Run
Run
By: Anne (cookie2697)
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairing: Rose, Ten II/Rose
Beta: sugarsicons and tasyfa both took a swing at it for me.
Setting: Post-Journey’s End
Genre: Mostly angst. Angst with reconciliation.
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Note: I've committed post-JE angst. Actually, to be more specific, I committed post-JE angst quite a few months ago. And then I didn't post it because I wasn't really sure about this...and I post fic so rarely these days that the whole insecurity thing kinda came back. AND THEN right when I decided to post it again, David announced that he was leaving the show, and I figured fandom didn't need any more angst for a while. AND THEN the whole Mumbai terrorist attacks thing happened, and I felt like it was weird to post fic with half the fic set in India. So I decided to reedit it, but I didn't want to. And then time passed, and today I felt like taking another swing at editing it, and I like what I've got, so I'm posting!
WHEW, that was quite the ramble. I'm not going to dedicate this one to anyone persay. It was good therapy when I was feeling angsty a few months ago. But chatting about writing with humansrsuperior lately has really inspired me to want to get back to it. And an idle comment from her on her LJ today is what drove me to sit down and finish this guy up. So I want to thank her for that.
Anyway, on with the fic!
Rose stood across the room, almost as far away from him as she could possibly be, watching the Doctor sleep on her mother’s couch. He was sitting there, mostly upright, but slumped, his head buried in the huge fluffy back pillows, his head tilted back and his long neck exposed. If she were standing closer to him, she could probably look straight up his nose. And in a normal guy, in a human guy, someone like Mickey Smith or even Jimmy Stone, she would have found it strangely endearing. But the Doctor wasn’t Mickey or Jimmy, and when he made a soft sound that strangely resembled a snore, Rose knew that she desperately needed to escape.
It was only mere hours earlier that they had been left behind on a beach in Norway. The engines of the TARDIS had faded away while they stared at each other and wondered what would happen next. Now, in London, there was dinner with her family, some awkward conversation with her parents, and she went upstairs to say goodnight to Tony, and while she was gone, he fell asleep on the couch. The strangeness of watching the Doctor, who never seemed to even slow down, actually sleeping, affected her so strongly that she found herself physically recoiling from the situation.
She whipped around to rush from the room and immediately halted at the sight of her mother, who was standing in the doorway behind her, clearly watching her watch the Doctor. Rose had no idea what she looked like, but from the quizzical look her mum gave her, Rose guessed that the confusion she felt was clear. Rose jerked her head quickly, gesturing to her mother to meet her outside to talk. Silently they slipped from the room, and closed the door behind them.
“Will you look after him for a while?”
“What?” Jackie’s voice was sharp, and Rose knew that this conversation wasn’t going to be easy.
“I know it isn’t right of me to ask. He doesn’t exist in this world. Pete needs to set him up with an identity. He’s going to need clothes, something to do with himself, a place to stay. All of that stuff. Please, mum. I need you to do this.”
“Rose…” her mother sighed her name. Sensing an impending lecture, Rose had to cut her off before she said something typically parental, when what she needed was to get away.
“He doesn’t sleep, mum.”
“What?”
“The Doctor doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t need to. But he’s in there, right now, sleeping. And it’s just too weird, mum. It’s not right. None of this is right. I just need time. To think.”
“Where will you go?” Rose fell silent. How could she answer that question when she didn’t even know yet? “How long will you be gone?” Again, Rose evaded the question.
“Just…don’t let him come after me. Not yet.”
“But you are coming back, aren’t you, sweetheart?”
Rose looked back to the doors behind them that were hiding the Doctor from her view. She stared deeply into them, as if somehow if she looked hard enough, she could see through them to the Doctor’s face. It was the right face, the one that she had missed so much these past few years. It was the face she had been fighting to get back to ever since the most terrible day of her life. It was the right face, even if he wasn’t quite right in other ways. But he was still the Doctor. Wasn’t he?
“Yes.” She finally answered. “I’m coming back. Once I’ve…I dunno…figured out what I’m feeling.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
She felt like a criminal, walking into Heathrow with two bags: one full of clothes and essentials, the other filled with cash. Who besides a criminal walks around with a duffel bag full of cash? But she knew the answer even if she felt weird about it: someone who wants to disappear. Someone who doesn’t want to be found. Even so, she fingered the mobile in her pocket. It was powered down. She couldn’t be reached. But it was the one thing that could connect her back to home.
She stood in front of the international ticket counter, staring at the various airlines and the potential places that she could go. France, Canada, Australia, America…nothing seemed right. They were tourist spots. Places people went with friends, families, and lovers to explore and relax and make memories. Rose wasn’t looking for good times. She was looking to disappear.
When she finally walked up to the counter and paid cash for a one-way ticket to Mumbai, she finally felt like she was getting on the right track. India was one of the poorest and highest populated countries in the world, even in this world. If there was anywhere to disappear, it was in a country where no one would even think to look for her.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The problem was that Rose didn’t feel invisible in India. She tried to disappear, as she had planned. She avoided the touristy parts of the cities, and found rooms in the common areas. She moved from city to city. She adopted their clothes, their food, their culture. But everywhere she went, people stared at her. Children pointed at her blonde hair and whispered to their parents. She even tried wrapping her sari so that it covered her hair, but shopkeepers still stared when she came to buy food at the market. She felt like the most obvious invisible girl in India.
She didn’t think twice about it when she decided to dye her hair. It wasn’t easy to find something to use. She had to find a richer part of the city, the industrial part of town, to get a proper permanent dye. But the moment she walked out in the city with her new black hair, so sharply contrasted with her pale skin that was tanning much too slowly for her liking, she felt more like the person she was looking for in her escape: someone other than Rose Tyler.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
She wasn’t keeping track of the days. There was no need without a job to go to, or family to come home to. Instead she lived her life like a nomad, moving from community to community. Renting a room for a week, or a month, or a few days as her hosts allowed.
She helped out the local people as she could: shoes for a poor child who couldn’t afford them, helping to cook meals for hardworking families who had no money or time. She would tutor children who needed help in school. Anything that she could do, anywhere that she could go to help the people around her. Sometimes she just walked through the town like a ghost: unknown and invisible to the people around her, but watching, listening, and observing common life in a place that once would have been completely foreign to her.
In the back of her mind a part of her realized that she was living like the Doctor. Her feet were her TARDIS and India was her time and space. The common people of India were her alien race, and she did what she could to help them. But when thoughts like that entered her mind she pushed them away along with the guilt that bubbled up inside of her, and the voice that whispered that she had abandoned him, alone in a strange new world without an escape.
