Sparkling Cosmos {A Torchwood Story Two} [COMPLETED]

19. Out Of Time

For months, all I've been thinking about is Evelina. Everything about her, down to the way when she smiles with her mouth closed a small part of her right incisor shows - she is everything to me. The person who saved me from the dark pit I spiralled into; my moral compass whom I always listen to; the person I can always confide in and trust, the only living person in the world who can make me feel safe.
I'm trying to see the bigger picture; the bigger person I could be. I want her back, and I want only her.

At least, that's what I was thinking until tonight.

Now, Diane is holding an unlit cigarette between her slender fingers as she stares outside the window of Evy and I's flat. Below us, the lights of Cardiff illuminate the dense black water that surrounds everything; consumes everything. It makes me think of Evelina - she consumes almost everything I think of.

"Whose beauty products do those belong to?" she asks, and once again I think of my roommate.
"About half of them are Evelina's." She's already met the team, along with the two other people who slipped through the Rift from 1953. In fact, Evelina was the one who alerted us that the Rift had swallowed something larger than a Weevil. God, she's so intelligent. I wish I could've told her that before she stopped talking to me.

Diane nods in faint understanding and turns back toward the window. She asks, "And is Evelina-?"
"She's-" I begin saying, then close my mouth. Everything I want to say about her is everything I shouldn't say.
Diane's head is now turned to me, one thin eyebrow delicately arched up, waiting for an answer.

In truth, I want to say that Evy's my girlfriend, but that's not true. I want to say she's just my lover, but that's not true either. I want to say she's just a friend, so that I could just have sex with this intelligent cocky smoking hot woman who quite clearly wants to have sex with me too, but that's never going to be true.
My final answer is: "She's... Evelina."
Silence. Then:
"I'm glad she's not your girlfriend."

I slowly close my eyes. Diane is confident, and clever, and quick, and witty, and of course amazingly attractive. She's basically Fifties Evelina - although for all we know, Evy could've been on Earth in the Fifties. I've always wanted to research more about memory in psychology, so I could help her remember her life.

I'm getting off track. What I'm saying is, Diane is amazing, and in any other situation I would gladly fuck her without a second thought... but...

Why is this a difficult decision for me? Just let her sleep on the sofa for the night or send her back to the B&B, go to my room, go to sleep thinking of how much better the night would be with Evy in my arms instead of Diane.

But when Diane presses her lips to mine, instinct takes over.

Evelina's POV

Jack's trying to cajole me into picking apart Rift times from Toshiko's monitoring, but I can't focus.
Someone's in my flat. Someone that isn't just Owen. I'm so long connected to my home that I can feel it: not exactly a stranger, but not a friend either. That's all I can discern.

"Evelina?" Jack waves a hand in front of my face and I blink at him.
"Sorry, I'm somewhere else. What were you saying?"
He smiles without showing his bright white teeth. When he speaks, his American accent doesn't worry me, because his tone is softer than normal.
"It's about them, isn't it? Are you thinking about them?"
Actually I wasn't, but now that he's mentioned them I can't get them out of my head.

Seeing people from the Fifties have changed something within both Jack and I: seeing those people struggle to cope in a drastically different world, it's taken us both back to a place before Torchwood; when I left the drug ring I was flung into this spanking new sex-fueled world where everyone knew different things, different social cues. I didn't know how to be in this world, just like them. Just like Jack.

I look up at my boss, who has his head back in graph paper and prints again. I tilt my head at him, wondering how hard it must've been for him. Immortal, hundreds of years old, travelling alone for so long.
"Is there anyone you miss, Jack? All those years living through everything, everyone - surely there's someone you wish was always with you?"

The Captain continues to study, but his eyes have gone blurry, unfocused. He's remembering something - someone.
"There's always people I wish never left," he says, more vulnerable than I think I've ever witnessed him, "but one more than the others. The Doctor."
I lean forward. "The Doctor? That Doctor?"
He nods. "Yes, him," he says; "I thought he had died, or he thought I had died, because he never came back. He hasn't died - he just doesn't know where I am. Maybe he doesn't wanna know."

I don't know what to say. This is the most he's ever said about my fellow Time Lord, and after all this time, all this admiration, he left Jack? It asks more than it answers - and makes me worry. I can't even look at Owen right now, but I don't ever want him to leave, though I've told him to.

"I miss him," Jack says miserably, and I pat his shoulder companiably, at a loss for anything else.
"Hey. Maybe you'll find someone else, yanno? Someone who'll always be here for you, someone who listens to and understands you - someone who knows how to work the coffee machine."

He breaks his frown to laugh heartily at my joking plea, but it dies down as soon as our eyes connect. I've seen those eyes before on others, but before I can protest he leans forward and kisses me.
Though I knew it was coming I'm still taken by surprise, and gently prise myself out of him. Jack's face instantly freezes, but I don't fight like I usually would in this situation, which even he finds weird in these circumstances.

"Evelina? I'm sorry for that: it was outta line, and we're close friends, and-"
"No - it's okay," I cut him off, and he looks at me puzzled.
"Why? I just lightly assaulted you?"
I smile and blink slowly, feeling a new light gather in my eyes. "It's okay, really. Because it made me realise that there's someone I've been kissing for too long to leave. Owen. I'm in love with Owen."

With that I run out of the Hub, all the way to our flat, never stopping unless it's a traffic light. I quietly unlock and go through the door, looking round to see if Owen's still up or if he's in bed - and see something I definitely shouldn't've.

I see Owen and Diane having sex, extremely passionately, as hot as we do, facing each other and not the door so neither can see me, both of their faces expressing sheer pleasure.
I place my hand over my mouth so I won't make any noises of shock and hurt, and silently walk out of the room and out the front door. In the hallway, I slide down to the ground and pause a moment to process, before bursting into tears.