AN: Okay, writing about lesbians is me definitely being a good author - it isn't JUST because I want to write about lesbians. It does no good to "say" they're bisexual and have them stuck in straight relationships. So. Have some gay on top of your banter.

Oswin

The Dish Ran Away With The Spoon

In the ensuing week after the arrival of Flek, Oswin distinctly remembered being haunted by green eyes through her waking moments. They got more and more vivid with every passing day, and she daresay obsessed her far more than anything Adam Mitchell had done in his first week. Although, she did admit that when she had met Flek she had spent her days boarded up on the top floor of the house, utterly alone, and when she had met Mitchell, Clara had been in dire need of nursing, and there was always so much chaos on the TARDIS she thought it was a marvel she had managed to think of him at all. It was hardly an equal comparison, and hardly a moral one, too.

Her behaviour grew even more unjust than usual. She started to keep time again, and went to shower more in the daytimes than the nighttimes for some reason she hadn't thought through at that point - she put it down to visceral inclination, above all else. In fact, she started to shower more in general, and knew how long it had been since the last time she had done so.

Showers aside though, she didn't go downstairs to eat as much. Vaguely, in the back of her mind, she was always aware of when a week or so had passed, and she'd decide to at least show herself downstairs. But she hadn't done that at all. She had been getting more meals delivered straight to her door than she had been going downstairs to receive them in person. Nobody picked up on that - well, nobody except Frank.

One day, there was a knock on her door, and she paused to listen for who it was. They hadn't woken her up that time, and she wondered if perhaps Flek had been keeping tabs on her sleeping habits. As usual though, she ignored the knock completely. Whoever it was would either leave eventually, or open the door themselves, and she was quite engrossed then in reading about the complicated ventilation system Horizon had.

"Oswin?" the door had opened so quietly she had not heard it, and she looked over from her desk to see Frank, pulling a sour face.

"Hmm? Yeah?" she stood up and went over to him, blocking his path as he tried to get into the room. She kept him firmly on the stairs, spotting pink hair out of the corner of her eye at the bottom of them.

"What's the smell in here?" Frank asked.

"Smell? There's no smell. I don't smell - what're you doing?" he had tried to push past her again.

"Investigating," he said coolly. He was nineteen then, and over a foot taller than her. She had no hope of keeping him out of her room if he was that set on entering, and pried her hand off the door handle and forced his way in, "It smells like rotting food."

"There's no rotting food," Oswin said quickly. There was though, it was all stacked under her bed.

"Why have you been getting more food than usual and then not eating it..?" he asked slowly, like he didn't want to know the answer.

"I just... I'm changing my diet to a healthier one. Since I can't exercise," she lied.

"I asked Flek, she said none of this is healthy, and it definitely doesn't smell it," at this point, Frank knelt on the ground to follow his nose to the source of the stink, "Jesus, Os! How come you've just left all this and not asked anyone to take it down!?"

"Because! I forgot," she said defensively.

"You've never forgotten anything in all the time I've known you," Frank said, waving the smell away from his nose when he stood back up, "I can't believe you've been sleeping above that."

"Okay, it's not that bad," she said.

"Yeah, it is, it's disgusting," Frank said, "Get rid of it."

"I can't."

"Why not!?"

"Because of the same reason I couldn't take it down as soon as I'd finished. Now can you go? I'll sort it out."

"Do not throw this out of the window," he told her sternly. She scowled. That had been exactly what she was going to do, and he knew it.

"I won't," she said, "I wasn't gonna. Go away."

"Not until you tell me why you're being so queer."

Oswin started, "Alright, it's not my fault she's so attractive, okay!?"

"What?"

"You said 'queer'."

"Yeah, as in 'strange.'" Oswin realised her blunder. If her brother didn't talk so funny, she'd have been able to keep everything a secret. Probably forever.

"Oh."

"Wait - who are you talking about? Who's 'she'?" Frank asked.

"Nobody." She shuffled awkwardly, crossing her arms. "Are you going?"

"Are you talking about Flek?" he asked, and she could see the amusement in his eyes.

"Who? Who's Flak? I don't know any Fliks."

"Flek. Your new guard out there. The Spore. With the stupid hair," Frank said.

"It's not stupid!" Oswin protested in Flek's defence, and Frank smirked.

"So it is her?" he quirked an eyebrow.

"No!" Oswin objected, uncrossing her arms and putting a hand on her hip, then moving so her hands were together in front of her, then crossing her arms again, before restlessness got to her and she groaned loudly. "No," she repeated.

"Have you been asking for more food as an excuse to speak to her?" As a rule, Oswin didn't like to think through her actions enough to come to those sorts of dreadful conclusions - she liked to think she was above all that.

"No," Oswin said.

"And showering more, why, exactly?" he asked.

"How do you know I've been showering more?"

"Because since she arrived, your shampoo bottle has gone from full to half empty," Frank told her.

"I can't take the plates down, because she'll see I've left loads, and then get confused when I ask for more food later and don't eat that too," Oswin blurted out, and Frank laughed. She glared at him. "Don't start."

"You're so bad with girls that you make me look good with boys," he joked.

"Are you leaving yet? I have important genius things to be doing. They're very important," Oswin said. Frank didn't move. "Did I mention they're important?" she went and pushed him out of the room, and he laughed again, just as she slammed the door behind him and sank down against it, burying her face in her hands.

"You asked for more food as an excuse to talk to her?" Eleven asked incredulously. At that tone, Oswin questioned why she was even telling him this stuff. "And I thought I was bad at flirting."

