There were moments when he cried calmly without provocation. Silent moments staring off into space, mind seemingly a complete blank and he'd laugh when she asked, wiping away at the tears and shrugging them off as though they'd never existed. They were moments he'd bring up something strange and fantastic in an even more erratic manner than usual, and begin asking her ridiculous things, trying to distract her from the obvious question: what had the Doctor been thinking about that made him so sad?
River suspected not even he knew, seeing the boggled look in his eyes in that split second before he brushed it away with a glance skyward. It was as if, she considered, he were trying to remember something important and every so often he almost did. And when he did, it brought him to quiet tears. Or maybe, she considered, it was the not remembering.
Watching him hold the edge of the balcony, looking out at the singing towers of Darillium, she followed the wet streak the tear on his right cheek created, travelling over the lines on this new face, and she waited as it hung on his chin so long it dried out. River found her own eyes watering because she knew that pain; she'd felt it night after night, thinking about the way her mother cried that bright day in Manhattan.
Just before she said goodbye.
"It's not polite to stare," the Doctor told her quietly.
"It's not polite to keep secrets, dear, and yet here we always are," River retorted, heart not in the jest.
He turned and he sighed, hand reaching out – not to take hers, she knew, but to guide her to the space at his side – and she shifted to it, fingers trailing lightly over the delicately coarse surface of the stone they leaned against. The towers were silent in that moment, only the whisper of a gentle breeze over the landscape accompanied their sadness and she smiled because River felt it was apt.
"What's on your mind?" She asked. As he shook his head and took a breath, she turned sharply to add, "Don't tell me about a planet, or an adventure, or some other ridiculous tale – please, Doctor, just this once, the truth."
It had been five months.
Five months of watching him hide whatever this truth was she suspected she knew. It was always the same with this sort of pain. It was always the same with this sort of lie. The Doctor, she knew, in spite of what she spoke to others, loved more deeply than anyone she'd ever met. And he'd lost in much the same way.
"What was her name?" She asked when he stared at his hands, a harsh white against even the pale stone he gripped too tightly, for too long.
He smiled then. A different smile from any other she'd seen during her time with him. Different from any smile she'd seen on any of his faces. It was a sad smile, it was a confused smile, it was a nostalgic smile, it was a lover's smile... it was too many things all at once and she watched him struggle with something, knowing he wouldn't be able to maneuver his way out this time.
The Doctor knew River wouldn't let him anymore.
"Clara," he finally said softly, and something about the way he said her name, watered River's eyes.
For a long time, neither of them spoke. He stared at the space between his forefingers and River looked to the towers, wishing they would sing to distract them from the awkwardness. This wasn't like them listing off their marriages, keeping some sort of tally through feigned jealousy of flippant affairs; this was something real and River understood the Doctor hadn't the words to explain it to her nor did she think he should have to.
She shook her head and offered a chuckle before telling him boisterously, "You don't have to go into detail."
But he raised his right hand and his eyes closed as he shook his head, then laid his hand back down and told her quietly, "It's not that I don't want to give you the details; it's that the details you might want are gone."
"Gone," she repeated curiously.
His fingers came up to wave beside his head as he grimaced, "Memory wipe gone a bit botchy – more like a perception filter's been built around the memories so they're there, but I can't quite," his hand closed in mid-air, "Can't quite hold onto them."
"Can't quite hold onto her," River breathed, eyes drifting down to look at her hands, clutched together against the balcony, proper jealousy momentarily boiling her blood before she soothed it away on the knowledge that she belonged to the Doctor no more than he belonged to her.
And she knew, deep somewhere in her heart, he loved her – even if he couldn't say the words. Like she'd known this secret before he'd spoken, that there'd been another love lost. The Doctor loved often; he merely pretended that he didn't. Because, she thought on a shuddered breath, it was safer for the one inevitably left behind.
Inhaling deeply, she raised her eyebrows and turned back to his sour expression, still looking out at the towers as she stated, "Must be important, this Clara."
