RPF > Matt/Karen > Stasis
Angst warning time. Because it must be done in EVERY fandom. :DDDD
“Hello,” she says, the first time they meet, all porcelain skin and contradictory fingernails and mischievousness personified.
(It’s not her firm handshake that makes him wince internally, but instead the flash-forward he has of his skin touching hers again, counting her freckles with his mouth.)
“Goodbye,” he says, the day they wrap the first series, unrestrained energy, with flashes and sparks lingering behind him like fireworks long after he’s gone.
(She is far more sluggish, and realizes she relies far too much of him; her battery’s drained, and the only compatible jumper cables just walked off on lanky legs and with a scarf trailing behind him. It‘s frighteningly unsettling.)
“Hello,” she says, this time in surprise, when they run into each other in a restaurant during the break; their bodies are not made up of oxygen and organs, but instead of conflicted minds and uncoordinated limbs, because inevitability lies on the other side of any hug.
(Instead, he removes his coat and scarf, trying to convince himself it’s the heat from the lamps hanging in the kitchen that are making him flush and not her proximity.)
“Goodbye,” he says as the Doctor, and he turns away as Adam calls cut; they mustn’t know that it’s not the Star of Bethlehem leading him to the promised land, but instead her tossing a smile over her shoulder and asking whether or not he’s coming to Beth’s for the Christmas party (canonical holiday months be damned.)
(He nods, muttering about needing to grab something from his trailer, and she’s left to look at the set of a Victorian home, decorated to the hilt for Christmas, being caught between hell and hope -- wanting this so much for them, and yet realizing it’s never to be.)
“Hello,” she says when it’s actually Christmas, identifiable only from the shock of hair on her head, presents piled high for him, his family, and, it seems, everyone who’s ever lived, is living or will live in town.
(The sight of her on the couch with his dad, yellow paper crown crookedly atop her head and a beer in her hand after they convince her to stay awhile, is the best present he gets.)
“Goodbye,” he says, after he drives her home, and there is a beat, one breath, one small moment in time he knows will forever define the rest of his life, and there are a million reasons why they shouldn’t do this, and two why they should ---
(She kisses him and his mouth is sweet and tangy and the whole thing would be altogether perfect if her mind weren‘t screaming at her that this is a huge mistake -- he‘s her best friend, and if this fails, it‘ll fail spectacularly. But the Doctor’s shown Amy so many impossibilities, so many things that cannot possibly be but are, and she tries to grasp hold of that with all her might.)
“Hello,” he says atop her, body thrumming with warm content, and the cocoon around them -- around this -- begins to build with the softest string of trust and friendship.
(She feels the cocoon closing, but it’s not around them; only him, and she hates herself with a ferocity she‘s not sure will ever be duplicated for screwing this up, for hurting him. For believing in the impossible when impossible dreams never come true.)
“Goodbye” is the walk from the bed to the loo, and it’s not supposed to be of shame, but somehow, it feels like it is. Everything’s changed. What if it’s not for the better? What if they’ve just ruined the best thing they had?
(Neither sleep that night, trying in vain to figure out ways to untie the knot they’ve just hopelessly tangled.
They don‘t come up with a single solution.
And then they are in stasis, a holding pattern, surviving meagerly on blind hope.
There‘s only enough to sustain one of them.)
She cannot keep the tentativeness out of her voice when she says “hello” when she arrives in his kitchen one day, for she is uneven having used his key and subsequently swallowing surprisingly bitter domesticity. He’s cooking up a storm and making a gigantic mess -- and not necessarily in that order -- and she sits on the countertop, wine glass in hand, wishing for his ease in this particular life -- hell, just wishing she wanted it.
(He can read her like a book, and across a table of pasta, wine and smothering stillness, knows her walls are back up and he must find words to tell her it’s okay if she wants out -- and words to lie to himself that it’ll be for the best.
He will not beg her to come back if she‘s already halfway out the door.)
“Goodbye” is the slamming of the door after a particularly spectacular row, about what they were, are and could be; asking why he’s tried to wrestle his fears and demons while she’s letting hers devour her -- consume their try at a proper relationship -- and for how right this can feel, why can it also feel so, so wrong? He stares out into the night, unblinking as acceptance washes over him, and knows the apocalypse is nigh.
(She stands outside his flat, key halfway slid into his lock, because for as desperate to reach out to him as she is, to ask him to teach her to fight, her arms are lined with lead engraved with I told you so.
She leaves her key beneath his mat, and uses the white of the moonbeams to indicate her surrender.)
She nods “hello” at the next table read, but says very little to him other than lines; they’re only a few inches apart, and yet it feels like light years. She’s dizzy and falling unchecked into a rocky shaft of consequences. She’s bloody, broken, scarred, and wishes she‘d stayed firm in her truth that he was her best friend and nothing could jeopardize that. But if wishes were horses, she’d be trampled by now.
(He curses himself for going all-in without realizing she didn’t know the stakes of the game.)
He leaves without saying “goodbye.”
