Fanmix: In Your Keeping
Medium: TV
Fandom: Doctor Who
Subject: Ian and Barbara
Title: In Your Keeping
Notes: Okay, guys, I see all the New Who soundtracks, and I realize that there is no Old Skool love, so I have provided the love. Comments v. v. much appreciated; share the love for this oldest and probably most rock-solid of the OTPs. Cover art, explication, zip and bonus ficlet behind the cut. I am happy to upload individual songs when asked.





1) What a Good Boy – Barenaked Ladies

When I was born, they looked at me and said,
what a good boy, what a smart boy, what a strong boy.
And when you were born, they looked at you and said,
what a good girl, what a smart girl, what a pretty girl. …
This name is the hair shirt I wear
And this hair shirt is woven from your brown hair.
This song is the cross that I bear,
Bear it with me, bear with me, bear with me, be with me tonight

Sometimes they get tired of being what everyone expects them to be. It’s a relief to be with each other then, where there’s no expectations at all.

2) It Is You (I Have Loved) – Dana Glover

There is something that I see
In the way you look at me
There’s a smile, there’s a truth
In your eyes
What an unexpected way
On this unexpected day
Could it be this is where I belong
It is you I have loved all along

Ian hears horror stories from his brothers and sisters about bad dates, bad relationships, broken hearts. He can’t sympathize.

3) All I Want Is You – Barry Louis Polisar

All I want is you, will you be my bride
Take me by the hand and stand by my side
All I want is you, will you stay with me?
Hold me in your arms and sway me like the sea.

Apart from home, and steadiness, and a lack of head wounds and death sentences, and maybe even a bed that isn’t ergonomically correct, what’s to want when they’ve got each other?

4) Contemplations – Heather Alexander

But this one man, like no other,
Like a partner, like a brother
He doesn’t want a mother,
Nor a goddess, nor a slave
And he does not bring me flowers
Nor demand all of my hours
Is not jealous of my powers
And my heart will not behave

Ian isn’t like most other men of his day and age: he asks nothing of Barbara beyond her love and friendship, and demands nothing at all. And her mother wonders why she fell in love with him.

5) Life Less Ordinary – Carbon Leaf

Live a life less ordinary
Live a life extraordinary with me
Live a life less sedentary
Live a life evolutionary with me
Well I hate to be a bother,
But it's you and there's no other, I do believe
You can call me naive but...
I know me very well (at least as far as I can tell)
And I know what I need

Their courtship is strange and fun and clumsy and charming, enacted on a time and space ship bigger on the inside under the watchful eye of a benevolent old man and two young girls. Their wedding is chaotic and weird and stressful and wonderful, attended by one Doctor after another and characterized by bad timing. Their married life surely can’t get any stranger.
Barbara is certain that the universe is up to the challenge.

6) In Your Keeping – Jann Arden

and I know this much is true
I have lived inside of you
you have always seen me through
while I am peacefully sleeping

If she gets kidnapped, he will come to find her; if he gets hurt, she will heal him; if she is poisoned, he will cure her; if he is sentenced to death, she will save him. It’s that simple.

7) Maybe I’m Amazed – Paul McCartney

Maybe I'm amazed at the way you love me all the time
Maybe I'm afraid of the way I love you
Maybe I'm amazed at the way you pulled me out of time
And hung me on a line
Maybe I'm amazed at the way I really need you

They’re caught in the middle of something totally beyond their comprehension. Thank God they’ve got each other to hold on to; they might have gone insane otherwise.

8) Easy Silence – Dixie Chicks

And anger plays on every station
Answers only make more questions
I need something to believe in
Breathe in sanctuary in the
Easy silence that you make for me
It's okay when there's nothing more to say to me
And the peaceful quiet you create for me
And the way you keep the world at bay for me
The way you keep the world at bay

Sanctuary and home, comfort and support, they hold on to each other in the middle of a world gone mad, remember their time on the TARDIS, and know there’s nothing they can’t survive as long as they’ve got each other.

9) I’m Gonna Be – The Proclaimers

When I come home (When I come home), well I know I'm gonna be
I'm gonna be the man who comes back home to you
And if I grow old (When I grow old), well I know I'm gonna be
I'm gonna be the man who's growing old with you
But I would walk five hundred miles
And I would walk five hundred more
Just to be the man who walked a thousand miles
To fall down at your door

Ian has seen Barbara at her absolute best and her absolute worst, and loved her deeply all the way; what makes them perfect for each other, he thinks, is that he knows she’s seen the same of him and loves him still.

