Baby Just Say Yes
Relationship: 12th Doctor x Reader
Warnings: brief mention of drowning - but not graphically described, and some spoilers for War and Peace (the book, although I suppose it would apply to the TV show as well, since they're the same story)
Word Count: 2,704
Summary: When you, Bill, and the Doctor debate the merits of how many doughnuts are too many, it accidentally leads to a revelation on an event you hadn't actually known had happened.
Request: Bill finds out that the reader is "married" to Doc and at some point Bill jokes calling the two her grandparents
A/N: I took the route of reader knowing the Doctor for years and years, just so it was easier to justify the nature of the Doctor and readers relationship. As a result, it's got some implied past 11 x Reader. Hope that’s okay!
Your finger trailed along the spines of the collection of books on one the shelves in the second level of the console room. You paused when your eyes landed on a familiar novel, one you had yet to crack open, but really wanted to. If so you could boast to the Doctor that you'd read it.
War and Peace.
1,225 pages. The Doctor had never had the patience for it. You took the novel out from the shelf, only for a plume of dust to pool into the air. It tickled your nose, making it itch.
Then you sneezed.
You rubbed your finger along the base of your nose in a vain attempt to scratch it, and narrowed your eyes at the dusty bookshelf. The Doctor had said he was going to dust it.
A muffled voice spoke from below, it took you a moment to place what was said, but you were pretty sure it was ‘bless you’.
You were on a planet the Doctor and you had discovered in his last face, back when he had been younger, had a longer chin, and was far more obsessed with sweets. It was famous for its doughnuts, the best in the galaxy, the Doctor had decided.
And that decision had stuck, since, when the Doctor had told Bill about the planet, she had decided that they absolutely must go.
You poked your head over the bannister and locked eyes with Bill. She was holding a doughnut in her mouth, and her hands were full balancing two trays. You realised it must have been Bill who spoke, because the Doctor was only now coming in, holding a near empty tray of doughnuts in one hand.
“Hey,” you said, and you placed your book on one of the chairs before hopping down the stairs. “You two get enough?”
Bill snorted, dropping her boxes onto the console and taking a bite out of her doughnut. “Not even. He,” she nodded towards the Doctor. “Has already eaten nearly every single one out of that box.”
Your eyebrows flew into your hairline, and you snatched the box out of the Doctor’s hands. You waved the Doctor away when he protested, and instead eyed the boxes contents. There was a single doughnut left. Out of nine doughnuts, and only one was left. It was round, with no hole in the middle, and a good layer of icing sugar sprinkled on top.
You raised an eyebrow at him. “Feeling sick yet?”
The Doctor raised his own eyebrow at you, and you knew, instinctually, that it was more effective than yours. “You do not get to lecture me on health.”
It was a weak rebuttal.
“You’ve had eight of them Doctor,” you took the final doughnut out of the box. “Eight.”
He snatched it out of your hand, and your face fell. “Timelord,” he replied, and then took a large bite out of the final doughnut. The Doctor immediately winced, then hissed. He pulled the doughnut away with a frown, and you saw the remnants of hot jam on his lips.
A swell of vindication ran through you, and, under the guise of wiping some of the jam off, you took the doughnut off of him. You let the air cool the jam slightly, not wanting to burn yourself too. “Eight,” you said again. “Is more than enough.”
“The very basics of my physiology are different,” he gestured to both his hearts for good measure, then tried to reach for the doughnut, you were ready though, and you held it out of reach. “I’ll be fine.”
“Just because you've got two hearts,” you said. “Doesn't mean you've got two stomachs. At the very least you'll get indigestion.”
And with that you took a hungry bite out of the very doughnut he had just stolen from you. It was good, they’d made it with raspberry jam, and the stark taste of the sharp raspberry against the sweet sugar warmed you. You gave him a satisfied smirk, and turned to Bill. “What about you, what’s yours?”
Bill had been watching you both, her head swinging between you like she was watching a tennis match. She had just bitten into her doughnut, and she looked slightly stunned that you had spoken to her.
“It’s really good,” she said, but her mouth was full so it sounded more like ‘ts r’lly gud. She swallowed, then continued talking. “Can’t remember what they said this one was,” and she turned to the Doctor, holding the doughnut up so both you and the Doctor could see its contents. It was filled with a rich purple paste. “What’s supposed to be in it?”
“Ube,” the Doctor said coolly, and he shuffled over to your side. You sidestepped him, taking another bite of the doughnut. He wasn’t getting it that easily. “It’s from the Philippines, traditionally.”
“We should’ve gotten more,” Bill said. “I think these are my favourite so far.”
This was the beauty of this planet, they were obsessed with Earth doughnuts, so they’d preserved every culturally significant recipe that Earth had, 1,893 – the Doctor had counted. They even had cronut’s, of all things, though you’d yet to try them.
