I stopped dead at the sight of my Dad, who was bending over to give Marla a kiss and rub her belly, and very quickly flicked my gaze over to the nearby calendar on the wall with growing horror as I took in the year.
Eighteen months since he'd left me.
I turned my gaze back on the two of them just as Marla blushingly pushed him away and gestured towards us.
"Stop it! We have guests," she said, obviously in a much better mood than the last time we'd seen her which made me think she might have been hangry, and my Dad grinned at her. "Doctor, Emma this is my husband."
Eighteen months since he'd left me, and he already had a new wife and a baby on the way.
He turned towards us with a welcoming smile on his face.
"Hello Dad," I said before Marla could say anything else, hoping against hope that I was wrong, but he stared at me in confusion then with recognition in his eyes before he flashed a very guilty look between Marla and I. "Been a while."
That was all I managed to get out before the realization set fully in and I bent over the trash can and threw up neatly into it to the sounds of everyone's noises of confusion and then suddenly the sound of a punch made me look up. The Doctor was standing in front of my Dad shaking his hand out with a look of fury on his face.
"How could you!?" the Doctor bellowed, and I opened my mouth to say something to calm him down before I realized that I couldn't breathe, so I reached out with one hand and wrapped it around his arm. He dropped down next to me in a heartbeat and cupped my face in his hands. "Emma. Emma easy."
"I can't—" I tried to breathe in desperately. "I can't breathe."
"What on Earth is wrong with her?" My Dad asked through the fog. The Doctor's eyes moved from my face so that he could glare at him over his shoulder.
"That is the lingering effect of you abandoning your daughter," the Doctor snapped. He swung me up in his arms without another word and carried me out into the hallway.
"Oh my god. Oh my god- he abandoned me and - had another baby," I gasped out and the Doctor reached up to rest his fingers against my temples and calmed me down enough that I quit gasping. I was still shaking, which was a side effect I could handle much better. I gave the Doctor a smile. "Thanks."
"I'm sorry," he said.
"For what?"
"I don't particularly like calming you down like that. It feels manipulative." He shuddered slightly on the last word. "And it isn't as if your emotions aren't justified, but every time you can't breathe I panic."
"I don't mind," I said, reached out to take his hand and smoothed my thumb over his knuckles. I gave him the best shaky smile I could muster. "I can't believe you punched him."
"I can't either. I can't remember the last person I punched," he said with a slight frown before he got a very guilty look on his face. "I shouldn't have, but I would give almost anything to hold my children again. The fact that he just walked away from you makes me so angry."
"And you hate being angry," I said.
"Emma tell me what you're thinking." He said after several moments of silence.
"I don't know what I'm thinking. I'm too numb, in shock I guess." I swallowed harshly and wrapped my fingers around the edge of the bench and held on so hard that my knuckles turned white. "I never wanted to go looking for him, I never wanted to know, I knew it would be bad for me."
"We're going back to the TARDIS," he said immediately and I carefully side eyed the heavily armoured guard standing at the end of the hallway.
"I don't think that's an option," I said, and he followed my gaze before swearing violently in Gallifreyan. He looked up at me soulfully from under his fringe.
"Emma I—I don't want this to break you."
"I won't. I promise." He gave me a doubtful look. "I was just caught off guard."
"We aren't separating. I don't care what comes up I don't care what happens. You are not leaving my side," he said and I nodded.
"You certainly won't hear any arguments from me," I said and offered him the best smile I could manage. "You might have problems getting me to let go of you."
"You hold on to me as much as you need to," he said as he stood up and pulled me up off the bench he'd set me on.
"Plus I just realized that we left our phones charging on the console in the TARDIS. So, we definitely can't split up because disaster would certainly strike," I said, and he laughed.
"Right you are Emma."
When we got back into the other room my Dad was haltingly explaining to Marla what had just happened, with the Doctor interjecting a frosty explanation of the TARDIS when they had both expressed confusion about the fact that I should be a fourteen-year-old in England, not a young adult in America. I kept one of the Doctor's hands in a white knuckled death grip as I listened.
"How did you even recognize her?!" Marla hissed and my Dad swallowed harshly before skittering his gaze between me and his wife.
"She's the spitting image of her mother, except with my hair," he said and for some stupid, slightly vindictive reason that made me happy a second before I wondered if that was why he had left, so that he wouldn't have to look at the younger version of my Mom.