10) Harbor – Vienna Teng

sail your sea
meet your storm
all I want is to be your harbor
the light in me
will guide you home
all I want is to be your harbor

They can hardly fear adventure, not after the TARDIS; not knowing that they’ve always got a home in each other, no matter where they are.

11) Two of Us – The Beatles

Two of us wearing raincoats
Standing solo
In the sun
You and me chasing paper
Getting nowhere
On our way back home
We're on our way home
We're on our way home
We're going home

She can’t quite keep her breath from catching in hope every time the TARDIS doors open, and can’t quite keep her heart from sinking when it isn’t the right place or the right time; but Ian’s hand is in hers, and they’re out on another adventure, and she might as well enjoy it.

12) Push – Sarah McLachlan

You stay the course, you hold the line, you keep it all together
You're the one true thing I know I can believe in
You're all the things that I desire, you save me, you complete me
You're the one true thing I know I can believe

It’s a well-balanced partnership, a dance so old that neither of them take a wrong step anymore, a love so deep that jealousy has no point anymore.

13) Best Years of Our Lives – Baha Men

When we first met
I could hardly believe
The things that would happen
That we could achieve
So let's be together
For all of our time
We'll go out so thankful
That you are still mine

Ian can’t dance, Barbara can’t sing, neither one of them is any good at telling jokes sober, and polite party conversation is pretty much out of the question after the TARDIS. Ian finds it hard to care.

14) Long Long Journey – Enya

Long long journey
Through the darkness
Long long way to go
But what are miles across the ocean to the heart that's coming home?
Long long journey
I don't know where
Long long way to go
But what are sighs and what is sadness to the heart that's coming home?

There’s snow up to their knees, a freezing wind turning Barbara’s nose pink and Ian’s ears bright red, rocks lurking under powdery drifts, but they’re almost back to the TARDIS. There’s a cup of tea, warm covers and soft pillows, and an evening in each other’s arms ahead, and so they’re laughing in the wind, hand in hand.

15) At the Beginning – Richard Marx and Donna Lewis

We were strangers starting out on a journey
Never dreaming what we'd have to go through
Now here we are and I'm suddenly standing
At the beginning with you
No one told me I was going to find you
Unexpected, what you did to my heart
When I lost hope, you were there to remind me
This is the start
And life is a road and I want to keep going
Love is a river I want to keep flowing
Life is a road now and forever
Wonderful journey
I'll be there when the world stops turning
I'll be there when the storm is through
In the end I wanna be standing
At the beginning with you

Every Friday evening, the Chestertons take a walk down to the junkyard.

Ian is fairly sure that John thinks his parents are insane. There’s nothing of interest in a junkyard, or not for a nine-year-old boy who’d rather be playing the drums. So John stands apart, hands in his pockets with a sulky frown on his face, scuffs his foot against the ground and counts down the minutes until they go home. He never believed in the Doctor anyway; he has no reason to want to be here.

Gillian, on the other hand, believed from the start, but then she’s only five, and imaginative. The Doctor has nothing to do with her fun on these walks. She’s perfectly happy to play in the junk, finding the strangest objects and running back to her parents to show them off. She even draws John into the game, tugging on her brother’s sleeve until he finally, reluctantly follows her.

In just a few minutes he is running and playing, yelling as loudly as his sister. It’s nice to have children who get along, Ian thinks, and pats Barbara’s hand, nestled in the crook of his arm.

Barbara is laughing, watching their children play, and he, watching her, cannot believe his luck. For all the trouble that came of that night in this junkyard, for all the arguments and pain and head wounds and death sentences, he would not change what happened here, because he never would have had this, otherwise. He never would have had Barbara, or John, or Gilly.

“Hey,” Barbara says, and squeezes his arm gently. “Penny for your thoughts.”

“Beginnings,” he says, leans over, and kisses her.

“Ew!” John and Gilly chorus, and burst into shrieking laughter.

Barbara laughs again. “Beginnings indeed. Come on, let’s go home.”

In Your Keeping zip