We used to take family holidays to all sorts of exotic locations.
Mum liked to travel…she said if she had to be confined to 197, 060, 800 square miles of earth she wanted to see it all.
And we saw a fair bit.
And John and I enjoyed every minute of it. We were the kind of endearing, but hellish care for children who wanted to touch everything. Climb everything. Ask everyone we met every one of the myriad questions produced by our overactive imaginations.
But we had an uncanny capacity for new knowledge.
We could both speak several languages by the time we were 12 and put in to French classes at the grammar school we had just begun attending.
Having undertaken no formal lessons in anything but English, we took our French GCSE's that year…Using them as an excuse to gently persuade mum that a trip to France was necessary to hone our conversational skills.
Ofcourse our mother was perfectly aware that the trip was completely surplus to requirements as far as passing the GCSE's was concerned.
She agreed anyway, after only a token show of resistance; it was when we were in strange and remote corners of the earth that our Mum was happiest.
Now and then, Gazing out over barren dessert or breathing the thin air at the summit of a mountain she would get that same far away look she had displayed when she had snatched the toaster paddles out of John's hands.
And though she looked infinitely broken, at the same time she emanated a profound joy which was notably absent most of the time.
Not that she wasn't okay…mostly. She was almost always okay.
But sometimes we would disturb her in a quite moment and when she turned to us, her eyes would be red and her face streaked with tears.
Of course, as the old adage goes, time heals all wounds.
As we got older nights during which we heard her sobbing through the bedroom wall grew less frequent. She spent less time gazing in to nothing. Smiles not directed at us, however, did not frequently reach her eyes.
We asked about our dad…of course we did.
We were periodically obsessed. He was a cowboy, or a farmer, or a wizard…an explorer…a spaceman.
We got a little older and it dawned on us that he was more likely a dead man.
I don't think mum could have talked about him even if she had wanted to…The look that engulfed her features when we asked the first time had scared the both of us enough to halt the questioning for good.
Nan, normally not one to let anyone else-even John or I, who were blessed with similar powers of chatter- get a word in edgeways shut up and averted her gaze when we asked about daddy.
"good" was all she said "good in the end"
and of course we dwelt on the comment for weeks. Theorising madly as to what she had meant. In the end however, she gave us nothing remotely concrete.
WDKJGDSFGIYDGFKJ
"No, I meant it"
the doctor's dark haired companion shook her head.
"all of time…the entire universe…It's wonderful and everything, but"…
she shifted uncomfortably, sighed, looked down at the grubby grill beneath her feet.
"But I don't have forever doctor. I don't have forever to do the things people do…and call me boring…call me close minded, but I want to do them.
I want to be home enough to have a dog…I want a meaningful relationship with another human being…I want, believe it or not, a crack at some kind of career….although what I'll achieve with a degree in philosophy I have no idea…I"…
She trailed off…her word well run dry, looking expectantly at the downcast face of the man in front of her.
The face of her doctor. Because she had come to think of him like that, as they all did eventually.
Lord of all time, and charming to boot.
How could a humble human not be in some way fascinated…enchanted by him.
Especially when he had ripped the blinkers from their eyes, as he inevitabbly did for all who travelled with him
He showed them the wonders of the universe, and when they had drunk their fill they tottered back out in to their worlds, enriched and ever so slightly drunk on the world they knew was out there.
Probably living twice as hard because of the knowledge.
And the doctor's face broke in to a characteristic grin.
"well" he drew out the vowel, withdrew his hands from his suit pockets "if you're sure you aren't up for one more teensy-weensy little trip".
He raised his eyebrows, maintaining a smile
"because there's a festival right here in about…oOoo" he made a show of checking his watch "three thousand years. Brilliant firework display..well, I say fireworks, but no gunpowder of course, not here. Insects actually. Millions of little"…
He trailed off. Silenced for once, mid-flow by his companion's expression
"all-righty then"
he strode to the mushroom of a console in the middle of the room. Pulled his glasses back down out of his unruly mop and began stabbing at the ship's controls In what would seem to the untrained eye a rather erratic manner.