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He’d been right, Jamie thought, when he was first fumbling his way through the forest all those weeks ago, and he’d laid eyes on the big oak tree. It was strange, unnatural, far larger than any other tree in the forest, the scale of it almost unsettling – but it was a comfortable place to rest, all tucked away in the curve of a branch, far from the rest of the world.
The only discomfort about it was his arm, steadily falling asleep where it was half-trapped beneath his weight. He shuffled it out from under him, swinging one leg off the edge of the branch lazily. Vertigo swooped faintly through his stomach when his foot met only empty air, but it was gone in a moment. There was enough room up here that he wasn’t the least bit afraid of falling off.
It had been an easy climb up, too, clambering from one broad branch to another until he was high enough to reach one of the spots carpeted with moss. He’d never been much of a tree-climber as a child, too nervous to reach the heights that the other children did. Here, though, the ground had fallen away beneath him with surprising speed, but falling hadn’t even crossed his mind once. Something about the tree just felt safe, like if he did lose his footing it would bend a limb down to scoop him up before he hit the forest floor, easy as a mother catching a child.
It was hard to believe he’d ever looked at this tree and thought it might be dangerous, or part of a trap.
The Doctor had put him right on that, weeks ago. He’d marched Jamie into the forest and planted his hand on the trunk and said that doesn’t feel like a trap, does it? It was a random eruption of magic, he’d said, turning an ordinary oak tree into something extraordinary. Nothing more, nothing less.
Now, Jamie slapped one palm against the branch beneath him, just to feel that rush of warm energy. The Doctor insisted that he was good at this, somehow, seeing magic and sensing it – but Jamie wasn’t so sure. It wasn’t like he’d ever felt anything like this before, after all, when he’d been out of the Doctor’s forest, out in the real world. And he wasn’t sure how anyone could possibly miss it, if they touched this tree. Just standing next to it felt like stepping into a patch of sunlight, like plunging into a lake in spring and finding it already summer-warm. Anyone would have sunk into the feeling as readily as he did now.
Blowing out a breath of air, he rolled his head to the side, pressing his cheek into the damp squish of the moss. It could only have been a week or two – but it seemed like ages since the Doctor had been here, dragging him around on a whim whenever it took his fancy.
Head still turned, he watched a bird settle on the branch beside his, poking experimentally at the bark in search of bugs, or moss sprigs, or whatever it was looking for. Slowly, carefully, he reached out towards it, whistling soft and gentle like the Doctor had taught him. The bird’s head snapped up, beady eyes narrowing in on him.
It’s alright, he thought, as hard as he could. I’m not going to hurt you.
He knew straight away that it hadn’t worked. You had to think to the bird, the Doctor always said, not start shouting inside your skull, and Jamie hadn’t really worked out the difference yet. But he kept his hand stretched out anyway, just in case he got lucky.
For a long, considered moment, the bird watched him. If it hadn’t been just a blackbird, he might almost have said it was unimpressed, looking at him like he was an idiot. It pecked at the bark beneath its feet again, like it was trying to drive home how thoroughly not-spooked it was – and then it took off in a rustle of feathers, vanishing into the crest of leaves of the lower trees surrounding them.
Huffing, he turned onto his back again, fixing his eyes on the oak’s broader leaves as they waved above him. He was no good at it without the Doctor around.
And he – he missed the Doctor, he really did. More than he’d thought he would. He’d kept well occupied, as the season turned and the garden ripened, fruits bursting into an impossible array of colours too quickly for him to pick them all. The icebox was well-stocked with meat, and he’d taken a day to string up a drying rack for the little fish he’d managed to hook out of the stream. Things worked, now, around the house, where they hadn’t before. It was a wonder that the Doctor had been getting by at all, when he’d clearly never learnt to run things properly. And it was nice, in a way, to have so much space to himself, all the peace and quiet in the world. He’d even caught himself singing, like he hadn’t done since he was back home, working alongside people who knew the same songs. There was nobody here to sing with him, but there were the birds, and the wind through the trees, and that was enough. Maybe he’d been talking to himself a little more than he should, trying a bit too hard to get the birds to come closer, but that was fine. He was fine.
