Fanfiction: To Be Titled Later~
Tea with her mother is a fact of life for Amy Pond; today they sit around the table in the back garden, sipping her mother’s favorite blend.
There’s a flash and a sound like quiet thunder, and Tabetha looks around, frowning.
“But the weather’s been so nice today…” Amy hears her mumble as River slips through the gate to join them.
“Sorry I’m late,” she calls, “I brought someone to see-oh. Hello.”
River stops abruptly, staring at Tabetha. “River!” Amy finally manages to get out. “You’re-I’m sorry, I didn’t expect you today.”
“Didn’t you?” River asks, smiling opaquely, “I must have got the date wrong. And Mrs Pond, it’s lovely to see you, you look smashing. Should I come back another time?”
“No-no, of course not!” Amy protests immediately. Her mother won’t appreciate how far River has to come to visit, or how rarely she does, but Amy will not miss out on this opportunity.
River’s smile is understanding. “I’ll be back in just a moment, then. I’ve brought someone to visit you.” She flits back through the gate and around the side of the house, and Amy turns back to her mother.
“You might have introduced us, dear,” Tabetha says, huffily.
“Sorry Mum,” Amy replies, automatically. “I’ll just-I’ll be right back? Only I’ve got to check something.” She dashes up the stairs to her room and fumbles about under the bed until she finds the slim blue diary she keeps for just such purposes. There is a date marked there-six years in her future. Even as she watches, it fades and blurs and then appears crossed out, with a new date written next to it. Today.
She liked time travel so much more when she was the one showing up at the wrong time because of it.
She makes her way downstairs a little more slowly, wondering what will happen. River knows her mother, of course-she spent almost half her childhood at Amy’s house, playing games and eating Tabetha’s homemade cookies. It’s jarring to think that she must have known, the entire time, that Tabetha was her grandmother.
So the only difference today, really, is Amy herself. Now she knows that she’s having tea with her mother and her daughter. Quite a family reunion, she thinks, and cringes. It’s still too soon after-after everything-and she wants nothing more than to Not Be Here.
She opens the back door and slips out into the garden, where River and Tabetha are already chatting.
“River was just telling me about her life as an archaeologist,” Tabetha says, clearly quite taken with River already. River turns to smile, a little tightly, at Amy, but Amy is too distracted by the toddler on her hip to notice. There can be no mistake; she has the same lovely dark hair and eyes that are very definitely his.
She can’t breathe.
“Amy,” River says, setting the girl down and moving quickly towards her, “I was just introducing her to my daughter.” She manages to slip her arm through Amy’s before she can collapse, and whispers, “I’m so sorry, Mum, I meant to get here later, but the vortex manipulator has been acting up… you didn’t know, did -?” River doesn’t finish the thought entirely because she’s busy guiding Amy to a chair, and Tabetha might overhear.
A cup of tea is set down in front of her, rather forcefully.
River picks up the little girl again and balances her on her lap.
“Amy’s told me so much about you, Mrs Pond,” River says, sounding absurdly cheerful. “Why, I feel as if I grew up in your house right alongside her!”
If River winks at her, Amy might actually vomit. The little girl giggles and shifts around in her mother’s lap to get a better view, and Amy finds herself quite unable to do anything but stare back.
“I’m afraid that Celeste takes after her father, she’s quite the handful-” River is saying.
“Blue,” the little girl chirps, and they all focus on her. “Not Celeste.” She sticks her lower lip out as far as she can manage. River, for her part, looks exasperated.
“Her father insists on calling her Blue, and she’s… taken to it.”
“Hello, Blue,” Amy almost whispers, reaching out to offer Blue some fingers to play with. It suits her, much better than Celeste, Amy thinks. Maybe they can save ‘Celeste’ for when company’s over.
“Hi,” Blue replies, scrunching up her pretty green eyes, “You’re very pretty.”
“Amy, why don’t you take Celeste over by the rose bush and play with her for a bit,” River says, casting worried eyes at her. “I’m sure your mother and I can keep ourselves perfectly entertained.”