The Doctor scowled at the other two boxes, and you stepped carefully in front of them.
“I chose a new book,” you said, which was a blatant redirection of conversation, but you powered through. “One I’m sure you haven’t finished.”
From the corner of your eyes, you noticed Bill was watching the pair of you again, as if a spectator of a sport.
The Doctor studied you carefully, and you knew he was humouring this new conversation. “That’s an unlikely assumption.
“War and Peace,” you said, with only a small hint of pride.
The Doctor cocked his head to the side, considering it. “You’re right, actually. I got bored once the Anatole and Natasha affair got going. Couldn’t visit the opera for a couple decades either.”
Your face fell.
Bill spluttered. “Did you just spoil it?”
The Doctor waved a hand. “The book's over 150 years old. If Y/N doesn't know about the ending by now then that's not really my fault.”
You vaguely heard Bill breathe out an Oh my God.
“That's one of the most arrogant things you've ever said,” you said, still processing the shock of how he had so simply said what he had. “And I once listened to you drone on for an hour on how you choreographed the macarena.”
“I did that in a different face though, younger, more nimble. I’ll have to tell you about how I taught Claude Debussy how to shred.”
“Like, on the guitar, or in the ocean?” Bill asked.
“Yes,” the Doctor said, and then he went to grab for the rest of the doughnut in your hand.
“Oh no,” you said, side-stepping him. “No more, especially not after you spoiled the book for me.”
“That’s ridiculous,” he said. “It’s not like I told you how Andrei dies in a gruesome battle against the French, and Natasha coincidently finds herself by his side as he dies on his deathbed, even though they’d long parted. Honestly.”
Your eyes bugged out of your skull, you could feel it, as though they were ready to up and roll away.
“Is Andrei an important character?” Bill asked slowly, and then, she meekly added. “I haven’t seen the show.”
You spoke very slowly, your voice low. You narrowed your eyes to the Doctor. The death of a major character was a pretty big spoiler. “I cannot believe you.”
The Doctor winced slightly. “I just rambled like I was 900 years old again, didn’t I?”
“At least,” you breathed. You swallowed your exasperation, and then, suddenly, you sneezed. It was loud, like it had to announce itself to the world, and you rocked backwards slightly. You sniffled.
“Bless you,” Bill said again, but her mouth was full, so it sounded like ‘bleshooo’.
You gave her your thanks, then turned to the Doctor, your mind going to the reason why you were sneezing in the first place. “Dusting,” you said. “You haven’t dusted yet. You said you would.”
The Doctor waved a hand. “I will, I’ll get round to it.”
“You offered, Doctor,” you continued, and in the back of your mind, you wondered if it sounded like you were nagging him . “No one asked you to do it, Nardole didn’t even ask. You offered.”
“You’re in a mood,” The Doctor said suddenly, and he leaned forward, so his big nose was almost against yours.. “Are you sick?
“I – what, no, I’m not sick,” you said, and you stumbled back suddenly. His eyes were so large, so close, and it was momentarily disarming. “You can be so infuriating sometimes, you know that?”
“You tell me constantly.”
Bill’s face grew into a large, delighted grin. “Oh my God,” she said. “You're like an old married couple.”
You turned to her, stunned. Or course, you were with the Doctor, but the idea of being married to him… well, he had done it, you knew he had, you’d been there, several years ago now when he’d had a different face with a long chin and an affinity for custard.
It certainly hadn’t been to you, though.
Of course, time had been broken and you’d been wearing an itchy eyepatch, but schematics.
You’d also seen the Doctor, a much younger face, one you had never travelled with, marry Queen Elizabeth the first. You’d been a ring bearer. It had been too fun teasing all three of faces of the Doctor that day for it.
But no. You had certainly never married him.
It wasn’t as if you didn’t want to, quite honestly, the thought had never crossed your mind. You had been so content in your relationship with him, how sure it felt, how right it was, that you’d never thought about anything more.
The Doctor, too, gawked, but for an entirely different reason. "You called me old.”
Bill glanced up and down the doctor's frame, which was enough to make her point.
“Fine,” the Doctor grumbled. “I'm old.”
“How are we like an old married couple?” You pressed, because the Doctor was not getting the key part of Bill’s statement.
“The bickering,” she said. “It's totally what couples do.”
You gaped and turned to the Doctor for some sort of guidance. You waited for him to shut it down. To laugh and just say it was because you were comfortable around one another. Instead, the Doctor only shrugged. "I mean,” he said. “Technically we are married'
You did a double take. Married. You were, apparently, already married to the Doctor.
What?
Bill gasped. “What - no, since when? Why didn't you tell me?”
“Yeah,” you said, finding your voice. “I'd quite like to know too.”
Bill turned to you. “Wait what do you mean?”
“This is news to me,” you continued. “We're married? Where was my something old and something blue?”
