Yowzah Oneshot Collection (2)

100(G)

                 Le Chapeau Chic

                       leiascully

"And what," River said flatly, "is that."

The Doctor adjusted his tam o' shanter. "You're an archaeologist. I don't think this is a particularly difficult artifact to identify."

"But you do admit it's an artifact," River said. "Without relevance, perhaps? Definitely unnecessary to wear."

"It goes with my kilt," the Doctor insisted.

"Which you aren't wearing at the moment," River reminded him. "Although now that I know that you own one, perhaps we'll have to find an occasion for you to flaunt those shapely calves."

The Doctor fussed at his tam, even though it was already perfectly settled. "Yes, well. I might have lost it. The infinite wardrobe, you know, a bit impossible to say exactly where it might be."

"And yet you found this," River said.

"I always know where this is," the Doctor said defensively. "This is the genuine thing. Doncaster Rovers, 1879."

"It's genuinely awful," River said. "I don't know what possesses you, sweetie. It's just one ridiculous hat after the other. Better the fez than this. It does make me wonder where along the way you left your dignity, and which one of us will find it first."

The Doctor swept the tam off his head and tucked it into his pocket. "You're not vaporizing this one," he said sulkily.

River smiled at him. "Come on, then. If you want to wear something foolish on your head, at least let it be an appropriate venue. We'll go to Paris - at least there it's acceptable to wear a beret. Or an American football game, or the Renaissance. Surely you could jest."

The Doctor smiled and rubbed his hands together. "Paris sounds better. And I know just the time."

"You always do," River said, and he winked at her and pulled the zigzag plotter.

                            Echoes

                          leiascully

There’s a knock at the TARDIS door, which is odd. The Doctor opens it and River steps through.

"Hello, sweetie," she says, and something in her voice tells him that she knows.

"I lost them," he says, the words rasping past the lump of sorrow that seems permanently lodged in his throat.

"They chose," she tells him. "Amy chose. Together was better. It wasn’t your fault."

"And you didn’t stay with me," he says.

"Oh, my love, I couldn’t," she says. "It could never be forever and always for us, galloping through space and time hand in hand. I don’t believe the universe could bear it."

"I could have borne it a little longer," he tells her. "The universe would have endured."

She gazes at him, her eyes deep with grief. She has a few new creases at the corners of her eyes and her mouth and he wonders where she is. Where they are. What they are. Then she opens her arms and he stumbles into them, and she wraps him up in the strength of her embrace. He lets his forehead fall to her shoulder. He is crying, almost without realizing it, and his tears soak into the shoulder of her dress. River holds him, stroking his back. They don’t often do this, he thinks; they don’t often have the leisure to embrace, or the need for this particular comfort, but he didn’t know how badly he craved her touch until now. He has been alone the past few weeks, having left her at her university, listening to the echoes of Amy and Rory’s lives, thinking of their shared gravestone and the way Amy reached after Rory, reached for the angel that meant the end of all they had shared.

River holds him for a long time.

"I’m sorry," he says at last, sniffling. He digs a handkerchief out of his pocket and wipes at his face. River brushes back his hair.

"Only returning the favor, my love," she tells him.

"What favor?" he asks, too distracted to worry about foreknowledge.

"You came to me," she says compassionately. She keeps one hand on him, reassuring and unobtrusive. "You held me all night while I wept and wept. You were older. Sadder. You wouldn’t tell me where you’d come from. But you held me, and you listened as I told you all the stories of how we grew up together, my parents and I. Oh, the adventures we had, spinning out the tales of the Doctor and the blue police box."

"Something to look forward to," he says, and tries to smile. "River. I’m so, so sorry. I can’t even imagine the loss of them from your perspective."

"Now, Doctor, our burdens are heavy enough for our own shoulders," she says, and her words are gentle. "There’s no use measuring one against the other. Your grief is yours and my grief is mine. That’s the value of it. That’s the ache of it. And remember, my love: you are forgiven, always and completely."

"Thank you," he says quietly after a moment. "Will you stay?"

"A little while," she says, and pulls his head back down to her shoulder.

"Not longer?" he asks.

"Oh, my Doctor," she says. "You and I both know that forever could never be long enough."

"If only destiny didn’t take its own time," he says, and she kisses him very softly.