Ok, so before I wrote this I told myself this wouldn't become a romance. After reading this chapter I realised that it was heading that way, so I have decided to embrace it! Sorry if romance isn't your thing, but I just can't help myself. Also, you may have noticed, that Joe is the main character in a lot of the chapters. That is because he is my favourite in the show and I kind of have a bit of a schoolgirl crush on him. Yes, I know he died over 30 years before I was born, but I can't help it! I have a freaky thing about cockney's with big brown eyes. In an unrelated note, I was excited for hours yesterday because, while watching part of the royal wedding, I noticed someone in the choir who's a David Tennant looky likey!

"I reckons I can pu' ya up fer the nigh' Martha," said Joe as they sat in the back of Jones's butchers lorry. Martha nodded.

"Thanks Joe," she said. "Kind of you, I'm sure."

"And this Doctor bloke," said Joe, gesturing forward, at the cab at the front of the van where Captain Mainwaring, Sergeant Wilson and the Doctor were sat. "I reckons I can pu' 'im up if you likes."

"Thanks. I suppose you'd better."

"You're still mad a' 'im," said Joe.

"Yep."

"Shame," said Joe, seeming to relish the idea. "Ah well, never mind, ay?" Martha smiled at the man.

"Joe I have a question," said Martha. "And this may sound really, really stupid."

"Go on."

"Why are we travelling in the back of an old-fashioned butcher's van?" Joe gave her a strange look.

"T'aint tha' old fashioned darling. Pretty new this is, relatively."

"Course it is," said Martha, cursing herself silently in her head. "Why are we travelling in the back of a new fashioned butchers van then?" Joe chuckled.

"We ain't real solders. Not proper soldiers, anyways, no matter what Mainwaring says. So we aren't authorised to a decent army van what-a-ma-call. And Jonesy had this little beauty for years but since the war 'e can't get petrol off the ration. So I says to Jonesy here, Jonesy I says, we need transport, we can't go pedalling around on little bikes, y'know? So I says to him we stick some sandbags and that in it, some marble tiles, look we got little slots to stick our rifles out of and we got ourselves a little method of transport! And also, well I'm a busy man; I'm driving around a lot sorta deliverin' this an' tha' and it burns up petrol! And I need off the ration petrol to get these places. As a registered military vehicle we gets the petrol withou' the coupons so 'e can deliver 'is meat easier. So I gains, he gains and the platoon gains!"

"Very clever," Martha grinned. She was beginning to really like Joe Walker.

"Yeah, bit of a smart idea, if I does say so meself."

"Speaking of smart ideas," said Jones, crossing over to where they were sitting. "Wasn't half a bad idea using this to transport that blue telephone boxy… thing isn't it? I think Captain Mainwaring was quite impressed by that contribution."

"That's after you spent five minutes giving the background details before summing up the idea in a sentence," joked Joe. It was true; Martha had been shocked about how the old soldier could stretch out an explanation to such lengths.

"Ah, shut up Joe, I needed to make sure he understand properly, I had to explain it, I was giving a description."

"It was a good idea, Mr Jones," said Martha.

"Ah, just call me Jonesy everyone else does," said the old man cheerfully. Martha smiled at him. Jones was a friendly man with a twinkle in his eye and a permanent grin on his face.

"Alright," she said easily. "So you're a butcher, then?"

"My meats the best in the town," said Jones.

"Yer the only butcher in the down you ole duffer," smirked Joe, but he was grinning.

"Now don't you start-"

"Would anyone like an upside down cake?" It was Godfrey, his voice as dry as paper, as he popped open a little tin.

"Thank you Mr Godfrey," said Jones, carefully selecting a cake from the tin. "Ah, that's very nice that is."

"Cheers Mr G," said Joe. Martha took one too and took a bite from it.

"That's gorgeous!" she said. "Where did you get it?"

"Actually my sister Dolly made it," said Mr Godfrey. "She's got rather a gift with them."

"I can tell," said Martha.

"Oh! Can I have one Mr Godfrey?" Frank Pike stumbled over to where the cakes were being handed out and took one. A violent jerk of the truck sent the cakes flying from Godfrey's arms and splattered everywhere.

"You stupid boy," said Jones.

"Yeah, Spikey, you ruined a nice batch of ole Mrs Godfrey's cakes," said Joe, gently slapping the boy's hand with his flat cap.

"Sorry Mr Godfrey. Sorry Joe."

"It's quite alright," said Godfrey. "But it does seem rather a waste, she used up her whole weeks butter ration on them. Very proud, Dolly was."

"Tell her they were delicious," said Martha.

"Thank you my dear, I dare say I will." He looked kindly at Martha, his face a picture of fatherly concern. "I suppose you need a place to stay tonight, I would be only too happy to offer-"

"S'alright Mr Godfrey, I've already offered her a spare room tonight," said Walker.

