Earth Grazer || Doctor Who

54. One Terrible Night

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Secretly Ella was keeping track of something, counting days, and as a certain date drew closer and closer the more, she didn't want to exist, it wasn't until she started obsessively cleaning that Rose and the Doctor noticed anything was wrong. Ella was an excellent liar after all those years of pretending she was fine with her father's emotional abandonment. When the self-destructive thoughts didn't cease and just kept getting worse, she turned to her journal, her written words may have been dark and hopeless. But they really helped her get the thoughts out of her head and those thoughts living in her head wouldn't have been good because now she actually likes life and wouldn't want to leave it because of one terrible night. The Doctor and Rose watched worriedly as Ella tackled one of the hallway bathrooms and started furiously scrubbing the tub.

"What are we watching," Jack wondered as he walked by on his way to the kitchen.

"Just Ella losing her marbles a bit," Rose shrugged chewing on her nail.

"Why?"

"Because we're concerned," the Doctor answered instead this time with an ancient look in his eyes as he watched the woman that he loved unravel bit by bit every day.

"No, I mean why is she losing it?" Currently the brunette was in her own headspace while her music from a speaker she got from an asteroid market a couple months ago was blaring her favorite angsty playlist. Featuring songs from Nirvana, some Metallica, Tool and Korn, there were more but those were the headliners from her sad cleaning spree.

"I don't know but it has been over two years since she left her life and started traveling with me, maybe something is happening on earth that is causing her to act like this?" a sound came from Rose as she face palmed.

"Of course! What month is it on earth do you think?" the Doctor looked towards the ceiling as he did some mental math. Calculating the number of earth days Ella had been with him and the months and he came to an answer that Rose had already figured out. Rose had been Ella's friend for longer than the Doctor knew her, and the blonde was familiar with this unhinged cleaning pattern she had this time of the year.

"Around April, I think."

"Her mom died in April! And this is around the time last year she started acting like this, do you remember Doctor?"

"How can I forget? The Tardis was spotless for weeks." The group decided to leave Ella alone for now, she kept on scrubbing the tub and never noticed them watching her in the first place.

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Later that night Ella snuck into Jack's room and stole a bottle of vodka, she slunk back to her room because the shouting in her head was getting louder and louder every hour that passed. She also needed something to both muffle the shouting and numb her to the fast-growing pang in her heart, the pain was indescribable, and she hated to think about how she would handle that with a sober mind. When the bottle was half gone there was a knock on her door, she already knew who it was, and she seriously debated on whether or not she wanted to let him in on her mess right now. But when she thought about being alone the fear that gripped her was much stronger than any apprehension that she had about letting her Doctor see her like this. As if he sensed her thoughts the door slowly pushed open, and he stood in the door frame hesitating when he saw her sitting on the floor with the bottle of liquor beside her and her journal open in her lap.

A hesitation that quickly disappeared when she looked up at him barely holding herself together, he quickly rushed forward and brought her into his arms where she finally let loose the tears she had been holding in for weeks. Sometimes it was like that, Ella could be truly happy with no hint of darkness in her eyes, some days it felt like she was drowning in her grief. The ocean that pulled her under always got worse around this time, no matter how many years that passed since her mom died. The Doctor felt tears build up as their skin made contact and her thoughts flooded through his mind, as his own thoughts raced through hers the two heartbroken people were in a weird state of peacefulness. They might be hurting because of their individual situations but there was always a sense of calm when they could just sit in their feelings together and not have to talk.

After some time, Ella had fallen asleep, the Doctor carefully maneuvered her until she was in bed and as he was removing her glasses and her shoes she reached out and clutched his sleeve. Already having had no intention of leaving her in this state he climbed into bed with her, as she rolled over and rested her head on his chest his own thoughts turned darker and darker. He thought about his family on Gallifrey and as much as he didn't want to, he had assumed this had to happen at some point, no matter how much he tried to run away from it. This night had snuck up on him in the worse way and at possibly the worst time as well, he was supposed to be helping Ella but now his own mind had turned against him. The thoughts full of self-hatred floated through his mind and he had to swallow back the lump that had threatened to break free and at this moment he would have done anything not to cry.

Through Ella's dreams, numbers flitted through his own, numbers he had no right to count but he was doing it anyway because he apparently hated himself. As the number of days grew in Ella's head, the number of children on Gallifrey the day he killed them all grew in the Doctor's. This one terrible night the Doctor fell asleep with numbers on his lips, but he didn't forget, "2.74 billion..."

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Did anyone catch the 10 reference? lol - Lilly