Sorry this took so long, and i am still not happy with the chapter. I have had writer's block, i know wherew this is going, but..

Hope you enjoy it

He pulled her through the living room to the piano. Martha had begun to understand that as a human, this was his safe place. She smiled from her place beside him. How often had they sat here, like this in the month since she had been exiled. He smiled at her between strokes of the keys, and she tucked her hands between her denim clad legs. Since their first 'date' two weeks ago, much of the tension that had been there was evaporating.

"So, Christmas at the Jones residence, then?" he sighed

She could tell he was not looking forward to it. Somehow he seemed to recall how much her mother disliked him. He even remembered the infampus slap. :She doesn;t hate you, you know." Martha tried with a small grin.

"No, she smacks everyone she meets." he offered.

"Sure she does." Martha returned with a knowing smile. "Makes weddings very interesting."

"Martha..." he stopped playing and folded his arms in front of him. "She hasn;t been our greatest champion in all of this, and given the state of our marriage right now, I am afraid she will talk you into a separation."

It was astounding to her, to see him being so open and honest with how he felt, his fears and doubts. The vulnerability wasn't what got to her, the honesty clinched it. She put her hand on his arm and gave it a small squeeze.

"She did give consent for us to get married." the fact left a sour taste in her mouth, but Martha could not mention all the details to him. Not that it would do any good, even the Doctor in his right mind was sincerely unapologetic for it. The man beside her right now knew nothing of what she had been through, save for some fabrication that barely skated along the edges of reality.

He nodded silently and gave her a small kiss on the cheek. They had been coming more frequently, his small gestures of affection. She had even kissed him a few times. They were nothing like what had transpired on the front porch that night, the memory of that made her burn with shame and longing, creating an intoxicating cocktail of passion that Martha was sure to get her into trouble by the New Year.

She had called her mother to let her know she was all right, a five minute check in had turned into a two hour conversation. Martha warned her mother about the Doctor's condition after her mother's insistence upon Christmas in London.

"What do you mean, he's humn" Francine had asked.

Martha had shrugged, drew a long breath, and launched into a stinted retelling of the last six weeks. Her mother was silent throughout the conversation. Not even an 'mmhmmm' nor a 'what?" It made the young doctor nervous. "It's complicated, Mum." Martha answered, feeling a headache coming on.

In the end, her mother promised to fill everyone in, as long as Martha promised to bring Adric along. "will Tish be all right with that?" Martha asked.

"Tish is doing great, Martha, since..." Francine trailed off, and Martha thought she heard a faint sniff at the end. "I think she needs to see him, I think she wants to see him. It'll be good for her."

"Well, be that as it may, Mum, I was referring to seeing me, not Addy."

"What a dreadful nick name. Yes, Martha. I think the two of you need to kiss and make up."

It was grade school all over again. But, instead of arguing over a ten quid sweater from Debenham's, Martha had tossed angry words at her only sister, and she knew she was the one that needed forgiveness. No one had forced her into the situation, though she was asked, over and over again. The thought rekindled the anger inside of Martha all over again. Her life had not been of her own choosing, she had not had the opportunity to choose. She often wondered if, given the circumstances, she could go back in time, would she do it all over again.

The thought made her giggle as she realized her current permanent address was 1 TARDIS Way.

"You look like the cat that swallowed the canary." John accused next to her. "Good to see you can get a giggle out of my misery.'

"Nothing to be miserable about, I have it on good authority that everyone will be on their best behaviour." she soothed. "They just want to see Adric and tell us how we are screwing up as parents."

John shrugged, "Their right I suppose. " John threw his head back and placed his hands on his eyes.

"You have been awful tired lately." Martha noted, her hand coming to rest on his forehead. "You feeling all right?"

"Save it for the NHS." But John's humor did nothing to reassure Martha. "I've been having the most vivid dreams lately."

"Really," Martha congratulated herself on the shock in her own voice. She had been expecting the dreams to start, it was a matter of time. "Anything good?" she offered him a raised eyebrow, reassuring him that she was not trying to treat him. Martha knew that the man she shared her life with right now, hated when she did that. Not too much different from the Doctor. She also knew how good it felt for both of them to have the physical contact, even the slight touch of her hand to his head under the guise of health seemed to lighten his mood. She noted it to ask about in a year or so. The touches, she recalled, were esential to whatever thing he had done to her. She felt better when he touched her, even now. She felt her anger disipate minutely with the connection, and John placed his hand on hers and took hold of it.

"You make me feel better." he smiled. "Just by being near me, you make me feel so much better."

Martha nodded.

"Your patients are so lucky." John placed his free arm around her waist and moved her closer to him on the bench. Before she realized it, they were kissing, deep and passionately as if there were no histories of tension between them. Martha gave over to the sensation, allowed her body to once again sink into the abyss of his touch. There was no bottom there, nor did she care to ever find one.

He deepened the contact, an urgency in his movement against her mouth. Urgencies noted and returned, she brought her hands to his hair and held him fast to her. He was like a drug, and there and then, she could not get enough.

