Chapter 9 – Biology
Sea turtles reproduce by mating at sea, fertilizing the eggs inside the female and then she lays her eggs in a nest that she has dug in a sandy beach. Then the female, I shan't call her a mother, covers the eggs and departs, permanently. The young are left to incubate on their own, hatching some weeks later, then the young must crawl from the nest and make their way to the sea, usually pursued by hungry predators. The female's part is quite short, being a mere producer of eggs, a repository of sperm, and an egg layer.
Birds follow similar patterns, being egg layers, but they build elaborate nests for their eggs, and sit on them to incubate the young, standing by to feed and teach their young to eat and fly. But similar to other egg layers, they do not carry their fertilized young inside them.
Female mammals, on the other hand, from whom we get our class name as the females have mammary glands, carry their fetuses internally from conception to birth. Pregnancy causes massive changes in the female's body and physiology to grow the unborn offspring via a placenta. Hormonal changes mediate growth and adapt the mother's body and brain for child-bearing, nursing, and child-rearing. All mammals then suckle their young after birth, after what may be a protracted gestation, and then care for the young until they are able to make their way alone.
I stared at Louisa's belly, inside of which is a fetus that bore half of my genes, and half of hers, or so she just told me. And in around three months, or so I guessed, after more tremendous growth, this baby would be born.
"It's ours, Martin… yours and mine!" she said. She'd also just informed me that she had just dropped by on her way. To tell me before the village found out.
Just dropped by? On her way?
My faculties were still in shock and my natural reticence made not only words stick in my throat but my mind was blocked as well.
"Who's she?" she asked, indicating my evening guest.
"What? It's Edith," I managed to blurt out, not thinking to add that she is a colleague, a doctor, a classmate… a former lover. I muttered something like "Do you want to get married?" followed by a totally inane, "You're quite certain it's ours?"
Louisa then told me that it is ours, no doubt, and that she does not want to get married.
"You know it's too late for an abortion," I inform her of the facts.
She flipped her head away a few degrees and pressed her lips together firmly. "I'm having this baby, Martin."
Interspersed with more of my halting and rather dense questions she told me that she will be staying at the pub since her house is rented out and that the London school had let her go.
"I didn't like London," she said, "and the school didn't like this." Her greatly enlarged abdomen spoke all for itself.
You should have married her, a little voice in my head started up. You should have married, you fool! She was pregnant when she left, and you know bloody well when this baby got started! If it wasn't mid October when you asked her to marry, and she said YES, it was in that next week or so.
This is all YOUR FAULT, Martin, I thought. Her red and white bedroom in her house flashed into my head. Her bed and her flesh were… too tempting, too obtainable when she said YES to your proposal to marry. But you both were eager, so very eager, weren't you?
But that night… that night… our desire was fulfilled, but our lust was barely sated. Did we know what we accomplished that night or did we not care for the consequences? Was that it? Just made love with abandon – with… joy?
What unspoken ordeals afterward did Louisa have to face in London? Stares, snickers, gossiping… and very likely not behind her back, either! Bloody people are no different whether in Portwenn or London, are they? Damn them! How that must have hurt her… Louisa.
"It's going to be fine, Martin. It's not your problem. Bye," she said, then turned and walked down the steps and off down the street, carrying her little case and a handbag.
Swaying a bit, almost swishing, like I've seen her walk off before. And the last time I saw her thus was on our wedding day, as she left the surgery; the day we did not get married.
But before I can unfreeze my mind and go after her, Edith was at my elbow.
"Is she from the village?" she asks.
I nodded my head like an idiot.
"Well don't do anything hasty. You don't have to rescue her. She's a grown woman – she's chosen to have her baby."
Words started to come to mouth to protest, but Edith spoke once more.
"Not that it's any of your business."
My business? Not my business? I turned from Edith and faced downhill to watch Louisa make her way. She was all alone and it tore my heart from my chest. I wanted to scream, to cry, to chase after her… to do something… anything to stop her. Even to speak, but no words were possible.
Does Louisa really not want me to have nothing to do with her and the baby? Our baby?
But she said it was not my problem.
I thought of sea turtles. They meet on the waves, couple, and swim away. Is that Louisa and I?