Yowzah Oneshot Collection (3)

41(G)

   don't get too close it's dark inside
  
            AmaranteReikaChan

“You redecorated.”

The Doctor spun around so fast it gave him whiplash. It wasn’t River’s presence that was shocking, he’d known she was coming, it was her words and the sudden biting feeling in the pit of his stomach that this was the first time she’d seen this TARDIS.

“It’s rather dark and depressing don’t you think? You haven’t gone all brooding teenager on me have you?” She stopped her inspection of the TARDIS interior and came to stand in front of Clara, eyeing her up and down. “And hello, who are you? Doctor who is this? Have you been bringing other women home again?”

If he’d been in any other state he would have painstakingly reminded her that it was twice, and each time she had been the other woman he’d brought home. But as he was frozen with dread, he said nothing, and only stared.

“River?” Clara said cautiously. All her encounters with River had been strange in some sense. But that’s to be expected when the first time she met her River was actually dead. It had made it quite difficult the next time she saw her and she was very much alive. Clara was in awe of how the Doctor had never given anything away.

But this River, this was all wrong. And Clara really wished the Doctor would say something already. His silence was extremely unsettling.

“Oh.” River’s expression instantly warmed. The threatening gleam in her eyes neutralised. “You know me then do you? Must be me from the future. So I have a future then. How fun. What’s your name?”

“Ah…” Clara stumbled. “Um. Clara.”

“Lovely name. Well hello Clara.” River smiled at her amiably, “Doctor River Song. Though you already know that, don’t you?”

“Doctor?” Clara repeated with a bemused frown, she’d only ever known River to be a professor.

“Are you a companion?” River asked lightly.

“Ah, yeah. I guess.”

She paused, then nodded, then turned to her husband who was watching her with a form of enigmatic caution she couldn’t quite read. She filed that away, it was always unusual when she couldn’t read the Doctor.  “So my parents have gone have they—”

“River when are you?” His voice sounded thick and dry as he tried to get the words out.

She didn’t miss the signs that he was struggling emotionally. There were few things he could hide from her, just like there were few things she could hide from him without excessive amounts of will and precaution. Regardless, she opted not to press him on it.

“It was my birthday the other day,” she smiled archly, mirth dancing in her eyes. “You took me ice skating – you are a horrible ice skater, Doctor. I’m surprised I still have all my toes.”

Despite the inkling this should be a tense moment, Clara couldn’t help laughing.

“Stevie Wonder?” the Doctor asked, barely above a whisper. He feared if he spoke any louder he wouldn’t be able to mask how hoarse his voice really was.

“Oh yes. It was lovely sweetie. Though, then I came home and found a Roman outside my cell wanting me to help save my infant self from a mad woman. Just your average day.”

“Sorry,” he grimaced at the memory. Looking at it in retrospect made him quite guilty. He couldn’t imagine what was going through River’s mind when Rory asked for her help, and to see the devastation it caused when she refused must have been heartbreaking.