Still, she kept moving. She kept walking, traveling, and helping people. And even though she tried not to think about it, she knew that a part of her felt closer to the Doctor than ever before.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
She found herself in a shop in New Delhi one day. Her roots were showing and she needed to touch up her dye job. While she paid the shopkeeper, she spied a calendar on the wall of the shop in English. She blinked in surprise, counted on her fingers, and walked out of the shop numb.
She had been in India for more than five months.
She knew that she had been gone for a long time, but she had no idea that it had been quite so long. She remembered her promise to her mother. I’m coming back… She wondered if they were still expecting her to keep that promise, or if they had let her go. She thought about the Doctor and realized that wherever he was, whatever he was doing, he must have long since settled into his new life here. And once again, a pang of guilt filled her heart at leaving him alone.
That afternoon she packed her bags, paid her landlord, and took a cab to the airport. Once again she found herself standing in front of the international counter, staring at the names of the airlines. This time she had only one bag. Most of her clothes were gone, and she had compressed her cash, still plentiful, in with her essentials.
She stood for over an hour just staring at the British Airways counter, trying to convince herself that she was ready to buy a ticket to London and head home to her family, and to him. Finally, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the mobile that she had been carrying, silent and powerless in her pocket, for five months.
She sunk into a hard, plastic chair before flipping the phone open. Her fingers were shaking as she pressed the power button and waited. Her voicemail was, as expected, filled with new messages.
She swallowed, and chewed on the inside of her cheek, trying to ignore the sick feeling in her stomach and the overwhelming fear of what she would hear as she dialed her voicemail.
Her mother, a week after she left. They talked to her landlord and pre-paid her rent for the next six months. Pete was taking care of the Doctor, who was staying in the guest room. Tony wondered where she’d gone. Come home.
Pete, a few days later. They’d offered the Doctor a technical position at Torchwood. They figured it made sense. He knows alien technology better than all of their best minds put together. Maybe in a lab he could stay out of trouble. Her mother misses her and wanted her to come home. Take all the time she needs.
Jackie, a month after she left. Pete found out that she went to India. The Doctor doesn’t know. Please check in and let them know she’s okay. Tony misses her. Jackie misses her. The Doctor refuses to talk about her, but Jackie can tell he’s a miserable sod. If she doesn’t come home soon, they’re going to give the Doctor the keys to her flat just to get him out of the house. Please call.
Six weeks gone…Jackie. The Doctor’s moved into her flat. Come home.
And then the next message, after a long silence at the beginning.
“I’m sorry. I know you don’t want to...I mean…your family wouldn’t give me your number, but I saw it on a bill in your flat. I don’t know why I’m calling. I know you don’t want to hear from me...you think I’m not him. Not Time Lord enough for you or something.” There was another long pause. “I wish you’d let me show you. Prove to you that I’m still me. It’s not like I can prove it with a swordfight on a spaceship over London with you a thousand miles away or wherever you are. Come back to me. I love you.”
She snapped the phone shut before she could hear more and leapt from her seat. She was shaking this time as she walked up to the ticket counter.
“One way to Tokyo, please.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Japan was like a rush of noise and colors after India. It was all flashing lights and electronic dance music and people absolutely everywhere. Rose was completely overwhelmed.
She paid cash for a nice hotel room with a view of the city, and locked herself away in the room for a week. Here she had luxuries that she hadn’t experienced since before the dimension cannon. She pinned up her dark hair, sunk into a hot bath, and just soaked away the aches and calluses that had developed over the past five months. Her bed felt as soft as a cloud. She passed out quickly and slept for a full day. When she awoke, she felt rejuvenated, and finally, she began to think.
She listened to the rest of her voicemails, and cleared out her inbox on her phone. There was only the one message from him. She listened to it over and over again until the battery lost its charge and she couldn’t listen to it anymore.
She could hear the loneliness in his voice. That familiar, familiar loneliness that had characterized the Doctor for the entire time that she had known him. She felt his plea to be allowed to prove himself to her. She thought about that horrible Christmas with the Sycorax and him unconscious in bed. She remembered how convinced she was that the Doctor was dead, gone forever. Until he had challenged the Sycorax leader, clearly not just for the human race, but for her, to prove that he was still there in that new body with that new face. When she saw how much he wanted her to believe in him, and knew that it had to be the same man. Suddenly, remembering that day, she realized that this time she hadn’t given him the same chance. And this time he hadn’t even changed faces.
The guilt bubbled up inside of her until she couldn’t ignore it anymore, and she started to cry. Once the tears started, they didn’t stop. She cried for the longing she heard in his voice, and the hesitancy that she sensed in him. He took her disappearance as proof that she didn’t love him, and she cried for letting him question her like that. She cried for herself being separated from him in the first place during the battle of Canary Wharf. She cried because she knew that he had missed her for the years that she was gone, and she cried for him being out there without her again even now. She cried because he didn’t even say goodbye to her this time, and she cried because she did the same to him when she left him with her family. She cried because she was sure that he thought she’d forget all about him now that she had his double, and she never, ever would. She cried for him waiting for her in London, because she had abandoned him alone in a strange world, and she related to that feeling more than anyone. And she cried for herself…because she finally had the chance for some real happiness with him, and instead she ran away from it.
And most of all, she cried because she knew that she needed to go home to him, but she was so very, very scared to face him after all of this time.
The fear and pain boiled inside of her, surged through her, and she couldn’t breathe through the heaves of her chest. She wiped the snot from her nose and felt the dampness of the pillow she hugged in her lap, but she didn’t stop crying. For the first time she allowed herself to truly feel the pain of the original Doctor’s abandonment, and she wallowed in the guilt of the knowledge that she had done exactly the same thing to the new Doctor who was waiting in London.
And then, hours later, when there were no tears left to cry, she reached into the bottom of her bag, and pulled out the credit card that she hadn’t touched in all of the months that she had been gone, and she picked up the hotel phone, called British Airways and bought a one-way ticket back to Heathrow.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
When she arrived back in London, she didn’t quite know where to go. She knew she couldn’t face her mum yet, and all the madness that seemed to come with the big family home. She took a cab to her flat, and then, as she sat in the taxi in front of her building, remembered that the Doctor was living there and was suddenly too afraid to go inside. She had no idea what she could possibly say to him to repair what she had done to him, and she didn’t quite know where to start. Finally, she had the taxi take her to a nearby hotel instead, and she checked herself in. Paying with cash, once again.
She sat awake on the edge of the bed with her hands folded in her lap all night, staring distantly at a generic picture of the London Eye hanging on the wall opposite the bed. She thought about the city that she grew up in, and how many things were the same here, even though there were so many differences between the universes. She thought about the first time she met the Doctor, and how the Autons used the Eye as their transmitter, and he had been too daft to notice it. She remembered the clueless look on his face, and she smiled at the memory.
