Disclaimer: The BBC, RTD and others own the characters, setting etc. I just borrow them from time to time to amuse myself and others.
This story has an AU setting. No-one died and CoE never happened. This story is related to 'If Owen was Right' and to Part One of 'The Future Lies at the Bottom of a Coffee Cup'.
Whatever I Can Get
I agreed to the deal, so I have to handle the consequences. Jack offered me an exit, but I didn't take it. I'd rather be with him, on whatever terms he can offer, than be emotionally and mentally safe but without him. I'll take whatever crumbs I can get, however minimal they may be, and however much it leaves me hopelessly craving for more.
"It's okay, Jack". I lie. I'm always lying to him. I hate myself for it, but if he realised he'd feel guilty, and it's my choice, so it's not right for him to feel guilty. He sleeps on, oblivious to my lie. Our bodies don't touch. He always rolls away from me when we're finished. Just one more little thing that causes me pain.
Usually I get up afterwards. I go and lie on the sofa, or take myself off to the guest room we keep ready downstairs. Mostly, then, by morning he has forgotten we were together in his narrow bed. He gets up and he dresses and then he calls down looking for his coffee. He waves and smiles and then he just gets on with business.
On the better nights, those few and infrequent nights when I don't leave his bed afterwards, he will take me and make me his again when he wakes, for a little while. He likes to play, to tickle me or to wrestle with me. Sometimes we have a shower together, with him molesting me all the way through it. We fetch breakfast together and we talk a little, like a real couple, whilst reading the newspapers. I like the illusion of that.
It's a half-life, a sad, grey shadow of what I truly want. I die a little more each time I realise that; each time I experience it. He can never love me, need me or want me in any of the ways I want him to. He just doesn't have it in him. No-one's fault.
One day I will end it, just not yet. I can't yet.