Amy nods and reaches over to accept Blue from River’s arms. Blue gurgles and curls into her torso, and Amy clutches her, perhaps a little too tightly. She can feel River’s worried eyes as she walks away, and she hears her mother say, “I don’t know what’s gotten into her today-it must be the baby. I keep telling her that she and Rory really should think about settling down and starting a family, but she won’t listen to me…”
“I’m Blue,” Blue repeats, tugging gently at her hair. “Your hair is oranch. What’s your name?”
“I’m your grandmother,” Amy replies, careful to speak quietly so that her mother won’t hear her. There are some things she’d really rather not even try to explain. “But you can call me Aunt Amy if you’d like. I’m really too young to be a grandma.”
“Grandma.” Blue scrunches her nose up and tilts her head as she tries the new word. It’s awkward, holding a child this large-her Melody was still so small when they took her away. Amy shakes her head and focuses on Blue.
“Down,” Blue commands imperiously, and Amy obliges. Blue scrambles over to the rosebush and begins exploring it. Amy watches with a soft smile on her face until Blue grabs a stem and Amy can see the thorn-she reaches to stop Blue before it’s too late-Blue draws her hand away, bleeding. Amy braces herself for the wails of a hurt child.
“Ow,” Blue says, instead, beaming. “They have thorns, Grandma!” she exclaims, loud enough that River and Tabetha turn to look at them.
“Amy has the same color hair as my mother, Celeste probably can’t tell them apart,” River lies, deadpan, from behind her. Blue scrambles into Amy’s lap.
“Why do they have thorns?” she demands.
“Well, to protect the flowers, I suppose,” Amy replies, taken aback. Sometimes her life feels like it moves far too quickly-a wife and then a mother and now a grandmother, all in less than a year.
Blue’s mouth forms an odd little ‘o’, and she scrambles back into the rose bushes, heedless of scratches and bugs.
“She’s two tomorrow,” River says from directly behind her, startling Amy.
“Augh,” she gasps after a moment, holding a hand to her heart. “Don’t scare me like that, River.”
River only smiles.
“She’s two?” Amy asks, as Blue examines a bug in a startlingly scientific way.
River laughs. “I told you she took after him. You ought to see the hats they try on when we go out shopping.”
“But who does she live with?” Amy demands. “You can’t all possibly just… just live on the TARDIS, could you?”
“We could,” River points out, “But, no, we don’t. I’ve got a house, on a nice, safe planet in the Gallian System. I’m, er, taking some unauthorized prison leave until she’s grown. I’ve been working freelance, as an archaeologist.”
“And the Doctor?” Amy asks, her eyebrows drawing together. If he’s left her daughter and granddaughter to fend for themselves, she does not care what she has to do to track him down, she will give him a piece of her mind…
“Oh, he’s around. He visits every night, though sometimes in the wrong order, and when Celeste gets a bit older we plan to take her with us sometimes. He watches her when I have to work. You babysit her for me once a month or so, when both of us are busy-or you will do.”
“Give me a choice,” Amy mumbles, but jokingly.
“It’s alright, yeah?” River says, meeting her eyes. “You’re okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, that’s me, the queen of okay…”
“I’m sorry,” River says. “I meant for you to find out another way.” Amy brushes her apology off.
“But why Celeste? I think Blue suits her much better.”
“Oh, not you too, Mummy,” River says, rolling her eyes. “I didn’t dare to name her Amelia. She’d have ended up being you through some unimaginable time twisting event. And Blue is not a real name.”
“Neither is Doctor,” Amy points out “And your name isn’t actually River. I mean, it is, but…”
“It’s ridiculous.”
“I like it.”
River rolls her eyes and stands. “Your mother will be wondering what we’re talking about so earnestly. We’d better get back to her. Celeste, sweetie, don’t eat any of the bugs. She’ll be fine, Amy, just let her play.”
“These bugs are yucky anyway,” Amy hears Blue say from behind them, and she chokes back a laugh.
Oh, Blue is a Pond alright.