When the sun came up, she took a shower and cleaned herself up. She put on clothes from her old life, before the dimension cannon, and shook out her now long, black hair over her shoulders. She put on makeup like it was a normal day, and then she went outside and started walking through the city that she loved.
She walked to Oxford Street, and once there she walked up and down the long miles of the shopping district all day, never once going into a shop. Instead she weaved through the crowds of people on the streets, and listened to their voices, letting the familiar accents wash over her. She tried desperately to feel like she had come home, but she couldn’t feel it. She was still disconnected from this world. After all of her time away, hiding from her real life, she walked the streets of London feeling as invisible as she had in India. Nobody recognized the mysterious Vitex heiress from the tabloids with her new hair and her darker skin.
She returned to her hotel that night and she slept fitfully, tossing back and forth and wondering whether she should leave again. When she crawled out of bed the next morning she eyed her bag in the corner and thought about running back to Heathrow. She packed her things, and tossed the bag over one shoulder. She took a last glance through the hotel room, and once again her eyes fell onto that ridiculous picture of the London Eye. The Doctor’s old face flashed before her eyes once more. She flipped the lights, closed the door, and checked out of the hotel.
She walked to the nearest tube station instead of catching a cab, and stood there blankly for a long moment staring at the signs. The Piccadilly line would take her back to Heathrow. If she walked into the hallway with the blue signs it would be back to the nomad life, the wandering and traveling alone through strange and unusual places. But the Jubilee Line would take her to Canary Wharf. If she walked beneath the grey sign, it was off to Torchwood, where the Doctor would be working today. The grey sign meant a return to reality, to the new life that was waiting for her if she would just reach out and take it.
She slowly started to walk towards the entrance with the blue sign, but the memory of the Doctor’s voice in her mind stopped her in her tracks. She thought about his one lonely message, and the quiet plea to come home. She remembered that daft smile beneath the London Eye, and later fighting the Sycorax with his new face to prove himself to her. She thought about the end of his message, and those three words that he had never said to her before the dimension cannon, and how much they terrified and excited her all at once. And then she smiled nervously, turned, and walked beneath the grey sign.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Even though she had made up her mind that there was no more running, Rose couldn’t bring herself to walk into the building. She didn’t have her Torchwood ID anyway, but she had a sneaking suspicion that if she walked in, the guard would recognize her and probably let her pass. There were certainly some privileges that came with being the boss’s daughter. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Instead, she took the escalator up and out of the tube station, into the outdoor square in front of the towering building. It wasn’t the only exit, but Rose doubted that the Doctor would exit through the underground shopping centre. Too many people. She stood and stared at the building for a long time, before crossing the plaza to a cement wall opposite the entrance to the tube station. Tossing her bag against the wall, she hoisted herself up onto it, and she sat and waited.
During the five hours that she sat there, she tried to figure out what she was going to say to him, but when she finally saw him coming out of the main entrance to the building, she completely forgot it all. She couldn’t even move.
He walked alone across the plaza towards the station, just one familiar figure in a crowd of strangers. He was wearing another new suit; brown pinstripes, like the original, but not quite the same. It was still wrinkled, of course, and with his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his trousers, he had a casual air about him that was so typical of the Doctor. But he wasn’t looking around, curiously studying the world around him like he normally would be. As he passed close by her, she took note of the fact that his hair wasn’t styled, instead lying flat against his forehead, and he looked like he hadn’t shaved in a day or two. Rose remembered the last time she had seen him, when he had fallen asleep on her mother’s couch, and she found herself wondering if he was sleeping at night.
He walked past her without looking up, and headed straight into the underground station. She jumped to her feet, slung her bag back over her shoulder, and went to follow him.
As she stood in the tube station, a mere 20 feet away from the Doctor, Rose felt like a ghost once again, only now she hated the feeling. He stood at the tracks, slowly rocking back and forth on his feet, staring distantly at the tracks. Please turn around. She silently begged him to look at her. One close look and he’d recognize her, wouldn’t he? Never once did he turn to see her.
When the train came, she got onto the same car as him, on the opposite end. They crowded in with dozens of other commuters, and as she held onto the rocking train, she kept her eyes on his shoulder, the only bit of him that she could see between the crowds of people. When he got off, she followed. The wait for their transfer was much the same as the first, with one exception. The second train was much emptier than the first, and this time, when he got on the train, his eyes scanned over the other side of the car. She felt it, almost like a physical caress as his gaze passed over her.
He didn’t recognize her. And he didn’t look at her again.
She didn’t follow him into her building. She watched him hurry up the steps, two at a time, and then disappear through the door. For a long time she just stood across the street, watching the place where he disappeared. She glanced up and took note of the light flipping on in her flat, and she found herself wondering how it was different now that he had worked his way into her life in her absence. The flat had never really felt like home to her. It was more of a temporary space that she occupied while she waited to get back to him. She wondered if it would feel real to her now that he was there with her.
She crossed the street and made her way up to the front of the building. She reached into her bag and pulled out her keys. She pushed the key into the lock and toyed with it for a moment, before pulling it out. Pocketing the keys, she backed away from the door and down the steps. Mirroring her actions from that morning, she tossed her bag to the ground and pushed herself up onto the brick wall in front of her building. Staring off into the distance, she tried to decide what to do next.
She had been sitting there for nearly an hour when she heard the front door open and shut, and someone making their way down the steps. She didn’t think anything of it. Other people lived in the building, and it wasn’t as if the Doctor had anyone to go visit after work on a weeknight.
So when she heard his voice for the first time in nearly six months it took her completely by surprise.
“I’m sure there’s some sort of normal, human thing I’m supposed to do when someone follows me home from work and camps out in front of my home, like call the police, or set attack dogs on you, or something like that, but I’m not quite sure what it is, and you don’t exactly seem dangerous or anything, so I thought I’d just come down and ask you what you want and why you’re following me.”
She stayed frozen as he spoke, and kept her eyes carefully trained ahead, with her hair shielding her face. When he finished speaking she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to fight the tears that were pooling up in her eyes.
“Because,” she said quietly, turning to face him. “I didn’t know how to say hello.”
He had been casually leaning against the brick railing on the building when their eyes met. His eyes widened and he quickly pushed himself forward onto his two feet and stared at her in complete and utter shock.
“Rose…” he whispered. And at the sound of her own name for the first time in almost six months, coming from his voice, she couldn’t fight it anymore and let the first tears slip down her cheeks.
“Hello,” she greeted him in a shaky voice.
“You came back.”
“I said I would.”
“Jackie told me, but I started to think…I mean…It’s just…it’s been…” Rose smiled through the tears at his rambling, which was so very, very him. She stopped smiling though when he finally got his question out. “Are you leaving again?”
