Change. It's a strange thing but something I've had to endure my entire life, in ways you could only imagine. I've been physically and mentally bruised, only to be put back together again. Put back so completely and without seam that it's almost as though it were never there at all. When I was little I used to hate change, I would refuse to return to somewhere if it had been re-decorated. I was afraid of it. I always thought that if things stayed the same I would be safe. When I grew up a bit things started to change more often. New schools, timetables, friends, everyone deciding they loved each other just so they could say they had someone, so they could say they had done something. I never understood crushes, I never had one. I'd lived in the same house for all twelve years of my life, slept in the same room and had the same friends for as long as I could remember. They even changed to the same high school. Then, after eight years of the most important thing in my life being school things changed more than ever. My friends decided to become stereotypical, my entire house was to be redecorated and, in the process, rebuilt with a completely different landscape on the bottom floor. We had to move out because there was no hot water and the only rooms still standing were full of furniture. My first crush was someone who lived thirty miles from me and I barely knew him. I'd seen him a few times and I knew his family well. I knew his family better than him. My life was falling apart in front of me and I couldn't do a thing about it. And just when I was starting to feel safe my life apart again. A man, who had no legal right to be in my life came back from a long since forgotten past. Not only that but he was following me. That wasn't what the problem was, no the problem was that if I spoke to him I knew everything l'd built up in the past few months would go away again, and I'd have to start all over again. The other problem was that he was never going to go away. So, things changed again. Some changes were similar to one's I'd experienced before. I was changing already, the difference was I wasn't going to be taught about this in school. The others were that I somehow needed to smuggle a man into my life every week without anyone noticing and that I needed to know what the hell this man was, in general. Responsibilities began building up at home, my friendships were dissolving and I ended up missing so much school there wasn't much point going anymore. I hardly ever left the house, until I left permanently. Secrets and lies were now such a large part of my life I couldn't remember one without them. Soon the old life of school, shattered friendships and no prospects became a dream. Instead I had a personal tutor, no responsibilities and a knack for turning up unexpectedly in the strangest of places. Lies had never become more important. My personal tutor was very subjective in what he taught me. Maths was a favourite but English was thrown out of the window along with every other language you can think of. Science was another favourite and never boring, neither was history, although he disagreed with almost everyone who wrote a history book. Music was optional but I took the chance when it was offered. There didn't seem to be structure to any of his lessons and he could end up offering one at any moment. I learnt to live with his quirks and the odd 'companion' he'd pick up out of nowhere. Not that I didn't like them but it got confusing not knowing who I'd met or if I'd met them before and sometimes I had to hide from them so it coincides with my past correctly. A web of lies to the only man in my life, to the others and occasionally myself meant slip ups were inevitable. There was one lie that I couldn't ignore however. It was a lie to myself. I had tried to convince myself that it was a fantasy of long days past, that I didn't know what I felt sometimes and that I'd truly grown up without the knowledge of a human girls puberty. But that wasn't true. I also wished I could deny the fact that the person who these feelings were subjected to had lied when he said he thought of me as a daughter, because to me this was wrong. Completely wrong. Whether the universe had decided this was necessary or not I couldn't believe that humans and time lords were supposed to mate. Because that's exactly what he'd done sixteen years ago, a mating ritual. That was another lie I'd told him. I knew it was a mating ritual, I'd known for years, but I'd let him pretend it wasn't if he wanted. There was something else as well. This was a new change and I'm not sure how it worked. Before, when we used the pressure points it would just relieve us of pain or anxiety, things like that. Now it seems more sensitive. Usually, when I used it I still just wanted to calm him down, except I didn't need to push so hard, but if I'd been feeling, say, needy in the nether regions that day it would make him jump. I think he knows what it is too. Or if I'd been feeling tired he'd fall asleep straight away instead of after a few minutes. He'd sleep for longer if that happened, as well. I couldn't always judge what would happen. It was beginning to be pot luck. I'm sure my skins never been so sensitive either. It's uncomfortable.