Title: Book of Dreams
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: gen
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 30_losses
Prompt: 23B, Photo album
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the Tenth Doctor. Please do not sue.

***

The Doctor sighed as he idly turned the pages of the photo album in his lap, looking back over moments from the long centuries of his life. Some of them he could barely remember, and some were as crystal-clear as though they had just happened yesterday.

All of these people .... so many who had been a part of his life for what seemed to him like a very brief time. Some of them had been there for a few weeks before leaving with a smile and a wave, not looking back, taking their memories with them.

Some had been with him for months, not wanting to leave and only doing so reluctantly. And some had stayed for years -- though they all had one thing in common, no matter how long they stayed. In time, they had all left, willingly or otherwise.

He flipped through the pages, some of the pictures there bringing a smile to his face. Jamie .... Adric .... Turlough .... so many memories went with those pictures. People who were long gone, but who would always remain in his hearts.

There was an entire stack of photo albums, holding the memories of several lifetimes. The more recent ones lay on the couch beside him, silently waiting for him to open the leather covers and take a look at the memories that lay dormant inside the pages.

The Doctor closed the photo album he was holding and picked up the next one, flipping it open and expecting to see faces from one of his older incarnations. People from the past, who could stir up his memories, but who no longer brought him that aching sense of loss.

Instead, the first picture that he was confronted with was Jack -- the smiling face of the man he'd loved and lost, the one companion who he'd ever allowed to be more to him than merely a friend. The man who he had thought would always be here.

The Time Lord swallowed hard, his hand frozen on the page in the act of turning it over. He couldn't quite bring himself to look away from that face; he had a hard time not reaching out to touch it, even though he would only touch lifeless paper and not warm skin.

He would more than likely never touch Jack again -- at least, not in the way that he wanted to. Oh, they would shake hands and smile at each other across a distance; they would continue to be friends. But it would never be the way that it had been before.

He would never be naked next to Jack again, he was sure of that. The only thing that he would have to remind him of their time together was the pictures in this photo album, and the memories that still lived on, no matter how hard he tried to push them away.

His hand was shaking slightly as he turned the page -- to be faced with another photo of Jack, this one a close-up. He didn't remember when it had been taken, but he could remember that day. They had been together on Earth, laughing and happy.

That was before Jack had become restless, before he'd started to spend time away from the Doctor when they went to some of the planets they both knew. He hadn't questioned what Jack was doing then; he hadn't wanted to know.

But he'd had his suspicions, even though he'd never voiced them aloud. He knew that Jack hadn't been the kind of man to be faithful, and even though he'd told himself time and time again that he could live with that, the truth was that he couldn't.

Every infidelity, whether real or imagined, cut into his hearts with the precision of a surgical knife. It was as though Jack carved a piece of him away whenever he smiled -- especially if that smile was turned on someone else rather than being directed at him.

Why hadn't he gotten angry and confronted Jack? He'd asked himself that a hundred, no, a thousand times before, and the answer was always the same. Because he knew that he would lose the man he loved if that confrontation ever happened.

Well, he'd lost Jack anyway. The immortal had decided that he wanted to stay on Earth, that he could do more good as the leader of Torchwood than he could by traveling with the Doctor. They'd had such a brief time together before that decision had been made.

He couldn't blame Jack in some ways. After all, he had abandoned the other man when he was in his last body; Jack had a perfect right to be angry with him over that. But he'd been so sure that had been put behind them when they'd become lovers.

How long had their relationship lasted? Had it been months, or only weeks? Funny how that had been the most important relationship of his life, the one that had meant the most, and he had no idea how long he'd been happy and secure in that love.

It had been love, at least for him -- but was that how Jack had felt? He looked down at the smiling face in the picture, that smile piercing his heart yet again. He would probably never know how Jack had felt; he'd certainly never bring up the subject again.

It would hurt too much if Jack told him that he'd never been in love. Oh, the immortal had said that he loved the Doctor; he couldn't count the number of times he'd heard Jack breathe those words in the darkness when they were making love.

But had he ever really meant them, or were they something that he said to everyone he was intimate with? He'd held those words close to his hearts for so long, believing that he was the only one Jack said them to -- at least in the time that they were together.

Now, he wasn't so sure. The one thing he was sure of was that he still loved the other man. He would always love Jack Harkness; there was a part of him that would always belong to the one man who could have given him forever, but had instead chosen to walk away.

With a soft sigh, the Doctor closed the photo album, sliding it under the others. He didn't want to look at the pictures in that book of dreams any longer. Those dreams had died for him; those dreams were lost, and he wasn't going to try to recreate them.

When those dreams had died, he'd become a different person. Maybe stronger, in some ways. He'd put those dreams from him and built up walls, vowing never to let himself trust again in the way he'd trusted Jack. He wasn't meant for that.

Those barriers were far too strong for anyone to get through now; he was sure that no one would ever break through them in the way that Jack had. They would only get so close. He was more well aware now than he'd ever been of how to protect his hearts.

Gathering the stack of photo albums in his arms, he returned them to the shelf, then turned and walked out of the Tardis' library. He'd spent too long there with his memories. It was time to put the past behind him and move towards the future -- no matter how poignant that past might be.

***