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Smile and Try To Mean It (1/1)
Title: Smile And Try To Mean It
Rating: G
Spoilers: Vague ones (including some dialogue) for all of the Eleven's run through Flesh and Stone, This is only canon compliant through the first 2/3s or so of Flesh and Stone.
Beta: My always-awesome girlfriend. Any mistakes that remain are all on me.
Word count: ~4200
Disclaimer: Doctor Who and the characters therein belong to the BBC.
While other little girls were dreaming about their weddings and playing house with baby dolls and clueless boys, Amy Pond was dreaming about time and space while she played with a cut-out police box and dolls with raggedy clothing. She knew that The Doctor would come back for her, and when he did they'd see everything together. Who needed boys and babies and houses when you could have a time machine?
And now Amy has a time machine, more than a time machine. She's floated in space with nothing but a hand to hold her. She's faced some of the most malevolent creatures in the universe, and seen the most wonderful acts of kindness it had to offer. And she has a home. A place where, when she was done running for her life and helping the Doctor save the day, she can read any book she's ever heard of and a great many she hasn't. Where she can try on the kinds of clothes she's only seen in dreadful historical dramas. And where, some nights when one of them was particularly lonely and doesn't want to part ways for the night just yet, the Doctor will sit at the foot of her bed and tell her stories. Sometimes they're about people, often in the loosest definition of the word, or particular adventures he's had. More often, though, they're just wonderful word-paintings of the places and times he's seen that he hasn't taken her to just yet, seemingly just so she'll add them to her mental list so she can beg for a visit on their next slow day.
Today is a slow day. There's been no desperate calls for rescue or crying children or things that the Doctor just had to go look at. So they're in what Amy had come to think of as the TARDIS' backyard. The 'floor' was covered in the softest, greenest grass she had ever seen, and flowers in such shapes and colours and scents that Amy knew they had to be alien. There was a big tree there, too, just perfect for climbing on—unless you were the Doctor, in which case it seemed to be just perfect for falling out of. And just to the left of the tree was a big swingset. Not like the rusted and ugly thing that had been in Amy's school yard. It was shiny and red, and the seats were just the perfect size and the chains didn't cut into the palms of one's hands. Sometimes, Amy thought the TARDIS had made the swing-set—if not the whole yard—just for her. It was one of those things she'd always meant to ask the Doctor about. When she thought that, Amy wondered what would happen to all of it when she left.
She's wondering that now, as she pumps her legs back and forth and breathes in the scents of all the flowers. Because, being that it's a quiet day, the Doctor had asked her where she'd wanted to go next. And her first thought hadn't been to finally see Woman Wept or Atlantis or anything else on the mental list. Her first thought had been back home for 'stuff'. She just couldn't say it, though. Not when the Doctor had just smiled at her like that before twirling around to get his tea. So instead, Amy just told him that she had to think about it. She did, after all, because she had no idea why her first thoughts this morning had been of Rory, why she felt that she had to go back to him now, and no idea how to tell the Doctor that it was time for her to leave.
So she told the Doctor that she had to think about it, and what better place to think than on the swings.
***
“What about Sidg? Haven't been there yet. Excellent fish there, if you can get past the glowing. Or—hmm,” the Doctor drops his legs so the swing stops; pointing his left foot down on the ground and twirling around slowly. At any other time, Amy would be giggling as the plastic-coated chains tangle and the Doctor tilts back in his seat. Right now, she's just trying to think about how to tell him the truth without utterly spoiling this wonderful moment.
The Doctor makes up her mind for her, like he often does. He shifts his weight so that his swing bumps hers and looks up at her; his posture so easy and young but his eyes so full of worry and time that Amy can't help being reminded how very old he is and how many people he must have lost. “Something the matter, Pond?” he says, without the teasing tone he usually uses when he calls her that in private to say that Amelia was a much better name than Amy.
And Amy wants to laugh and say, 'Nothing! I'm fine! So, glowing fish?'. Instead she stands up and walks a few steps, standing just in front of the Doctor's swing. She puts her hands behind her back, nervously swaying on her tiptoes. “Y' remember what I said, about needing to be back for tomorrow morning?” she says, finally.
The Doctor doesn't sit up, but Amy sees him nod. “Of course. And you know, I think I've just about got the TARDIS run in, so it'll be ready whenever you are.“
“Yeah, 'course,” Amy swings her hands around and starts flicking off her chipping nail polish so she can avoid looking at him. “That's, ah, that's good.”
“Amelia, is there something you're not telling me?” He sounds like her aunt when she'd try to hide the fact that she'd just broken a vase. And he is worse than her aunt, because he still has a power over her that fourteen years and four psychiatrists have never been able to shake. So Amy looks up to find him sitting, and she wants to laugh because being upside down messed up his hair. But instead she's trying her hardest not to cry, because what she's going to say can't be unsaid and she knows that things won't be the same after she does, but that she has to anyway.
