Unbetitelt

The Doctor took me to this planet a while back. It was much colder than this. They called it Woman Wept.

because the reason people flirt with partners in their home language isn't just sweetness. it's that the words fit. the emotion was built in that language.

and for the Doctor this is so much more than that because Gallifreyan is dead. he is the only speaker. every single thing he says to her in Gallifreyan evaporates the moment it leaves his mouth. no record, no witness, no accountability. he can mean it with his whole chest, in the most precise and complete language he has, and it is technically as if he never said it at all.

it's not cowardice. it's having it both ways, the full emotional release of saying the true thing, in the truest possible language, to the person it's about, while maintaining perfect deniability. and i think some part of him knows exactly what he's doing.

and then the Rose, she would notice. she's too sharp not to clock that his voice does something different in those moments. she probably probably never asks directly because she knows he'd deflect and she doesn't want the door to close.