And I Will Call You
The "new one" was sleeping. She couldn't quite bring herself to call him "the Doctor." Not yet. He was the "new one" for now. The not-Doctor--an imposter.
He, the one with the nose and, god the ears, told her once that there was an African saying that once you named someone (be it animal, human, or vegetable) it became your responsibility. So by sitting in her mum's flat by his bedside, she was just fooling herself. He was the Doctor and he was already her responsibility. No matter whose face he wore.
He was skinny, all skin and bones, spare, with downy brown hair that was extreme in its fluffy brown-ness. For the first time in her knowing him, he would need to brush his hair. And use gel. Lots and lots of gel, by the look of it.
He was fair, pale, like a true Londoner. And he spoke like one. He wasn't from the North anymore, on any planet. He had freckles, like fairy dusty sprinkled across his cheeks and rail thin nose. And a mole between his shoulder blades, apparently. Even with his boggle eyes he was pretty in a sort of oblong way. She supposed that what made the Doctor handsome in any of his forms was his personality. Luminescent, his aura just had this glow that fair enough blew her mind. He had these doe eyes. She thought of him like a buck, all brown innocence until the antlers got you. Yes, a deer would fit his coloring perfectly.
A doe, a deer, a Doctor deer….
He was tall. Really tall. His massive hair made him taller. Like a tree. Jabe, from the end of the world, would have loved this version, two-point-oh, a sort of bastard weeping willow. So far, he was new, a deer, a tree, but no Doctor-ness in any description of him just yet. Just an implied name, a-responsibility-that-wasn't, not yet, not until he….
He had lovely hands. He had long tapered fingers, like a musician, just perfect. She could already imagine him tinkering, gesturing, even holding….
On the palm side they were just as new and lovely. She traced the lines, wondering if a Time Lord's life line existed, or was just invisible--as if it continued on from the palm, on and on. Palm readers would hate him, she figured. Kind of ruins the dramatics if you can't wow a client with the approximate time they're going to die. Then again, the one in the leather jacket had always hated mystics. As it was, the Doctor had been a man, a Time Lord, of little faith.
On further inspection she discovered he had calluses. How funny. On both palms, he had calluses. A biological helper so he wouldn't have to break in his hands, again. A reminder of the work that lay ahead. She checked his hands for stains. Red stains, for some macabre reason. He had always said the he had blood on his hands. Silly, morbid Time Lord. She checked for him, though, anyway. A tribute to who he used to be. But, if the calluses stayed, would the blood stains stay as well? What rebirth was this, which made him new only to make him suffer past failures, again, and again, for all his damnably long life? He needed someone to wash those hands, those magic hands.
He was the Doctor, though, and her interpretation of what that meant changed with him. But, honestly, he wouldn't be her Doctor until he took her hand once again, in this new-yet-not-so-new form, then he would prove himself worthy of his name, her faith, worthy of her responsibility and possibly love.
She would wash his hands of red, and he would paint her's.
But, regardless of how many times he was re-made, he would never wash his hands of her.