The Doctor gestured to himself, then around the console room - the TARDIS. So those were, apparently, the something old and something blue. A bit on the nose.
He raised an eyebrow, and you wondered if your expression was as confused as you felt. “On the foreshore of Tralite,” he prompted. “With the Arhkor embassy.”
That... that hadn't been a wedding. Had it?
You mind went back to that evening, so many years ago now, back when you had been travelling with Clara, back when the doctor knew who Clara was. Your heart clenched for a moment, you didn't think about those times often. You felt alone in those memories, like you were the only one who held them, could cherish them.
But you remembered, quite clearly.
Here's what had happened:
Every decade, the Arhkor would sacrifice a person with renowned intelligence to the foreshore of Tralite, a beach that was more pebble than sand. The sacrifice would sit in the water until they drowned, and their memories would be recorded into the water. Living memory, the Doctor had said.
But the sacrifice that year, a young girl named Ardiel, whose bright purple hair had matched her purple scales, had been so young, and she hadn’t wanted to die.
So the Doctor, in all his foolish martyring glory, had marched out into the sea himself.
And of course, you couldn’t let him do that, so you followed.
“That wasn’t a wedding,” you said. “You were trying to sacrifice yourself to an ocean.”
You remembered it, your hand clasped in his, and the water settling over you both. You hadn’t been scared, which, in hindsight, terrified you. You should have been scared, but you weren’t. You had felt calm, at ease, safe even.
You couldn’t remember exactly why you had both been spared, but the water washed away, leaving you both wet and cold – but alive. And the water had never asked for another sacrifice since.
“It was a marrying of the minds,” The Doctor said, enunciating the words like he was trying to drill the meaning into your brain. “The water had been the officiant.”
“This is so weird,” Bill said, and she took another bite out of her doughnut.
You found yourself agreeing with Bill. “Doctor, that makes exactly zero sense.”
“The water had found something worth more than intelligence,” the Doctor continued. “It had found love. So when it copied and pasted our minds, that’s all it found. It unified us. It was a wedding.”
You rubbed your forehead with your fingers, trying to process this.
“I gotta say,” Bill commented, and she’d finished the doughnut she had been eating and was now fishing another out of a box. She pulled out a brown doughnut that was an oval shape with a silt down the middle. “I dunno how many people can say their grandparents got married by an ocean.”
“Ox-tongue,” the Doctor said, and he nodded to the pastry in Bill’s hand. Then, he considered her statement. “And that’s true, you should use that. It’s a good pick up line, should impress a girl or two.”
Bill scrunched up her face. “Okay, one; Ox tongue? Seriously? That can’t be right.”
The Doctor shrugged. “It’s Cantonese. A friend once told me about it. Apparently it references the shape of the dough. That being said, it might also be horse ears.”
“Okay,” Bill raised a sceptical eyebrow. “I’ll maybe half trust it, because it doesn’t sound right, but I don’t know enough to prove you wrong,” she paused before speaking again. “Also, two; I don’t think those two can get mixed up. Three, I’m never, ever using that as a pick up line. Not ever. It’s terrible.”
Thankfully, the Doctor was so focused on Bill’s last point, that he disregarded what she had said earlier. “It’s an excellent line! You’ll get to teach the girls something new!”
“Sorry, circle back,” you said, because your brain wasn’t computing. You weren’t even sure what you needed to address first. The marriage comments? The grandparents comment? The ox tongue?
Both Bill and the Doctor looked to you expectantly.
You pointed to the Doctor. “First of all, still wasn’t a wedding,” you then pointed to Bill. “Second of all, grandparents? I know he’s old but I’m certainly not.”
“Yeah but you’re with him,” she said, after swallowing part of her doughnut. She took another eager bite.
“He is sitting right here,” the Doctor grumbled. “But alright, if it wasn’t a wedding up to your standards, we can always do something different,” he stood up. “We can arrange it.”
Your brain short circuited, and you had to reprocess what the Doctor had said.
We can always do something different. We can arrange it.
Had the Doctor just proposed to you?
You were so stunned you didn’t even protest as he plucked the remaining doughnut from out of your fingers, wandering out of the console room. “Let me know,” he called out. “And we’ll get to reading that Tolstoy.”
You sat there, bug eyed, and turned to Bill. She was wearing a similar expression, she’d dropped her own doughnut, which sat dejected on top of one of the doughnut boxes.
“Did what I think just happened, happen?” You asked, your voice only slightly shrill.
Bill nodded. “I – uh, yeah. I think so.”
You stood up, and sprinted after him.
A/N^2: I gotta give huge thanks to the ever-sweet @phxntxmx, who pointed out there was a bit of confusion in how I described one of the doughnuts here. I’ve tried to clear it up and make it a bit more consistent, since it’s not something I know about for sure.