He just – missed the Doctor. All his chatter and buzz and bright, strange energy. All the odd things he did.
But it couldn’t be long, now, he reminded himself. Even if he’d been telling himself the same thing for days, he had to be right at some point. The Doctor would be back soon – and his chest warmed just at the thought of it.
Sinking back down onto the moss, he let his leg kick idly off the edge of the branch again, staring up at the leaves above him. The sunlight was white against the backs of his eyelids whenever he blinked, and he let his eyes slip closed, soaking up the warmth. It was just the time of year where he should be appreciating the good weather while he had it, and he let his whole body fall soft and boneless, until he could almost believe he was floating beneath the clear sky. Sleep was tugging at him vaguely, his limbs turning heavy, and he peeked out at the world in a half-hearted effort to fight it off. It wouldn’t be so bad, he thought, if he did fall asleep here. He had nothing to do, nobody to answer to. In the cradle of the tree, he was warm, and comfortable, and safe.
Beneath him, the undergrowth rustled.
Something in the back of his mind clicked instinctively into alertness, running through a list of all the creatures he’d seen in the forest. Whatever it was, it was heading this way, snapping twigs and shaking branches as it went. Too small to be a boar, but too clumsy to be a fox.
Frowning, he pushed himself upright, scanning the brambles and ferns around the oak. He was safe, he knew, high amongst the branches, deep in the forest – but his heart beat just a little louder anyway, his skin prickling as he woke into high alert. It was probably nothing, he knew that well enough. There was no chance it was anything actually dangerous. No soldier would come this far into the forest. And no villager would think to search for him yet, so early into autumn. He was too deep even for the occasional woodsman or hunter, venturing further from home as the weather cooled and the prey slowed.
Worst case scenario, he told himself, at least he’d be prepared, sitting up like this. And in the best case – well, maybe he’d get to see another one of the forest’s inhabitants. Some kind of deer, maybe, or a noisy wildcat.
In the end, though, it was none of those things. Not a clumsy wild animal, and not an attacker, either.
Instead, a mop of black hair popped out of the bushes, followed quickly by bright eyes and a wide smile. Before he’d even really registered what he was seeing, the Doctor was right there, pushing himself up onto his tiptoes to wave frantically, grinning up at him like he’d never been so glad to see anyone in his life – and every thought in Jamie’s head dissolved automatically into static.
“Jamie!” the Doctor exclaimed, loud enough to send a little huddle of robins fleeing into the air beside him.
It didn’t make any sense, Jamie thought absently, that he was so good at befriending the birds, when he could be so loud. Jamie himself was far quieter and more polite, but they didn’t like him half so much.
“Over here!” the Doctor added – entirely unnecessarily, seeing as Jamie hadn’t taken his eyes off him, drinking in the sight of him greedily like he might fade away at any moment.
“I can see ye,” he called back down, as calm as he could be with a smile tugging insistently at the corners of his mouth. Forcing his eyes away from the Doctor, he pressed his hand over his chest, as if he was still startled. His heart was beating just as fast as before – but it wasn’t fear, anymore. ‘Ye nearly spooked me, makin’ all that racket.”
The Doctor’s face fell into a frown – but he was still pleased as anything. Jamie could see it in the way his cheeks were puffed out to hide the twitching of his lips. “Well,” he grumbled. Hiking his coat up around his waist, he began wading through the undergrowth towards the oak tree. “Don’t look so happy to see me.”
Jamie wasn’t so sure he’d ever been so happy to see anyone, in all his days. There wasn’t a scrap of his bare skin pressed against the tree anymore – but warmth was still seeded in his chest, spreading through him like vines, just as if he could still feel its energy.
“It’s no’ my fault if ye give me a heart attack,” he shot back – though there was no venom in his voice, not really. Just a little tremble that he hoped and prayed the Doctor couldn’t hear. “I’ve changed my mind, ye know. I didnae miss ye at all.”
The Doctor just beamed brighter at that, cobalt eyes crinkling into half-moons. The night sky might almost have descended across the sunny-morning meadow, wide and velvety and comforting, and all Jamie could do was stare, tracing out every crease in the Doctor’s skin, committing him to memory.
