I was rewatching The Lost Boy today and thought that Alan and Sarah Jane definitely had a conversation without their respective children around. And that's how this little one-shot was born. Think of it as my first contribution to the small (but much loved!) Alan/Sarah Jane community on here.
Second Chances
The tension in the attic could be cut with a butter knife.
Maria was getting worked up, Luke was hovering in the corner, and Sarah Jane knew she was about to witness the next stage of the fall-out from Alan's earlier discovery.
"Luke, why don't you and Maria put the kettle on? I think we could all do with a cup of tea," She suggested, patting her son on the arm as the teenager didn't wait to be asked twice. While he had no problem fighting aliens, Luke was naturally averse to conflict and disagreements. After all, he was only a few months old.
Maria folded her arms and shook her head before silently following Luke out of the attic. All that was missing was the stomping of feet.
The only sound in the attic was the ticking of the clock over Sarah Jane's desk.
Putting the cap over the lens of the telescope, Sarah Jane recalled Alan's initial reaction to finding out about what they did. He had practically marched Maria over the road and demanded an explanation. Maria had given him enough to answer his questions, but even the teenager didn't know the full story.
No, the stories about The Doctor would come later.
"I want you to know that I trust you with Maria," Alan started, breaking the tension in the air. "I see you two together, I know you would never let anything happen to her," he said, remembering how desperate his daughter had been to get Sarah Jane back.
Alan had found himself on more than one occasion feeling jealous of her relationship with Maria. Perhaps that was why he had invited himself along for dinner the weekend before or why he had suggested they all take a visit to the new exhibition at the British Museum.
But in the back of his mind, he knew it wasn't just Maria's company that had motivated him. There was something about Sarah Jane that drew him to her. He couldn't put his finger on it. She was an enigma.
Their friendship had come in leaps and bounds since the day they arrived on Bannerman Road. They no longer used the kids as an excuse to see each other. He had invited her as a plus-one to an event at work – under the guise of there being a potential story (which there had been!). She had returned the favour by giving him her spare ticket to the opening of a show at the National Theatre.
There was no point lingering on that now.
"Chrissie might be her mother, but you're the person Maria comes running to when she needs something," Alan confessed, shuffling from one foot to the other as he avoided her eyes. He would never call Chrissie a 'bad' mother, but Maria lit up when she was around Sarah Jane.
Sarah Jane stepped forward, taking a moment to process what he was saying.
He wasn't wrong there.
Maria was like the daughter she never realised she had wanted. She also knew she filled the void that Chrissie left behind as an ever-present maternal figure. A part of her had always accepted that she had gained two children the day she found Luke – and not one.
Alan was just the first one to put it into words.
"I tried to protect her from it all, I really did – but her and Luke, they've changed everything," Sarah Jane said, glancing around her attic for a moment. The place looked virtually unrecognisable from only a few months ago. It was no longer just a dumping ground for her trinkets.
In amongst her gadgets were more prized possessions – photos of the four of them at the museum, a ceramic mug Maria had gifted her, and Luke's beloved science books.
13 Bannerman Road had become a home. Their home.
"Everyone deserves a second chance, Sarah," Alan said, snapping her out of her train of thought and making her think of the last man that had called her 'Sarah'.
Alan was making eye contact with her now, summoning a sense of Dutch courage from within him. There was something in the way he was looking at her. A softness behind his eyes that she had never noticed before. As though he was seeing the world through her eyes.
Before she could speak, the attic door opened again, and the two teenagers appeared over the threshold. Luke balanced a tray with four cups of tea – one black, two with a splash of milk, and one with just a dash. Maria came behind him with what looked like a makeshift charcuterie board.
Just like that, everything seemed to slip back to normal.
While her attic was quickly starting to feel like Piccadilly Circus, Sarah Jane found that she didn't mind it. She couldn't imagine the attic now without the hustle and bustle of Luke and his friends. Without Clyde's quick-witted jokes or Maria's ever-growing makeup collection taking over one of the spare countertops.
Her attic had become a safe haven for them all.
Perhaps Alan was right.
Everyone deserved a second chance.
Maybe this was theirs.