"Oh," said Godfrey. "And what about that rather tall young man?"

"Him too, mate, Martha's got it sussed."

"You're sleeping in the same house," said Frazer, walking slowly over to where the small crowd were gathering. "You and yon Doctor fellow?"

"Yes," said Martha. "What of it?"

"I don't see a ring!"

"Ah, leave off taffy, don't be so old fashioned," said Joe. Frazer pointed a knobbly finger in Joe's face.

"Death will come to ye if ye encourage unmarried couple to sleep together! It's wrong!"

"Wait, wait, wait," said Martha. "I think you've all got the wrong end of the stick."

"An' I donnae know what right you have to speak, young woman!" Frazer cried.

"Me and the Doctor aren't…" Martha waved her hands around in embarrassment. "Like that. We're just friends."

"Like me and Mrs Fox," said Jones. "We're just friends."

"Then why did I see her lying on top of you in that old air-raid shelter?" asked Joe cheekily. Jones flushed.

"Well she came over a bit faint," he mumbled. "I couldn't just leave her…"

"Enough said," Martha interrupted. "Me and the Doctor are really close but we'll never be a couple. He's in love with someone else."

"Aye"-chimed in Frazer. "Now, I'm not one for gossip, or tittle tattle of any kind, but who?"

"I don't think you know her," said Martha. "I don't even know her. But I'm happy with him and me as… mates. Just mates." But nobody believed her.

!

The men leapt out the van, holding their rifles and marching into three ranks. The Doctor and Martha stepped back, watching.

"This is brilliant," said the Doctor. "Don't you think this is brilliant?"

"What's brilliant?" asked Martha.

"Everything! These men, too old, too young, unfit, unwell, whatever. Had their flaws hurled in their face by officials, turned down for the army and what do they do? They start another one! Human ingenuity at it's greatest, Martha!" Martha thought of the creepy, wild-eyed Scotsman, the blustering Captain and the looming month ahead in this prejudiced society. Not even as a maid, when she was tucked away inside a school, and was mostly ignored. She would have to face up to the white local community with her head held high. She sighed.

"Yeah," she said. The Doctor looked at her strangely.

"Are you ok?" he asked warily.

"Tired," she said.

"Does you're head hurt?" he asked.

"No."

"Martha!"

"Ok, ok. A little. But just a little and don't look at me like that, Doctor. You've got a lot of explaining to do so please don't test me."

"Said the true daughter of Francine Jones," laughed the Doctor, and Martha glared at him. Then she sighed.

"Come here you," she said, pulling him into a hug. She put all her smothered emotion from the past three (or rather, two a little bit) months into that embrace. Every time she saw him walking past and he never even stopped to say hi…

The Doctor held her reassuringly as she pulled herself together.

"Alright?" he said.

"You are so not off the hook," she mumbled in his ear.

"Oh, I know," he said. "I really, really know."

"See," whispered Frazer. "Not a couple, my arse."

"Shut up taffy, you don't even know the girl. Don't be harsh."

"Foreign girl, in those clothes, no ring on her finger with that long, fellow. Summat wrong. I don't like it."

"I think she's nice," said Frank loyally. "My Mum says-"

"Shut up you Jessie," Frazer said cruelly. "I don't like her. I don't like either of them."

!

Martha sighed and dumped her sopping wet jacket on the faded chair in the spare room of Joe Walker's house. She folded her arms across her chest, shivering and sat down, fingering her mobile.

"Alrigh' Martha, Doctor, this is yeh room, erm…" Joe coughed. "There's only one bed so I could sleep on the sofa or well…" he winked at Martha. "Pay me a visit." Martha smiled sweetly.

"I'll sleep on the chair," she said, pointing at the armchair she had just put her coat on. The Doctor frowned, and nearly spoke, but she stamped on his foot hard.

"Ok," said Joe, unfazed. "I'm going out now, delivering some… stuff to a… friend. I'll see you later. Oh and-" He paused before leaving the door. "Good night," he said, giving her an adorably crooked smile that should have turned her insides to butter but she felt nothing.

"Night Joe," she said. "Thanks for everything."

"Good night," the Doctor added, waving. They listened as Joe walked out the room, clattered down the stairs and slammed the door behind him.

"I'm not sleeping on the couch," said Martha.

"I know."

"You better know." It was dark now, very dark. After they had vacated the van, the men had towed the TARDIS across fields to an empty barn in the middle of nowhere. Martha hadn't seen the point of the spot the Doctor had chosen being so far away from civilisation; her jeans were coated in mud up to her knee and she was soaking after a heavy downpour of rain.

"You better get out of those wet clothes," said the Doctor. Martha hunched her shoulders defensively.

