Disclaimer: Alas, the ownership of Doctor Who in all its splendour does not belong to me. Also, I’m not very well-versed with DW Fanfiction, so if someone else has already written this, please know that it’s impossible for me to have stolen it because I’ve never actually seen it before.

Dedicated: to Catherine Tate’s cat, name unknown to myself. I dedicate it to this anonymous cat because Ms. Tate was told when she called the animal shelter that she might not want said cat because it had a problem. When she asked what that problem was, she was told it was ginger. Of course, she had to adopt it after that.

Ginger –by JotM

He’s had a mild obsession with it in any of its forms—candies, crystallized, teas, freshly grated, scents… Its lovely, warm taste is like an old friend, both soothing and exciting—a sort of unanimated companion. Of course, if there’s one thing he’s noticed about this regeneration it’s that it’s more attuned towards taste than the previous one. It seems natural that he should regard this taste as a companion.

The word itself fascinates him. He loves the sound of it, rolls it around on his tongue just to hear it said. Ginger. He tries to say it “gingahr” instead of “gingurr,” snapping the syllables about in different ways, . It makes the ordinary word sound infinitely more exciting, he thinks.

And then, of course, there’s his favorite sort of ginger—the kind of ginger he’s always wanted to be.

“Am I…ginger?”

He’d always wanted to be ginger. Never mind the bias most people tend to have against this type of hair. He wants to be ginger. It would make his eccentric personality that much better. Set off the blue of his sonic screwdriver rather well, too.

“No, you’re just sort of…brown.”

Frankly, he’d been rather put out when his current regeneration had failed to give him the vivid, red head of hair he’d always wanted but never really thought about. He supposes that, since it was such a sudden, unexpected process, he’d not had the time to even think or hope for ginger.

“I wanted to be ginger! I’ve never been ginger.”

Well, this next time he’d been certain it would be different. He’d concentrated all the mental power he could spare towards remembering for the next regeneration: ginger. Make me ginger. I want to be ginger. Sometimes he’d just sat and thought the word to himself, repeating it so that it was permanently engrained in his brain. Ginger. Ginger. Ginger.

He’d thought that fate couldn’t withhold this from him much longer—and he was right! He’s finally got it. He surveys the results. Yes, definitely ginger—look at that head of hair! Flaming red, exactly the color he’s always wanted.

Something’s wrong, however, and the word ‘brilliant’ sticks in his mind on the way to his throat. Any other time—any other way—that would have been the first word off his lips. Not this time. Not this way.

How could he have been so thick? How could he not have realized that, with all his fixation on ginger, with all his wishing for something that has never happened before, perhaps something else that has never happened before might also have to occur? How could he have failed to realize just how devastating the not-yet-experienced could be?

His ginger companion—himself, in an unfathomable sense—locks eyes with him as she babbles on, her mind burning as it throws words around haphazardly, uncontrollably. His mind burns a little with hers. His mind is painfully under control, while his circumstances are spinning wildly around him.

Why hadn’t it occured to him? This final link, this manifestation of the DoctorDonna… There were a million coincidences he should have paid attention to, chance meetings and common grounds that should have been cause of suspicion, but he thinks overlooking this one is his greatest blunder: she’s ginger.

Not just her appearance, but her. She was warm, and spicy, comfortable, familiar. She was a friend, a mate—she soothed and roused him by turns. She was better than ginger, better than taste, because she was alive. She was brilliant—brilliance personified, probably.

He’d always wanted to be ginger—not just in appearance, he knows now, but ginger like her. Real ginger.

She's ginger and because of that now he's ginger. He’s got what he wanted now, but it turns out he didn’t want it after all.

When he tells her he’s sorry, so sorry, he thinks that if he dared to travel back in time and change one thing about his past, he would remove that one accursed word from his mind. As he puts his fingertips to her temples and watches the memories slip away, he knows that he’s really, truly dying this time with no hope of regeneration.

The next time he tastes ginger, he’s on his way to the third century. All he can taste is ashes mixed with salt. He thinks of tears—her tears—and spits the offending sweet out. He can’t stand the scent. He flings the lot out the TARDIS door, not caring where it lands. It’s probably gone to whirl around somewhere in time and space. That’s where she is, he realizes—where the Donna that he once knew is—floating about in circles, a wisp of memories.

He breaks down, but he doesn’t weep as long or as hard as in times previously. When he’s done, he stands and runs a hand through his hair, pondering. He remembers her better without tears clouding his eyes. Maybe he’ll remember her even more completely without the taste or smell of her—not of her physical self, but of her soul, the taste of that word that’s been haunting him—meeting him at every turn.

He thinks peppermint might be good for a change.