Chapter 2
The Doctor figured he'd hear tears again. Instead, when he knocked on Donna's door, he heard a hiccup, followed by a morose "Come in, Doctor." He entered and found the redhead slumped against the foot of her bed, her jacket stained with whiskey. A razor rested in a death grip in her left hand.
"Donna…what…what on earth are you doing?" the Doctor choked out.
A bemused, impish smile-a carbon copy of the one he'd given her so many times-played on her lips. "Well, well, well. Looks like I'm the one who knows better for once, doesn't it, Spaceboy?" She hiccupped again, then cackled. "Need a hand figuring something out, do you, Timeman?"
"Donna, please get up. I can't send you back in this state." he hardly wanted to be firm with the poor woman, but he couldn't linger with her for long. "Doesn't she know this is hard for me, too?" He slowly unclenched his jaw, squatted down on his heels, and offered her his hand. She swatted it away and fixed him with a sad, pitying gaze. "You really don't get it," she whispered, shaking her head and stroking his cheek. "I'm not going back. Why d'you think I'm drunk as shit right now? Why d'you think there's blood running out my arm?"
Disturbed, frightened, he stammered, "I'm…I'm sorry, Donna. I'm so sorry-"
WHAP! The whiskey hadn't impaired her motor skills too much. "Oi! Answer the bloody question!" She snorted when she spotted the bloody dots on his face. "Ha, bloody question. Ain't that wizard."
He ignored her and pressed on. "Donna, I know you don't want to go back, and if I could somehow save you, I would. In two heartbeats. But there's no reversing the regeneration process." Living just to cheer her up now, he smiled and went on, "But we had the best of times together, didn't we?"
"Yeah." Wisps of her past caused a smile to flicker on, but it shorted out after a second. "And now you're taking them away!" she cried out.
"There's no other way to save you, I told you," he snapped back.
"Oh, you're saving me, are you," she retorted. "Boy, I just get the BEST sending off present, don't I? Poor Rose. She got the love of her life. That wretched Martha, marrying someone who actually loves her and working a job she likes. And I get…" Donna paused and gave the Doctor a look of longing. "Oh please, dear Doctor, enlighten this poor, dim witted earthgirl as to all the wonders of the world she'll encounter when she leaves."
"SHUT IT!" he roared. "Oh, you might have my mind in your body, but you don't know why I'm doing this. It's because I love you. Donna Noble. My best mate. I'm making you leave, yeah. Because I can't be the cause of your death, or I'll go even more mad than I am now. Hell, even after I send you away, I'll still be bonkers. Cause guess what? I try to pop in and visit you like I do with Rose or Martha, BOOM. You're dead." There was an aching fire in his eyes, a burn that comes when you realize death is sewed into your core and enshrouds all around you as a result.
Donna, still quite drunk, cracked up. "You…you love me? Plain old Donna? Oh, Doctor, you are very lucky I'm drunk or I'd slap you for trying to get a laugh out of me, saying stuff like that. Still might slap you," she joked. "It's obvious he's just humoring me before he sends me back." And the realization-It's gonna be over-barreled over her again, and her heart plummeted like a faulty elevator.
"If…" he started saying something and then frowned. "Hang on, you're still a mess, let's get you cleaned up." The Doctor went to Donna's bathroom and ran a wash cloth under warm water. He returned and gently scrubbed the blood off her arm. "Good thing the cut wasn't too deep," he muttered. "Anyway, what I was saying is: If you love someone, you have to let them go." He traced a finger over her blood and slid his fingers down her wrist.
"That's all nice to hear, Doctor, really." Donna's voice cracked as she continued. "I really never thought I'd mean that much to you. But you're still not getting this one little thing: I don't have anything if you let me go," she hissed.
"You'll have your life." His voice shook. If the Doctor was being honest with himself, he could surmise what she'd say next, and it would confirm that their trains of thought were two adjacent continental plates. They were shifting, overlapping, cracking, and they'd create nothing but destruction.
"Yeah, what a grand time I'd have, living with my mum again, working another temp job!" she screamed. "Don't you get it, dumbo? I don't wanna go back. Everyone else you've been with-they KNOW what you do. They REMEMBER. You show people how to make the world a better place, and they do that, in their own little ways, even after they've left you. Without even thinking about it. I won't do that. I'll go back to worrying bout what's on the telly or who shagged my best friend last week or if I should let that bloke at the bar buy me a drink. I'll be nothing. That's what you're gonna make me. Nothing." Tears rolled down her face, and she leaned into him. "I wouldn't be the same. That's why I was gonna be with you forever. I'm better with you."
"We're better together," he corrected her. He pulled her closer. One hand was resting on her waist, the other was scrambling to interlock with her fingers before she gave him a warning look or uttered the dreaded word: "HANDS!" She did neither.
"So let's be together for however long forever is," she whispered, and their voices joined to form words they'd never said before:
"Til death do us part."
