A/N: Quick warning- this one shot contains minor spoilers for Doctor Who, seasons 5 and 6. Proceed with caution. And I hope you enjoy this one shot! It was a blast to write. ~writergirl8

It's nights like these that Lizzie loves best. Sitting on the couch, eating Chinese food, and draping a blanket around her fuzzy sock covered feet. Granted, being alone isn't the best, but she's made plans for herself. Maria has given her the entire fifth series of Doctor Who to chase away the lonely, and Lizzie is fully prepared to waste the whole evening watching it.

Besides, it's not like she has anything better to do than spend twelve hours of her life watching one of the most epic television programs ever.

She's about midway through "The Eleventh Hour," and desperately craving custard, when there's a knock on the door of her small apartment. She exchanges a surprised look with Matt Smith before pausing the episode. There's another knock. She's just considering staying to watch and not bothering with whoever is at the door when she hears a hesitant voice saying,

"Lizzie?"

Lizzie's eyebrows shoot up as she rushes to open the door. He's standing there with his clothes and hair still wet from the rain outside, and there is a confused look in his eyes.

"Darcy?" she says. "Why are you here?"

"Bennet," he replies, the tiniest ghost of a smirk on his face. "I came to see you."

"From… China?" Lizzie asks, puzzled.

"No, but you took so long to answer the door that I'm wondering if that's where you came from."

"Will!" she laughs. "Come on!"

"Aren't you going to invite me in?" he says in response, and she's halfway through telling him to come on inside when he's got her pressed against the wall and is kissing her with both hands on her cheek. His thumb softly strokes them in a way that starkly contrasts the fierce way he is kissing her. She vaguely registers how he kicks the door closed with his foot, and laughs against his lips, running her fingers through his rain soaked hair.

"You were coming back on Wednesday," she points out, breathless.

"You talk too much," he points out, equally out of breath.

"Admit that you came back early for my mother's cooking and I'll shut right up."

He chuckles, smiling down at her with his body still pressed against hers and his hands pressed against the wall just above her head.

"I came back early because I… well, I missed you, Lizzie."

Her heart seems to skip stumble and fall right down, and she only answers him when it has gotten back up.

"Skype wasn't doing it for you, huh?"

Darcy barks out a laugh.

"I was trying to be romantic, you know."

"And you know that it's my job to lighten you up."

"Not when I'm… you know… making a move on you!"

"Oh," she says innocently. "Does this mean that I can't laugh hysterically during sex anymore?"

"Lizzie!" he balks, face turning bright red, which was, admittedly, the desired effect.

She says sorry, but she doesn't look it.

"So, you missed me."

"I did," he concedes. "Maybe going to China for a month wasn't my best idea. Actually, scratch that. Maybe going to China for a month without you wasn't my best idea."

Lizzie wants to reply. She really does. She wants to say something beautifully snarky and make him laugh and say her name reproachfully, like he can't believe she said it but is so glad that she did. Glad because it's her. But she can't, because there are very few people in the world who have the ability to make her speechless, and William Darcy is one of them.

"I missed you, too," she tells him, her own cheeks lighting up, and the look in his eyes is enough to make all the blushing worth it to her.

She'd always thought he was a robot- someone for whom it was impossible to emote or even feel. She hadn't realized until far too late that Darcy expressed his emotion through his eyes. If she'd had the courage to look into them earlier on in their acquaintance instead of hatefully avoiding him, she may have discovered that and avoided the animosity and loathing and embarrassing moments posted on the internet. More importantly, she might have fallen in love with him much earlier. It's no surprise that there's a rather large part of Lizzie that hugely resents herself for not looking this close at Darcy when she had first met him. There's a small part of her that knows that they both needed to change a little before they could be together, but usually she shuts that part up when she sees this look in his eyes. The look that lets on to how much he adores her. At this thought, she stands up on her tip toes again and kisses him, trying to tell him how she feels without having to bother with words. As said before, sometimes Darcy leaves her without them.

"Hmmmm," he says, eyes still closed as he pulls back briefly. "Maybe I should go to foreign countries more often."

"Shut up," Lizzie advises with a somewhat dangerous look on her face, and he complies, leaning down to capture her lips with his again. She pushes him back towards the couch, where his knees hit the armrest and he falls backwards onto it, bringing Lizzie down with him. They stay in this position, kissing feverishly, until suddenly Darcy's voice rings through the room.

