Disclaimer: The Doctor and Donna's owner, the BBC, cursed them with their cruel fate.
Choice
He had been waiting so long for her, and there she was, standing at the end of the street, staring, smiling, heart open wide.
They ran to each other and he thought to himself, I'm coming home, I'm finally coming home.
And then there was a flash and he fell and suddenly they just weren't.
So after they'd all saved the day, and the sun was back shining in the sky and reality continued to be reality, his choice seemed almost too easy to be a choice, it had been assumed for so long the natural course of things.
Except that when the time came, he'd said no to her. Something had changed. Oh, he still loved her and everything, but when it actually came down to the choosing, and three simple words, he didn't do it. He could give his human self to her, but he didn't give who he really was, his true hearts, to her.
He didn't because he couldn't, because he had already chosen to give them to someone else.
And so without looking back, he had left her, so that he could be with her. His true love. Even though it was hopeless. Even though he knew there was no time left for them. He had no choice but to choose her, because real love always chose the truth.
As they hurtled through space, and the cruelty of her fate revealed itself, he had looked into her tear-stained eyes. Stroked her brilliant red hair and held her close, his utter devastation pushed, shoved, deep, deep down into some dark, inaccessible place, just to stop himself from crumbling away in grief.
Whispering goodbye to her as his own hands stole her away from him, he knew then the limitlessness of pain.
It had been agony watching her sleeping peacefully on her bed at home, her memories of their shining, brilliant, best of times lost to her forever, never knowing the depth and passion of his unending love for her.
Leaving Wilf and Sylvia and walking back to the TARDIS in the rain (Look, even the heavens are crying) he imagined for a brief, hopeful moment that this had all been some terrible nightmare and that when he walked through the door, there she'd be waiting for him, as usual, all welcoming hugs, warm smiles and unbridled excitement about their next adventure.
But as he opened the door, the emptiness and silence and heaviness of her not being there – she would NEVER be there again – crushed him to the floor with an almost physical force, and he wept and wept and wept, every cell of his body crying out for the woman he loved but could never ever have.