The question took her by surprise. Ever since she had made the decision to go to him at Canary Wharf, it had never once occurred to her to leave London again.
“I don’t know,” she answered carefully. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No.” His response was quick, certain. “No, I want you to stay. But I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do.”
A silence fell between them, and Rose didn’t know what to say. She pushed herself off of the wall and back to her feet, and turned to face him. She studied her sneakers, and felt his eyes on her, waiting. For what, she didn’t know.
“I got your message,” she finally said. “You said that you wanted to prove to me that you’re still you.”
She looked up at him and he nodded. “I do.”
“You don’t need to.” His eyes widened, and she smiled at him. An awkward, nervous smile that she could tell showed all of her uncertainty. She took a deep breath and continued.
“I know that you’re still you. I knew it when I first saw you running out of the TARDIS on the Crucible.”
“Then why did you leave?”
“I never expected all of this. I never dreamed of it. You know, you and me, living a normal life. House, mortgage, all of that. Whenever I saw us together in my head, it was on the TARDIS, traveling, running, saving people, and getting into trouble.” She saw his lips curve up into an amused smile.
“It wasn’t you I was running from.” She tried to explain. “It was this life that I never wanted. I saw you lying there asleep on my mum’s couch, like a normal human, and it just felt like too much. Like someone was handing me the normal human dream life, packaged up nicely with your face, and I just panicked.”
“So you ran.”
“So I ran,” Rose agreed. “And kept running until I couldn’t hide from what I did to you. I am so sorry for leaving you like that.”
He was silent for a long time, clearly studying her carefully. Then, suddenly, he gave her an amused half-smile. “Running away. That’s something I can relate to a bit. I’ve always been the one who ran away.”
And then he opened his arms, and she grinned and in two quick steps ran right into his tight, warm hug. She buried her face into his shoulder, and breathed in the scent of him, and she felt his fingers in the back of her hair, and it was all she could do to not start crying again. She was disappointed to feel him begin to pull away, but she knew that they were still outside, on the street, and it was slowly growing into a cold evening.
The Doctor grinned at her again, and then in a burst of energy that was so very Doctorish, stepped around her, picked up her bag, and slung it over his shoulder. He was back at her side in an instant, offering her his free hand, which she willingly took.
“Come on!” he insisted, pulling her up the stairs and through the front door. “Upstairs into the warm flat. You know I get cold now? I had to wear a wool coat this past winter! You wouldn’t believe it! Me, all bundled up in a coat and scarf to go to work! It’s a bit fascinating, discovering all of this human stuff.”
Rose giggled, as they stepped into the lift. “I was in India this winter. Southern Hemisphere. Winter was warm. No coats for me.”
“India, really? I went to India once. Fascinating place. Had to stop an alien race from lacing the Taj Mahal with an energy converter. Would have destroyed the entire solar system if I hadn’t stopped it.”
“Good one,” Rose said with a laugh. They stepped off the lift and crossed the hallway to her apartment door.
“Ooh, you’ll like this bit,” the Doctor said with a laugh. He let go of her hand and reached into his pocket and pulled out a sonic screwdriver. She couldn’t help bursting out laughing. “Took me a month to make in the Torchwood lab,” he explained. “It’s still missing some settings though. No resonating concrete or anything like that. But it does do this!” He flipped it on, and unlocked her apartment door.
“Can’t use a key like a normal human, eh?” They stepped into the flat, and he turned around and locked the deadbolt with the sonic instead of his hand. She couldn’t help snorting in amusement.
“Who says I have to act like a normal human?”
“No, I guess you don’t.” Rose agreed. “Nothing normal about you.”
She stepped into the heart of her flat and took a quick look around. There were very few changes to the room since the last time she had been there. There were a few scrap bits of tech on the table with tools, clearly from the Doctor continuing to fiddle with his new sonic screwdriver. She took note of the blanket hanging over the back of the couch. It appeared the Doctor had been sleeping there rather than in her bed. Rose wasn’t quite sure what to make of that.
She turned around to find him quietly watching her with a sad expression on his face. She met his eyes, and wondered what he was thinking.
“Why’d you come back?”
Rose was startled by the question, but then realized that she hadn’t told him yet. She had said that she was back, and why she left, but she never told him what convinced her to come back.
“I heard your voice,” she answered simply.
“You heard my voice?” he repeated back, surprised.
“Yeah,” Rose replied. “I mean, I know it sounds like such a simple answer to a hard question, but honestly, that’s what did it. I heard your voice, and I realized that I missed you, just like I’ve missed you the past few years. And I remembered all of those nights when I just wished desperately that I could hear your voice again. And it suddenly occurred to me that I could. Every single day if I wanted to.”
“Forever,” he agreed, softly.
“I said I was never going to leave you,” she reminded him. “And then I did. I am so sorry.”
“Quit apologizing. You came back to me. You always do.” His expression was serious, and she could only smile softly at him. Until suddenly he returned her smile with a wicked grin of his own. “So when are we going to see your mother?”
Rose’s eyes widened in horror and she groaned. “Oh God, not tonight. Please? Tomorrow? She is going to kill me.”
“Nah,” the Doctor drawled. “She’ll just be glad that you’re back. And might possibly slap you, but at least you earned it.”
“True.” Rose said with a smile. “For now, I just want to spend the evening here, with you.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
A few hours later, after dinner and drinks and a few stolen kisses, Rose climbed out of the bath that she was soaking in, toweled off, and slipped into a clean pair of pajamas. She brushed her teeth, let down her hair, and studied her face in the mirror. She ran her eyes over her well-tanned skin, and ran her hands through her long black hair. And she suddenly found herself wondering if the Doctor liked what he saw? Was the new Rose different to him? Or did he only see her clearly as Rose, and the aesthetics didn’t matter? How long would it take for her hair color to grow out? Or should she just dye it again?
She pinched a few strands between her fingers and thought that she’d just leave it alone for a while. This was a different life that she was starting, and for now, she wanted to be a different Rose. She wanted to be the Rose Tyler that came home with the Doctor every night, and held his hand while he made adjustments on his new sonic screwdriver, and ate frozen macaroni and cheese with the Doctor and her little brother. The Rose Tyler that left for India was a workaholic who couldn’t think about anything except the dimension cannon and stopping the darkness. She wasn’t going to be that person anymore and it started now.
She brushed out her hair carefully, and then wandered out to the common room to see what he had gotten himself up to while she was cleaning up.
She paused in the doorway, at the sight of him lying asleep on the couch, the blanket tossed haphazardly over his lithe form, and his bare feet sticking out over the edge of the couch. Her heart leapt in her chest, and she just stood there for a long time, watching him. This time, when he let out a little snore, she didn’t turn and run, but instead clasped her hand over her mouth and giggled.
