5 Times Sarah Jane Smith Fell in Love with Toshiko Sato
1.
It was a snowy Wednesday afternoon in a cafe in Cardiff when Sarah Jane Smith first fell in love with Toshiko Sato. They were sitting in the bow front window, Tosh at her laptop and Sarah Jane with a paper notebook, and hot chocolates for both, working out a knotty alien language translation. There was no urgency, except for the work itself needing to get done to their own satisfaction.
Sarah Jane felt blissfully free, in that moment, sitting in comfortable seats and drinking liquid chocolate, and solving problems together that did not need to be dealt with right this very moment. No one was dead. No one was in danger. Luke was making friends with a pterodactyl and devouring Tin Tin comics with Ianto and she and Tosh had an afternoon free to consider a puzzle as a mental exercise and not a life or death necessity.
"I think if we can get that codex from Manchester before the weekend, we can have it cracked by Sunday," Tosh said, looking up from her laptop, slightly flushed at the possibility of a breakthrough.
And that's when Sarah Jane felt herself fall in love.
2.
Tosh was wet. Sarah Jane was wet and muddy. And the alien had got clean away.
Sarah Jane shouldn't be here. She'd just come to Cardiff to drop off a device left over from what Luke liked to call their 'adventures' and Sarah Jane privately thought of as 'messes'. Young Ianto had turned a peculiar white color when she'd video messaged him about it, and he'd all but begged her to bring it to Cardiff.
So she had, one afternoon when Luke and the others had an overnight school trip. She would have only rattled around in the house, as she currently between the journalistic assignments that kept food on the table, and her cover intact, and the exceptionally busy week of alien adventure had calmed down. A trip to Cardiff, a few compliments from Jack that could still make her preen, if only internally, and a visit with Tosh.
Then she'd been Shanghaied into chasing this alien. Only women could approach it, Jack had said, and Gwen had sprained her ankle the day before, he said. It could be a big problem if it ran loose and started giving off hallucination inducing gas, he'd said. Please, he'd said.
Tosh couldn't chase the alien all by herself, could she?
The alien was afraid of the water, so Tosh and she had chased it towards a fish pond in a suburban back garden.
At the last minute, they'd found out these aliens could teleport.
Jack had not mentioned this.
Jack would not be pleased that the creature had got away, and while Sarah Jane did not care all that much about Jack's opinion, she hated to look silly in front of the Captain.
"Jack's going to have something to say about this," Sarah Jane said. She pushed wet hair from her face but it fell back into her eyes, wet and clammy. Mud slid down her cheek.
"Sod Jack," Tosh said.
Sarah Jane loved Tosh in that moment. She leaned over and kissed her, mud and all. And Tosh kissed her back.
3.
Tosh was beautiful in candlelight. The power in all of Eeling had gone out while Tosh was visiting, and for once it didn't seem to be an alien incursion, just a simple human problem. It was damp, and cool, that night, and Sara Jane had lit a fire and they were toasting defrosted sausages over it. Tosh had offered an orange and a bar of Cadbury fruit and nut from her carryall for dessert.
Luke was camping with Maria and Clive in Maria's backyard, and they had the house to themselves, without teenagers clattering in and out.
They talked in front of the fire past the witching hour. Tosh seemed entranced by Sarah Jane's stories of the beauties she'd seen in space and on Earth. There was very little beauty at Torchwood, it seemed, and Sarah Jane thought she might call the Doctor one day soon and ask for a little sightseeing trip for two.
Sarah Jane brought out the Arcateenian poetry she'd been given by her friend, though first she hesitated over the narrow book.
Gwen had told her a little of Tosh's experience with Mary, the rogue Arcateenian, but Sarah Jane no longer believed in hiding things to make life easier.
Instead, she read to Tosh poems on the joy of flight, delicate paeans to radiation in all its light-giving forms, odes to the touch of a lover's wings.
Tosh did not speak of Mary, but she listened with a very slight smile, an almost ethereal expression in the candlelight. She offered Sarah Jane the last piece of chocolate and orange off her fingers, and herself read a poem aloud to Sarah Jane, the words of love limned with math, and watchful eyes, and bravery.
4.
Sarah Jane was called away to UNIT on a Saturday morning, which was surprising because she no longer cared to respond to UNIT's summons' and they knew it. Still, it was the Brigadier asking, and she couldn't refuse. There she was offered weak canteen tea, some rather dry sandwiches, and a stack of files from her time there with the Doctor which had got mixed up in the archives. Could she sort them out, the Brigadier said. By which he meant, sort that lot out and then come to my office and reminisce.
Mid-afternoon, her mobile rang. Sarah Jane saw that it was Toshiko and abandoned the current file to answer it.
"Luke called me," Tosh said after they exchange fond greetings.