It was the tiny wail of the third person in the house that finally broke them apart. Sh rose to get him, but John was faster. Casting a small wolfish grin in her direction, he lifted Adric into his arms and kissed his forehead.

Martha realized she was well and truly screwed.

"So," she tied, just starting to feel her heart return to its normal cadence. "I take it, tht is a yes on two days of fun in London?"

He cuddled the baby closer to him. "On one condition."

"I didn;t know we were negotiating."

"Martha, you are asking me to walk into a dangerous situation..."

"It's just Mun." she countered, matching his smile. "You make it sound as if we are staring down Daleks."

His face made her wish she had not said anything. "Daleks?" he asked with a raised eyebrow. "Have I been talking in my sleep?"

"Occasionally." she covered, thankful for his unintentional out clause. "But all right, let's hear your list of demands, Dr, Evil."

HE tipped his head slightly at the monniker, then laghed and nodded. "All right, one thing."

"Only one?"

"Yes, Martha, only one condition."

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Their second date was another homage to their past, at least as John remembered it. They took Addy with them and road the train to central Manchester. "Why the train?" she asked as they sat side by side.

He shrugged. "I dunno, this is our second date, and I seem to recall the last time around we got stuck in a horrendous traffic jam. Thought this would be safer." he was quiet for a econd then spoke again. "I recall the traffic jam, and the weird pharmacy..."

She nodded. "You asked me to come to New York, whisked me away practically. We were trying to get to the concert you were giving. We got stuck in traffic..."

"...and got separated, right?"

"Yeah, I got...held up." she nodded.

He seemed put b her answer. "You were robbed? Why don't I remember that?"

Her hand found his arm, "no, no not like that. There was an accident, and you know me-"

"Always the do-gooder." he smiled. John held Adric in the snuggly, she had tried to take him, but he had, if at all possible, grown more attached to the baby. Martha wondered if all of the skirting of the truth would hurt later, but the necessity of keeping the two of them safe was greater to her than any hurt feelings later. She leaned down and softly kissed the sleeping baby on the head. The train had lulled him, and as far as the rest of the world knew, Adric Bowman was an angelic baby.

"So, where are we going then?" Martha asked. "New York?"

"No," he smiled. "That was quite enough the last time."

"So, where then?"

He did not answer, it was one of his many ticks that Martha notied. The Doctor would have given an entire spiel about going somewhere without answering the questions. In fact, the Doctor would have gone on for twenty minutes about destinations, and he would have veered his tirade into territory that had absolutely nothing to do with their present locaation.

But, that was the Doctor, a time traveling alien being.

John Bowman was not the Doctor, but he still knew how to avoid a question he was not ready to answer; with silence.

It was not that he was ignoring...exactly. Martha figured it was a deliberate sidestep around an issue. Sometimes he did it at the piano. She would ask him what he wanted to do about dinner, or had he seen the checkbook, or something as innocuous like were they out of tissue. He would ignore the answer, as if it were just beyond his realm of understanding. It was the type of thing that had started off cute, which lead to being interesting. Right now, she was still at the shrug shoulders stage of the mannerism, but she knew, at some point long before John opened the watch, Martha would be ready to scream.

John lead her through the streets of central anchester, through to a trendy area frequented by hipsters and college students. He stopped in front of a shabby looking diner with pictures of the Statue of Liberty and the New York skyline.

"Finklstein's?" she asked with a smirk.

"New York style Delicatessen." he nodded. "My students highly recommended it."

"You asked your students for a good place to eat?" she asked. "At what point is that part of Music Theory?"

"All that music makes you hungry. Besides, I thought going to New York again wouldn;t be such a good idea. " he looked down at Adric. "And its a bit harder to be so spontaneous now."

They settled into the ancient booth at the back of the diner. Martha was surprised at her stomach's appreciation for the delicious smells coming from behind the greasy doors. The place did remind her of New York, she had been there a few times while with UNIT, and it was sort of dystopic to be sitting with the Doctor in a completely normal, non life threatening situation.

"The kids tell me the corned beef here is amazing."

They sat together huddled n the booth, passing Adric between them. Martha worried about the cleanliness of the place, and John reassured her that a few germs wouldn't hurt. While they argued over who would change the diaper, an elderly couple made there way into the small diner.

They chose a booth directly across from the younger couple. Martha noted their cadence was both deliberate and oddly young for their advanced age. The woman was tall, stately even. Martha imagined at one point she must have been a force to be reckoned with, and probably still was. She moved with a grace that reminded Martha of a ballerina.

Her husband was the same height as his wife, his gray hair was still lush and full. He seemed to be completely rapt by the woman at his side. He held her hand as they sat across the table, and Martha could see they were having an intense conversation, punctuated by not so covert looks in their direction.

"Look at that," John noted. "They seem so much in love, even now. I bet they have been together forever," he added wistfully.

"They are beautiful." she noted, still wondering why they kept looking at them. On some level, had she never traveled with the Doctor, or walked the Earth, she would not be so suspicious of an elderly couple seeing themselves in a young family. But, the Martha that was now in the New York Deli, could not help but feel her spidey senses go into overdrive.