The Doctor snored sometimes. Who knew?
She quietly padded across the room and crouched down beside his face and watched him for another moment. His face was relaxed, peaceful, and like that afternoon, Rose found herself wondering how long it had been since the last time he had slept. She looked down the couch, and traced his figure all the way down to his little bare toes, and she shook her head again, thinking about just how much she had changed.
She reached out, and softly shook his shoulder, and he jerked awake.
“Doctor,” she whispered quietly. “Come to bed.”
She took his hand, and watched as he glanced down at their joined fingers in wonder, and then looked back up at her with surprise. “Are you sure?”
“It’s much more comfortable than the couch,” she said with a smile. “And I want to wake up next to you tomorrow.”
She gave his hand a little tug, and silently, he followed her into her room, and into her bed, where she curled up against him.
And together they slept.
By: Anne (cookie2697)
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairing: Rose, Ten II/Rose
Beta: sugarsicons and tasyfa both took a swing at it for me.
Setting: Post-Journey’s End
Genre: Mostly angst. Angst with reconciliation.
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Note: I've committed post-JE angst. Actually, to be more specific, I committed post-JE angst quite a few months ago. And then I didn't post it because I wasn't really sure about this...and I post fic so rarely these days that the whole insecurity thing kinda came back. AND THEN right when I decided to post it again, David announced that he was leaving the show, and I figured fandom didn't need any more angst for a while. AND THEN the whole Mumbai terrorist attacks thing happened, and I felt like it was weird to post fic with half the fic set in India. So I decided to reedit it, but I didn't want to. And then time passed, and today I felt like taking another swing at editing it, and I like what I've got, so I'm posting!
WHEW, that was quite the ramble. I'm not going to dedicate this one to anyone persay. It was good therapy when I was feeling angsty a few months ago. But chatting about writing with humansrsuperior lately has really inspired me to want to get back to it. And an idle comment from her on her LJ today is what drove me to sit down and finish this guy up. So I want to thank her for that.
Anyway, on with the fic!
Rose stood across the room, almost as far away from him as she could possibly be, watching the Doctor sleep on her mother’s couch. He was sitting there, mostly upright, but slumped, his head buried in the huge fluffy back pillows, his head tilted back and his long neck exposed. If she were standing closer to him, she could probably look straight up his nose. And in a normal guy, in a human guy, someone like Mickey Smith or even Jimmy Stone, she would have found it strangely endearing. But the Doctor wasn’t Mickey or Jimmy, and when he made a soft sound that strangely resembled a snore, Rose knew that she desperately needed to escape.
It was only mere hours earlier that they had been left behind on a beach in Norway. The engines of the TARDIS had faded away while they stared at each other and wondered what would happen next. Now, in London, there was dinner with her family, some awkward conversation with her parents, and she went upstairs to say goodnight to Tony, and while she was gone, he fell asleep on the couch. The strangeness of watching the Doctor, who never seemed to even slow down, actually sleeping, affected her so strongly that she found herself physically recoiling from the situation.
She whipped around to rush from the room and immediately halted at the sight of her mother, who was standing in the doorway behind her, clearly watching her watch the Doctor. Rose had no idea what she looked like, but from the quizzical look her mum gave her, Rose guessed that the confusion she felt was clear. Rose jerked her head quickly, gesturing to her mother to meet her outside to talk. Silently they slipped from the room, and closed the door behind them.
“Will you look after him for a while?”
“What?” Jackie’s voice was sharp, and Rose knew that this conversation wasn’t going to be easy.
“I know it isn’t right of me to ask. He doesn’t exist in this world. Pete needs to set him up with an identity. He’s going to need clothes, something to do with himself, a place to stay. All of that stuff. Please, mum. I need you to do this.”
“Rose…” her mother sighed her name. Sensing an impending lecture, Rose had to cut her off before she said something typically parental, when what she needed was to get away.
“He doesn’t sleep, mum.”
“What?”
“The Doctor doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t need to. But he’s in there, right now, sleeping. And it’s just too weird, mum. It’s not right. None of this is right. I just need time. To think.”
“Where will you go?” Rose fell silent. How could she answer that question when she didn’t even know yet? “How long will you be gone?” Again, Rose evaded the question.
“Just…don’t let him come after me. Not yet.”
“But you are coming back, aren’t you, sweetheart?”
Rose looked back to the doors behind them that were hiding the Doctor from her view. She stared deeply into them, as if somehow if she looked hard enough, she could see through them to the Doctor’s face. It was the right face, the one that she had missed so much these past few years. It was the face she had been fighting to get back to ever since the most terrible day of her life. It was the right face, even if he wasn’t quite right in other ways. But he was still the Doctor. Wasn’t he?
“Yes.” She finally answered. “I’m coming back. Once I’ve…I dunno…figured out what I’m feeling.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
She felt like a criminal, walking into Heathrow with two bags: one full of clothes and essentials, the other filled with cash. Who besides a criminal walks around with a duffel bag full of cash? But she knew the answer even if she felt weird about it: someone who wants to disappear. Someone who doesn’t want to be found. Even so, she fingered the mobile in her pocket. It was powered down. She couldn’t be reached. But it was the one thing that could connect her back to home.
She stood in front of the international ticket counter, staring at the various airlines and the potential places that she could go. France, Canada, Australia, America…nothing seemed right. They were tourist spots. Places people went with friends, families, and lovers to explore and relax and make memories. Rose wasn’t looking for good times. She was looking to disappear.
When she finally walked up to the counter and paid cash for a one-way ticket to Mumbai, she finally felt like she was getting on the right track. India was one of the poorest and highest populated countries in the world, even in this world. If there was anywhere to disappear, it was in a country where no one would even think to look for her.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The problem was that Rose didn’t feel invisible in India. She tried to disappear, as she had planned. She avoided the touristy parts of the cities, and found rooms in the common areas. She moved from city to city. She adopted their clothes, their food, their culture. But everywhere she went, people stared at her. Children pointed at her blonde hair and whispered to their parents. She even tried wrapping her sari so that it covered her hair, but shopkeepers still stared when she came to buy food at the market. She felt like the most obvious invisible girl in India.
She didn’t think twice about it when she decided to dye her hair. It wasn’t easy to find something to use. She had to find a richer part of the city, the industrial part of town, to get a proper permanent dye. But the moment she walked out in the city with her new black hair, so sharply contrasted with her pale skin that was tanning much too slowly for her liking, she felt more like the person she was looking for in her escape: someone other than Rose Tyler.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
She wasn’t keeping track of the days. There was no need without a job to go to, or family to come home to. Instead she lived her life like a nomad, moving from community to community. Renting a room for a week, or a month, or a few days as her hosts allowed.