“Did you really miss me?” the Doctor asked, delighted – and Jamie had known the answer was yes, of course he had, but he hadn’t really realised just how much until now.
It was like – trying to turn over a pebble, then realising it was a much larger stone, buried in the dirt. You could still push it over with an idle kick, but then you’d be left with a gaping hole in the ground, a void that you hadn’t known about before. And even if you tried to put the stone back in place, it never quite fit right again, the soil never packed in as tightly, no matter how hard you tried.
Still, you could try, just to cover it up – so the only reply he gave to the Doctor was a scoff and a wave of his hand. The Doctor didn’t seem to mind, or to be too fooled, because he just skittered up to the base of the tree, planting his hands firmly against the bark. His head tipped back just a little with the motion, and he swayed from side to side, like he was settling into the rush of energy from the trunk.
Briefly, wildly, Jamie wondered if the Doctor felt the same warmth at seeing him again.
He wasn’t sure he wanted to dwell on that thought too much.
“What are ye doin’ here, anyway?” he asked instead. Swinging his leg over the branch so both feet were dangling off the same side, he peered down at the Doctor. His fingers curled uselessly at the moss, like it could possibly hold him if he slipped – not that he was too worried about falling, even now. Not in this tree, and not with the Doctor here, too. There was nowhere safer in the world. “I thought you’d have – gone tae the house, or somethin’.”
“Oh, I’ve already stopped by,” the Doctor said. Leaning up towards Jamie, he cupped one hand around his mouth, as if he was about to impart some great secret, and as if there could possibly be anyone else around to overhear. “I, ah – I did bring one or two treats home, for us. Just a few things I picked up on the road.” He settled back onto the flats of his feet with a wink. “But then I came looking for you.”
Jamie’s smile had well and truly broken free, now, reigning fully over his face. He ducked his head to hide it – but of course the Doctor was stood below him, in prime position to see it. And judging by the pleased expression on his face, he had seen it. He might as well have been a cat who had jumped up onto the table to find a stray bowl of cream.
And Jamie couldn’t even bring himself to mind, because it was so like the Doctor, down to the tiniest shifts in his expression. The warmth growing in his chest had reached out through his whole body, now, biting at the back of his throat like tears, prickling at his palms and the soles of his feet like embarrassment. He was a stone by a riverbank, the sun sunk deep inside, keeping it warm even long after the light had faded. Or maybe he’d just been sitting up here for so long that he’d become part of the tree, some of its bright energy absorbed into him.
But he was none of that, really. He was human, plain and simple. And he’d just – missed the Doctor.
Was it so bad, really, if he didn’t go to such lengths to hide it?
“Come on, then,” he said, patting the empty stretch of moss beside him. It was a little flattened where he’d been lying on it earlier – but the sprigs were already rising back up, a pillow springing back into shape. “Come on up.”
“Well, that’s very kind of you,” the Doctor said, dipping his head in a funny sort of bow as he braced himself against the lowest branch.
The Doctor was many things, Jamie had spent enough time with him to know that much – but apparently he wasn’t a natural climber, even less so than Jamie himself. The oak had been perfect for Jamie, each branch just the right distance above another, but they seemed just a little too high for the Doctor, leaving him to scrabble furiously with every step up. The ends of his coat flapped oddly around his knees, threatening to trip him up and tip him over as he lurched onto each branch in turn. Every time he reached up, Jamie could see his palms getting redder, skin scraping against the bark. It was odd, somehow, to see the world marking his skin, like he was just as human as Jamie was.
“Are ye alright getting’ up here?” he asked, leaning down just enough that he could have stretched out a hand to meet him.
But the Doctor just batted him away, scowling in that way he did when he was teased – annoyed, but not really, not in any way that would linger. “I’m quite alright,” he said. The effect of it was spoiled a little by how he puffed through the words, all his breath leaving him as he shimmied up onto a fresh branch. “I, ah – I may look older than you – but I looked exactly this old when I was made, you know. And I’m stronger than I look.”
Barely a heartbeat after the words had escaped his mouth, his foot slipped against the branch beneath him, sending him scrambling to right himself with his hands and knees. Jamie just raised an eyebrow at the sight.
