Written for the doctor who contest, drabble, prompt was star
Somewhere far away, and yet close by, a long time from now or a long time ago, three friends lay, or will lie, in the grass and stared up at the sky above. Lying side by side, close enough to touch and yet not doing so, staring up at the millions of stars and thinking of the adventures that then still lay ahead.
This is what he remembers, this is what he knows.
He remembers how the stars shone in the sky, the smell of the grass that surrounded them; he remembers the sound of their laughter and the shooting star that suddenly passed them by. He remembers how Rose, so human, so unknowing, jumped up to make a wish.
What he doesn't remember, what he doesn't know, are the words that are spoken then, or at other times, the stories that were shared and the ones that weren't. He can't remember the way she felt in his arms, he can't remember the way he felt either, or the sound of their voices, or the way they smelt.
The details of his life, of them, are slowly slipping through his fingers, like water. They're escaping him, the details, he's forgetting them and he doesn't know how to stop it, or even if he can. He's lived too long, he's seen too much, there's too much to remember, and so much to forget. And they too, despite the fact that he loves them, despite the fact that he they are the only ones he definitely wants to remember, are slowly slipping away.
But he remembers lying there, in the grass, with them close by and staring up at the sky above. He can remember the shooting star and Rose jumping up, he can even remember the doctor explaining something to her.
(He can't remember what he wished for, or even if he made a wish at all, but that doesn't really matter.)
But that, that was then, when he still had a purpose, still had a live, still had something to do. When the stars above didn't just mean the stars but the adventures that were still to come, when he could look up and not only say 'I have danced among the stars' but also 'someday I will go back.'
He lies here now, alone, in a place he once laid with them and stares up at the sky above. At the stars that once meant something, but now mean nothing, at the adventures he had, but will never have again. He stares at the future, at the live, that somehow, inexplicably, slipped away from him.
The stars call for him, to return, he's the adventurer, the time agent, the man who danced among the stars and wants to return, to go back where he belongs.
But he's trapped in a time and place that isn't his own, and he can't go, not anymore.
Another shooting star passes by, he makes a wish.
I wish I could never forget them.