." Then she laughed out loud. "Oh, Marty, I'm no Holmes. I bumped into Mrs. Marrak at the co-op. She told me she was coming up here, and she was carrying a tin." She chuckled once more. "Ipso facto. Oh, you should see your face!"

I stared at her for a moment, then stepped to the machine to prepare my espresso.

Joan cleared her throat. "Didn't mean to make fun, Martin."

"Right," I sighed. Fun? Was that fun? Still she was my aunt, family, and that must mean something about familiarity. I put the coffee into the machine and got it going. "How do you like the espresso?"

I watched as she sipped at the beverage. "Hot, strong; but good."

"The pressurized water, nearly to boiling, provides a different set of oils than normal brewing provides. Less caffeine than the usual coffee making."

Joan tipped her head at me as I sat down, as she picked up another biscuit. "Now…" she started to say, but stopped abruptly. "Fine meal." She went back to fiddling with the biscuit.

I sensed that my aunt wanted to say more. I took a deep breath and asked her. "Auntie Joan, I… uhm… that is, harrumph, can tell that… well…" I gulped. "You have something on your mind."

She smiled nervously then held the fairing out to me. "Take it."

"No thank you. I don't eat sweets."

She poked the fairing at me. "Take the bloody fairing, Marty," she almost shouted. "Sorry."

I sheepishly accepted the biscuit, though I didn't want to eat it.

Joan sighed. "Mrs. Marrak took time to bake that. Switch the cooker on, get the oven nice and hot, measure out the ingredients, mix up the batter. Then after she baked them, let them cool, then pack them in that tin and then walk all the way from her house to here."

I felt the crumbly texture of the biscuit, but it was a few days past its prime, no doubt going stale. I peered at my aunt closely. "This isn't about baking is it?"

She rolled her eyes. "Got it one, Marty. Good boy. Always knew you had a good head on your shoulders; smart you are… about most things."

My espresso was going cold but to take a drink from the small cup would break the moment, for the moment was fear - the anxiousness of waiting for the hand to smack or the belt to fall. I gulped. "Joan, if you are not happy with me, out with it."

She steepled her hands together, as in prayer. "Mrs. Marrak took a lot of time and effort to make a nice little gift for you, and…" she tossed her head towards the Platt, "down in the village, Louisa Glasson's doing much the same. It strikes me that you don't want it, or to have anything to do with it."

"I…" A gift? Oh, right, the child I groaned. "Joan, Louisa had made it perfectly clear that I am to have nothing to do with it," I protested. "She is a grown woman and has made up her mind to raise it on her own."

"It?" Joan almost exploded. "That it, as you call it, is a baby, YOUR son, Martin!"

"I know that!"

She shook her head. "Have you given any thought to what happens later?"

"Later? Oh, right; after the birth. I have been working out a financial arrangement to provide for the child, therefore I…"

She cut me off with a wave of her hand. "You can't be as stupid as people claim you to be! Of course, after the birth. She, or he, will need a name, and a home, feeding up, caring for, and supplies, and those cost money. Plus effort; bags of that. Do you honestly think that Louisa Glasson - although she is a fine example of modern womanhood - will be able to have the time, emotion, and money to raise your child properly? On her own?" Her ruddy face twisted into a fierce yet pleading expression I'd never seen from her. "Martin, for Heaven's sake don't be daft! Louisa will need help, and a lot of it."

"As I she told me…"

Joan jumped to her feet and glared down at me. "Marty! You sit up like a man in his stone tower, all locked away, but I have seen the looks you give Louisa. I know what she said, you keep repeating it - raise it on her own - but do you honestly think that money alone is what she will need from you?"

I sat back in my chair. "Joan that is none of your business. This is between Louisa and me."

She took a deep breath. "Well from where I sit, stand rather, while you hide up here, Louisa is in trouble. She needs you, you silly git, and not just your money." Her lips quivered. "You have no idea how much I wanted to have a baby of my own. How Phil and I tried, and I prayed, and… even did a few things I am not proud of, but no pregnancy was forthcoming. But I had you down here in Cornwall for a few summers, and at those times I could pretend that you were my own. Little Marty… running through the fields, wood carving with your Uncle Phil, feeding the animals, sneaking out late at night to look at the stars…" She sighed. "A few weeks each year and then it stopped."

"Those were good summers," I told her. Those were marvelous times. "Joan… I had a good time on those holidays."

She nodded and then wiped her face and I saw wetness appear in her red-rimmed eyes. "Yes they were. And I cherish them even now. I miss those summer holidays with you, Martin. They are a bright spot in my life and I thank God I had them with you and Phil."

This was what I had feared - getting boxed into a corner by my aunt and her feelings.

The old woman straightened up but her gaze bored into me. "Do not assume that just because you are not baking a baby in your belly that you can just be a sperm donor and then go swanning off with the rest of your life. Free as a bloody bird?" The last was said severely and the words hurt. "And, you silly boy, you need Louisa as well! Just as much as that baby of yours will need BOTH parents!"

I had to look away from her gaze because it hurt to not only hear the words but to also to look at her. I was boxed in. There was no way that I could get out of the box. "But… Joan!" I began to say, but found myself looking at the back of her as she rushed out the kitchen door.

"Auntie Joan!" I called after her. "Oh, don't be that way!"

She jumped into her carryall and was gone in a cloud of exhaust smoke. As I watched her drive away it penetrated into my head that I was holding a crushed biscuit in my hand.