(She does not follow.
The world falls out from beneath them.)
“Hello,” she says, the first time they meet, all porcelain skin and contradictory fingernails and mischievousness personified.
(It’s not her firm handshake that makes him wince internally, but instead the flash-forward he has of his skin touching hers again, counting her freckles with his mouth.)
“Goodbye,” he says, the day they wrap the first series, unrestrained energy, with flashes and sparks lingering behind him like fireworks long after he’s gone.
(She is far more sluggish, and realizes she relies far too much of him; her battery’s drained, and the only compatible jumper cables just walked off on lanky legs and with a scarf trailing behind him. It‘s frighteningly unsettling.)
“Hello,” she says, this time in surprise, when they run into each other in a restaurant during the break; their bodies are not made up of oxygen and organs, but instead of conflicted minds and uncoordinated limbs, because inevitability lies on the other side of any hug.
(Instead, he removes his coat and scarf, trying to convince himself it’s the heat from the lamps hanging in the kitchen that are making him flush and not her proximity.)
“Goodbye,” he says as the Doctor, and he turns away as Adam calls cut; they mustn’t know that it’s not the Star of Bethlehem leading him to the promised land, but instead her tossing a smile over her shoulder and asking whether or not he’s coming to Beth’s for the Christmas party (canonical holiday months be damned.)
(He nods, muttering about needing to grab something from his trailer, and she’s left to look at the set of a Victorian home, decorated to the hilt for Christmas, being caught between hell and hope -- wanting this so much for them, and yet realizing it’s never to be.)
“Hello,” she says when it’s actually Christmas, identifiable only from the shock of hair on her head, presents piled high for him, his family, and, it seems, everyone who’s ever lived, is living or will live in town.
(The sight of her on the couch with his dad, yellow paper crown crookedly atop her head and a beer in her hand after they convince her to stay awhile, is the best present he gets.)
“Goodbye,” he says, after he drives her home, and there is a beat, one breath, one small moment in time he knows will forever define the rest of his life, and there are a million reasons why they shouldn’t do this, and two why they should ---
(She kisses him and his mouth is sweet and tangy and the whole thing would be altogether perfect if her mind weren‘t screaming at her that this is a huge mistake -- he‘s her best friend, and if this fails, it‘ll fail spectacularly. But the Doctor’s shown Amy so many impossibilities, so many things that cannot possibly be but are, and she tries to grasp hold of that with all her might.)
“Hello,” he says atop her, body thrumming with warm content, and the cocoon around them -- around this -- begins to build with the softest string of trust and friendship.
(She feels the cocoon closing, but it’s not around them; only him, and she hates herself with a ferocity she‘s not sure will ever be duplicated for screwing this up, for hurting him. For believing in the impossible when impossible dreams never come true.)
“Goodbye” is the walk from the bed to the loo, and it’s not supposed to be of shame, but somehow, it feels like it is. Everything’s changed. What if it’s not for the better? What if they’ve just ruined the best thing they had?
(Neither sleep that night, trying in vain to figure out ways to untie the knot they’ve just hopelessly tangled.
They don‘t come up with a single solution.
And then they are in stasis, a holding pattern, surviving meagerly on blind hope.
There‘s only enough to sustain one of them.)
She cannot keep the tentativeness out of her voice when she says “hello” when she arrives in his kitchen one day, for she is uneven having used his key and subsequently swallowing surprisingly bitter domesticity. He’s cooking up a storm and making a gigantic mess -- and not necessarily in that order -- and she sits on the countertop, wine glass in hand, wishing for his ease in this particular life -- hell, just wishing she wanted it.
(He can read her like a book, and across a table of pasta, wine and smothering stillness, knows her walls are back up and he must find words to tell her it’s okay if she wants out -- and words to lie to himself that it’ll be for the best.
He will not beg her to come back if she‘s already halfway out the door.)
“Goodbye” is the slamming of the door after a particularly spectacular row, about what they were, are and could be; asking why he’s tried to wrestle his fears and demons while she’s letting hers devour her -- consume their try at a proper relationship -- and for how right this can feel, why can it also feel so, so wrong? He stares out into the night, unblinking as acceptance washes over him, and knows the apocalypse is nigh.
(She stands outside his flat, key halfway slid into his lock, because for as desperate to reach out to him as she is, to ask him to teach her to fight, her arms are lined with lead engraved with I told you so.
She leaves her key beneath his mat, and uses the white of the moonbeams to indicate her surrender.)
She nods “hello” at the next table read, but says very little to him other than lines; they’re only a few inches apart, and yet it feels like light years. She’s dizzy and falling unchecked into a rocky shaft of consequences. She’s bloody, broken, scarred, and wishes she‘d stayed firm in her truth that he was her best friend and nothing could jeopardize that. But if wishes were horses, she’d be trampled by now.
(He curses himself for going all-in without realizing she didn’t know the stakes of the game.)
He leaves without saying “goodbye.”
(She does not follow.
The world falls out from beneath them.)