She helped out the local people as she could: shoes for a poor child who couldn’t afford them, helping to cook meals for hardworking families who had no money or time. She would tutor children who needed help in school. Anything that she could do, anywhere that she could go to help the people around her. Sometimes she just walked through the town like a ghost: unknown and invisible to the people around her, but watching, listening, and observing common life in a place that once would have been completely foreign to her.
In the back of her mind a part of her realized that she was living like the Doctor. Her feet were her TARDIS and India was her time and space. The common people of India were her alien race, and she did what she could to help them. But when thoughts like that entered her mind she pushed them away along with the guilt that bubbled up inside of her, and the voice that whispered that she had abandoned him, alone in a strange new world without an escape.
Still, she kept moving. She kept walking, traveling, and helping people. And even though she tried not to think about it, she knew that a part of her felt closer to the Doctor than ever before.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
She found herself in a shop in New Delhi one day. Her roots were showing and she needed to touch up her dye job. While she paid the shopkeeper, she spied a calendar on the wall of the shop in English. She blinked in surprise, counted on her fingers, and walked out of the shop numb.
She had been in India for more than five months.
She knew that she had been gone for a long time, but she had no idea that it had been quite so long. She remembered her promise to her mother. I’m coming back… She wondered if they were still expecting her to keep that promise, or if they had let her go. She thought about the Doctor and realized that wherever he was, whatever he was doing, he must have long since settled into his new life here. And once again, a pang of guilt filled her heart at leaving him alone.
That afternoon she packed her bags, paid her landlord, and took a cab to the airport. Once again she found herself standing in front of the international counter, staring at the names of the airlines. This time she had only one bag. Most of her clothes were gone, and she had compressed her cash, still plentiful, in with her essentials.
She stood for over an hour just staring at the British Airways counter, trying to convince herself that she was ready to buy a ticket to London and head home to her family, and to him. Finally, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the mobile that she had been carrying, silent and powerless in her pocket, for five months.
She sunk into a hard, plastic chair before flipping the phone open. Her fingers were shaking as she pressed the power button and waited. Her voicemail was, as expected, filled with new messages.
She swallowed, and chewed on the inside of her cheek, trying to ignore the sick feeling in her stomach and the overwhelming fear of what she would hear as she dialed her voicemail.
Her mother, a week after she left. They talked to her landlord and pre-paid her rent for the next six months. Pete was taking care of the Doctor, who was staying in the guest room. Tony wondered where she’d gone. Come home.
Pete, a few days later. They’d offered the Doctor a technical position at Torchwood. They figured it made sense. He knows alien technology better than all of their best minds put together. Maybe in a lab he could stay out of trouble. Her mother misses her and wanted her to come home. Take all the time she needs.
Jackie, a month after she left. Pete found out that she went to India. The Doctor doesn’t know. Please check in and let them know she’s okay. Tony misses her. Jackie misses her. The Doctor refuses to talk about her, but Jackie can tell he’s a miserable sod. If she doesn’t come home soon, they’re going to give the Doctor the keys to her flat just to get him out of the house. Please call.
Six weeks gone…Jackie. The Doctor’s moved into her flat. Come home.
And then the next message, after a long silence at the beginning.
“I’m sorry. I know you don’t want to...I mean…your family wouldn’t give me your number, but I saw it on a bill in your flat. I don’t know why I’m calling. I know you don’t want to hear from me...you think I’m not him. Not Time Lord enough for you or something.” There was another long pause. “I wish you’d let me show you. Prove to you that I’m still me. It’s not like I can prove it with a swordfight on a spaceship over London with you a thousand miles away or wherever you are. Come back to me. I love you.”
She snapped the phone shut before she could hear more and leapt from her seat. She was shaking this time as she walked up to the ticket counter.
“One way to Tokyo, please.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Japan was like a rush of noise and colors after India. It was all flashing lights and electronic dance music and people absolutely everywhere. Rose was completely overwhelmed.
She paid cash for a nice hotel room with a view of the city, and locked herself away in the room for a week. Here she had luxuries that she hadn’t experienced since before the dimension cannon. She pinned up her dark hair, sunk into a hot bath, and just soaked away the aches and calluses that had developed over the past five months. Her bed felt as soft as a cloud. She passed out quickly and slept for a full day. When she awoke, she felt rejuvenated, and finally, she began to think.
She listened to the rest of her voicemails, and cleared out her inbox on her phone. There was only the one message from him. She listened to it over and over again until the battery lost its charge and she couldn’t listen to it anymore.
She could hear the loneliness in his voice. That familiar, familiar loneliness that had characterized the Doctor for the entire time that she had known him. She felt his plea to be allowed to prove himself to her. She thought about that horrible Christmas with the Sycorax and him unconscious in bed. She remembered how convinced she was that the Doctor was dead, gone forever. Until he had challenged the Sycorax leader, clearly not just for the human race, but for her, to prove that he was still there in that new body with that new face. When she saw how much he wanted her to believe in him, and knew that it had to be the same man. Suddenly, remembering that day, she realized that this time she hadn’t given him the same chance. And this time he hadn’t even changed faces.
The guilt bubbled up inside of her until she couldn’t ignore it anymore, and she started to cry. Once the tears started, they didn’t stop. She cried for the longing she heard in his voice, and the hesitancy that she sensed in him. He took her disappearance as proof that she didn’t love him, and she cried for letting him question her like that. She cried for herself being separated from him in the first place during the battle of Canary Wharf. She cried because she knew that he had missed her for the years that she was gone, and she cried for him being out there without her again even now. She cried because he didn’t even say goodbye to her this time, and she cried because she did the same to him when she left him with her family. She cried because she was sure that he thought she’d forget all about him now that she had his double, and she never, ever would. She cried for him waiting for her in London, because she had abandoned him alone in a strange world, and she related to that feeling more than anyone. And she cried for herself…because she finally had the chance for some real happiness with him, and instead she ran away from it.
And most of all, she cried because she knew that she needed to go home to him, but she was so very, very scared to face him after all of this time.
The fear and pain boiled inside of her, surged through her, and she couldn’t breathe through the heaves of her chest. She wiped the snot from her nose and felt the dampness of the pillow she hugged in her lap, but she didn’t stop crying. For the first time she allowed herself to truly feel the pain of the original Doctor’s abandonment, and she wallowed in the guilt of the knowledge that she had done exactly the same thing to the new Doctor who was waiting in London.
