Title: Springtime of the Soul
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Jack Harkness
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 1, letter100
Prompt: 52, Spring
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own Ianto Jones, the Tenth Doctor, or Jack Harkness. Please do not sue.

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Dear Jack,

It's been a long time since I wrote to you, and the last letter was one that I never sent. I was feeling very bitter when I wrote it -- bitter and betrayed. I'm glad now that I never showed you that letter; it might have kept us from reconciling.

I still have it, but I doubt that I'll ever give it to you. I said some very hurtful things, and even though some of them may have been true, they're not words that you need to see or hear. And I no longer harbor those feelings of betrayal, so the letter is redundant.

I have to admit, though, that there are still times when I wonder if what we share now will really last. I know that you plan on staying with me this time, but you've said that before. I can't help thinking that you may get tired of being with me and start looking for something else to hold your interest.

If that happens, then we'll inevitably part. I can put up with a lot from a companion; when you and I were merely companions, I had no problem with you flirting and sleeping with anyone who caught your fancy. But once we became lovers, that all changed.

There are things that don't bother me in companions, but that I will never accept from a lover. And once you became my lover, our entire relationship changed -- at least for me. It didn't seem to change much for you, though it may have.

That's probably something that we still need to talk about. I'll admit that I have the same insecurities I did then; there's still a part of me that thinks you'll begin to look around for sexual satisfaction outside of our relationship if you get restless.

You can say that I shouldn't blame you for doing so, that it's just your nature -- but that's a part of your nature that you should overcome when you love someone, Jack. It's not something that you can keep doing, not if you want a strong relationship.

But that's another subject for another time. I know it's something that we still need to sit down and talk about, but I've been too happy at having you back by my side that I haven't been able to force myself to bring up that issue yet.

Is it strange that you've come back to me in the spring of the year on Earth? That's always traditionally been the season of renewal; I suppose it makes sense for us to renew our relationship at that time of the year. It certainly fits from a human perspective.

I've always loved springtime on Earth, actually. I like walking along winding paths in forests and seeing all of the foliage just bursting into bloom, flowers opening their petals to the sun, all of nature renewing itself after a long cold winter, just as my soul is renewing itself.

I feel that there's a kind of springtime within me now that you're with me again. I'd been feeling rather .... locked inside myself, for lack of a better way to describe it. I'd felt as though I was going through my own veritable winter of the spirit.

That's why it was so hard for me to believe at first that you meant to stay with me. There was a part of my mind that refused to step into the light and the springtime; that part of my psyche wanted to cling to the feeling that I would always be alone.

I have no idea why I hung on to that negativity so stubbornly. I suppose it's because I still find it hard to trust you wholeheartedly. Even in the springtime of our relationship, when every promise for our future is bursting out all around us, I still can't help thinking of the winter to come.

Will you really stay with me this time, Jack? Will you be here in the spring, summer, fall and winter, all the seasons of the year? Or will you get tired of me long before then and leave to seek greener pastures, just like you've done before?

Even though I feel that this is the spring of our life together, I can't help holding on to that bleak winter in the back of my mind. It's so hard for me to completely trust you again when you've been the one person in my life who was able to shatter my hearts by leaving.

I can't help but keep going back to that subject. It's been uppermost in my mind lately, though I haven't brought it up to you yet. There's a very large part of me that feels you may back away from me if I do, if you know exactly how I feel.

But we can't have an honest relationship that will grow into something deeper than what we have now if I'm not absolutely honest with you, and vice versa. I know that I need to get past my fear of your rejection if we're going to move forward from here.

This is the best time for me to bring this up, really; it's spring, the time of new beginnings, the time to renew our souls. The two of us are starting our relationship over, so there couldn't be a better time to put any fears and doubts behind us and start everything fresh.

Of course, we have too much intimate history between us to start completely new. It's not as though we don't already know a great deal about each other, and we can't simply push that aside and forget about what we already know.

I know that you can drive me absolutely insane with squeezing the toothpaste tube in the middle, and that you like your coffee with just a little milk and one sugar. And you know some equally silly things about me -- and quite a few embarrassingly intimate things, too.

Those are the things we shouldn't forget -- but we need to forget our fears and our memories of some angry words that might have been said between us the last time we were together. We need to get all of that out in the open, talk about it, and then let it fade into the past.

You know how I feel about you, Jack, without me having to say the words "I love you." You can see those words written in my eyes every time I look at you, and hear them in the tone of my voice even when I don't say them. And I know you feel the same.

If you didn't, then you wouldn't have come back. I have to trust to those feelings to lead us into the springtime of our relationship, and to get us through whatever might come in the winter ahead. And I have to trust that the spring will last for an eternity this time around.

Your

Doctor

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