"Oh?" Sarah Jane could not imagine why Luke would call Toshiko. He e-mailed her, talking math and arcane chemical concepts she herself did not understand, and he liked her well, but Luke had never called Tosh before.
"He wanted to know about girls," Tosh said. Somehow, Sarah Jane knew she was driving.
"We've had that talk. I got him books!" Sarah Jane was not comfortable with the idea of Luke and sexuality. She had just gotten him, biologically 13 but so very innocent, and it seemed wrong for him to be interested in the opposite sex so soon.
"Oh, he said he knows all about the theory of sexual relations. He even cited references," Toshiko said, and Sarah Jane heard the smile in her voice. "I suppose he wanted to know how to go about the courting aspect of it. As he said, I'm the only girl he knows to talk to who isn't his mum or his school friend."
"True," Sarah Jane said, faintly proud of her son.
"But then he asked who he should talk to about what boys were like."
Oh dear. That was not precisely a surprise, but Sarah Jane had hoped that her innocent son would not need to have prejudice explained to him again. "And what did you say?"
"I gave him Ianto's mobile number and told him to ask him both sets of question," Tosh said, and laughed. It was a beautiful sound. Sarah Jane could not help but join in.
"You're a clever, devious woman, Toshiko Sato," Sarah Jane said.
"Don't worry about Ianto. If he can handle Jack, he can handle a 14 year old boy with questions," Tosh said.
"I wonder just how he will exact revenge on you, my dear," Sarah Jane said.
"I'm going to tell him it was your idea," Tosh said, and laughed again.
"You minx," Sarah Jane said, files forgotten. "Have I told you how I love you?"
5.
Moonlight settled over the two bodies on the bed, their limbs intermingled, skin damp. Sarah Jane felt slack all over, as if all her muscles had been released at once by some great force, and she was a great force, Sarah Jane thought muzzily, her Toshiko Sato.
In bed, she was always Toshiko to Sarah Jane.
And Toshiko, she had as many faces as the ocean, though she was far more forgiving. She was lovely and not to be denied, for all her quiet aspects, Sarah Jane thought.
Shadows moved on the ceiling, leaves playing in the moonlight, and Sarah Jane shifted dear Toshiko and herself over so she could point out the play of shades on the ceiling. Toshiko settled herself back against Sarah Jane's shoulder, with a smile, and Sarah Jane leaned in to kiss her. Sarah Jane's thigh slid between Toshiko's, prompting an "mmm" into her mouth as her knee slid over Toshiko's wet center.
Toshiko pressed against her thigh, and Sarah Jane pushed back with a gentle knee. Sarah Jane had never been so careful with that joint, advancing in centimeters and retreating by inches as Tosh rode her leg, languid but intent.
Soon her leg was not enough, not for Sarah Jane, though Toshiko seemed satisfied, as Sarah Jane kissed her and mouthed her neck. Sarah Jane framed Toshiko's thighs with her hands and journeyed down her body, wet, open mouthed kisses decorating her collarbone, the underswell of her breasts, the center of her belly. Finally, Sarah Jane dipped a delicate tongue over the swelling bud at the center of her legs, surprising pleasure-sounds from her lover.
Sarah Jane encompassed Toshiko's bud with her tongue, enfolded the swollen, sensitive organ by millimeters, dropped down to the narrow cavern below to dwell in her musk. She tried to lap up her delicious scent, fetch it out from between the trembling walls of Toshiko's center, to the music of Toshiko's panting breaths.
A strong hand gripped her arm and tugged, and Sarah stretched herself the other way, not quite on hands and knees, and Toshiko nuzzled her hip, her fingers stole between Sarah Jane's thighs, and knuckles slid into her. Sarah Jane gave Toshiko a little cry of surprise, and rocked back onto her fingers. Toshiko had her palm cupped around Sarah Jane's mound, her fingers curling and uncurling inside her, and Sarah Jane forgot for a moment what she was about, until Toshiko lifted one hip to get a better angle.
Sarah Jane nuzzled back between her legs, stroked Toshiko's sensitive opening with her tongue, pressing in and letting go, exploring deep with fingers, until Toshiko was panting uneven breaths, until she pressed down toward Sarah Jane with more and more urgency, until she clenched internally and wailed as orgasm overtook her.
Toshiko's fingers in Sarah Jane became more insistent, her palm compressing and releasing her mound to draw pleasure forth, in wave upon wave, until Sarah Jane rocked out her release with her own cry.
Sarah Jane let herself fall onto the bed to catch her breath.
Toshiko crawled down to lay next to Sarah Jane, taking her chin in slender fingers and kissing her gently.
"You won't believe me if I tell you you're beautiful, but it's true," Toshiko said.
This, Sarah Jane thought, this is what love is.
