"To make things easier for you to understand, I would recommend reading Walking On Train Tracks, which this is the sequel to. If you don't want to, you don't have to. There is no major plot connections that will make you super confused, and I'm sure you could catch up just by reading, however I always preferred reading the first story first, so I had a better understanding of what was going on. Xoxo, Luna"
Lily would like to say that the kiss had gone forgotten between the two of them, but it would be a lie. In fact, she had the feeling that in had been much too long since the doctor had had just a simple kiss without any sort of relationship attached, and he might've been reading too much into it.
It almost never showed, though. It only slipped through every once and a while and he took it back with positivity that she would just let it slide. Whenever she didn't they always ended up in some sort of 'our life is in danger and we need to run' situation, including one where the TARDIS crashed and she was left to with his unconscious form trying to find a way out past the electrical fires and weird mazes. She got the idea that the TARDIS either didn't like her, or didn't appreciate her dragging around it's doctor's unconscious body.
She made it as hard as she possibly could for Lily to survive that in particular situation, and Lily no longer pointed out when the doctor was being weird.
Thankfully, they got into a lot less life endangering situations.
Every once and a while he brought her home to visit, and since her disappearance/reappearance a few months back, no one was particularly interested and she, once again, felt like an outsider in her own home. Well, that was wrong, because she couldn't view it as her home anymore. It was a house full of people who used to fight for her, to love her, and now it was a house full of people who seemed dismissive of her when she came home from life threatening situations. What she had done to deserve this? She no longer knew.
On this particular evening, she knew that if she didn't force the doctor who come home with her she would never go back again, and she was glad she did, too, because Teddy and Victoire were there, and she still had no idea how much of an impact seeing him would have. Especially not when Victoire was announcing that she was pregnant. (Of course there was that little side glance at Lily that seemed to say "he's mine and you're never going to have him' that had Lily wanting to scream she didn't need him anyway, she had the doctor.)
This news, of course, was still more exciting than the fact that Lily was alive.
"Oh! Oh how wonderful!" Lily's own mother squealed in delight over the news. The same thing, but worded differently, was shouted amongst the entire family. Even Lily had to let a small "congratulations" fall from her lips. Teddy didn't seem to notice.
That night, Lily made the doctor stay the night with her in her tiny little room on the top of the stairs, which features dried out flowers, paintings of famous painting, and slightly moldy smell that went with rooms that hadn't been used in a long time. And the doctor, though he was unaccustomed to this sort of thing, awkwardly held as she let out tiny sniffles and weird whimpering sounds. He didn't even say anything when she smeared snot, tears, and mascara all over his jacket.
It seemed like years the next morning before she could get out of the house and into the TARDIS, which smelt like home and felt like life. She didn't know she could miss it so much.
"Say," The doctor said, as he began to fiddle with the console. "Why was there only one green tie hung up above that fireplace?"
"Oh, that's mine." Lily replied, startled. She had forgotten how little he knew about the wizarding world. "My whole family, like, generations of them, have been Gryffindor's. Those are the red and gold ones. Then comes along me, Lily Luna Potter, the first Slytherin." She gave a short laugh, "I think that's when everything fell apart. Eleven years old and everyone believed the rumors started about me."
The doctor was not good, nor accustomed to comforting people. "Well, um, wow!"
In the months (felt like years) that Lily had been in the TARDIS, she had done a lot of growing up. She was no longer one to wear clothes that were too small, or lie on train tracks wishing for her death. She happy now, and she had the doctor to thank for that. She didn't thank him, though, in fact, he probably didn't know how much he had done for her. She went from a self loathing eighteen year old, to a (soon to be) respectable nineteen year old.
"Lanzalar! A very beautiful planet, thought you'd enjoy it." He straightened his bowtie, and beckoned for Lily to follow. "I'm not dressed properly!" Lily protested. He stopped, half out of the TARDIS, and turned back to her. "Oh, come on!"
It was a beautiful planet. She appreciated even in her odd, thrown together attire of of patterned leggings and one of the doctor's white button up shirts. The water sparkled like crystals, and the fountains had some sort of technology to make the form shapes. Today it was some sort of countdown.
The sky was light purple. The clouds were dark red. Naturally, there was some sort of live that the doctor had to save, and naturally, Lily risked her life so he wouldn't die, and neither would he. She had a feeling the behind his childlike manor he might be as self loathing as she used to be, and well, she couldn't have that, now could she.
A few days later, it was obvious that the air of Lanzalar didn't agree with her, because she fell ill.
The doctor took her home while she was too achy to walk and she coughed too much to breathe, and her head hurt too much for her to see. This was the first time her arrival brought any excitement and she was left to think, in between how much she hurt, that she should arrive ill more often.
Turned out, that she had a very terrible illness, and had to go to a muggle hospital to be treated for it. In the weeks that she was there, (still in the doctor's shirt, ironically) the doctor left. He left her.
Months later things were back to normal, and bars were nice to come by. For her nineteenth birthday she got a strange book with no return address and was still unable to open it.
Teddy had kissed her four times. Then told it meant nothing, though he proceeded to do it again. Once he came out in a bowtie, and Lily felt her pressure on her chest not because he handsome but because bowties were cool and she was still getting over it.
Another few months went by. Christmas time. A strange woman turned up at the door asking for Lily, the only attention she received that night.
"Clara." Was her way of introduction. "Lil-"
"No need, I know who you are. Come along." Strange woman indeed. Turns out, strange woman was fan of blue boxes, and bowties. Lily had been almost okay. But now, not only had the doctor left her, he had fucking replaced her, and he was about to give a bigger slap than he'd ever received in any of his regenerations.
He'd looked pleased to see her, for only a moment, then he caught sight of her face, and the excited "Lily!" died in his throat.
"This?! This is how you come back? You get me sick on some God forsaken planet, leave me, then send my fucking replacement to fetch me for you?"
"Lily, if you'll just let me explain-" He made move to step closer, and Lily's hand twitched, he seemed to think better of it.
"You don't have to explain." She hated the way her voice sounded, like she was choking back tears. Which she was, because honestly she was supposed to able to count on him not to leave her.
He looked crestfallen. "Lily.." He said quietly, inching forward.
"You asked me how long I was going to stay with you and I told you forever and you just left me like I never meant anything to you! Honestly, here I was thinking that maybe you'd want to kiss me again but you'd rather leave me by myself surrounded by people who have been abandoning me my whole life." Now there were tears. She could feel them on her cheeks and the wetness on her eyelashes.
Clara had gone.
"Lily... I would like to- but I just thought maybe you'd be too afraid to come again, after getting sick like that."
"You never asked." She stamped her foot like a child.
The doctor fidgeted. Lily shook. This wasn't right. The TARDIS was supposed to be home. A place she could count on to always be there for her. But instead there was some woman here now, someone the doctor obviously liked better than her because he had;t offered to leave her behind and take Lily back. She knew he was never going to say something like that. She knew that he was never going to want to take her back. She knew that she was going to have tho go back to her house with her family and try to come up with ways to get the hell out of her because she had gone from respectable to self loathing all over again. And she had the doctor to thank for that.
Finally she stepped forward to slap him. He'd been surprised when her hand met his face and the sound of skin on skin erupted through the console room, but instead of being angry or kicking her out he grabbed her arm and used it as leverage to pull her into a hug. Where, finally, she was able to break down in tears. "I fucking loved you." She sobbed as angrily as she could. "I know.." The doctor said quietly. "I know."