“I’m perfectly fine,” the Doctor insisted, already reaching for his next handhold.
And he was, too, collapsing onto Jamie’s branch with a long breath of relief. Jamie hadn’t even climbed particularly high, habit keeping him from reaching from the uppermost branches, but the Doctor still remained slumped over for a moment, catching his breath. With a groan, he started to crawl towards Jamie at last, perching beside him on the moss and swinging his legs back and forth restlessly.
“Aren’t ye magic?” Jamie asked. “Couldn’t ye – ye know – make yourself fly up? Or teleport?”
“Oh, no.” The Doctor shook his head. “No, that’s not, ah – not really my sort of magic at all, I’m afraid.”
Jamie still hadn’t figured out what the Doctor’s sort of magic was, exactly, largely because it seemed to be anything that struck his fancy. It wasn’t as if he had much experience of magic, he supposed – but somehow he was fairly sure that the other wizards he’d been meeting weren’t too sure what to make of him either. Something just told him that the Doctor was singular, no matter what crowd you put him in.
“Ye couldnae even make yourself catch your breath faster?” he prodded.
“No,” the Doctor said, huffing out a breathless laugh. “I, ah – I’ve never tried that, I’m afraid.” He paused, eyes sweeping up and down Jamie, lips pursed in thought. Jamie leaned away from him, frowning under the scrutiny. “How did you go, getting up here?”
For a long moment, Jamie just blinked at him, baffled. “Fine,” he said – but the Doctor’s gaze had settled on a very familiar spot on his thigh, and he realised what he meant. “Good,” he added, more softly. “I mean – it’s been a wee bit stiff, lately, but it always does that. I can manage.”
Whether it might have been better, this year, had the Doctor still been around to brew him tinctures and teas and whatever else he thought might help – he couldn’t say yet. He was looking forward to finding out, and not just because it might take away his really very mild pain.
The Doctor hummed, eyes flickering up and down Jamie like he really was thinking it over. “Has the weather been bothering you?” he asked. “It, ah – it is getting colder, after all.”
He looked so perfectly serious, like nothing in the world mattered more than whether or not Jamie’s leg was giving him trouble. It was – odd, still, but not unpleasant, the way he’d hone in on Jamie like that, look at him like he could see right through him, like the whole world had narrowed down to just the two of them. All the weight of his attention was squarely on Jamie’s shoulders. The scale of it should have been unbearable, but it wasn’t, somehow. More like sleeping beneath someone else’s body, secure in the bone-deep knowledge that there was someone else in the dark with you.
He’d never liked being fussed over, but somehow it wasn’t so bad, when it was the Doctor.
“It’s no’ been too bad,” he said. “But I’ve been a wee bit more sore wakin’ up, now I’m sleepin’ in front of the fire. It’s good an’ warm, but -” Grimacing, he rolled his shoulder. The aches of that morning had long since melted away beneath the sunlight, but he could still summon them up in his mind, if he tried hard enough. “The floor’s no’ so comfortable, with all that wood.”
Or maybe he was just getting old, he thought, long-since-healed injuries settling too deep into his flesh. It had been – longer than he liked to think, since he’d slept on the floor of his childhood home, blankets laid out on the clay floor around the hearth. Maybe the wooden boards wouldn’t have bothered him back then, either.
He glanced over to find the Doctor frowning at him, head tipped to one side curiously, like a dog that hadn’t understood its master’s command. His mouth was ever so slightly open, crooked teeth peeking out behind his lips. “Why, ah – why on Earth would you be sleeping on the floor?” he asked, clearly baffled. “And, ah, in the main room, too – there should be charms on the bedroom walls, to keep the heat in – if they’ve failed, I can fix them quite easily, really -”
And – oh.
It was so easy, having him back, that Jamie had forgotten for a second he’d been gone at all. He’d forgotten that the Doctor didn’t know he’d moved out of the bedroom. Or why.
But the Doctor had forgotten, too, clearly, because he’d let something slip. The bedroom, he’d said. Not your bedroom. And that was the last bit of proof Jamie needed to be absolutely sure.