“I'm getting married. In the morning. And...and I think I'm ready to go do that, now.”
***
She's a bit surprised by how the Doctor takes it. He gives her this look, a bit curious and maybe a little sad. A few moments later, he claps his hands together, 'right then!' and springs up out of the swing. And everything's amazingly fine, and as they walk to the console room Amy laughs a little to herself.
“What?” the Doctor says, not stopping but turning back to look at her, which causes him to nearly run in to a column. He swivels around it and keeps moving. “Is it my hair again?”
“No, I just thought you'd—oh, never mind.”
Even though he's not facing her, Amy can almost see his eyebrows furrow for just a second as he starts fiddling with the console. “So, who's the lucky fella?”
“Y' met him,” she says, idly, as she walks around the room. Looking around, trying to take every tiny detail in so she can tell Rory about it later.
“Oh?” The Doctor looks up. “The good looking one? Or...the other one?” he makes a gesture with his hand around his nose before going back to what he was doing.
Amy rolls her eyes as she runs her hand, fondly, against one of the faucet knobs. “The other one.”
“Well, he was good too.” The Doctor says, turning around to face her with a smile. Despite the fact that she kind of wants to smack him for that one, Amy smiles too.
“Thanks.”
The Doctor's expression flickers a bit and then he turns around. “Right then. Should be back with plenty of time to spare.”
Amy swallows tightly, and she thinks about going to hug him, but he's fiddling with the controls and there's something in his body language that doesn't seem at all welcoming at the moment. So she just nods, whispers, 'right then', and steps out.
Not into her yard, she knows that straight away. Unless the Doctor's way off—wouldn't be the first time, the still-not-grown-up voice in her head snips—and they've been gone so very long that the grass has gone blue. And is that a—no, cats don't have that many legs. Or antennae.
Amy quickly runs back inside, slamming the door shut behind her. “Ah, Doctor?”
He looks up, wordlessly. He looks a bit cheerier now, but Amy hardly notices. “Could you, ah, take a look outside?”
His forehead crinkles up a bit, but he nods. Jumps from the platform to the door and peers out for just a second before he laughs. “Ah. Not Leadworth, is it?”
“Nor anywhere close, no.” Amy's laughing a bit herself, too, because this isn't terribly surprising. Not the first time she and the Doctor had set out for one place just to end up somewhere else entirely. “You can get it sorted, yeah?”
“'Course!” he steps back from the door, grinning at her. So Amy leans against the door, watching and waiting as he fiddles with the console. He pauses after a few moments, then turns to her with a grin. “It will be a bit, though, so you might as well go look around a little.”
Amy crinkles her nose. “But you never let me go out alone.”
He waves a hand. “Daq's a perfectly safe place. No wars, no particularly volatile suns,” he starts fiddling with the controls again so he's not looking at her. “Wouldn't touch the trees, though, if I were you. Don't suppose purple spots would go with your dress.” He smiles and Amy can't help but smile back before stepping out the door.
***
She doesn't go far, of course. The Doctor might get the problem fixed too quickly and the TARDIS might decide to take off without her. He told her a story, once, of how the old girl had once gone off to the end of the universe to try to avoid one particular person. He'd looked a little sad when he'd said that, and when she'd pressed him for details about who this person was he'd changed the subject. At any rate, there was a precedent for the TARDIS running off without people or to avoid them, and it just might be insulted by her departing so quickly. So Amy walks just a few steps and then she lays down in the grass.
To say it's different from Earth grass is a vast understatement. It's not just the colour. It's the texture and the smell, and the fact that it's moving but there's no breeze as far as Amy can tell. It's moving by itself and after a moment, she realises that she's hearing a noise like singing and that it's coming from the grass.
And then there's the sky—in the time since Amy first ran out to now, it's gone from bright pink to a dusky red. And the cat-like things, one of which is currently crawling over her legs. Amy reaches down to pet it since it seems friendly, and she's sure the Doctor would have warned her if it was dangerous. It nudges her hand, like an Earth cat would, and trails its antennae against her wrist. When she pulls her hand back, it's soaking wet and covered in little sparkles. And as she turns her hand in the light of—a moon, she supposes—to watch the sparkles dance, Amy has the urge to turn over and show it to Rory. Like when they were kids and they were playing, either the normal games kids played or the ones she pulled him into with her cardboard TARDIS and clay Doctor, and she'd found a neat bug or worm. He'd never found it strange that a girl liked that kind of stuff, and he'd never flinched away from her hand as she passed off her new find even though the other boys would pick on him for having cooties.
“COME ON—oh,” the Doctor's voice drops and then he's grabbing her wrist, pulling her to her feet and out of her reverie. “Come on, Pond. Should be fixed, now.”
