Human? I'm not human, Sarah Jane.
His own words echoed in his mind as he watched Sarah Jane. He stood at the edge of the circle, watching, waiting, and thinking. Even where he stood, the strong aroma of the fire and its burning herbs burned his nose. He knew those dancing about the fire would be more strongly affected by the smells, most probably affected by the narcotic byproducts. Sarah was among them. It wasn't harmful; it was euphoric, a method of religious expression.
The chants and fiddles were loud. The beat of the drums was hypnotic. The circle of light created by the fire seemed to exclude him. It didn't bother him. As he had said to Sarah earlier that week: he walked in Eternity.
But Sarah Jane, she was a member of the circle. She danced in her white dress, her hands interlaced with those next to her. Her dark hair fell like tendrils of night about her shoulder. It shone against her white dress like onyx; its curls free and bouncing with her steps. Her laughter warmed his hearts and was all he could hear, although it was in complete symphony with those laughing around her.
"Doctor? Will you join?" asked a man at his shoulder.
Confused, he glanced down at the man. He could feel his curls being blown in the breeze. "Will I joinoh. No"
Darin gave him a gentle smile and moved on and the Doctor went back to watching the dancers. As the man walked off, the Doctor pursed his lips and slid his hands into his pockets. "Oh," he rumbled. "If only I could join in. But I'm a Time Lord," he continued. "And thisis so very human, so veryI cannot join. It celebrates their young lives; it symbolizes their short lives, the fire that burns so brightly, so shortly, sotransiently."
His eyes trained back in on Sarah Jane. She looked so vibrant, so wonderfully alive in the light of the fire. Her white dress caught and reflected the red, the fiery orange, and the incredible yellows and gold that shone off her black tresses. She was what he would call a beauty. What made her beautiful, he knew, as her undying loyalty, her warm smile, the way that she cared, and the inner strength that shone out of her wide brown eyes.
A large part of him wished to join her, whipping her around the fire, twirling in the night as all the other men were their friends, their lovers, or their companions. But as he had told her:
I'm a Time Lord, I walk in Eternity.
He had set down the separation between them. And she had laughed at him, teased him. Her brown eyes had twinkled as she playfully pulled her lace bonnet about her face. "Oh, I know" had been her sarcastic reply. She never saw him as different from her. She accepted him despite his differences and, he sometimes thought, because of his differences. Her friendship was based on him, not his race, not his physiology.
She swept by him, laughing, her skirt nearly whipping over his shoes. She broke away from her partner and twirled around him with her arm linking through his. She stopped, reaching up to take his felt hat from his head. "Oh, come on, Doctor, dance with me, with us."
He glanced down fondly. Her lips were split in a wide smile and her face was so gently rounded with true happiness that he found it nearly impossible to say no. "Sarah"
"Doctor," she said, mock sternly. "You simply must. Don't be a spoilsport."
An emotion washed over him that he couldn't completely recognize and he wasn't sure he wanted to give it a name, but he admitted that it left him feeling sunlit warm inside. He could feel her ever so petite warm hand through the weave of his coat. He wanted to dance with her, experience this celebration with her and damn the emotional detachment that he had, for so long, tried to let rule his life.
Sarah Jane clucked her tongue and reached to remove his coat from his shoulders, taking off his layers until he was left in his shirt, trousers and vest. Then, determined not to accept no for an answer, she pulled him out to join the circle by his hands. "Sarah Jane"
"You can lecture me about Time Lords later, Doctor," she admonished. "You can tell me that seven hundred year old Gallifreyans don't dance when we're back in the TARDIS. For tonight, you aren't to be stuffy or tiresome. Come on. Dance with me."
She slipped her arm around his waist and took his hand in hers. And then, on the next shrill of the violin, she swung into another dance.
Did she know that this was more than a dance, it signified acceptance? Did she know that by stripping his clothes off of him, she had removed his armor? Did she know that simply by slipping her arm around his waist, she was embracing more than just his body, but was showing affection despite his efforts to the contrary? He glanced down at her, his lips opening as he gave her a wide smile. No, she didn't. She simply wanted to dance with him.
And he found that out of all the other places and times in the Universe, he only wanted to be dancing with her too. They blended into the crowd, his white cotton shirt rippling from his movement and the breeze, his vest flaring wide from his chest. Her white dress made her look like a garden fire sprite. So warm, he thought, so beautiful. And she only wanted him.
Soon his laughter joined hers, his hand curling easily around her fingers, his hand clutching at her waist, drawing her closer. He found that he only wanted her; the warmth grew inside, evolving from the sunlit meadow to a flame inside of him.
Together, they danced in the circle, accepting of each other, accepting of the affection between them. And as a Time Lord, he found himself in awe of human expression and the free way that she encouraged him to laugh, to accept, to love.
And he found, despite his temporality, he wanted the moment to stretch forever and damn the Web of Time. He had Sarah Jane, he had the circle; it was enough.