It felt like a flood, the sudden ability to see images and thoughts and feelings. He could touch them and feel them as though they were his own, and they mingled in his mind with what he felt too. It was clear in a way Jack was almost surprised by. He remembered a time the Doctor had told him he didn't really have those thoughts. He was very glad to be proved wrong.

But it was more than that, of course, it was that subtlety to it, something said in a way words would never be enough to articulate. A need, and just what it was like to feel need. That wrenching feeling inside that was both good and bad. And that he was the one needed? That it was directed at him? And that more than anything, utterly above all it was the Doctor needing him? It was almost overwhelming.

And so, without words too, he let that be felt. His own emotion (something he so often tried to hide) free and with utter clarity so the Doctor could read it, so that he could see just how good that made him him feel. How important, how special. And how alive. He needed him too, and he'd been too scared to need, embarrassed to need. But now? Now he could just let him see it, and it was good.

What attention he could spare went to moving his fingers back to that space against the Doctor's neck. Back to drawing small figures of eight, a featherlight touch, barely a touch at all.

And as he continued to kiss him, his eyes grew damp. He was happy here, and it felt good.