And then, hours later, when there were no tears left to cry, she reached into the bottom of her bag, and pulled out the credit card that she hadn’t touched in all of the months that she had been gone, and she picked up the hotel phone, called British Airways and bought a one-way ticket back to Heathrow.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
When she arrived back in London, she didn’t quite know where to go. She knew she couldn’t face her mum yet, and all the madness that seemed to come with the big family home. She took a cab to her flat, and then, as she sat in the taxi in front of her building, remembered that the Doctor was living there and was suddenly too afraid to go inside. She had no idea what she could possibly say to him to repair what she had done to him, and she didn’t quite know where to start. Finally, she had the taxi take her to a nearby hotel instead, and she checked herself in. Paying with cash, once again.
She sat awake on the edge of the bed with her hands folded in her lap all night, staring distantly at a generic picture of the London Eye hanging on the wall opposite the bed. She thought about the city that she grew up in, and how many things were the same here, even though there were so many differences between the universes. She thought about the first time she met the Doctor, and how the Autons used the Eye as their transmitter, and he had been too daft to notice it. She remembered the clueless look on his face, and she smiled at the memory.
When the sun came up, she took a shower and cleaned herself up. She put on clothes from her old life, before the dimension cannon, and shook out her now long, black hair over her shoulders. She put on makeup like it was a normal day, and then she went outside and started walking through the city that she loved.
She walked to Oxford Street, and once there she walked up and down the long miles of the shopping district all day, never once going into a shop. Instead she weaved through the crowds of people on the streets, and listened to their voices, letting the familiar accents wash over her. She tried desperately to feel like she had come home, but she couldn’t feel it. She was still disconnected from this world. After all of her time away, hiding from her real life, she walked the streets of London feeling as invisible as she had in India. Nobody recognized the mysterious Vitex heiress from the tabloids with her new hair and her darker skin.
She returned to her hotel that night and she slept fitfully, tossing back and forth and wondering whether she should leave again. When she crawled out of bed the next morning she eyed her bag in the corner and thought about running back to Heathrow. She packed her things, and tossed the bag over one shoulder. She took a last glance through the hotel room, and once again her eyes fell onto that ridiculous picture of the London Eye. The Doctor’s old face flashed before her eyes once more. She flipped the lights, closed the door, and checked out of the hotel.
She walked to the nearest tube station instead of catching a cab, and stood there blankly for a long moment staring at the signs. The Piccadilly line would take her back to Heathrow. If she walked into the hallway with the blue signs it would be back to the nomad life, the wandering and traveling alone through strange and unusual places. But the Jubilee Line would take her to Canary Wharf. If she walked beneath the grey sign, it was off to Torchwood, where the Doctor would be working today. The grey sign meant a return to reality, to the new life that was waiting for her if she would just reach out and take it.
She slowly started to walk towards the entrance with the blue sign, but the memory of the Doctor’s voice in her mind stopped her in her tracks. She thought about his one lonely message, and the quiet plea to come home. She remembered that daft smile beneath the London Eye, and later fighting the Sycorax with his new face to prove himself to her. She thought about the end of his message, and those three words that he had never said to her before the dimension cannon, and how much they terrified and excited her all at once. And then she smiled nervously, turned, and walked beneath the grey sign.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Even though she had made up her mind that there was no more running, Rose couldn’t bring herself to walk into the building. She didn’t have her Torchwood ID anyway, but she had a sneaking suspicion that if she walked in, the guard would recognize her and probably let her pass. There were certainly some privileges that came with being the boss’s daughter. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Instead, she took the escalator up and out of the tube station, into the outdoor square in front of the towering building. It wasn’t the only exit, but Rose doubted that the Doctor would exit through the underground shopping centre. Too many people. She stood and stared at the building for a long time, before crossing the plaza to a cement wall opposite the entrance to the tube station. Tossing her bag against the wall, she hoisted herself up onto it, and she sat and waited.
During the five hours that she sat there, she tried to figure out what she was going to say to him, but when she finally saw him coming out of the main entrance to the building, she completely forgot it all. She couldn’t even move.
He walked alone across the plaza towards the station, just one familiar figure in a crowd of strangers. He was wearing another new suit; brown pinstripes, like the original, but not quite the same. It was still wrinkled, of course, and with his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his trousers, he had a casual air about him that was so typical of the Doctor. But he wasn’t looking around, curiously studying the world around him like he normally would be. As he passed close by her, she took note of the fact that his hair wasn’t styled, instead lying flat against his forehead, and he looked like he hadn’t shaved in a day or two. Rose remembered the last time she had seen him, when he had fallen asleep on her mother’s couch, and she found herself wondering if he was sleeping at night.
He walked past her without looking up, and headed straight into the underground station. She jumped to her feet, slung her bag back over her shoulder, and went to follow him.
As she stood in the tube station, a mere 20 feet away from the Doctor, Rose felt like a ghost once again, only now she hated the feeling. He stood at the tracks, slowly rocking back and forth on his feet, staring distantly at the tracks. Please turn around. She silently begged him to look at her. One close look and he’d recognize her, wouldn’t he? Never once did he turn to see her.
When the train came, she got onto the same car as him, on the opposite end. They crowded in with dozens of other commuters, and as she held onto the rocking train, she kept her eyes on his shoulder, the only bit of him that she could see between the crowds of people. When he got off, she followed. The wait for their transfer was much the same as the first, with one exception. The second train was much emptier than the first, and this time, when he got on the train, his eyes scanned over the other side of the car. She felt it, almost like a physical caress as his gaze passed over her.
He didn’t recognize her. And he didn’t look at her again.
She didn’t follow him into her building. She watched him hurry up the steps, two at a time, and then disappear through the door. For a long time she just stood across the street, watching the place where he disappeared. She glanced up and took note of the light flipping on in her flat, and she found herself wondering how it was different now that he had worked his way into her life in her absence. The flat had never really felt like home to her. It was more of a temporary space that she occupied while she waited to get back to him. She wondered if it would feel real to her now that he was there with her.
She crossed the street and made her way up to the front of the building. She reached into her bag and pulled out her keys. She pushed the key into the lock and toyed with it for a moment, before pulling it out. Pocketing the keys, she backed away from the door and down the steps. Mirroring her actions from that morning, she tossed her bag to the ground and pushed herself up onto the brick wall in front of her building. Staring off into the distance, she tried to decide what to do next.
She had been sitting there for nearly an hour when she heard the front door open and shut, and someone making their way down the steps. She didn’t think anything of it. Other people lived in the building, and it wasn’t as if the Doctor had anyone to go visit after work on a weeknight.
So when she heard his voice for the first time in nearly six months it took her completely by surprise.
“I’m sure there’s some sort of normal, human thing I’m supposed to do when someone follows me home from work and camps out in front of my home, like call the police, or set attack dogs on you, or something like that, but I’m not quite sure what it is, and you don’t exactly seem dangerous or anything, so I thought I’d just come down and ask you what you want and why you’re following me.”