"I don't have anything else to wear," she said. "And they haven't invented power showers yet." The Doctor sighed and walked out the room. Martha stood, shaking, wondering where he was going. Was he pissed off with her? Had he stormed out? No, he returned, with some clothes in his arms.

"Here you are," he said.

"What's this?"

"I went downstairs, and I found Walker's products. There are some nightdresses and I also brought a towel from the bathroom." Martha accepted his offer and smiled her thanks.

"I'll put it on then," she said. The Doctor nodded and continued staring at her in a totally inconspicuous way. He raised his eyebrows.

"What?"

"I'll go change in the bathroom," she said, leaving the room, flushing. She quickly changed and came back into the room ten minutes later.

"Ah, Martha!" he said. "Warmer, now?"

"Mmm warmer thank you," she replied. She yawned and crawled into the bed, crawling under the layers of thick blankets. The Doctor sat on the end of the bed threading the tassels of the top blanket together. There was a comfortable silence.

"So when are you going to have a go at me?" he inquired. She snuggled deeper under the covers.

"In the morning," she said sleepily. The Doctor kicked off his shoes and began to strip. Martha's eyes widened, but dropped when he stayed in his t-shirt and his boxers. He jumped on top of the bed and pulled the covers up so he could come under as well. Her heart rate quickened, and she quivered slightly.

"Ok," he said. She felt his breath tingle on her neck and her stomach leapt. The Doctor didn't even notice. "What shall we talk about?" Martha moved away from him so he wasn't touching her. He didn't get the message, moving with her and resting his head on her shoulder. "Martha?" She gasped, and stared into his deep brown eyes. She let out a kind of strangled cry, and blushed furiously.

"Yes," she squeaked.

"Can you give me a bit more of the covers please?"

!

When Martha awoke the next morning it was to an empty bed. She looked around groggily and stumbled to her feet. The clock said it was eight thirty in the morning. She grabbed a man's robe hanging on the back of the door and made her way downstairs.

The Doctor and Joe were sat at the table at the kitchen table, both fully dressed, looking at the newspaper. Both the men leapt up as she entered the room.

"Mornin' Martha," said Joe, waving at her cheerfully. "Good night? Not too uncomfortable on the couch?"

"It was fine, thank you," said Martha. She slid into a seat and looked at the paper. June the fourth, the paper said. She read the headline. "Clothes rationing?" Joe smiled and clapped his hands.

"All the more business for me," he said, grinning broadly. Martha smiled at him.

"Bad boy," she said. "It's not fair you know."

"It's for the benefit of my customers. Now clothing's on the ration, they'll come swarming." Martha sighed.

"I'm going to need some clothes if we're staying for a month," she said, purposefully jabbing the Doctor in his bony ribs. He winced and rubbed his hands along his suit.

"Martha, shall we go and look around for our own place today?" he asked. "Just to rent, you know. For the duration of the month."

"We have no money," she said. He nodded.

"I have a little bit," he said, showing her a slim wad of notes. She chewed her lip.

"We'll have to figure this out. Sensibly. Like adults."

"I can do that," said the Doctor. "I could do domestic… if I had to."

"Martha, you want an egg?" asked Joe. "Got some fresh today."

"How d'you do that?"

"I got me own chickens," said Joe without blinking.

"You don't even have a garden."

"They live in the bath."

"What!" Martha winced visibly. "You keep them in the bath."

"Yeah…"

"What happens when you need a bath?"

"I just take 'em out."

"You are such a lad," scorned Martha.

"I'm a bachelor," said Joe. "You could help me with that."

"Me and Martha will be moving out," said the Doctor. "Thank you for your hospitality."

"Wait, have some breakfast," said Joe.

"I'm not hungry," said Martha. "I never have breakfast. I know, breakfast is the most important meal of the day, Doctor."

"So we'll be off then," said the Doctor, grabbing Martha's hand. "We'll go and get our stuff."

"I need to go to work," said Joe. "Martha love, help yourself to any clothes you can find round the house."

"Thank you Joe," said Martha. "I'll pay you when I've got the money, yeah?"

"Don't be thick," said Joe. "I'll see you later- I will see you later."

"Thanks again," said Martha, kissing him on the cheek. He winked at her, grabbed a briefcase, and left the house.

"Right then," said the Doctor. "I'll go and get your clothes, you get changed and we'll hit the road." He took her hand. She snatched it away.

"Why did you have to be so rude?" she hissed. "He was being lovely to us, especially with me being black and us to being married, and you have to treat him like that."

"Martha, he's just a spiv who dodges the law and tried to take advantage of you."

"Tried to take advantage… Doctor, I can hold my own. He was just joking around, he knew I wouldn't accept."

"He was just joking around," said the Doctor sceptically.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were jealous."

"Jealous? Me? As if I could succumb to such a petty, totally human emotion! That's ridiculous. Really Martha… jealous?"

"Whatever," she said. "I'm going to get changed."