(Untitled)

[thedoctorwho]

The Doctor is sitting in a booth by the Window staring down into his teacup. He dropped Martha back at home to visit her family. He felt like he needed to be alone, but if that were true, why did he come here

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[riversinger]

She's prepared for the sight of him this time, though she can't deny there is still an ache in her chest when she looks at him.

But Dr. Song is looking at the world through new eyes today. And his scent also echoes that ache. Inevitably, her curiosity gets the better of her.

"You look like someone who needs chocolate. Or at the very least, a fresh cup of tea." The wink is genuine, if a bit cheeky.

[thedoctorwho]

His head jerks up, surprised. He'd been lost in thought.

There's something familiar about the woman. He frowns, not able to quite place it.

He notices, apparently for the first time, how cold his tea has gotten. "Ah. Yes. It's definitely not worth drinking now."

[riversinger]

She can scent his confusion, and her heart falls a little. No matter.

"Shall I get you another -- ?"

There is a word missing, truncated from the end of the sentence. She swallows the habitual endearment, locks it away.

[thedoctorwho]

The Doctor considers for a moment, then shakes his head. "Don't trouble yourself. I probably won't drink that one either. I ordered it out of habit, but I don't think it's going to be much good this time."

[riversinger]

"Mmm. So it's serious, then. Perhaps something it bit stronger?"

She slips into a chair opposite him, studying his features. She's also trying to catch more of his scent on the tumbling air currents of the bar. It's a new piece of information about the most mysterious person she's ever known.

[thedoctorwho]

"Bar makes a good Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster," he says, half-joking. Well, half-trying-to-joke.

"No, I don't think that's going to be much use, either. Thanks for the offer, though."

[riversinger]

"Personally, I'd skip the drink at that point and go straight to the brick of gold wrapped in a slice of lemon, but that's just me. You on the other hand --," she ponders for a moment. "Oh."

"You had to leave someone behind again."

[thedoctorwho]

Softly. "Something like that."

He doesn't question the 'again'. She obviously recognizes him, so she might come from a universe where he's fiction. He's met a couple of the Harry Potter kids, after all.

[riversinger]

She makes a quiet, sympathetic noise. A hand gesture is made to a passing wait rat, the universal signal for 'more tea.' That done, she turns her mind to the problem at hand. She remembers these maudlin moods and remembers one of the few things that could cheer him afterwards.

"Tell me about them?"

[thedoctorwho]

And that may just be why he came here after all.

"Her name was Joan," he began. "And I loved her."

It seems to surprise him that he said it out loud.

He backs up a bit, voice dull as he explains, not looking at her. "I was being hunted. To escape, I hid on Earth, just before the Great War. Locked away the Time Lord part of myself and became human. That human me met Joan and fell in love with her."

He swallows back a lump.

"The hunters tracked me. Found me anyway. I had to give up that human life, become the Doctor again, to stop them. It wasn't the same, then. The man Joan loved, the man who loved her in return, had died to bring me back. That was a gulf too large to cross. So I left. 'Time to be moving on,' I said. Just like always."

[riversinger]

River, for her part, listens. (There is a distant memory of her telling him, half in jest, "A life as long as yours, love, I know I'm not your first love, nor will I be your last. I'll simply have to content myself that I was the best.")

She knows now who it was she met in the bar the other night. His human form, free from the weight of all his years.

"There will be others, you know. As much as you might like to think it, you know you're not alone."

[thedoctorwho]

You are not alone. The Face of Boe's words echoed by this woman.

"Maybe," he says finally. "Maybe I'll even want there to be someday. At this moment, I'm not so sure."

Two losses, so close to each other. Loss is what his life has become. Its defining quality, it seems.

[riversinger]

"Trust me, pretty boy. You're very much like me in that regard. The idea of being alone is more of a fright to you than even the Vashta Nerada themselves."

She quirks an eyebrow at him as she sips her tea. She's no stranger to loss herself.

[thedoctorwho]

"Better to have loved and lost, you mean? You're probably right. Just doesn't feel that way right now is all."

[riversinger]

"It never feels that way. That's an empty platitude spewed by greeting card writers."

She pushes his tea cup at him as she continues in a gentle voice.

"When we love, we love with every fibre of our being. And that love doesn't end simply because we lose someone. It simply changes. Slips into another room, listens to old love songs and writes sappy poetry. But it never, ever goes away."

[thedoctorwho]

He nods. "It's in here somewhere. Everything he was, everything he felt. Tucked away like the fragments of a dream."