And for a moment it's not the Doctor holding her hand, but Rory dressed up in his father's torn up shirt and trousers playing at being her Raggedy Doctor just because it made her happy. She blinks away a few pesky tears and she sees the Doctor's suit jacket, slightly stained with glitter. She takes a deep breath and follows him into the TARDIS.
***
They wind up on Woman Wept next, and again the Doctor sends her out to have a look around while he tries to figure out the problem. Amy wonders, as she walks out, if he's not coming with her not just because of the problem with the TARDIS. When he'd told her about this place, he'd said something about how much someone else had loved it. Rose, that was right. She came up sometimes. And he'd looked so sad, in that moment after he said, “Rose loved it there”, so of course Amy had tried to ask about her. And, of course, the Doctor had clapped his hands and said it was well past bedtime.
It was easy to understand how someone could love this place. Sure, it was eerily quiet and empty and more than a bit cold. But once Amy walked a bit so the TARDIS was just barely in sight and stood on the frozen ocean, she couldn't help becoming a little breathless by how gorgeous it was. Even though they weren't moving, the waves were still every bit as grand as the ones she'd seen that one time she went on holiday with Rory's family. That'd been a bit funny, because Rory wasn't fond of the ocean. Too dangerous in a very real way. Amy had teased him about that when they were alone on the beach later. 'What, the killer of laser-wieldin' aliens is scared of a little water?', she'd said, elbowing him in the side. He'd glared a bit before he tackled her. She'd wound up finding sand in interesting places for a day afterward, she remembers with a smile as she picks up a handful of the grey-blue stuff from the shore. Rory'd probably like it here, though. All the ocean, none of the danger. No nosy relatives to interrupt them at inopportune moments, either.
“GOT IT!”
Just a Doctor, she thinks with a smile as she walks up the beach to the TARDIS.
***
When she opens the door for the fourth time to find that they are still not in her backyard, Amy doesn't go outside to take in the scenery. She slams the door and storms up behind the Doctor, grabbing one of his braces to pull him back away from the controls.
“Wo-oah!” he looked over his shoulder to give her a half-hearted glower. Amy just glowered right back.
“That, for the fourth time, is not Leadworth,” she snaps. “You've never been this off this many times in a row. What's going on?”
Sometimes, Amy can tell when he's about to spout off some brilliant lie. She's seen him do it enough times to others already, has had him do it enough times to her, so she's starting to recognise it. So she knows he's about to lie, but it's a far from brilliant one.
“Ah, final tour before your wedding!”
Amy's glare grows more serious. “No, it isn't.”
His face falls into a new shape she's never seen before, and then he's lifting a hand to pluck hers away from his brace.
“Fourteen years waiting,” he starts, after a long pause, and Amy can hear the apology behind the words; the 'sorry about that' he always tacks on when the subject comes up, “and you already want to go back?”
Amy tries to think of something to say, something about how she doesn't want to, not completely. How she can't bear the thought of leaving all this forever, but how in those fourteen years she's discovered that while boys and babies aren't everything—and while she's not sold on the babies bit just yet—one particular boy is definitely something. Before she can, though, the Doctor starts talking again.
“You always leave,” he says, and he's turned back to the TARDIS console again so she can't see him, but she can hear the pain in his voice. “Always. Because I can't take you with me, or I put you in danger one too many times and can't let it happen again. Because I made you. Or because I did something.” He turns around, now, and he's not even trying to smile. “Did I do something?”
Amy presses her lips together, because she's afraid if she doesn't a very sad, girlish sound will come out of them. Then she swallows hard and shakes her head. “No, 'course not! I...I've just gotta go do this, you know?”
The Doctor nods, slightly. “But now?”
Amy starts to say something, but she loses the words when she looks in the Doctor's eyes and she remembers their conversation when he came back that night.
“Been knocking about on my own....”
“You're lonely. That's it. Just that.”
“Just that. Promise.”
Amy takes a deep breath and steps closer to him. “I know what it's like, bein' lonely,” she says. She stands right next to him, turning to lean against the console. “Not just bein' the Scottish girl in an English village. Bein' the girl who's always talkin' about a man in a blue box comin' to take her away someday.”
The Doctor starts to speak, but she holds up a hand. “It's okay. Because even though all the other kids made fun of me, Rory didn't. Not ever. He...I dunno if he believed me, really, but he played along because it made me happy. Never said anything bad about it; didn't think I was crazy like everyone else did. A-an' he was so carin', not just to me but to everyone, even that kid who was always sniffin' the markers.” She smiles, shrugging a bit. “He's my best friend, y'know? And all this—Daleks and space and everything—it's like when we were kids, only so much better, and I wanna tell him all about it. I miss him. An'–an' I'll miss you too, but...” she throws up her hands. “Can't expect you t' settle down in Leadworth, can I?”
He laughs quietly. “No, 'fraid not.”