"What is that?"

She opens her eyes and directs them towards where he's looking, immediately seeing that the television screen had started moving. Prisoner Zero, in all his reptile glory, has sneaked up behind Amy, who is still dressed as a kiss-o-gram, and is scaring the hell out of her.

"You must have pressed play with that fine bum of yours," Lizzie teases, but her humor is lost on Darcy as he stares at the events playing out across the screen.

"Yes, but… what is that?"

Lizzie grabs the remote from under her boyfriends' butt and presses pause.

"It's Doctor Who," she tells him. "First episode of the Matt Smith years."

"Matt Smith?" Darcy says questioningly. "Doctor what exactly?"

"Doctor… Doctor Who, William." She pauses. "Darcy, are you telling me that you've never heard of Doctor Who?"

"Wait, I'm sorry, Doctor what again?"

"DOCTOR WHO!" Lizzie shouts, looking beside herself. "You spend all that time in England and you don't know what one of the biggest staples in their pop culture is?"

"How do you know? You've never been to England."

She glares at him until he looks guilty, which almost makes her feel bad about yelling at him like this. Almost.

"Well… maybe if you described it to me."

"There's this Doctor, and he has lived for over a thousand years, and he can't even die, really, because whenever he dies he does this thing called regeneration, where he comes back with a new face and an altered personality. Anything?"

"Nothing."

"So, um, this crazy Doctor has a TARDIS- which stands for time and relative dimensions in space- that is actually a living organism who can change shape to match whatever time it's in. This TARDIS, though, is stuck on a 1950s British telephone box, and in it, the Doctor and his companions can go anywhere in time and space."

"Still nothing," Darcy admits.

Lizzie frowns briefly before smiling and grabbing the remote.

"We'll just start the episode over. It's the first one of the fifth series, anyways."

"Don't I have to watch the first one?"

"Will, this is an emergency. We can go back later."

"Wait, but, how could you possibly start on season five and know what's going on?"

"New regeneration. Be quiet."
OOO

Lizzie doesn't remember exactly when she falls asleep. She thinks it's somewhere around "Amy's Choice," but she isn't too sure, seeing as she's already watched the entire series, unlike someone she could name. What she does know is that the next time she wakes up, she is lying in her bed, snuggled up next to her boyfriend. She's so confused that she can't even speak words as she turns towards Darcy, eyes squinting with her tiredness. He has noticed her stirring and is staring at her with eyes glazed with exhaustion, smiling all the same.

"Um," Lizzie says eloquently.

"You were mumbling about custard in your sleep," Darcy informs her. "It was adorable."

"Thank you?" Lizzie responds, blushing a little bit.

"I couldn't let you let you sleep on the couch," he says before she can actually ask. "And I had to stop watching. It was getting… frustrating."

"Why? Where are you?" Lizzie inquires, barely stifling a yawn.

"Rory just died," Darcy says, disgust on his face. "I can't believe Moffat did that."

"Rory just… Will, honey, you're going to have to give me more information than that."

"What? Why?"

"Um… spoilers."

"Don't you imitate River Song, Elizabeth Bennet! Tell me what you were talking about!"

"Goodnight," she says, reaching up to kiss him, and then she snuggles further back into his warm arms and falls asleep with her nose pressed into his chest.

OOO

After a solid month of waking up alone, Lizzie had been desperately looking forward to the mornings that would follow after Darcy came home. She always enjoyed waking up tangled in his arms, whether they were waking up in her queen sized bed in her apartment or the king sized bed in his mansion. She enjoyed the way the sunshine would slink in through the windows, and how he always looked so much younger and more relaxed in sleep.

But this morning was not one of those mornings. When Lizzie's eyes open into the first rays of light that she will be seeing that day, she is abandoned in her bed. A little disconcerted by the sudden disappearance of her boyfriend, Lizzie slowly peels back the covers and walks into her living room. Doctor Who, season five, is sitting neatly on the coffee table next to a coffee mug that is half full. He must have used it to stay awake- Lizzie wonders why she hadn't smelled it and get up. She ambles into the kitchen and notices that there's coffee in the coffee maker, still a little bit warm. Hoping it will wake her up, she pours herself a cup.

After she's finished it, Darcy isn't back.

She goes into her bedroom and makes the bed.

Upon finishing, Darcy isn't back.

