Amy, Reinette and the Doctor
"Doctor, where are you!"
Amy had been wandering the corridors of the TARDIS for almost an hour, looking for the Doctor, and was growing increasingly frustrated at his inability to be where she wanted him.
She wandered back into the control room, the orange glow washing over her, dulling the brilliance of her hair. Her shoes, a medium heel, snapped sharply on the metal floor. She stopped next to the control panels, eyes narrowed, hands on hips, foot tapping with impatience. She looked at the central pillar that she knew housed the heart of the TARDIS.
"You wouldn't happen to know where he went, would you?"
She started at a clatter from the other side of the room. She spun around in a motion well practiced after all the spooks she'd encountered in her travels with the Doctor. She spotted movement to one side and focused on a ladder that definitely hadn't been there before. Had that made the noise?
Amy glanced back at the TARDIS console, if she didn't know better; she would've sworn it was smirking at her.
"Show off."
The ladder was difficult to traverse, but she eventually managed it, emerging onto a circular balcony high above the control room. The Doctor was there, legs dangling between the bars of the railing, sitting rather still, a very strange thing for him, a usually very active man.
"There you are!" said Amy, adjusting her skirt as she struggled onto the balcony, all the while trying to seem put out. "I've been looking for you for an hour! Rory's napping and I wanted to know where we're headed next, but you disappear on me! What are you doing up here anyway?"
She looked around at the balcony, now paying attention to what was there. Racks of clothing ran the entire circumference of the wall, filled with hangers with clothes of every imaginable style, mostly for men, though a few skirts and low cut tops could be seen mixed in with various jackets, ties and slacks. Was this where the Doctor kept his clothes? Maybe where he slept? No, there wasn't a bed here; then again, did he even need a bed?
But her attention shifted back to the Doctor, who hadn't responded, hadn't even moved, at her appearance.
"You all right? You seem off."
She stood next to him on the balcony, where she could see the control room some way below, farther down then she had climbed up, which made her blink a few times to get the perspective to make some kind of sense.
Amy looked at him. His shoulders were slumped, his hands in his lap, holding an envelope. He wore his mopey expression, a rarity, but it sometimes happened.
"What's that?"
The Doctor didn't look up.
"Oh, c'mon, you have to say something."
He seemed determined to ignore her.
Amy sighed. "Fine, I'll leave you to your sadness." She started back toward the trapdoor and the ladder, not looking forward to the return trip.
"I broke my promise. I didn't mean to, it just happened. I didn't think two minutes would make such a difference."
"How do you mean? What did you promise?" She didn't look at him, but she wasn't going forward either.
"The connection was unstable to begin with. When you add how broken it was on top of that, I should have seen it. Stupid of me."
She turned around, slowly moving to sit next to him, legs in between the bars like him. She didn't say anything. He didn't need any more prodding. She knew to give him his time.
"She was a lot like you. Kind, brave, and fiercely independent." He almost smiled here, turning the envelope, which was old, creased parchment, over and over in his hand, the broken blob of wax showing up like a the head of a coin flying through the air. "But in other ways too. She called me her imaginary friend. I was the Fireplace Man, rather than the Raggedy Doctor. Same suit, different situation, I suppose."
"Who was she?" She kept her voice low, trying to guide his train of thought, rather than change it.
"She wasn't English either. French. And what a French lady she was." He did smile this time, but it was a fleeting moment. "Refined in all the right ways. As much dignity as a King, more even, she managed to be more calm than him even when it was her that was in danger."
His eyes were unfocused, staring at nothing, even while still flipping the envelope between his fingers. It sometimes seemed like he would drop it, but he never did. "Clockwork man under her bed, but she never screamed. Not once."
"What was her name?"
"Reinette Poisson. Some called her Madame de Pompadour. But it was just a title to her.
"And she was so clever, so thoughtful, so empathetic. She saw right into my mind. 'A door once opened' indeed." Now he was smiling, and it didn't vanish.
"She walked the slow path, something I could never do. I envy her patience. But in the end it was her patience with me that did it. It broke her heart. And mine."
He didn't say anything now.
"What did you promise her?"
"I told her to pick a star, any star. And that I'd be back in two minutes." His eyes glistened. "Two minutes became six years. And she was so young. Only forty-three when she died."
Amy didn't know what to think. The facts painted a picture, but she couldn't make it out clearly. But that was alright, she was used to it.
"I was so afraid I'd done it again, when I saw that shed aged so much after I'd promised five minutes." He was looking at her now, smiling while tears flowed down his chin. "But you were still there. And I thought to myself. 'I'll show her things, all the things she never got to see.'
"Have I done that, Amy? Do you think she'd be proud of me?"
"Of course, Doctor."
"It's been five years since then, for me, almost two hundred and fifty on Earth. I hope I didn't take too long this time."
He took her hand in his, holding the letter with the other. She didn't need to read it to know what it said; to know the sadness in it, the longing, and the hope. And that was enough.