Amy reaches out and takes his hand. “Y' know, when I told you that I was runnin'? That's what I was runnin' from. Getting' married. I just...it's a big thing, y'know? Life's never gonna be the same after this.” She squeezes his fingers, smiling up at him. “But I've done a lotta scary things, with you. Y' showed me that even if something's really scary I can get through it, and that it'll all be worth it.”
The Doctor squeezes her hand, letting out a deep breath.“Okay,” he says, sounding just a little hoarse. “Let's get you back for your wedding.”
***
Of course, when they land, Amy asks him to come to the wedding.
“You can't just—you can't just drop me off and then,” she snaps her fingers, “run off, just like that.”
“Yes I can.” But he's smiling as he says it. “If I come, it'd just be all about me. And I've done enough making things about me when they're not. It's your day, Amy.”
Amy wants to tell him that it is about him, in a way. How everything in her life since she was seven has been at least a little bit about him. She knows what he's saying, though. What part of her has been saying all day. That, even though dreaming of him was part of why she fell for Rory, she has to stop looking at as 'I love him because he didn't think I was crazy for believing in the Doctor', and more as 'I love him because he's Rory'. Which she does. Doesn't mean this doesn't hurt something horrible, though.
“So I'm never goin' to see you again?” she says, trying to be casual about it, but she can feel her lower lip quivering. The Doctor sees it and reaches out, putting his thumb on her lips and his mouth to her forehead. “I always come back,” he says, very quietly. Amy tries to smile, but can't quite make it.
“Y' can't promise when, though, can ya? Y'll come back to Earth, but...” she almost says 'but will y' come back for me' but that sounds far too clingy, so she starts again. “Y've got so much stuff to do, so many people an' planets to save....” she hears him sigh and decides not to say anything more, because she's sure he's had to do this before. Leave people. Want to see them again, but unwilling to make promises about where or when or even if he will at all because of who he is. She understands, of course, but it still hurts almost as much as when she was seven.
They stay like that for a long moment, and Amy almost wishes time would stop and is about to ask him if he can make that happen, just for a bit, but then he pulls away almost-excitedly.
“You have a mobile, yeah?”
“Of course...oh!” It takes a moment for Amy to realise what he's saying, but when she does her heart starts racing. “Right. Wait right here. Both of you,” she says, pointing a menacing finger to the TARDIS before she runs into the house. All the way to her room she's terrified that he'll leave anyway, and all the way back she's worried that she'll drop and break her phone because she's shaking so hard.
Neither thing happens, though she's still shaking when she hands it to the Doctor, heart hammering as he waves his screwdriver over it. He babbles to himself a bit, looks like he's about to slap himself in the forehead when he says something about why he hadn't thought of this before. Then the little green light goes off and he looks up with a grin.
“There. Now, if anything out of the ordinary happens—even if it's just, oh, I don't know, that you have a sudden insatiable craving for fish custard,” he waits until she lets out a little giggle before he continues, “and I'm not there and you think I should be, you call me, absolutely free of charge,” he says, waving the mobile, “—and I'll do my very best to be there. All right?”
“All right.” Amy barely squeaks out, but she keeps trying to hang on. When he hands her mobile back, his fingers brushing hers for just a second, and she thinks that this may very well be the last time they do, and that she'll probably have a nice-but-very-ordinary life from here on out, she can't hold it together any longer. She doesn't lose it loudly or violently; just a little hiccup and a few tears running down her cheeks and her nose probably going all red. Still, the Doctor pockets the screwdriver and puts an arm around her, drawing her face to his shoulder.
“It's okay to still be a little scared,” he says, quietly, against her hair. “Weddings are scary; especially your own. Much scarier than men falling out of the sky in boxes and demanding apples.”
Amy laughs a bit and squeezes her arms about his neck for a very long moment. Then she feels his hands about her waist, slowly backing her away and she's forced to drop her arms. They're quiet for a moment, then the Doctor reaches a hand out to move a bit of sticky hair from her face.
“I hope Rory knows how absolutely magnificent you are, Amy Pond.”
Amy laughs, though it comes out a bit of a hiccup. “He does.”
The Doctor beams. “Good, because if he didn't I'd have to give him a talking to.” He taps the tip of her nose. “Right. I'd best get going, because you need to get some sleep. Big day tomorrow.”
Amy starts to say 'thank you', even though those words don't come even close to summing up how grateful she is, but the Doctor puts up a hand. “Don't. Pleasure was all mine. Now,” he snaps his fingers and the TARDIS' doors swing open, “go to bed.”
She nods, stepping back. She stands there, though, until the Doctor steps inside and the TARDIS fades away completely. She's not tearing up or feeling like her entire world is falling apart like the last time she stood in her yard and watched him leaving; she's smiling and thinking about how she can't wait to tell Rory that she's got the Doctor's number. Though, she thinks with a bit of a chuckle, she'll probably wait until after the honeymoon.