"You can just shush or I won't tell you anything else," she snapped. He pouted.

"It's remarkably interesting though. After all, you never talk about anything," he said, "I love stories. That's why I married your sister."

"It isn't, it's because you were drunk. But fine, fine, if you're so interested..."

That was how she found herself awake at two o'clock in the morning, down in the empty kitchen, after tiptoeing out in the middle of the night. She did the journey back and forth three times, very carefully organising her filthy plates so that they didn't clatter about and make a racket. She had them stacked up next to her, and had a pair of rubber gloves on, the water warm and full of bubbles. She'd already had to empty it once, but as the crud mixed with the water the overpowering smell of mould had reached her, and she kept coughing and having to step away, uttering curses. So much for trying to be quiet. At least, in the future, walls were all thick and soundproofed. At least, she thought they were.

"Wow, I must be a really bad guard," came that same voice she heard in her head quite frequently from behind her, and she jumped violently and dropped a coffee mug back in the washing up bowl, turning around abruptly to see a tired Flek leaning on the back of one of the dining chairs. Oswin didn't say anything, she didn't know what she was supposed to. "...Sorry, they said I'm not really meant to talk to you. I'll be quiet." Oswin nodded, and didn't say a word, going back to her washing up, though she dropped the sponge a few times.

"Why are you washing all that up now?" Flek asked.

"I thought you weren't supposed to talk to me?" Oswin said. ("Wow," remarked Eleven, "Even more evidence of how excellent you are at flirting." She told him to shut up.)

"Yeah, and I thought you weren't supposed to leave your room?" Flek asked with a peculiar tone Oswin didn't, at the time, recognise. "I guess some rules are made to be broken." Oswin looked over her shoulder and raised her eyebrows.

"That's cliché," Oswin said.

"Damn, I thought you were so closed off from the world you wouldn't notice," Flek scorned herself.

"I'm not a hermit," she mumbled, feeling the lie. She wasn't a hermit by choice, she meant. She didn't say that though. ("By the way," Oswin added in a sidenote to the Doctor, "Refrain from telling my boyfriend this story. I like to maintain the front that I'm really, really good at chatting girls up." "I don't speak to your boyfriend," Eleven shrugged, "When would the topic of Flek come up in conversation with him?" "You know what I mean. Don't make any stupid remarks that either I or you will have to explain.")

"Oh yeah?" Flek asked.

"Yep. I mean. Hermits are like - I mean... They live in shells. Totally. The crabs, I mean," Oswin said (Eleven laughed when she recited this line.)

"Do you 'mean' that?" Flek asked.

"...Huh?" Oswin asked.

"You said... Nevermind, I guess I'm really bad at this," Flek shook her head and turned away for a moment, and Oswin frowned.

"At what?"

"Do you want any help with the washing up?" Flek asked.

"Um, no," Oswin said bluntly.

"Are you sure?"

"Only one pair of gloves," Oswin lied, there were two other perfectly apt pairs of rubber gloves in the cupboard. Hopefully Flek didn't know that.

"I don't mind getting my hands wet." There was a pause and Oswin stared at her with her brows furrowed and a bowl slowly trickling the water it was full of into the sink behind her. "Sorry, that was dumb."

"What was? What?" Oswin asked. She really didn't understand what was happening.

"Nothing. I should wait outside for you to finish," Flek walked backwards to escape, knocking into the doorframe and having to move to actually get through the door.

"...What?" Oswin asked again, of who, she didn't know, because Flek was gone.

"Really?" Eleven asked her, "You're telling me you're both atrocious at flirting?" Oswin shrugged. "Well, I'd never have guessed. You're certainly good at keeping up appearences."

"Why thank you," she bowed her head slightly, with a small smile.

"So, you're just dreadful at flirting with people you actually have feelings for, then?" Oswin said nothing. "I'm offended, on the Dalek Asylum you were entirely capable of flirting with me."

"Who's flirting now, Doctor?" she snickered.

"It was joke!" he protested, and she laughed.

"I'm going to tell Clara."

"If you lie to Clara that I've been unfaithful, I'll just have to tell her how pathetic you are with girls. I'm sure I can quote, I have a wonderful memory," he threatened wryly. She raised an eyebrow, and shook her head, admitting to herself they were at a stalemate. "Speaking of Clara," the Doctor moved on, "How come she doesn't know this story?"

"She's never asked."

"Why's that?"

"Well, she thinks it was a fling. She never thought to ask about somebody I'd only mentioned once - and barely, it was just some passing remark. I didn't even say it, she did," Oswin nodded at Flek's sick room. She was still fast asleep, and had been for some time.

"Why wouldn't she ask about a fling? Don't you ask about all of hers?"

"Nobody wants to hear about a fling; if you're a virgin, it's patronising, and if you're a slut, it's boring," she shrugged again.

"What if you're in between?"

"Then you have enough of your own to worry about not to care about somebody else's sex life."

"I can't tell if that's actually wise or not..." he slumped in his chair, thinking over Oswin's promiscuous musings into the downsides of being too-pure or un-pure. "So! Not a fling! What happened next? After the washing up?"

"Oh, I actually managed to focus long enough to finish it and put the plates away, believe it or not. Why are you so interested?"

"Because! It's uncomplicated by comparison to anything I've been through, and mundanity is intriguing to a time traveller."

"Well, then. I didn't sleep at all, or through the next day, and I spent most of it sitting against my door listening and going back over every word she'd ever said to me while waiting for Frank to come home so I could talk to him..."