"Stand still," said Martha adjusting the bowtie. "This will look a mess if you don't stop moving."
The Doctor strained to look out of the first floor window. Night had already fallen and he was a little cold from the shower and the fresh clothes. "I normally use a ready-made," he moaned. "Who would have time to make this up fresh every day?"
"Well if you hadn't torn your ready made in a street brawl, you could have used that." She stepped back and admired her handiwork. "There you go. Just don't fiddle with it."
The Doctor flattened the front of his fresh shirt and smiled with satisfaction. His nose was still red from the afternoon's rough and tumble, but he felt invigorated. Martha smiled and went to fetch cups from the cupboard by the sink.
The Doctor started to pace around the little kitchen, trying to be casual. A number of cheap postcards were sellotaped to the tiny cabinet of the refrigerator."Who's this from?" he asked.
Martha pulled a soaking tea-cup from the sink and let the water drain from it. She pulled her cardigan around her and leaned over to see which one he was pointing at.
"The one from Glasgow? With the Scottie dogs and the town hall?" She was surprised.
"Yes. A lovely town. Friends there from a long time ago." He smiled at her. "Do you know someone there?"
"It's from you, you idiot," she sniffed. "Don't you remember anything at all about our times together?"
The Doctor looked up, deep in thought. Then nodded. "Vaguely. Would that have involved a steam powered train?"
"No," she sighed. "You're probably a little bit too late for that. It's all diesel power now. It stinks less. Tea?" She lifted the heavy pot from the direct flame of the stove top.
"Yes. Four sugars, please." He reached out to touch the postcard, then paused for a second, fingers almost touching the card. "And lemon."
"Watch it doesn't explode," Martha said, pouring two cups of tea. "Is it a temporal anomaly to read your own mail?"
The Doctor shook his head and picked the card from the fridge door, a slight crackle of dried tape catching his ear. He turned over the collage of cheerful dogs and cloudless municipality and noted the pale white reverse.
"Wish You Were Here?" it read in his own tentative writing. He was always very careful with Earth graphology. A lot of room for misunderstanding.
"I'm as literate as ever," he said.
Martha passed him the cup. "You don't look like you remember it."
"I don't," he replied. "But that's not a surprise."
"I thought you said you were 'ahead'. I still think you're some earlier version of him." She eyed his unraveling bow-tie with some disgust. "Just a bit chirpier."
"Oh, thank you." He tried to straighten the wings of the tie with some pride.
"It wasn't a compliment." She sipped her tea and nibbled at a scone from a plate of second-day bakery. "Can't you just tell me one thing to convince me?"
He shrugged his shoulders and raised his hands in the air. "Why do I have to convince you? Then don't believe me. I just happen to know who you are."
"It's unsettling. You're like a friend I had at school who always knew the end of a book before I'd even bought it. She never told me what happened, but even that was infuriating. Maybe Craig is a time agent and he's filled you in."
"Ah yes. Craig." The Doctor sighed. "Does he strike you as law enforcement material?"
"I wouldn't know. You don't strike me as a master of time. Playing football and chasing wooden stools? Not exactly heroic."
He sat beside her and sipped the tea, nodding with approval after a second sip. "One can't always be saving the universe," he said sadly. "Sometimes you get the little jobs. You know, just picking up the garbage."
"I'm glad you realize that," she said archly. "You - him - left me here to go off on your - his - big adventure. Getting us back to the next century. Getting us back to the Tardis more like it."
"Same thing, surely?" He was completely indifferent.
"You may always know everything works out, but I'm left here for weeks now. For all I know, you may leave me here and go back traveling around the galaxy. That's what's frustrating.
The Doctor raised his eyebrows, but he was not thinking terribly hard. "Is it imperative that you get back? This is still London and it looks as much like your time as I remember."
She shook her head. "Would you settle down on an alien planet? Even one that was five minutes behind your own timeline? No. You have your little blue box. That's always there to rescue you or let you escape from a situation."
"I never run away, Martha. And I rarely leave people behind." He looked up slightly embarrassed. "Very rarely."
"Are you saying you come back for me?"
"I won't say. You can't live in this timeline knowing that it all works out. I can't say."
"I think it's won't. But I'm alright with that. I think I'm over you, Doctor. If you don't come back for me, I think I'll be alright."
The Doctor stood up and walked to the window. The square of Covent Garden Market was only poorly lit with a few dark figures walking around. He thought he might actually miss the view.
"You'll be fine," he said. "I think I had better move on from here. Too much clashing."
"Do you guarantee I'll be alright? You didn't just read some obituary in a newspaper in the future and console yourself?"
He turned to smile at her. "That too," he joked. "But Craig is a different matter. I want to leave you some information. You can ask him about it, if you want."
"I won't," she said. "There's trouble and there's your kind of trouble. Don't write anything down. I won't read it."
The Doctor walked back to the table, picked up the cup and sipped the warm drink.
"We shall see."