Rating: G
Spoilers: Vague ones (including some dialogue) for all of the Eleven's run through Flesh and Stone, This is only canon compliant through the first 2/3s or so of Flesh and Stone.
Beta: My always-awesome girlfriend. Any mistakes that remain are all on me.
Word count: ~4200
Disclaimer: Doctor Who and the characters therein belong to the BBC.
While other little girls were dreaming about their weddings and playing house with baby dolls and clueless boys, Amy Pond was dreaming about time and space while she played with a cut-out police box and dolls with raggedy clothing. She knew that The Doctor would come back for her, and when he did they'd see everything together. Who needed boys and babies and houses when you could have a time machine?
And now Amy has a time machine, more than a time machine. She's floated in space with nothing but a hand to hold her. She's faced some of the most malevolent creatures in the universe, and seen the most wonderful acts of kindness it had to offer. And she has a home. A place where, when she was done running for her life and helping the Doctor save the day, she can read any book she's ever heard of and a great many she hasn't. Where she can try on the kinds of clothes she's only seen in dreadful historical dramas. And where, some nights when one of them was particularly lonely and doesn't want to part ways for the night just yet, the Doctor will sit at the foot of her bed and tell her stories. Sometimes they're about people, often in the loosest definition of the word, or particular adventures he's had. More often, though, they're just wonderful word-paintings of the places and times he's seen that he hasn't taken her to just yet, seemingly just so she'll add them to her mental list so she can beg for a visit on their next slow day.
Today is a slow day. There's been no desperate calls for rescue or crying children or things that the Doctor just had to go look at. So they're in what Amy had come to think of as the TARDIS' backyard. The 'floor' was covered in the softest, greenest grass she had ever seen, and flowers in such shapes and colours and scents that Amy knew they had to be alien. There was a big tree there, too, just perfect for climbing on—unless you were the Doctor, in which case it seemed to be just perfect for falling out of. And just to the left of the tree was a big swingset. Not like the rusted and ugly thing that had been in Amy's school yard. It was shiny and red, and the seats were just the perfect size and the chains didn't cut into the palms of one's hands. Sometimes, Amy thought the TARDIS had made the swing-set—if not the whole yard—just for her. It was one of those things she'd always meant to ask the Doctor about. When she thought that, Amy wondered what would happen to all of it when she left.
She's wondering that now, as she pumps her legs back and forth and breathes in the scents of all the flowers. Because, being that it's a quiet day, the Doctor had asked her where she'd wanted to go next. And her first thought hadn't been to finally see Woman Wept or Atlantis or anything else on the mental list. Her first thought had been back home for 'stuff'. She just couldn't say it, though. Not when the Doctor had just smiled at her like that before twirling around to get his tea. So instead, Amy just told him that she had to think about it. She did, after all, because she had no idea why her first thoughts this morning had been of Rory, why she felt that she had to go back to him now, and no idea how to tell the Doctor that it was time for her to leave.
So she told the Doctor that she had to think about it, and what better place to think than on the swings.
“What about Sidg? Haven't been there yet. Excellent fish there, if you can get past the glowing. Or—hmm,” the Doctor drops his legs so the swing stops; pointing his left foot down on the ground and twirling around slowly. At any other time, Amy would be giggling as the plastic-coated chains tangle and the Doctor tilts back in his seat. Right now, she's just trying to think about how to tell him the truth without utterly spoiling this wonderful moment.
The Doctor makes up her mind for her, like he often does. He shifts his weight so that his swing bumps hers and looks up at her; his posture so easy and young but his eyes so full of worry and time that Amy can't help being reminded how very old he is and how many people he must have lost. “Something the matter, Pond?” he says, without the teasing tone he usually uses when he calls her that in private to say that Amelia was a much better name than Amy.
And Amy wants to laugh and say, 'Nothing! I'm fine! So, glowing fish?'. Instead she stands up and walks a few steps, standing just in front of the Doctor's swing. She puts her hands behind her back, nervously swaying on her tiptoes. “Y' remember what I said, about needing to be back for tomorrow morning?” she says, finally.
The Doctor doesn't sit up, but Amy sees him nod. “Of course. And you know, I think I've just about got the TARDIS run in, so it'll be ready whenever you are.“
“Yeah, 'course,” Amy swings her hands around and starts flicking off her chipping nail polish so she can avoid looking at him. “That's, ah, that's good.”
“Amelia, is there something you're not telling me?” He sounds like her aunt when she'd try to hide the fact that she'd just broken a vase. And he is worse than her aunt, because he still has a power over her that fourteen years and four psychiatrists have never been able to shake. So Amy looks up to find him sitting, and she wants to laugh because being upside down messed up his hair. But instead she's trying her hardest not to cry, because what she's going to say can't be unsaid and she knows that things won't be the same after she does, but that she has to anyway.