She meanders into the bathroom and makes the decision to brush her teeth, and when she's done she pops her head hopefully into the living room.

No Darcy.

Giving up, Lizzie heads back to the bathroom and takes a shower. By the time she is finished, she is so furious with William Darcy that she could scream. What kind of boyfriend comes over, takes advantage of your Doctor Who DVDs, and then just leaves in the morning without even saying goodbye? A horrible boyfriend, that's what kind of boyfriend! Lizzie exits the shower feeling as though she is on fire, braiding her hair back and changing into a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt with her alma mater's logo on it. For good measure, she puts on her favorite pair of fuzzy socks, then plops herself in front of the TV in an effort to distract herself so that she will not call that stupid, awkward turtle and yell at him.

She's in the middle of watching "The Lodger" when there's a knock at the door. She wonders if it's her mother freaking about the fact that Lizzie hasn't checked her phone in about twelve hours. That's probably it. Feeling her annoyance at the entire world rise back up, Lizzie stomps over to the door and wrenches it open.

There he is. Awkward turtle. Standing there looking all awkward and turtally.

"Hello," Lizzie says suspiciously. "What are you doing here?"

"What do you mean? I… I fell asleep here. Isn't coming back within my rights?"

"You left," Lizzie accuses. "Before I even woke up,I might add. You've never done that before. China changed you, William."

Darcy holds up two bags, one of them with a poster-shaped object protruding from it. But it isn't a poster. Darcy doesn't do posters.

"I had errands to run, Lizzie."

"What kind of errands?" she asks, even more distrustful.

"May I come in?"

"I am sleep deprived and irritable. I'd stay outside if I were you."

"Okay," he says, and then he puts one of the bags down on the ground and reaches into the other one. "I got you custard. Because you were talking about it in your sleep."

He hands her the custard as if he's trying to prove a point. Lizzie feels herself begin to smile, but she does her best to keep up the stern act.

"Thoughtful," she says, expression stoic.

"I also got this," Darcy continues, pulling season six of Doctor Who out of the bag. "I wasn't sure if you had seen it yet, but I want to watch it, and I'd rather watch it with you than anybody else."

"Fine," Lizzie says. "And what's that circular thing? Project for work?"

"May I?" Darcy questions, gesturing to the inside of her apartment. She moves aside and allows him to enter, upon which he pulls the wrapping off of the poster and lays it on the ground. "It's… it's a TARDIS exploding poster. From the season finale."

"I see you watched more after I went back to sleep."

"I grabbed your laptop and brought it onto your bed."

"You're welcome."

"Thank you, Lizzie," he tells her, his voice warm.

"So, what are you planning on doing with this poster?" Lizzie asks.

"I was thinking of putting it above the bed."

"What bed?"

"Well… our bed."

She halts in her inquiries, cocking her head, confused into dropping the "harsh" act.

"Our bed?"

He pauses, too, taking a deep breath before he begins what sounds like a well-rehearsed speech.

"Lizzie, I didn't even go to my house when I got off of that plane. I went directly from the airport to you, because I needed to see you, and I came back for you. And I don't know when it happened, Lizzie, but at some point my house stopped feeling like home, and home was whenever I was here with you, making dinner for ourselves and waking up next to each other and always being about two rooms away. I had thought it would be too cramped, but somehow it was always perfect and I don't think it's the apartment. I think it's you. So I don't care where we live. I just want to live with you."

She really wishes that she had been drinking coffee when he knocked on the door. It would have been the best spit take of all time. Her entire mind is buzzing, and she wants to have all of eternity to think it out and consider the implications and make a pro/con list and call Jane and call Gigi and drink water and maybe decide whether she even needs a TARDIS exploding poster.

Oh, god, who is she kidding. Everybodyneeds a TARDIS exploding poster.

"I love the poster," she smiles, kissing him on the mouth. "Wherever are we going to put it?"

"Absolutely up to you," he mumbles, leaning down to kiss her again.

"We'll figure it out later," she promises. "We have time."

"Not a TARDIS, though. That would be useful."

Lizzie stops kissing him and pulls back.

"I see I've created a monster."

He just grins down at her, looking well pleased with himself.

"You love it."

"Oh, yes. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you," she teases, imitating his stiff manner of speaking.

"I'd really rather you show me," he admits. "But, first… Doctor Who season six?"