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Home Cooking Fandom: Doctor Who Martha smells it as soon as she walks into the hall: the greasy, salty tang of hot chips and battered fish, wrapped up in newspaper and sprinkled liberally with vinegar. She follows her nose into the kitchen, where she finds her mum unpacking two paper-wrapped bundles on to plates while her dad looks on appreciatively. "Fish and chips?" Martha asks. "Has the oven broken?" That's the only explanation she can think of for her mother tolerating the presence of fast food in her kitchen. Francine believes in home cooking; Martha's lost count of the number of long lectures she received down the years on the importance of healthy eating. "No, nothing like that," Francine says. She exchanges a look with Clive -- she is half-smiling, and if Martha didn't know better, she might almost think her mother was flirting with her father. Then her dad reaches out and steals a chip and her mum slaps his hand and says, "Wait, greedy," and Martha knows they're flirting. She grins. "The first place we lived after we got married," Clive says, "was a flat above a chip shop. We were both studying for exams, and we had fish and chips every Friday night, didn't we?" "You could smell it all the time," Francine says. "I got so sick of it I thought I never wanted to see a chip again. But that year --" her voice catches a little, but then it steadies and she goes on, "That year, my God, I dreamed about fish and chips. Crisp cod, just battered, and thick chip-shop chips, crunchy on the outside and fluffy inside." Martha reaches out and takes her mum's hand. She notices, after a second, that her dad has taken Francine's other hand in his. "Better eat it before it gets cold," Martha says after few seconds. "Nothing worse than soggy fish and chips." "Oh, I don't know," Clive says thoughtfully. "I think it'd still taste pretty good." "Are you staying for dinner?" Francine asks Martha. "There's enough for all of us." "Yes," Martha says. "I'd love to."
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