I'm baaaaaack…
So I haven't written any Doctor Who fanfic in probably almost six months (well, anything that's been finished anyway)—and this is a seriously depressing thought. However, severe mental stress gave me a story idea—isn't that always the way?—and I wrote myself out of a corner with this little study in character what-ifs. Please read and review—it doesn't take much time, I promise. *Hopeful grin* Anyway, do not own characters; make no money off story; intend no copyright infringements. I just write to keep myself sane; you wouldn't want to stop me, now, would you?
Revisionist History
'I can't go on like this anymore,' she'd wanted to tell him.
'I can't handle this anymore,' she'd wanted to say. 'Can't you see I'm trapped? Can't you see how…constricted I feel?'
She'd wanted to sit down and talk to him. Really talk, one of those long three-hour, deep conversations that covered everything from philosophy of life to thoughts on death to whether Shaggy was on drugs or not, and if he had a crush on Daphne. You only got those conversations once in a blue moon. Only with certain, close friends.
She'd wanted that. Maybe in the cloister room, somewhere peaceful and conducive for communication.
They'd never had any time for talking. Always rush, rush, rush. Never any time for assimilating, reflecting, re-experiencing.
'We never have time,' she would have wanted to shout at him in frustration. 'I only ever wanted a moment to catch my breath. I never got one. Don't you know how hard that is on a person?
'I can't take anymore,' she would have gone on. 'Anything. You throw the slightest thing at me—missing an appointment with someone at the Louvre in 1902, a little teddy bear-like alien only wanting a snuggle, a bloody cracked nail—and I'll break. I will shatter into dozens of sobbing little pieces. I'm brittle, Doctor. Can't you see that? I've been worn down. I need a holiday. A proper holiday, not one of your kind. Your holidays are worse than your deliberate adventures.
'They're not adventures anymore,' she would have realized as she told him this. 'They're just chores. Really stressful chores. We hate chores. Including you. I think it's why you never stick around to clean up your messes. And it's definitely why you never fix anything in the TARDIS.'
She would have sat back, sighed in frustration at her inability to explain all that had taken a wrong turn at some point, exasperated that she couldn't pinpoint the exact moment when things became too much, when the tension became grating and constant, when the snapping irritability stopped being a habit, a mere personality trait, and became something more, something deeper and more corrosive. He would have looked grave and hurt, and maybe he would have tried to interrupt, but he would have listened. He would have listened and maybe he would have understood when she left.
'I'm sorry,' she would have gone on. 'I'm so sorry, Doctor. But you just can't see, can you? You don't notice that I'm ready to start screaming my bloody head off. You don't notice that I can't sleep anymore, and I can't eat anymore, and my head is always, always aching. You don't see the scars.
'It turns out I'm not indestructible, Doctor.'
At some point she would have cried. It was inevitable. She couldn't help crying, no matter how much she despised the weakness, the lack of control, especially in front of him. The tears would have sparkled in her eyelashes and fallen down her cheeks. Unless, of course, by that point she felt so trapped, so constricted and bottled up, that she couldn't even cry anymore. That had happened at some point, some very awful points.
'I need a release,' she would have wanted to struggle on explaining. 'I feel—I feel like there's a bomb ticking inside my chest, and that if I don't defuse it soon, somehow, it'll explode and kill me, shatter me. And I can't do or say or feel anything because that bomb could go off at the slightest provocation, the slightest imbalance. The slightest thing, Doctor. So everything's jumbled up in my head, and I'm scared to sit down and think it through. Because I'm brittle.'
She would have sat him down and talked to him like this, made him understand. He would have known. He would have understood. He would be able to see her point. And maybe he'd learn to change.
'I can't handle anymore,' she would have repeated, because it was the simplest truth, and she couldn't find any other words that would mold themselves to her emotions any better. 'One more disappointment, one more accident, one more death, one more leaving…I can't handle anymore.'
She would have sobbed for him, for hurting him, for making him listen to this, for leaving him. She would have cried for everyone, the entire universe, because it hurt. The universe hurt. It was crying out in its own pain. Her heart would have ached, and maybe she would have grabbed his cool, pale hand to reassure herself. And maybe he would have let her take his hand, an introspective look on his face that distanced him from her, but perhaps he would have absently squeezed her hand, just to let her know it was alright and things would be better, because they always got better and you have to have hope. You simply can't live without hope.
While there's life there's hope.
'It'll get better,' she would have told him, smiling through her tears. There is a turning point, sometime, when things stop looking so rosy or so grey, when life starts inching down or up again. She would be able to see that. And if she could see that, then maybe it was a sign things were already getting better. 'You of all people, Doctor, know it will get better.'
He would have nodded and still looked sad, but he would have forgiven her leaving him. He would have understood. She would have had her say. She would have gotten all she wanted to say out in the open. And he would have perhaps held her hand to his lips, and then given her a hug, and then seen her out the door to her home.
She would have given him a proper good-bye then.
But there hadn't been any time, and one too many deaths had happened, and that bomb inside her chest had been ready to go off and explode, and she was brittle. So she'd stumbled, she'd stuttered, she'd told him it wasn't fun anymore, she'd looked desperately into his eyes and wished she could have told him all she wished, sat down and had a three hour conversation with him.
She'd run away, brave heart broken.
She hoped that, despite her messing things up and haring off on her own like always, he had understood.