Too Good To Be True

5. Gone and Back

It was gone. The TARDIS was just...gone. Mari freaked out, feeling where it had been thinking maybe it was invisible or something. How could it just be gone?! She never even heard the sound!

Had she imagined it all? Mari walked through what had happened today. She still had orange marks in her arm, her phone must've been on the ground outside where she'd dropped it because she didn't have it, and she could hear Kayla downstairs talking to her mum.

Mari heard footsteps run up the stairs. Kayla walked in, "Hey Mari, my parents say I could stay the night."

Marianna looked at her, she still had a slight wound on her head. "Kayla, this may sound crazy, but was the TARDIS just sitting in my bedroom?"

"Very funny." she said, "but I'm pretty sure if it had been you'd be long gone."

How could she not remember?! "But you saw it didn't you? I said it was a prop."

"What are you talking about? I've been downstairs." she said.

Was Mari really going completely mental? It had been so real.
"Alright...lets play a board game."
Maybe he'd come back or maybe she was crazy. Mari would just continue like nothing happened. No one would believe her anyway. It had been a little too good to be true.

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Beep Beep Beep

Mari's alarm rang out. She got up and turned off her alarm clock. 6am. She had to get up. She rolled over groggily and sat up. She took a quick shower, got dressed, brushed her braces, got her stuff together, and ate a quick breakfast. She packed herself a lunch then ran over to her neighbor Isaiah's house. She'd been carpooling with him ever since her family's cars all broke down.

We'd been having a lot of problems lately. Everything seemed to be breaking. My eldest brother's condition seemed to be deteriorating and he was doing a lot of drugs. I kept all this to myself. Never would I ever tell any outsiders about my problems.

Lately Isaiah and I had spent a lot of time together. I hated getting close to him because ended in me breaking his heart, but he made me feel more special than anyone had ever made me feel.

Flashback

"C'mon!" Isaiah laughed, "Just let me take your picture!"

"No way." Mari insisted, "I'm ugly."

"No you're not!" He promised, looking her in the eye, "You're pretty."

"Am not."

"Yes you are."

Marianna was taken aback by how good that made her feel. She didn't care much for outward appearances but she could hardly remember the last time someone complimented her. She had to try so hard to get noticed. Sure, her friends complimented her on her writing, her teaches complimented her on her work, but the last person to say she was pretty was her mother.

End Flashback

Mari hopped into Isaiah's van. Isaiah sat in the passenger's seat and his grandpa drove.

"Hey." she greeted them.

"Hello." Isaiah's grandpa replied.

"Hi Marianna." Isaiah greeted. He always called her by full name for some reason. All her other friends called her Mari except him.

The drive went quick and when they reached Mari and Isaiah's middle school, they each exited. Mari and Isaiah had the same first period even though they were a year apart: PE. Even so, they entered separately, Mari with the her fanboy friend, Conner, and he with a bunch of random girls. Looking at them, she felt a twinge of jealously but Mari did her best to suppress it. Not him again.

Conner and Mari chatted through boring morning announcements. Then we parted ways to different PE classes. She changed into her PE clothes but wore her Whovian jacket over them. She had gotten it for Christmas. She only took it off to wash and for sleeping.

After a bunch of random boring stretches, her PE teacher gave them three laps to run...ugh. Mari jogged, not very fast being that she wasn't too active. Marianna focused in exercising the brain. However, she wasn't unhealthy, just slow.

That's when she saw it. Something she never thought she'd see again.

The TARDIS. In between two school buildings. Mari stopped dead in her tracks staring at it.

"Marianna!" Her PE teacher called. He didn't like them to stop.

Mari rubbed her eyes, half expecting the TARDIS to disappear. It didn't.

"Marianna!" He called yet again.

She ignored him and bolted toward the TARDIS like she had all the energy in the world. Marianna probably made a record time to it.

Mari felt the handle under her hand. Its touch was cold and real. She pulled it open, eyes wide with either excitement and fear.

"Doctor!" Marianna exclaimed as she saw the Doctor walking towards the TARDIS door, looking exactly the same as the last time she saw him. "You...you're here!" She threw her arms around him. He was real and stood stiff and awkward underneath her embrace for awhile. As she unwillingly began to cry though, he hugged her back. Mari didn't know if she was scared, relieved, confused, or all at once, but it felt good to cry.

"What's wrong?" He asked her concernedly, "I was just coming out to help with the silence."

"What?!" Marianna asked, "That was months ago! Like 4 months ago!"

"What d'you mean?" He asked, pulling away to look her in the eye, "I just saw you a moment ago."

"How...how can that be possible?" I asked, wiping my eyes.

"I don't know," he said, "but I don't like it."