[For the Doctor]

Entry tags:

the doctor

[For the Doctor]

As far as Chase was concerned, there was patience and then there came a point when you weren't being patient anymore -- you were just being silly. He was still letting weeks go by with the Doctor, expecting that any day (any shift), a thesis was going to wind up on his desk so that he could present it to the current group at the Office as well as the Council.

And it still didn't come.

Which meant that patience was fast fading and now he was starting to worry that it was never going to happen. So, instead of just avoiding the subject like he might have done, he was waiting in the living room for the Doctor to return.

And he had the partial work in hand.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The Doctor was whistling as he stomped the snow off his boots. He'd run into a herd of tiny reindeer on the way home, and that was enough to make anyone cheerful. That is, until said person saw his husband's expression, which was hardly as pleasant as terribly cute reindeer eating carrots from your mittened hand.

"Hi," he said simply, waiting for Chase to drop the bomb.

Chase offered a bemused smile when the Doctor got back and reclined back on the couch, partial thesis still in hand. "Hi," he replied in turn, polite enough as he crossed his legs. "So. What do you think happens first? Nate graduates or you finish your work?"

The Doctor raised both eyebrows, inhaling, then exhaling. "I'll finish my work," he said, aware that he'd been saying the same thing for the better portion of a year, if not longer. He stuffed his hands in his pockets. "Seriously."

Chase nodded, flipping through the pages idly as he kicked up his feet on the table. "I mean, we're stable now for staff," he admitted, only barely paying attention to the words. "But I'm speaking more as your husband than your potential boss at this point. Finish something," he pleaded. "Please?"

"I know why I want it done," said the Doctor, sitting down across from Chase...well, more like sinking into the chair across from him. "Why do you, if it's not the potential boss 'going to kill you' kind of thing?"

Chase leaned forward and pressing his forearms on his thighs, watching him carefully. "Because it means you'll have the beginning, middle, and the end of a project. It means you've done something that you can be proud of. That I can be proud of. It means you've left a mark here, in some way."

"I'd like to think I'd left a mark." The Doctor sunk his head down into his palm, then heaved a long sigh. "Look, I just...I don't know how to end it. It's like it's a story without an end, none of us quite merging into human life entirely."

"So don't end it so neatly," Chase said, putting the papers back on the table so he wouldn't set them out of place. "There's no right or wrong answer with the thesis. It's your argument with your proofs and claims. If you can defend a lack of proper integration into human society, it'll fly over just as well. The thesis is just a culmination of your studying, it isn't meant to be a pass or fail exercise."

The Doctor rubbed his forehead, then pinched the bridge of his nose. "I realise that, it just feels like a pass/fail issue," he admitted. "It just feels like once I'm done, I'll be too..."

Too grown up, for a start.

Chase kept waiting. And waiting, but the words never came, so he stood up and perched on the edge of the Doctor's chair. "Too what?" he prodded.

"Erm," said the Doctor, and ran his hands through his hair. "Mature," he finished, looking a bit shifty.

Chase let out a snort at the word, like it was the most amusing thing he'd heard in ages. "You think if you finish some papers, it'll suddenly propel you from being Peter Pan's biggest sidekick to mature? Not the parenting, not the marriage, the thesis?"

"Oh, come on, Rob, I'm definitely not one of the Lost Boys," the Doctor retorted. "If anything, I'm Peter himself." Though the one that had been on the island might not have agreed with him, per se.

"Then I'll have A Job. You know when the last time was that I had a 'real job'?"

"Hundreds of years ago?" he estimates, an innocent and lost look on his face, still not really sure what the problem was. "Doctor, I work one day in the office and whenever I have appointments. That's not a job, it's...a helpful credential."

"Hundreds in my life, millennia of absolute time," the Doctor retorted, but then his face grew a bit more sober, and a bit more lost. "I...I've not had a credential, Rob."

"You know, if you don't want, you don't have to finish. That's an option too, you know. And I'm not saying I'd let you on anyway, I'm saying you could not finish and keep on with whatever you want," he offered, feeling like he had to at least try the option.

"No, I can't not finish," said the Doctor, who was almost offended by the suggestion. "That's just terrible, there's no bloody way. No, I swear, I'll sort it, love. It's just a mental hurdle is all."

"Well, I'm here anytime you need to hurdle anything else," Chase said with a mischievous smirk, losing more and more of his shame by the day, really.

"I know," the Doctor said, not processing what Chase said for a full few seconds as he was still caught up in the idea of 'not finishing'. Then he essentially gawped at him for a moment. "Oh," he said, then cleared his throat. "Erm...oh. You cheeky little..."

Chase smirked at that, unable to help his little quirk of his brows, amused by his own daring and a little ashamed at how cheap and tawdry he sounded, slightly. "What, it's been a while," he said, almost nonchalantly and passively as he shrugged his shoulders.

The Doctor looked over at him, grinning slowly but steadily by the moment. "It has, hasn't it?" he said, eventually getting up from where he was sitting, then perching where he could lean over Chase and look him in the eye from above.

Chase retained his look of innocence as he stared up at the Doctor, almost like he was challenging him to do something. "Nate's at the children's office, seeing as I dropped him there when I picked up all your work."

Leaning over further, the Doctor kissed him slowly, just for a moment, before pulling back a few centimetres to grin at him. "So we have some time, then, without the parenting thing?"

"We have some time," Chase agreed with a daring grin, leaning in for another slow and perfectly long kiss, exhaling as he grabbed the Doctor's shirt to yank him closer. "C'mere."

Laughing, the Doctor complied, enjoying the shirt grab most of all. "Not even going to move this upstairs?" he asked, hands sliding up under Chase's own shirt to get it loose, potentially off as soon as he could do so.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject