Chapter 6 – Making an Entrance
As I stepped into the sunlight streaming down onto the Platt, the flat bit at the very bottom of Portwenn, I scanned the harbor, and a voice called out.
"Louisa!"
I shaded my eyes, and there was Bert Large on his restaurant terrace. "Welcome home!" he shouted and waved to me.
I waved back feeling a gush of goodwill from his words, wave, and beefy smile, all flooding onto me like warm water.
That made four - John and Maureen Howe, Timothy Gest, and now Bert. Four people who were on my side. Not of course that the rest, weren't exactly, but these four. They were with me, body and soul.
A couple of years ago when I started surfing lessons, the instructor made me wear a life vest, an orange awkward thing that could inflate if needed. The idea being if you fall, you pull the little tab, and compressed gas would fill it and keep you up. On top of the half-coverage wetsuit, I felt almost like I was in space armor and ready to face the Cybermen. Perhaps that was why I chose this sweater today. It was orange, and it did cover my chest, back, and arms. The wetsuit would be to be imagined.
Literally buoyed up by these thoughts I started the long walk up the hill to Portwenn School. As I turned the corner onto the slanted street, five members of the pastel tank top and sandal clad girl-pack were walking downhill to me.
Their expressions of surprise along with 'oohs' and laughter did not dent my spirit. I only rolled my eyes and trundled on – a mass of determination – but I did give a little toss of my head, making my hair slash about like a cat's angry tail.
Someday, I imagined, they might remember this moment when they were six months preggers themselves. The girls were all at that peculiar stage of knowing where babies come from and the act and biology of it verged on the forbidden, nasty, and oh so lustful. Some day they might remember how they laughed at Miss Glasson.
Could they understand right now that I chose to keep this baby? Would they get it that Doc Martin was obviously involved with someone else and now out of the picture, and saying that I was the mistress of my fate and not him?
In a very righteous manner I walked on actually putting a little bounce in my step. It felt good to stretch my legs after the long train ride and taxi trip of yesterday. And a walk up one of Portwenn's steep streets must be worth three times the length of an ordinary London street for cardiovascular conditioning. Lord, Louisa you sound like Martin! But I pushed him from my head and it was difficult.
I waddled past gift shops, the bakery, a couple of B&Bs, with a few tourists about, not nearly as many as would be here in summertime, but there were a few. A Belgian couple I recognized from the pub at breakfast waved to me and greeted me in very good English.
"Morning, madam," they said in unison and I smiled back at them, not having the heart to correct them on a minor technical issue. No ring, no boyfriend, and no… husband, and very likely now not probable at all to get one.
As I climbed Fore Street I noticed that there was a bit of a parade feeling to the street. No banners or music, but an unusual number of shopkeepers and residents, just happened to emerge to wash a window or sweep a step or find that they just had to step out and examine a flowerpot or shutter.
Each one would glance quickly at me from afar, to see if it was true. "Is she really pregnant?" they all wondered.
Their quick looks would be followed by a longer one and then an even longer one, all the while pretending to get that last bit of dirt off the glass or the slate porch. If they all had x-ray eyes such as Superman I would have been fried a dozen times with blasting beams but my orange life vest kept my spirit floating above it all.
The bulging bow of my dress plowed through any waves of doubt I might have.
My flashing smile disarmed each one as I said "morning" or "good morning." I threw in a few "good to see you's" and a "hello" or two for good measure.
There was no way in hell that I'd slink about wearing a raincoat, not that a raincoat would cover this thing I was lugging about and it was getting larger every day and I could feel it. But I had resolved I'd not let this baby slow Louisa Glasson down. Not one bit. Bloody Martin Ellingham had better watch out. Tosser!
Finally I was at the school. I walked through the play yard, squared my shoulders and pushed open the door. The smell of the school – an admixture of markers, poster paint, and the weird wax the custodian used on the lino tiles, plus the scent of little children - filled my nose.
The school's front door swung shut behind me and I knew that the first act had actually begun.