“I'm getting married. In the morning. And...and I think I'm ready to go do that, now.”
She's a bit surprised by how the Doctor takes it. He gives her this look, a bit curious and maybe a little sad. A few moments later, he claps his hands together, 'right then!' and springs up out of the swing. And everything's amazingly fine, and as they walk to the console room Amy laughs a little to herself.
“What?” the Doctor says, not stopping but turning back to look at her, which causes him to nearly run in to a column. He swivels around it and keeps moving. “Is it my hair again?”
“No, I just thought you'd—oh, never mind.”
Even though he's not facing her, Amy can almost see his eyebrows furrow for just a second as he starts fiddling with the console. “So, who's the lucky fella?”
“Y' met him,” she says, idly, as she walks around the room. Looking around, trying to take every tiny detail in so she can tell Rory about it later.
“Oh?” The Doctor looks up. “The good looking one? Or...the other one?” he makes a gesture with his hand around his nose before going back to what he was doing.
Amy rolls her eyes as she runs her hand, fondly, against one of the faucet knobs. “The other one.”
“Well, he was good too.” The Doctor says, turning around to face her with a smile. Despite the fact that she kind of wants to smack him for that one, Amy smiles too.
“Thanks.”
The Doctor's expression flickers a bit and then he turns around. “Right then. Should be back with plenty of time to spare.”
Amy swallows tightly, and she thinks about going to hug him, but he's fiddling with the controls and there's something in his body language that doesn't seem at all welcoming at the moment. So she just nods, whispers, 'right then', and steps out.
Not into her yard, she knows that straight away. Unless the Doctor's way off—wouldn't be the first time, the still-not-grown-up voice in her head snips—and they've been gone so very long that the grass has gone blue. And is that a—no, cats don't have that many legs. Or antennae.
Amy quickly runs back inside, slamming the door shut behind her. “Ah, Doctor?”
He looks up, wordlessly. He looks a bit cheerier now, but Amy hardly notices. “Could you, ah, take a look outside?”
His forehead crinkles up a bit, but he nods. Jumps from the platform to the door and peers out for just a second before he laughs. “Ah. Not Leadworth, is it?”
“Nor anywhere close, no.” Amy's laughing a bit herself, too, because this isn't terribly surprising. Not the first time she and the Doctor had set out for one place just to end up somewhere else entirely. “You can get it sorted, yeah?”
“'Course!” he steps back from the door, grinning at her. So Amy leans against the door, watching and waiting as he fiddles with the console. He pauses after a few moments, then turns to her with a grin. “It will be a bit, though, so you might as well go look around a little.”
Amy crinkles her nose. “But you never let me go out alone.”
He waves a hand. “Daq's a perfectly safe place. No wars, no particularly volatile suns,” he starts fiddling with the controls again so he's not looking at her. “Wouldn't touch the trees, though, if I were you. Don't suppose purple spots would go with your dress.” He smiles and Amy can't help but smile back before stepping out the door.
She doesn't go far, of course. The Doctor might get the problem fixed too quickly and the TARDIS might decide to take off without her. He told her a story, once, of how the old girl had once gone off to the end of the universe to try to avoid one particular person. He'd looked a little sad when he'd said that, and when she'd pressed him for details about who this person was he'd changed the subject. At any rate, there was a precedent for the TARDIS running off without people or to avoid them, and it just might be insulted by her departing so quickly. So Amy walks just a few steps and then she lays down in the grass.
To say it's different from Earth grass is a vast understatement. It's not just the colour. It's the texture and the smell, and the fact that it's moving but there's no breeze as far as Amy can tell. It's moving by itself and after a moment, she realises that she's hearing a noise like singing and that it's coming from the grass.
And then there's the sky—in the time since Amy first ran out to now, it's gone from bright pink to a dusky red. And the cat-like things, one of which is currently crawling over her legs. Amy reaches down to pet it since it seems friendly, and she's sure the Doctor would have warned her if it was dangerous. It nudges her hand, like an Earth cat would, and trails its antennae against her wrist. When she pulls her hand back, it's soaking wet and covered in little sparkles. And as she turns her hand in the light of—a moon, she supposes—to watch the sparkles dance, Amy has the urge to turn over and show it to Rory. Like when they were kids and they were playing, either the normal games kids played or the ones she pulled him into with her cardboard TARDIS and clay Doctor, and she'd found a neat bug or worm. He'd never found it strange that a girl liked that kind of stuff, and he'd never flinched away from her hand as she passed off her new find even though the other boys would pick on him for having cooties.
“COME ON—oh,” the Doctor's voice drops and then he's grabbing her wrist, pulling her to her feet and out of her reverie. “Come on, Pond. Should be fixed, now.”
