A/N: *sigh* Again with the delays... stupid move... I will hopefully catch up tomorrow :)
"Ex Memoria"
2. The Art Of
Chicago, Illinois – In the year 2021
It was meant to be a proper treat for them, a gift on the occasion of their nuptials. That was what the Doctor had been calling it all day, and it was just shy of driving Amy mad. Nevertheless, after answering the call sent out to them, the idea had then become that they should do something just a tiny bit more pleasant. This had then led the Doctor to think of an exhibition in 2021 Chicago. The last time he'd gone to a museum with Amy had been especially marking on her, but he hoped this time around, with the restored Rory by her side, that she would make it a day to remember.
The Doctor stopped and doubled back, pointing to one painting with a smile and looking back to Amy and Rory with pride. "This is mine," he declared.
"You couldn't have," Rory frowned.
"Couldn't what?" the Doctor frowned back, mildly affronted.
"You didn't paint that," Rory pointed.
"Who said anything about painting it, I said it was mine. Look," he indicated a small sign on the wall next to the painting. The newlyweds leaned in to read it together, while the Doctor wandered off.
On loan, with thanks, from the collection of Mr. John Smith…
"1879?" Amy grabbed hold of Rory's arm to drag him along, trying to catch up to the Doctor.
"Funny story, there was an auction, which happened to be taking place on the very same spot where…"
He stopped so suddenly that the other two had nearly run right into him, only prevented as such by Amy still having a hold of Rory's arm and managing to pull him back. The Doctor had not noticed this in any way. His attention had been grabbed entirely by a panel advertising another section of the exhibition being to their left. Without so much as a word, he had forgotten the story he'd been in the midst of telling and, like a kid in a candy store, he was off again, leaving the other two to tag along as best they could.
They found themselves all three of them standing side by side, quietly observing one of the paintings. It was hard for Amy or Rory to look even remotely as fascinated as the Doctor was. Amy would smile to Rory, finding this amusing, and her new husband would briefly think the smile had been a sign of affection toward him. Once he understood, he tried to smile and nod back, though his enthusiasm wasn't bound to hold, and finally he went to see what other paintings were there for him to discover.
He came to stand in front of a square frame. On the canvas, the artist had depicted a couple running hand in hand, dashing from cover from the rain. It made him smile; the girl had something about her that reminded him of Amy.
As it happened, the moment he'd looked back to her, meaning to call her over, she'd been looking at him, too, so he signalled to her, and she came to see. He knew how much she could get into museums, and he really wanted at least one moment here that would be about the two of them, without the Doctor, so while he was busy elsewhere…
They'd only been observing the painting briefly, or it might have been minutes, but then the Doctor had rejoined them and come to stand between them.
Rory wasn't going to let it get to him. He would rise above it. He was here, in the near future, with his new wife, the girl he'd loved and waited for over countless years, and the painting made him happy. It wouldn't be this Time Lord to ruin it for him. He was going to look at that painting for as long as he meant to.
"Do you ever get sort of pulled in staring at those prints in waiting areas?" Amy asked the others as they walked off after having finished their run through the museum.
"They select those on purpose, you know?" Rory told her.
"It is sort of soothing," she admitted, then, "I'm starving. Where can we eat?" she asked the Doctor. She had been walking around the museum after leaving the painting Rory had liked, feeling so very at ease, and it took her a moment to see how perplexed the Doctor was looking. He still walked with them, but his mind might have been light years away. "Doctor?" she tried to call his attention. He turned to look at her, though he could still have been far off in his thoughts. "You wouldn't happen to know a special restaurant to go with this special exhibit?" she asked, pointing about.
"Well… as a matter of fact," the Doctor led them out toward the exit.
He needed to leave the museum. He needed to see what would happen, if the feeling inside him would pass once they left this place. He didn't know too well how to explain it just yet, but something told him their peaceful trip wasn't meant to remain as such. It might have been nothing, he might have been overreacting, but then when had he known an ignored hunch to lead to anything good?
Even if he hadn't been so caught up in this feeling, he probably wouldn't have made anything of the man and woman who'd walked into the museum just as he and Amy and Rory were walking out. It may have been that Mike and Tina Chang were still strangers to him, but he was no stranger to them, especially as he appeared now. They did not see him and the others as they exited any more than the Doctor did.
TO BE CONTINUED (TOMORROW)