He laughed, "She's the end of the universe." River bowed again, listening to him sigh before he laughed louder and she glanced up sideways to see him eyeing her before he told her, "She was supposed to die – is supposed to die." He paused to turn away, "I suppose she's already dead."
Clearing her throat and straightening, River told him honestly, "I'm sorry, Doctor."
Nodding, he continued, eyes narrowing as he pinched his thumb and forefinger together, "I pulled her out at that exact moment, just before her death, and then I sent her off from Gallifrey in a stolen Tardis – the only apology I could give her for that: all of the days she should have had."
His voice tapered off in such a way that River understood the words meant so much more than he could ever explain and he dropped both hands heavily onto the stone before them. She watched as his grip varied between sadness and anger and she reached out to take hold of his right hand, feeling the way it tensed underneath her palm. Because five months had gone by and he was still reluctant and she accepted that this was just this incarnation; she accepted that it had been a thousand years since she'd last seen the Doctor.
She accepted that it might not be her hand he wanted to hold.
Pressing her lips tightly together, she surmised, "She has to return to her death, or the paradox could unravel the universe." River laughed then, jokingly adding, "I think we've heard this story before."
The Doctor remained silent as River's fingers slowly eased off his, finding a spot on the cold surface beside his and she took several slow breaths, watching his mind working over thoughts. She did love watching him think, she considered with a smile. Didn't always necessarily like what came out of his mouth, but watching the way his eyes travelled the universe of thought behind them was wondrous and she imagined this Clara had enjoyed it as well.
River frowned, knowing she had to have meant a lot for him to work her memory over the way he did. She wondered if he'd spent any of those thousand years they'd been apart giving their history the same treatment. The Doctor had assured her he had, but she had her doubts. She still had her doubts and she probably always would. On a smile, River turned away as he began to speak again, listening attentively to his words.
"It's agonizing, knowing that wherever she is, whatever adventures she's having – or not having – every moment she makes a conscious choice to return to that death in the end." He sucked his teeth harshly and looked up at the towers, "Every single moment I've given her is a decision to live with the certainty of death."
"We all live with the certainty of death, Doctor – even you." She glanced up to see him unaffected by her words and River took his hand again and this time she insisted on holding on as she argued, "Doctor, the important thing is, you've given her those moments – don't you understand how impossible that is?"
His hand eased underneath hers as he turned his eyes to meet hers, telling her softly, "Yes, I do."
For a moment she watched him intently, waiting for him to reveal something, because he was staring into her with a new sort of adoration she'd seen only once in five months – in that first moment on that very balcony. Except now there was a sadness underlying it and she nodded slowly. She smiled as she heard the winds pick up softly as they changed direction, and then the towers began to whistle.
And quickly, that whistle turned into a song as she glanced over to watch them, understanding that what she'd imagined before had been true. Her time was so very limited, and the Doctor had always known when it would end. She bowed her head as she felt his fingers twisting gently underneath hers and she clenched her jaw to keep her mouth from trembling as he took hold of her hand, raising it gently to his lips to kiss while she ignored her own tears.
"We should dance," he whispered, fingers gripping hers, "Not in the ballroom, but here on this terrace – we've not done that yet, River; why haven't we done that yet?"
She let him pull her away from the balcony and she offered him a genuine smile he mirrored. "Because I enjoy an audience," she finally teased, voice as confident as ever in spite of the small bit of heartache that tried to waver it.
He tilted his head and scoffed, "An audience requires but one."
"Are you watching?" She asked coyly as his free hand landed comfortably at her waist.
"How can I not?" He replied with a grin.
River slipped closer to him and laid her head on his shoulder to hide the new tears that fell because she knew one night or twenty four years, it had to end. She'd take her new Sonic and she'd go off with her diary and she'd count down the pages. What the Doctor had given her were a few final days with him. More than she imagined he'd been willing to give before, when he ran hastily from their final meeting, knowing it was coming.
And River knew he knew. He'd always known.
"Hope I meet this Clara one day," she told him quietly, "I feel I may owe her a small debt."
He laughed softly and replied, "Perhaps one day you will."