"That'll be us someday," John murmured low, reached across the table and took her hand in his.

She wanted to tell him the truth, but it served nothing to negate his happiness at that moment, and the sensation of the skin to skin contact lulled her into that odd sense of absolute contentment, that she did not notice the elderly woman had come to stand next to their table.

"Excuse me." she offered in a stilted American accent softened by Celtic vowels. "But I could not help but notice your baby. How old is he?"

Martha found herself placing an arm around Adric's seat, but John offered a proud smile and spoke. "He's three and a half months. Growing like a weed."

The older woman nodded and cast a glance back toward her husband who rose to stand nest to them. "He's beautiful." she smiled. "Its good to see you."

John and Martha exchanged a look, and Martha wondered how this woman knew the Doctor. "Do I know you?" he asked/

"John," Martha interrupted quickly. "I am sure they are fans. You know my husband's work, music, right?" She reinforced her words with a look that must have spoke volumes, for the two elderly people nodded solemnly.

"We are visiting here from the states, our son moved here. Wanted to be close to his roots, whatever that means." the woman smirked.

"And you came to eat at a New York Deli?" Martha asked with a frown.

"We live in New York." the husband finally spoke. He placed his hand on his wife's elbow, and with a small nod lead her back to their booth. The woman seemed unready to go, but nodded angrily before going to sit down again. They resumed their arguments and stares until the woman excused herself for the restroom in back.

"Excuse me." Martha rose from the table.

"You always travel in packs " John smiled as he fed Adric a chip from his plate. The baby seemed more interested in smashing it in his hands than actually attempting to eat it.

The washroom was small, but clean, nothing like the bathrooms she remembered when she visited New York. The woman stood by the sink and looked as if she had been crying. "What's wrng with him?" she asked without turning around.

"It's complicated." Martha answered.

"I know from complicated, and believe me, I can figure it out. Speak."

Martha drew her shoulders together and sighed. "If you know who that is, then you know that there are things that can not be explained given certain circumstances. I probably shouldn't even be talking to you right now."

The woman turned then, quicker than a woman of her advanced age should. It caught Martha off guard and she took a step back. "Now you listen, I know that face, maybe I never met that face, but I know what's n it. IF I recall that's him before I met him. I'm not asking you to give me all the details, I just want to know, is he going to be all right?"

"Right as rain in a few months." Martha nodded. "Call it witness protection."

The old woman nodded. "Just see that you keep him in one piece, yeah?" She dried her hands and readjusted her purse onto her shoulders. "Tell him," The older woman paused then, as if thinking of the right thing to say. "When he is back to himself again, tell him to try reading the whole book."

By the time Martha made it out of the lavatory, the elderly couple were gone, John smiled when he saw her, he always did. "I was wondering if you got lost in there."

Martha sat down and began to clean off Adric, who had managed to smear potato all over himself in her absence. John seemed to want to say something, his fingers were twitching as if he missed his piano. It was one of his human habits that Martha had picked up on early. "What's wrong?" ahe asked.

He shrugged, then pretended to look out the window. "It's just, meeting them, that odd couple. They knew me, and I didn't remember them."

"I am sure you fans of some sort." she grinned.

"That's just it, I really don't They seemed to know me, and I could not recall ever having met them." he sighed and rubbed his hands over his eyes. "Can you do something for me?" he asked in a voice that reminded Martha of a little boy searching for his mother.

"Anything,"

"Tell me something, about me, about myself, before...before all of this. Before I got sick and got the Etch a Sketch treatment."

"You are the same, really." Martha tried.

"No, I'm not." he shook his head. "I'm not the same and I know it."

Martha picked at the reminder of her Corned Beef on Rye before speaking. "You were much more animated. Talked a lot more. One of the things that used to drive me nuts was how much you talked. " she realized in that moment that she actually missed it, missed him. "Twitchy was what my Mum sometimes called you."

"Oh, I could not have been that bad." he said, and Martha could here the relefif in his voice. He had begun to doubt his life, doubt his memories. She understood giving him something back of who he really is was not such a bad thing at all.

"You whisked me off in the middle of the night, and that was what pissed my mother off so much. Her strong level headed daughter had allowed herself to be taken off from her studies by, of all things, a man much older than her."

"I'm not that much older." he grinned nervously.

She understood, the age thing again. Here, they were fifteen years apart in age, not some immeasurable amount that was the reality of the whole mess. For n older man to have a younger wife, it sets them into a frame of mind, does she dream of men her own age? Will she leave for someone younger, less gray? "I know that, but my Mum. It's different, I understand better now, since Adric." She leaned into him and met his eyes. "It's never been about age for me, all right?"

John nodded, "does this mean you are going to go about smacking people for no good reason?"

"Oh, there will always be a good reason." she lifted Adric into her arms and began to put his jackets on him. "Him. There is nothing I would not do for him."

"Christmas in London it is, then."

The college student at the front brought her left hand up as John attempted to pay the bill. "It's all been paid for, Sir." the blonde with too many piercings insisted. "Even the tip."