“I really can fix them, you know.” The Doctor must have taken his silence as – disbelief, maybe, or maybe just free license to keep talking. “But there’s a perfectly good bed in there, Jamie, you, ah – you don’t have to sleep on the floor.”
“Aye, but -” Jamie shrugged. “It’s your bed, isn’t it?”
That made the Doctor stop short, blinking at Jamie. “Ah – yes,” he said, apparently baffled. “It is my bed.”
It was silly, really. How Jamie had never thought of it, all through the summer.
He must have thought – the Doctor must have slept elsewhere, in a room he’d never noticed. Or that he curled up like a cat anywhere he liked, or went out into the forest, or just plain didn’t sleep at all. It wasn’t like he was human. He could have been doing anything, when he vanished at night.
More likely, though, he just hadn’t thought about it at all. The Doctor kept his own hours, and did as he liked, and that was that. It wasn’t any of Jamie’s business if he slept, or if he didn’t, let alone where he did it.
But he’d gotten curious, with the Doctor away. Bold and nosy and scrabbling around for some piece of the Doctor, something to stave off the dawning realisation that being without him felt oddly like cutting off a limb. Poking around the house had yielded no secret rooms, no hidden chambers, no odd little nest in the corner. Just a pile of blankets and a threadbare pillow stowed haphazardly away in a closet, like he’d been dragging them out every night to sleep on the sofa.
If he truly didn’t sleep – there was no point in him having a bedroom at all. It wasn’t like he had guests often.
And the bedroom itself was so clearly the Doctor’s, too, once Jamie bothered to look. Well, the whole house was his, every corner bursting with his trinkets and his scattered, forgotten things, and his energy – but the bedroom was so clearly lived in. Books were laid out on the little table, dog-eared and opened face-down, like he’d only just walked away from them. The dresser had been emptied of clothes, but a few stray shirts and socks were left behind, crumpled rather than folded. The carved branches that ran across its face were worn smooth from day after day of someone brushing up against them, pulling the drawers open. The Doctor had lived in that room, not just left it to gather dust. He’d spent his time there. And one day he’d carried Jamie’s unconscious body inside, laid him down on the bed, and just not gone back.
Now here was Jamie, taking up his space for a whole season. Leaving him to sleep on the sofa of his own house.
He’d tried to sleep in the bedroom again, the night he’d found out. The Doctor was still away, after all. It wasn’t like he was there to use the room. But sleep hadn’t found him, no matter how he contorted himself to lie beneath the covers. So he’d pulled his knife out from under the pillow, gathered his clothes into a bundle, and traipsed off downstairs to curl up in front of the fire’s last few embers.
“Look, I’m – I’m grateful,” he said carefully. The Doctor was still staring at him, eyebrows raised, hands held poised above his lap like he’d forgotten they were there. “But it’s been – ages, now, hasn’t it? An’ I’m recovered, an’ everything.” More than recovered, really. All this fresh air and good produce from the Doctor’s garden must have been agreeing with him. He couldn’t remember ever breathing so deeply, being able to walk so far without his limbs burning. “I’m fine on the floor, anyway,” he added, tossing the Doctor a grin. “It’s no’ like I’ve ever had a proper bed of my own tae sleep in, before this.”
He’d – missed it, funnily enough, when he’d moved down into the living room. Life had always been the clay floor of his parents’ house, the one he should have inherited, should still be living in now. But then it had been the cold ground of army encampments, surrounded by hundreds of other men, the faint stamping of horses and the groaning of the injured filling the air – and then forests and meadows and fallow corners of fields, and finally a straw mattress in his little shack in the village, prickly and stiff and good enough. More than he had ever expected to have for himself. The Doctor’s bed had been a luxury he could never have dreamt of in a thousand years.
Still, the floor wasn’t bad. And there was always the sofa, if the boards got too harsh on Jamie’s bones. It was long past time to give the Doctor’s bed back to him.
The Doctor’s mouth opened and closed, like he wanted to say something – to protest, in some way. “Look, Jamie -” he started.
“It’s fine,” Jamie cut across him hurriedly. “Really, I want ye tae have it back.”
