Author's Note:
Thank you for commenting on the length of the chapters! I am completely unsure as to what the "perfect length" is, if such a thing even exists. Unfortunately I have one more sort-of short chapter for you, then I'll pick it back up with some longer ones, I think.
Thank you again, my delightful reviewers!
It was dangerous.
The thing she had done.
So very treacherous. Perilous, even.
In fact, it might kill her.
She wonders… If she were to die in the computer, would she die in reality, too?
At this point, she doesn't care much about the answer.
It had started with a whisper from one of the dark, secret places in River's mind: the possibility of return. She had tried to cage the thought, the faith, had tried to ice it over like a young flower slain by an unexpected, late-spring freeze. But it had adapted, had broken through…
She was…
Hoping.
Hoping for The Doctor.
And for once, she had listened to the small whisper in her mind.
She wants him to find her, and desperately so. There is a physical pain in her chest, in her hearts, that makes her whole body ache.
After her guests had left earlier, she had put Charlotte, Josh, and Ella to bed (she told them the tale of her wedding day as a bedtime story). She had tried to lay down and sleep in her own, but her mind was restless. After pacing around the house in darkness for hours, she had collapsed on the grey sofa in her living room, her body exhausted. A few minutes of lying perfectly still, then her fingers had begun to twitch in impatience and she had gotten up again, this time heading for the closet in the living room.
It was at that point that she had broken her own rule: do not hope for his return.
She removed the only ribbon she had in the entire house: TARDIS blue. After carefully cutting and tying a piece neatly to the knob of her front door, her had mind calmed. She fell asleep for a short while on the sofa, fleeting dreams of her children dancing in her mind.
The peace, however was short-lived. She now lies on her back, awake yet again, her hands folded on her stomach, eyes wide open, looking at nothing. She is reminded of her days at Stormcage, many of them spent with her staring at the ceiling in a state of depression and loneliness. Of course, she would never let the guards see her like that. Only him.
She knows it's almost morning, but she is awake once again. She lays thinking. Wishing. Hoping.
She rolls to her left side, facing the back of the sofa. Longing grips her heart tightly like a fist. But she's not going to cry; she won't show her weakness to anyone but him, even when there's no one to see it at the moment. She will not cry. She squeezes her eyes shut and breathes deeply, once again bottling her emotions. Her eyes stay closed, and in no time, she is drifting back to sleep.