Eventually the conversation turned to a discussion on the Leki Spraitove and since my knees were still feeling a little shaky and I could only barely manage to keep from shouting every time my Dad moved in the corner of my eye, I wandered over to a bench and sat down. The Doctor shot me a look and opened his mouth, likely to remind me about Rule Two, but I shook my head. There must have been a hint of hysteria in my expression because he simply gave me a deeply concerned look and a nod.
"Fine then. Let me go and remove the Leki Spraitove from the paintings by myself and Emma can stay here with Marla," the Doctor argued to the lead militia man after several minutes of pointless back and forth. The man in question had never bothered to introduce himself. I also noticed that the Doctor was very pointedly not looking in the direction of my Dad.
"Unacceptable." Militia man grunted. "You need to be accompanied by an employee of the museum."
"Scott can accompany him," Marla said decisively while looking tired. I flinched at my Dad's name despite myself, which made the Doctor's concerned face drop into a harsh frown which made my Dad shoot a betrayed look at his wife.
"Acceptable." This guy was almost starting to remind me of a Dalek with his answers which was not helping matters at all. I wrapped my hand around the Doctor's and tugged him down next to me so that we could whisper to each other.
"Don't do anything stupid," I said, and he raised an eyebrow up at me. "You're angry. You're so angry because of everything he did and that's okay. But you also don't think right when you're angry. So don't do anything stupid."
"What would I do without you Emma?" He asked with a smile as he reached up with his other hand and knotted it into the curls at the back of my head before resting his forehead on mine.
"God only knows," I teased. He pulled back slightly and pressed a lingering kiss to my forehead before he released me and stood up to look at my Dad.
"Come along then," he said brusquely and my Dad followed without a word. Marla and I settled into an incredibly awkward silence as she sat down on the bench next to me an arms length away.
"He told me that you also died in the car crash with your mother,"" Marla said quietly several tense minutes later. I snorted loudly at the fact that we had told the same half truth and Marla gave me an offended look.
"Sorry it's just I used to tell people that he also died in the car crash with my mom," I said.
"Why?"
"It was easier. To be Emma the orphan, not Emma the girl who got abandoned," I said, and Marla flinched.
"I'm sorry."
"Wasn't your fault," I said because that was the only response I could muster. I squished my hands between my knees so that she wouldn't see them shaking. "Listen if you're sitting over there worrying about if he would do the same thing, I don't think he would."
"Why?" She sounded shocked, and I couldn't really blame her because I wasn't really sure why I was reassuring her.
"When was the last time you had a fight?" I asked and she frowned at me. "Just answer."
"I don't remember."
"If you were my Mom you would remember. Because they always fought. You'd remember because it would have been this morning, or this afternoon, or it would have been an hour ago." I shrugged. "He wouldn't abandon your baby because your baby isn't making you miserable."
"I-" Marla stopped like she didn't know what to say and shot me a pitying look. I pointed at her with my shaking finger.
"That expression right there is why I lied," I said and she blinked and hastily rearranged her expression. I swallowed. "The Doctor is slightly telepathic. He could take the memory of this whole evening away so you could go back to before you knew."
"He'd do that?"
"He would if I asked. And I'll ask if you want."
"You would do that?" I gave her the best smile I could manage, which was pretty pathetic.
"Yeah why not," I said and suddenly realized that I was shaking very hard, on the brink of tears and that I had somehow managed to convince the Doctor to separate. Marla made a concerned noise and slid closer to me.
"Are you okay?"
"Not in the slightest," I managed to get out between the rattle of my breaths from my crying and shaking. I white knuckled the bench to try and ground myself and went through the mental exercises I had learned back when everything had been very bad.
"Do you need the Doctor?"
"He's not available right now so I'll power through."
"Don't ask." I glanced at her through my lashes. "The Doctor. Don't ask him to take these memories away."
"Really?" I asked and she nodded firmly.
"It may take me a while to fully trust him again, but I do love him and this makes so much make sense. We can move past this." I nodded at her. We fell into another silence that was slightly less awkward this time, that was interrupted by one of the militia men leaning into the room with their radio in hand.
"The invasion has been contained."
"Invasion," I scoffed lightly under my breath.
"The Doctor would like you to return to the TARDIS." I practically leapt up from the bench and glanced over at Marla who shook her head.
"I'll wait here." I didn't offer any protest and took off as quickly as my shaky self could manage it. I was about halfway back when the Doctor appeared, and I let out a huge sigh of relief even as his face became horrified, and he swept me off the floor and into his arms without an ounce of hesitation.
"Oh, Emma I'm sorry. I shouldn't have left you," he said and pressed another long, lingering kiss to the side of my head.
"It's okay," I said as I fisted my hands in his coat at his shoulders.