“Oh -” The Doctor wavered for a moment – but the allure of having his room to himself again must have won out, because he sighed, shoulders slumping in defeat. “Oh, very well, then,” he grumbled. “But you are more than welcome to take the bed, should you wish,” he added sternly, wagging a finger to silence Jamie when he opened his mouth to argue. “More than welcome, I said.”
He was staring at Jamie so sternly, like he really meant it – and what was worse, Jamie knew that he did. The Doctor wasn’t the sort of person to offer something like that just to be polite, or because he thought he should. It wouldn’t even occur to him. No, if he was offering, it was because he’d thought of it all on his own. Because he truly cared that Jamie was comfortable in his house.
Guilt spiked through Jamie at the thought, from the pit of his stomach all the way to his throat, stronger than he’d felt in weeks. He’d come here planning to slit the Doctor’s throat, believing him more of an evil spirit than a person – and now here he was, offering to give up his bed for Jamie without even a second thought. Now, more than ever, he couldn’t believe he’d spent so long prowling around the Doctor’s house with a knife in hand.
The knife had come with him, when he’d moved out of the Doctor’s bedroom – but it hadn’t gone back under his pillow. He’d stowed it by the door with his boots, ready to be slung from his waist when he went out, but not to be carried inside. Not where he was safe.
Maybe it wasn’t enough to make up for everything. But it was a start, good enough to loosen the shame coiling in his throat, just enough to breathe around.
“Hey,” he choked out. “What were those treats ye brought back, then?”
He hoped – prayed the Doctor would take the bait, and let him change the subject.
Silence hung in the air between them for a long moment, the Doctor’s mouth hanging half-open like he was debating whether to press the point or let Jamie ignore it. The seconds ticked by, in pounding heartbeats against Jamie’s temples, in the rustle of leaves as a breeze picked up, in the far-off chatter of a bird.
And then the Doctor’s face split into a smile, fond and indulgent, and the weight of that silence dissolved like it had never existed at all.
“Well,” he said, leaning over so his shoulder bumped briefly against Jamie’s. “I shan’t spoil things for you.” Pulling away again, he fixed Jamie with a sharper look, eyebrows raised. “You’ll just have to come back to the house with me to see, won’t you?”
It was firm enough that it might almost have been a command – but somehow, Jamie could see through the smokescreen, down to what it really was. A question. One whose answer the Doctor really wasn’t sure of, for once in his life.
“Aye,” he said, fixing a smile on his own face as he nodded. “I will.”
“Hm.” The Doctor’s expression softened, at that. In fact, the whole of him seemed to loosen, shoulders dropping, feet kicking idly against empty air. There was nothing agitated about the motion, just – busy, as he always was. “I’m, ah – I’m glad to see you again, you know, Jamie.” His voice was softer, too, low and rough like the scratch of his house’s stone walls against skin.
It had been a long time since Jamie had been properly homesick for the sound of someone’s voice – but he knew the feeling well enough to recognise it slipping away now, dissolving beneath the heavy sincerity of the Doctor’s words.
“I’m glad tae see you, too,” he confessed. He hadn’t really meant to tell the Doctor so, not in as many words – but he felt a good bit less silly about it, now the Doctor had said it first. “I missed ye.”
The Doctor hummed. He was still relaxed, still soft – but one hand was spread out in his lap, the other tracing endless circles against his palm, and that was agitation, Jamie thought. Something was still biting him.
“I, ah – I wasn’t sure if I’d see you again, you know,” he said at last, eyes fixed on the constant movements of his hands. “I – wasn’t sure if you’d still be here when I got back.”
It shouldn’t have been surprising. Jamie had hardly done a good job of hiding it, the fact that he was thinking of walking away while the Doctor was gone. But still, the fact that the Doctor had thought about it – had worried, if Jamie dared to read his words that way – the chill morning air was awfully hard to breathe, suddenly, catching cold and sharp and metallic at the back of his throat.
And it wasn’t as if the Doctor was wrong. He nearly hadn’t been here, after all. Every day, he’d woken up and wondered is now the time? Is this the day I should pack up and leave it all behind?
