Disclaimer: Doc Martin is the property ofBuffalo Pictures. I own nothing except my imagination.
Charity Begins at Home - Chapter 29
When they got back home from the Charity Ball, Louisa sat and chatted with Joan while Martin disappeared into his study to catch up on all his emails and correspondence that inevitably built up in just the short time that they had been away. She filled her in with everything that had happened at the Ball, while Luke happily played and chatted around them.
"Serves her right, never did like that bloody Edith woman, she was such a cold calculating piece of work, the way she treated Martin back then in their student days. Couldn't even get my name right either – Auntie Jill," she snorted. But then she just sat there quietly, and seemed rather preoccupied, not like her usual chatty self. Even playing with Luke didn't seem to cheer her up as it usually did.
Over a cup of tea, Louisa tackled her to see if she could find out what was on the older woman's mind.
"Is every thing alright, or is something bothering you Joan?" she enquired.
"What? No, no, really, I'm fine," Joan replied, smiling weakly.
"Come on, out with it, I can tell there's something on your mind," Louisa persisted.
"Well if you must know, the MOT is due on my truck next month. It barely scraped through last year, and I'm pretty certain it'll fail this year, and that the cost of the work to get it through will be more than it's worth, and I can't afford it anyway, truth be told," Joan confessed. It had been worrying her for quite a while. She'd been pushing it to the back of her mind, but now she was going to have to face it.
"Your truck is pretty old. How about replacing it with something newer, maybe a large estate car with more passenger seats?" Louisa suggested. She and Martin had been trying to find ways to help Joan financially for quite some time, but she always stubbornly refused any offers of help from them.
"Can't afford it. I'll just have to manage without it, though quite how I'm not too sure if I'm honest," Joan sighed.
"Then let us help you with getting a new one. You know we want to help. Martin would be a lot happier if you had something newer and more reliable, and you know how he worries about car safety and accidents. Pauline said he was worried sick when he heard you'd had an accident that time with Mrs McLynn," Louisa suggested.
"No, it's my problem and I'll solve it. Martin's done more than enough for me, I'm not going to be any kind of burden on the pair of you," Joan insisted stubbornly.
"No one could be less of a burden than you Joan! You help us all the time, just as you have this weekend so that we could stay over at the hotel and not have to worry about Luke, knowing that he was being looked after by you. I'm sure you've let your farm produce business slide since we've had Luke, you always drop everything to look after him whenever we ask you," Louisa chided her.
"I love looking after Luke anytime, you know that. It's not a chore, I'd rather be looking after him than doing anything else," Joan said, truthfully.
"Yes, and maybe we're guilty of taking advantage of that. We simply couldn't manage without your help, and when this next baby comes, we'll need your help even more. So the least you can do is let us help you out. We both have good jobs, earning good money, and don't forget that I still have White Rose Cottage which brings in additional income too. To be honest Joan, it makes us feel very uncomfortable that you won't let us help you financially," Louisa told her.
"Don't be so ridiculous! We're family, he's my grandson as far as I'm concerned, of course I'll look after him any time, that's what family's do, help each other out," Joan replied.
"My point exactly Joan. So why won't you let us help? How do you think we feel seeing you struggle when we can easily afford to help you? And anyway, you'll need some sort of reliable transport to be able to help us out when we have both Luke and the new baby," Louisa pointed out.
"I know, that has been worrying me, but even so…" Joan conceded.
"And maybe you need to let Martin feel useful and helpful. Remember what you told me, when I was ranting and raving about him being so protective of me? You told me that I had to let him help, that it was what he needed to do. Well I think he needs to help you, to stop him feeling guilty about you, worrying in the winter that you can't afford your heating bills, things like that. He can easily afford to help you, so don't be so proud, let him be protective of you as well as me Joan," Louisa told her firmly. She felt that the time had come for some plain talking with the older woman, just as Joan had done with her before.
"Well I suppose you could have a point," Joan admitted. Her income had dropped this year, she hadn't devoted nearly so much time to her farm because she loved being with Luke so much, he came before anything else, and she was so thrilled about the new baby coming too. And if she was honest with herself, it really would be a weight off her mind not to have to worry so much financially and to get her transport problems sorted for once and for all.
"We're family Joan. As you said, family help each other, agreed? It will make Martin feel much happier too. Another side of him is coming out, he's discovering that he enjoys looking after us and being needed, so I think we should encourage it. And if you did let us help you, you could get a few of those jobs done round the farm that you've been putting off, that would be good wouldn't it?"
"OK, well when you put it like that, I suppose I can be a stubborn old bird at times, so maybe I shall have to swallow my pride and let Martin help me," Joan finally accepted.
xXx
"How the hell did you get her to agree to that?" Martin asked in astonishment when Louisa told him that Joan had agreed to let them help her to get a new car to replace her truck, and to let them help with her heating bills over the winter by way of an allowance - he'd been trying for years without success. Previously, the only way he'd been able to help with paying off his father for his share of Joan's farm was by not telling her about it, she hadn't found out about it until it had all been completed.
"Oh I just pointed out a few home truths, I told her that we're family, and that if she wouldn't accept our help, then maybe we couldn't accept her help so much with Luke and the new baby," Louisa told him with a little smile.
"You didn't actually say that did you?" Martin asked her, shocked.
"No, of course not, give me some credit. I basically told her that we're family, and being family means having to learn to accept help as well as to give it. Joan is one of life's givers, she never takes anything from anyone, but I pointed out that she should allow us to help her as we are in the very fortunate position of being able to, and that we felt really guilty and upset just standing by and watching her struggle when she helps us out so much. Eventually she saw my point and she agreed," Louisa explained.
"Well naturally I'm delighted, I'll look into getting a new car for her straight away before she changes her mind, maybe an estate rather than a truck. And if you can get her bank details…."
"Already got them. We can set up a regular payment straight into her account with no messing around I thought," Louisa said, waving a piece of paper at him.
Martin looked at her with admiration.
"You really do care about her, don't you?" he said.
"Of course I do. She's wonderful with Luke, I trust her completely with him and they simply adore each other. We just take it for granted that she's always happy to help with him at any time. We really couldn't manage without her – can you imagine having to find another baby sitter, someone we could trust and rely on the way we can with Joan?"
"I wouldn't trust any of those so called babysitters, most of them are disgusting, revolting teenagers who haven't got the first idea of how to look after a baby, I wouldn't trust any of them in our house…." Martin started to rant.
"Exactly. You've always said she's been more of a mother to you than your actual mother ever was. Well I suppose I could say the same, my mother's never done anything for me the way that Joan has. Don't forget that Joan was pretty much the only person who welcomed me back with open arms when I came back to the village six months pregnant," Louisa pointed out.
"Yes, she was really good to you, wasn't she? I'm so glad you feel that way about her. And I'm really glad you that managed to persuade her to let us help her, I've been very worried about how she was going to cope through the winter with all her heating bills. And I would rather she wound down the amount of work she puts in on her farm at her age, so maybe now she will," Martin said.
He took Louisa in his arms and held her tight, loving her for caring about Joan as much as he did.