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Yaz sat on her bed, trembling. She wasn’t sure if Dan had burst in at the right or wrong moment, but her brain had used the opportunity to pull her from a situation for which she had been secretly wishing for 3 years. Her consciousness had no input as she rushed off to usher Dan in the right direction towards the bedrooms. It hadn’t helped her that he appeared to have noticed that he’d interrupted something and spent the whole of the walk apologising profusely whilst she tried to shrug it off as not important.
However, they had just spent three years trapped in the early 1900s, and however hard she had tried to hide her feelings about the Doctor, she knew he wasn’t daft. She had been able to tell from his responses and comments at various times that he saw more than he was letting on.
“I’ll make it up to you, you wait,” Dan had said as she’d opened a door into a random bedroom. She could have chosen Ryan or Graham’s old rooms, knowing they had picked particularly impressive ones. But even now, after all the time that had passed since they left, it didn’t feel right to give their rooms to someone else. And anyway, Dan seemed suitably impressed with the room behind the door and pushed past her to walk around inside, taking in the features.
“This is brilliant, Sheffield, it’s bigger than my whole house!” he chuckled, which Yaz was about to brush off as an exaggeration until she remembered that his house was now approximately 5cm high and couldn’t stop herself snorting in laughter.
“I knew I could make you laugh,” he said smiling kindly and walking back to nudge Yaz with his shoulder. “And I really am sorry for interrupting,” he continued, causing Yaz to protest once again that he hadn’t interrupted anything and only prompting him to believe even more that he absolutely had.
Feeling her face begin to warm, she had hastily closed the door and headed round the corner to her own bedroom, sinking slowly onto the end of the bed before allowing her brain to attempt to digest anything.
She didn’t even notice she was trembling at first, given that her brain had basically just been shouting incoherently for what felt like several minutes. When she realised, though, she rubbed her eyes and tried to regain control of herself. Her rational side wanted to look more objectively at what had just happened in the console room, but the entire of the rest of her being could only picture the Doctor’s face: tears threatening to spill, eyes feeling like they were gazing into the very depths of her soul, mouth open, so close, so close, a tiny fraction of movement causing Yaz’s brain to scream “She’s going to kiss you!” before Dan had charged in.
The Doctor had startled and plastered on the kind of fake grin that was meant to say “Oh hello nothing to see here carry on…” and which only ever really said “You have interrupted at a VERY inopportune moment when something intimate was about to happen”. She might as well have just blurted out, “We weren’t about to kiss…” thus making it abundantly clear they had, in fact, been about to kiss.
But had they? Yaz’s brain was in panic mode and on the one hand was telling her that she was an idiot and there was absolutely no way whatsoever the Doctor was going to kiss her, what utter nonsense! On the other hand, it was also still extremely preoccupied with the image of the Doctor right before Dan had intruded. It had certainly not seemed the face of someone having a chat with their friend, having a bit of banter, who wasn’t thinking about doing something a whole lot more intense within moments.
Yaz could feel herself spiralling again and stood up, shaking her arms out to try and clear her head. She took a deep breath and blew it out slowly, deciding that what she really needed was a hot drink and an early night. The past few years had been some of the most challenging in her life (apart from THAT year, the one she’d never mentioned to the Doctor, the one that had created an unbreakable bond between her and Sonya despite all their superficial bickering). For what was probably the first time since before the discovery of the Flux, there was nothing immediately threatening them, no crisis situation they were in the middle of, and Yaz could finally, finally, let go of everything she had been holding inside.
She changed into some comfortable pyjamas and pulled on a pair of warm, woolly socks and a dressing gown before peering out into the corridor. There was no sight nor sound of anyone, so she figured it would probably be safe to head for the small kitchen near the bedrooms. Dan was either settling into his room or had wandered off and gotten lost in the endless TARDIS corridors (she hoped the TARDIS would safely guide him back if necessary). The Doctor was doubtless busy in the control room as was usually the case. So Yaz padded silently into the kitchen, filled the kettle and sat at the small table waiting for it to boil.
The next thing she knew, a warm hand on her back was gently shaking her, and she realised she had fallen asleep at the table, head on her arms, mortified to note the drool on her sleeve. She rubbed her eyes and realised it was the Doctor crouched next to her who had woken her up, her hand still on Yaz’s back as she looked intently into Yaz’s sleepy eyes. Yaz’s brain was too befuddled to worry about anything, and the Doctor instead took action, gently taking her hands and pulling her to her feet.
“Come on, sleepy, let’s get you to bed,” she smiled, wrapping an arm around her waist to accompany her back towards her bedroom. Yaz was still too full of sleep for her brain to panic at all about any of this, and instead she let herself simply feel warm and safe as they shuffled into her room. The Doctor pulled back the covers on the bed, gently pushed Yaz down and bent to lift her feet up. Yaz relaxed into the soft mattress and couldn’t help but chuckle as she was literally tucked under the covers. The Doctor sat on the edge of the bed next to her. “What’s so funny?” she quizzed with raised eyebrows.
“You taking care of me!” she replied, stifling a yawn.
“Why is that funny?”
“I don’t know, it’s nice though.” Yaz was mortified to see the Doctor’s smile fade away.
The Doctor took one of Yaz’s hands in both of her own and looked down at it to avoid looking into her eyes.
“Well I think you’ve earned a bit of being looked after,” she said quietly. Yaz didn’t respond, and the Doctor added, even quieter, “Three years...”
Neither spoke for a few moments, the reassuring hum of the TARDIS filling the space between them. Then the Doctor squeezed Yaz’s hand and looked back at her, a smile once again pulling at the corners of her mouth.
“Will you stay until I’ve fallen asleep?” Yaz asked softly. She was enjoying being with the Doctor like this, with her critical brain still switched off, and wanted to make the most of it.
“Of course,” whispered the Doctor.
“You look tired, too. You can lie down, there’s plenty of room,” Yaz couldn’t quite believe she was saying that out loud, but before she could try and take it back, the Doctor had pulled off her boots and had scooted around to the other side of the bed to lie down, on top of the covers.
As the Doctor lay there, looking up at the high TARDIS ceiling, Yaz shuffled on her side to watch her, bootless but otherwise still fully dressed, hair fanned out on the pillow. She turned to look at Yaz and they couldn’t help but smile at each other.
Both felt weighed down by what they had experienced in the Flux, but right at that moment, each provided the other with a sense of peace and an ability to forget all that had happened, for now at least. Consequences would inevitably need to be faced, but not until tomorrow.
Yaz wished she could stay awake in this moment forever, but exhaustion was forcing her eyelids to close.
So instead, the Doctor watched her as sleep overtook her, reaching out to brush a strand of hair behind her ear. And then, unexpectedly to her, her own eyelids suddenly felt far too heavy to keep open, so she closed them and allowed sleep to wash over her.