Doubly so, once he’d finally realised he’d been sleeping in the Doctor’s bedroom. His own guilt had filled the house like a miasma, and he’d nearly walked out just to stop himself from choking on it. All his fear that the Doctor would give him away, hand him over, betray him somehow – it had all turned to deep, burning shame. The Doctor wouldn’t do that to him, not in a thousand years, but he’d been ready to take the Doctor’s life. He’d thought about it, planned it, tried to convince himself to do it, for far longer than was right.
He should never have come here. He should never have taken up this quest. It would have been better, if he’d never encountered the Doctor at all. Then the rotted fruits of his own bitter cowardice would never have been laid out before him like this, all the more repellent under the light of someone so brightly, unfailingly good.
But he had come here. He’d met the Doctor, grown to care about him. If it had been someone else – maybe they would have struck down the Doctor the moment they saw him, and never given him the chance to prove he wasn’t what people thought.
So maybe it was better for the Doctor, that it had been him. And maybe this was his punishment, seeing all his sins so clearly, letting himself be swallowed by them.
Yet – every time he had gone to leave, whether it be from fear or shame – something had held him back.
Now here was the Doctor himself, saying he was glad Jamie was still here. That he’d feared the alternative, that he’d worried about it. And looking at him now – however hard he tried, whatever dark thoughts he attempted to dredge up, Jamie couldn’t bring himself to doubt that he’d made the right choice.
What sort of a life would he have had, after all, if he’d gone back out into the world?
He might have found another village. Maybe he would have thought to change his clothes before he approached, this time, and warded off some of the stares, at least until he opened his mouth. The work might have been better, or it might have been worse. He might have settled down, made friends, lived until he didn’t have to be afraid anymore, until the soldiers had found someone else to shoot at. He might have built a life for himself.
But he wouldn’t have belonged. He would have lived his life on the outside, in his own heart if not in the eyes of others.
He still couldn’t have gone home.
And – the thought came unbidden, without warning, striking him like a blow to the back – there wouldn’t have been the Doctor, either.
In the end, it didn’t matter. He hadn’t left. And, somehow, the Doctor hadn’t wanted him to.
Shifting a little so he was half-turned towards the Doctor, he mustered up a smile. It came easier than he expected, pulled from some well of relief within him.
“I’m here,” he said, like the Doctor didn’t know that. Like he had to be reminded.
Like – when the Doctor had been standing at the base of the oak tree, before, waving and calling out, like he wanted Jamie to be absolutely certain he was back. Like Jamie had needed the proof of it, even if he hadn’t taken his eyes off him the whole time.
And sure enough, the Doctor didn’t seem to think his words were useless, swivelling around to face Jamie, too. “You’re here,” he echoed, a little breathily, like hearing it was a relief.
Another moment hung between them. Another silence. This one wasn’t quite so sharp, the two of them smiling at each other – but it set something crawling beneath Jamie’s skin all the same. Something about it was just too soft, too comfortable, an inviting pit he didn’t want to fall into.
Not yet. Maybe not ever.
“So,” he said, just a little too loudly – and just like that, the moment was shattered. If the Doctor minded, he didn’t show it, sitting up a little straighter and smiling a little wider. “How was your meetin’, then?”
“Oh -” And now he had the Doctor set off, distracted properly. His head tipped back, hands waving wildly as he spoke. “Well, it was much as I expected – one or two useful things, rather a lot of bother, mostly boring – but -” He heaved out a great sigh, eyes rolling so hard that his whole head tipped over.
He was truly gone now, Jamie thought with a smile, about to rant until he was done. Warmth flooded back into his chest at the way he knew that, at the fondness that came with it, filling up every gap left by his guilt.
“My esteemed colleagues from the south truly don’t appreciate anything that doesn’t come from one of their books,” the Doctor went on, “let me tell you – and if someone happens to tell them that they’re outdated – or, ah, heavens forbid, wrong…”
Pressing his hands into the moss behind him, Jamie let himself lean back, watching the Doctor almost as much as truly listening to him. The sun was soft against his cheeks, and the breeze was full of the sounds of the forest, and the tree was firm and safe beneath him. The Doctor was here, bright and loud and full of life, just as if he’d never left.
And – Jamie was here, too. Right beside the Doctor, like he belonged there.
Startlingly, frighteningly, wonderfully – he was almost starting to believe he did.