Archive of Our Own ^beta

    The Doctor snapped the TARDIS door open, and the married couple, The Doc and River, walked out the TARDIS, exhausted, and back to their table in Darillium, facing the Singing Towers.

    “That’ll be one for the diary!” The Doctor exclaimed. River chuckled as she brought out her diary and started writing. The Doctor smiled and took his seat while his wife wrote about their most recent adventure in her diary. Filling a page, River turned the page to the next page.

    The last page.

    Doctor Song stared at the diary, now on its last page. Her eyes filled with dread and fear. Her diary was done. No more pages. What could this mean?

    The Doctor, unknowingly, tries to start a conversation.

    “So… how was the view? I made sure that we would get the-...”

    He turned to his wife before he could finish, but he stopped at the sight of his wife, the love of his life (well… two of his lives), crying. Tears trickling down her beautiful and timeless face. Once filled with life, excitement and joy, now filled with sadness.

    “What’s wrong?”

    “My diary…” River explained. “I’m on my last pages.”

    “Oh.” The Doctor said, understanding. He looked away, feeling tears forming in his eyes, not wanting her to see them.

    He sniffed.

    “Are you crying?”

    “No…”

    “You are… yes, you are!”

    “River…”

    “Just like you did, on our first night here, twenty-four years ago.” River deduced. More tears came flooding out. “This is it, isn’t it? Our last night together?”

    “Spoilers.”

    “No. No, no spoilers… tell me, Doctor. Tell me this isn’t it. Tell me this isn’t the last time I see you. Tell me this isn’t our last night. Our last time.”

    The Doctor turned to River, trying to keep a straight face. But no amount of effort could stop a single tear from trickling down his face. River watched as the tear trickled down and gasped.

    This was it.

    River turned away from her husband, tears flooding. Everything has been leading up to here. Her last night with the man she loved. As she cried, she felt a hand gently grab her by her chin, and turn her head towards him. He gazed in her eyes, more beautiful than any galaxy or supernova he has seen in his travels. A sight he would spend all of eternity staring into if he could. And her face, the most beautiful and pure in all of time and space. There she was, his wife, a woman who poets would write poems about, artists would write music for, there she was. He smiled to himself, the luckiest man ever, before leaning in and kissing her.

    River closed her eyes, feeling his old, fragile yet young lips touched hers. His warm lips on hers. He kissed her gently, and she kissed him back. They kissed once more before breaking apart. The Doctor opened his eyes, to see a single tear on her cheek. He leaned in and kissed her cheek, wiping away the tear with his lips, and he looked at her. River looked at him, eyes still filled with sadness, but where there was none, now there was a spark of solace.

    The Doctor smiled, reassuringly. He turned to face the Singing Towers and he felt the head of his wife lean on his shoulder.

    The Doctor glanced at River, sadly looking at her, wishing he did a few things differently in his past life, and this one. He wished that he had more time. More adventures. Something one couldn’t get.

    Unless… you had a time machine…

    “So, one night left.” The Doctor said. “Shall we go on one last trip? For old times’ sake?”

    River looked at him, tempted. One trip could take forever. It could take an eternity and they would still be back for tea. They had twenty-four years on Darillium.

    Well… twenty-four that they knew of, not counting her side trips with The Doctor every few years, of course.

    River thought about it. More time. More time to keep running. To run away from the final page in her diary. In her life. One last chance to escape what was awaiting her, whatever it was.

    But… she couldn’t.

    Happily ever after doesn’t mean forever, it just means time. A sentiment she had twenty-four years ago, and still held onto now.

    River smiled, sadly, accepting.

    “No, sweetie. No. I’m where I need to be. I’m where I want to be.”

    The Doctor and River shared one look, one smile, and he understood her. She nodded and she watched him nod back before leaning back on his shoulder.

    The two watched the sunset on Darillium. The final sunset the two would share. And as they did, River glanced up at The Doctor, her madman with a box, the man who could turn armies with a single word, whose name brought fear to the hearts of his enemies, crying.

    River looked back at all her memories with him. From their first meeting in 1940’s Germany, to destroying all of time and space just for him. Their blood pumping adventure in the Byzantium, to their heartbreaking loss in Manhattan. All of them, an eternity away. And she loved him. She loved him in every single one of them. Every adventure they had together, and even the once they didn’t share. She loved him, never expecting him to love her back. Never seeing herself as someone who someone of great importance to the universe would stop to spend time loving and crying over for stop and cry.

    And yet… he did.

    Maybe she still had her doubts then, but now, this time, this moment, she knew full well that he did. That to her and to him, they were all that really mattered. Not just in this time and space, but in every one of them.

    The Doctor felt River’s hand grab his hand, and he didn’t fight it. He held her hand as she held his, fingers locking onto each other, both never wanting to let go of each other… and this moment.