Yowzah Oneshot Collection (3)

49(G)

The Things He Has in Common With the Stars

TheDoctorAndRiversArmyOfPeppers

River sat on her bunk in her cell and wrote in the blue notebook her new husband had given her a few years ago. She sighed. It was the first night of a long, old sentence and she was missing the Doctor. Not that she would ever admit it.

Then, as if she'd summoned him with her thoughts alone, the TARDIS appeared outside her cell.

River hurried into her husband's timeship.

River looked at the sky. It was beautiful with all the stars and him just standing there admiring the view. He looked so gorgeous and she wished time would stop, so he would stay like that, with the starlight shining on him like a golden halo. But the space idiot had to ruin it by moving.

He started to explain things but she wasn't really listening. She was paying attention to the way he didn't touch her, didn't look at her much and just went on about the alignment of the stars.

"What do you think of them?" he finally looked at her properly.

River took some time to take in the amazing view.

"They're beautiful, sweetie," she smiled at the sky in awe.

And he turned back to the view with a smug smile on his face and kept not touching her, kept not kissing her.

She had learnt something, stareing up at that sky. As much as she admired those stars, they were never going to know she even existed. She saw the look on the Doctor's face as he watched the many suns and she realized how similar he was to them.

She felt her hearts drop and her stomach churn, then quickly pulled herself together. She was not going to think like that, she decided. She was going to enjoy her time with this man, despite what she'd just learnt. And she was going to adore him enough for both of them.

After all, you don't expect the stars to love you back.

River knew the Doctor tried to love her, and he did a very good job. The way he treated her, if she didn't know better, she would've believed she was his Universe. But she did know better. She knew he cared about her, always had, from what she could gather. It was more than she'd expected from him and she was glad of it. But over the nearly two-hundred years she'd known him, and the many dates they'd been on, she became more and more convinced. It wasn't love. It could never, ever be love.

And that was okay.

River stood there, listening to Flemming read her diary and became very cross with him. He even had the audacity to assume that the Doctor loved her! How dare he! How dare he bring her Doctor down so low! She was seething beneath her skin. She could feel her emotions getting the better of her.

"The Doctor does not and has never loved me. I'm not lying," River told him.

"Confirmed. The life form is not lying," King Hydroflax's robot body said.

"Impossible! This is a trick!" Flemming insisted.

"No it's not," River replied.

"My information is correct! You are the woman who loves the Doctor!"

"Yes I am. I've never denied it. But whoever said he loves me back. He's the Doctor, he doesn't go around falling in love with people. And if you think he's anything that small or that ordinary, then you haven't the first idea of what you're dealing with."

Still Flemming insisted the Doctor would come to save her, and no matter what she said, he didn't seem to believe that he was wrong. And that idiot surgeon was no help. He kept on saying her name for no apparent reason and he was beginning to get a bit distracting. But she kept going.

"When you love the Doctor, it's like loving the stars themselves, you don't expect a sunset to admire you back! And if I happen to find myself in danger, let me tell you, the Doctor is not stupid enough or sentimental enough, and he is certainly not in love enough to find himself standing in it with me!" River was close to tears by the end.

She turned her head and caught sight of the surgeon, who's expression took her breath away. He was looking at her with sadness in his eyes, as if his heart was breaking for her. And fondness was there too, and a familiarity she felt sure there was no reason for. And love. Like there was endless love for her within him and she just...

Oh.

"Hello, sweetie," the Doctor smiled weakly.