And for a moment it's not the Doctor holding her hand, but Rory dressed up in his father's torn up shirt and trousers playing at being her Raggedy Doctor just because it made her happy. She blinks away a few pesky tears and she sees the Doctor's suit jacket, slightly stained with glitter. She takes a deep breath and follows him into the TARDIS.
They wind up on Woman Wept next, and again the Doctor sends her out to have a look around while he tries to figure out the problem. Amy wonders, as she walks out, if he's not coming with her not just because of the problem with the TARDIS. When he'd told her about this place, he'd said something about how much someone else had loved it. Rose, that was right. She came up sometimes. And he'd looked so sad, in that moment after he said, “Rose loved it there”, so of course Amy had tried to ask about her. And, of course, the Doctor had clapped his hands and said it was well past bedtime.
It was easy to understand how someone could love this place. Sure, it was eerily quiet and empty and more than a bit cold. But once Amy walked a bit so the TARDIS was just barely in sight and stood on the frozen ocean, she couldn't help becoming a little breathless by how gorgeous it was. Even though they weren't moving, the waves were still every bit as grand as the ones she'd seen that one time she went on holiday with Rory's family. That'd been a bit funny, because Rory wasn't fond of the ocean. Too dangerous in a very real way. Amy had teased him about that when they were alone on the beach later. 'What, the killer of laser-wieldin' aliens is scared of a little water?', she'd said, elbowing him in the side. He'd glared a bit before he tackled her. She'd wound up finding sand in interesting places for a day afterward, she remembers with a smile as she picks up a handful of the grey-blue stuff from the shore. Rory'd probably like it here, though. All the ocean, none of the danger. No nosy relatives to interrupt them at inopportune moments, either.
“GOT IT!”
Just a Doctor, she thinks with a smile as she walks up the beach to the TARDIS.
When she opens the door for the fourth time to find that they are still not in her backyard, Amy doesn't go outside to take in the scenery. She slams the door and storms up behind the Doctor, grabbing one of his braces to pull him back away from the controls.
“Wo-oah!” he looked over his shoulder to give her a half-hearted glower. Amy just glowered right back.
“That, for the fourth time, is not Leadworth,” she snaps. “You've never been this off this many times in a row. What's going on?”
Sometimes, Amy can tell when he's about to spout off some brilliant lie. She's seen him do it enough times to others already, has had him do it enough times to her, so she's starting to recognise it. So she knows he's about to lie, but it's a far from brilliant one.
“Ah, final tour before your wedding!”
Amy's glare grows more serious. “No, it isn't.”
His face falls into a new shape she's never seen before, and then he's lifting a hand to pluck hers away from his brace.
“Fourteen years waiting,” he starts, after a long pause, and Amy can hear the apology behind the words; the 'sorry about that' he always tacks on when the subject comes up, “and you already want to go back?”
Amy tries to think of something to say, something about how she doesn't want to, not completely. How she can't bear the thought of leaving all this forever, but how in those fourteen years she's discovered that while boys and babies aren't everything—and while she's not sold on the babies bit just yet—one particular boy is definitely something. Before she can, though, the Doctor starts talking again.
“You always leave,” he says, and he's turned back to the TARDIS console again so she can't see him, but she can hear the pain in his voice. “Always. Because I can't take you with me, or I put you in danger one too many times and can't let it happen again. Because I made you. Or because I did something.” He turns around, now, and he's not even trying to smile. “Did I do something?”
Amy presses her lips together, because she's afraid if she doesn't a very sad, girlish sound will come out of them. Then she swallows hard and shakes her head. “No, 'course not! I...I've just gotta go do this, you know?”
The Doctor nods, slightly. “But now?”
Amy starts to say something, but she loses the words when she looks in the Doctor's eyes and she remembers their conversation when he came back that night.
“Been knocking about on my own....”
“You're lonely. That's it. Just that.”
“Just that. Promise.”
Amy takes a deep breath and steps closer to him. “I know what it's like, bein' lonely,” she says. She stands right next to him, turning to lean against the console. “Not just bein' the Scottish girl in an English village. Bein' the girl who's always talkin' about a man in a blue box comin' to take her away someday.”
The Doctor starts to speak, but she holds up a hand. “It's okay. Because even though all the other kids made fun of me, Rory didn't. Not ever. He...I dunno if he believed me, really, but he played along because it made me happy. Never said anything bad about it; didn't think I was crazy like everyone else did. A-an' he was so carin', not just to me but to everyone, even that kid who was always sniffin' the markers.” She smiles, shrugging a bit. “He's my best friend, y'know? And all this—Daleks and space and everything—it's like when we were kids, only so much better, and I wanna tell him all about it. I miss him. An'–an' I'll miss you too, but...” she throws up her hands. “Can't expect you t' settle down in Leadworth, can I?”
He laughs quietly. “No, 'fraid not.”
Amy reaches out and takes his hand. “Y' know, when I told you that I was runnin'? That's what I was runnin' from. Getting' married. I just...it's a big thing, y'know? Life's never gonna be the same after this.” She squeezes his fingers, smiling up at him. “But I've done a lotta scary things, with you. Y' showed me that even if something's really scary I can get through it, and that it'll all be worth it.”
The Doctor squeezes her hand, letting out a deep breath.“Okay,” he says, sounding just a little hoarse. “Let's get you back for your wedding.”
Of course, when they land, Amy asks him to come to the wedding.
“You can't just—you can't just drop me off and then,” she snaps her fingers, “run off, just like that.”
“Yes I can.” But he's smiling as he says it. “If I come, it'd just be all about me. And I've done enough making things about me when they're not. It's your day, Amy.”
Amy wants to tell him that it is about him, in a way. How everything in her life since she was seven has been at least a little bit about him. She knows what he's saying, though. What part of her has been saying all day. That, even though dreaming of him was part of why she fell for Rory, she has to stop looking at as 'I love him because he didn't think I was crazy for believing in the Doctor', and more as 'I love him because he's Rory'. Which she does. Doesn't mean this doesn't hurt something horrible, though.
“So I'm never goin' to see you again?” she says, trying to be casual about it, but she can feel her lower lip quivering. The Doctor sees it and reaches out, putting his thumb on her lips and his mouth to her forehead. “I always come back,” he says, very quietly. Amy tries to smile, but can't quite make it.
“Y' can't promise when, though, can ya? Y'll come back to Earth, but...” she almost says 'but will y' come back for me' but that sounds far too clingy, so she starts again. “Y've got so much stuff to do, so many people an' planets to save....” she hears him sigh and decides not to say anything more, because she's sure he's had to do this before. Leave people. Want to see them again, but unwilling to make promises about where or when or even if he will at all because of who he is. She understands, of course, but it still hurts almost as much as when she was seven.
They stay like that for a long moment, and Amy almost wishes time would stop and is about to ask him if he can make that happen, just for a bit, but then he pulls away almost-excitedly.
“You have a mobile, yeah?”
“Of course...oh!” It takes a moment for Amy to realise what he's saying, but when she does her heart starts racing. “Right. Wait right here. Both of you,” she says, pointing a menacing finger to the TARDIS before she runs into the house. All the way to her room she's terrified that he'll leave anyway, and all the way back she's worried that she'll drop and break her phone because she's shaking so hard.
Neither thing happens, though she's still shaking when she hands it to the Doctor, heart hammering as he waves his screwdriver over it. He babbles to himself a bit, looks like he's about to slap himself in the forehead when he says something about why he hadn't thought of this before. Then the little green light goes off and he looks up with a grin.
“There. Now, if anything out of the ordinary happens—even if it's just, oh, I don't know, that you have a sudden insatiable craving for fish custard,” he waits until she lets out a little giggle before he continues, “and I'm not there and you think I should be, you call me, absolutely free of charge,” he says, waving the mobile, “—and I'll do my very best to be there. All right?”
“All right.” Amy barely squeaks out, but she keeps trying to hang on. When he hands her mobile back, his fingers brushing hers for just a second, and she thinks that this may very well be the last time they do, and that she'll probably have a nice-but-very-ordinary life from here on out, she can't hold it together any longer. She doesn't lose it loudly or violently; just a little hiccup and a few tears running down her cheeks and her nose probably going all red. Still, the Doctor pockets the screwdriver and puts an arm around her, drawing her face to his shoulder.
“It's okay to still be a little scared,” he says, quietly, against her hair. “Weddings are scary; especially your own. Much scarier than men falling out of the sky in boxes and demanding apples.”
Amy laughs a bit and squeezes her arms about his neck for a very long moment. Then she feels his hands about her waist, slowly backing her away and she's forced to drop her arms. They're quiet for a moment, then the Doctor reaches a hand out to move a bit of sticky hair from her face.
“I hope Rory knows how absolutely magnificent you are, Amy Pond.”
Amy laughs, though it comes out a bit of a hiccup. “He does.”
The Doctor beams. “Good, because if he didn't I'd have to give him a talking to.” He taps the tip of her nose. “Right. I'd best get going, because you need to get some sleep. Big day tomorrow.”
Amy starts to say 'thank you', even though those words don't come even close to summing up how grateful she is, but the Doctor puts up a hand. “Don't. Pleasure was all mine. Now,” he snaps his fingers and the TARDIS' doors swing open, “go to bed.”
She nods, stepping back. She stands there, though, until the Doctor steps inside and the TARDIS fades away completely. She's not tearing up or feeling like her entire world is falling apart like the last time she stood in her yard and watched him leaving; she's smiling and thinking about how she can't wait to tell Rory that she's got the Doctor's number. Though, she thinks with a bit of a chuckle, she'll probably wait until after the honeymoon.