She stayed frozen as he spoke, and kept her eyes carefully trained ahead, with her hair shielding her face. When he finished speaking she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to fight the tears that were pooling up in her eyes.
“Because,” she said quietly, turning to face him. “I didn’t know how to say hello.”
He had been casually leaning against the brick railing on the building when their eyes met. His eyes widened and he quickly pushed himself forward onto his two feet and stared at her in complete and utter shock.
“Rose…” he whispered. And at the sound of her own name for the first time in almost six months, coming from his voice, she couldn’t fight it anymore and let the first tears slip down her cheeks.
“Hello,” she greeted him in a shaky voice.
“You came back.”
“I said I would.”
“Jackie told me, but I started to think…I mean…It’s just…it’s been…” Rose smiled through the tears at his rambling, which was so very, very him. She stopped smiling though when he finally got his question out. “Are you leaving again?”
The question took her by surprise. Ever since she had made the decision to go to him at Canary Wharf, it had never once occurred to her to leave London again.
“I don’t know,” she answered carefully. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No.” His response was quick, certain. “No, I want you to stay. But I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do.”
A silence fell between them, and Rose didn’t know what to say. She pushed herself off of the wall and back to her feet, and turned to face him. She studied her sneakers, and felt his eyes on her, waiting. For what, she didn’t know.
“I got your message,” she finally said. “You said that you wanted to prove to me that you’re still you.”
She looked up at him and he nodded. “I do.”
“You don’t need to.” His eyes widened, and she smiled at him. An awkward, nervous smile that she could tell showed all of her uncertainty. She took a deep breath and continued.
“I know that you’re still you. I knew it when I first saw you running out of the TARDIS on the Crucible.”
“Then why did you leave?”
“I never expected all of this. I never dreamed of it. You know, you and me, living a normal life. House, mortgage, all of that. Whenever I saw us together in my head, it was on the TARDIS, traveling, running, saving people, and getting into trouble.” She saw his lips curve up into an amused smile.
“It wasn’t you I was running from.” She tried to explain. “It was this life that I never wanted. I saw you lying there asleep on my mum’s couch, like a normal human, and it just felt like too much. Like someone was handing me the normal human dream life, packaged up nicely with your face, and I just panicked.”
“So you ran.”
“So I ran,” Rose agreed. “And kept running until I couldn’t hide from what I did to you. I am so sorry for leaving you like that.”
He was silent for a long time, clearly studying her carefully. Then, suddenly, he gave her an amused half-smile. “Running away. That’s something I can relate to a bit. I’ve always been the one who ran away.”
And then he opened his arms, and she grinned and in two quick steps ran right into his tight, warm hug. She buried her face into his shoulder, and breathed in the scent of him, and she felt his fingers in the back of her hair, and it was all she could do to not start crying again. She was disappointed to feel him begin to pull away, but she knew that they were still outside, on the street, and it was slowly growing into a cold evening.
The Doctor grinned at her again, and then in a burst of energy that was so very Doctorish, stepped around her, picked up her bag, and slung it over his shoulder. He was back at her side in an instant, offering her his free hand, which she willingly took.
“Come on!” he insisted, pulling her up the stairs and through the front door. “Upstairs into the warm flat. You know I get cold now? I had to wear a wool coat this past winter! You wouldn’t believe it! Me, all bundled up in a coat and scarf to go to work! It’s a bit fascinating, discovering all of this human stuff.”
Rose giggled, as they stepped into the lift. “I was in India this winter. Southern Hemisphere. Winter was warm. No coats for me.”
“India, really? I went to India once. Fascinating place. Had to stop an alien race from lacing the Taj Mahal with an energy converter. Would have destroyed the entire solar system if I hadn’t stopped it.”
“Good one,” Rose said with a laugh. They stepped off the lift and crossed the hallway to her apartment door.
“Ooh, you’ll like this bit,” the Doctor said with a laugh. He let go of her hand and reached into his pocket and pulled out a sonic screwdriver. She couldn’t help bursting out laughing. “Took me a month to make in the Torchwood lab,” he explained. “It’s still missing some settings though. No resonating concrete or anything like that. But it does do this!” He flipped it on, and unlocked her apartment door.
“Can’t use a key like a normal human, eh?” They stepped into the flat, and he turned around and locked the deadbolt with the sonic instead of his hand. She couldn’t help snorting in amusement.
“Who says I have to act like a normal human?”
“No, I guess you don’t.” Rose agreed. “Nothing normal about you.”
She stepped into the heart of her flat and took a quick look around. There were very few changes to the room since the last time she had been there. There were a few scrap bits of tech on the table with tools, clearly from the Doctor continuing to fiddle with his new sonic screwdriver. She took note of the blanket hanging over the back of the couch. It appeared the Doctor had been sleeping there rather than in her bed. Rose wasn’t quite sure what to make of that.
She turned around to find him quietly watching her with a sad expression on his face. She met his eyes, and wondered what he was thinking.
“Why’d you come back?”
Rose was startled by the question, but then realized that she hadn’t told him yet. She had said that she was back, and why she left, but she never told him what convinced her to come back.
“I heard your voice,” she answered simply.
“You heard my voice?” he repeated back, surprised.
“Yeah,” Rose replied. “I mean, I know it sounds like such a simple answer to a hard question, but honestly, that’s what did it. I heard your voice, and I realized that I missed you, just like I’ve missed you the past few years. And I remembered all of those nights when I just wished desperately that I could hear your voice again. And it suddenly occurred to me that I could. Every single day if I wanted to.”
“Forever,” he agreed, softly.
“I said I was never going to leave you,” she reminded him. “And then I did. I am so sorry.”
“Quit apologizing. You came back to me. You always do.” His expression was serious, and she could only smile softly at him. Until suddenly he returned her smile with a wicked grin of his own. “So when are we going to see your mother?”
Rose’s eyes widened in horror and she groaned. “Oh God, not tonight. Please? Tomorrow? She is going to kill me.”
“Nah,” the Doctor drawled. “She’ll just be glad that you’re back. And might possibly slap you, but at least you earned it.”
“True.” Rose said with a smile. “For now, I just want to spend the evening here, with you.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
A few hours later, after dinner and drinks and a few stolen kisses, Rose climbed out of the bath that she was soaking in, toweled off, and slipped into a clean pair of pajamas. She brushed her teeth, let down her hair, and studied her face in the mirror. She ran her eyes over her well-tanned skin, and ran her hands through her long black hair. And she suddenly found herself wondering if the Doctor liked what he saw? Was the new Rose different to him? Or did he only see her clearly as Rose, and the aesthetics didn’t matter? How long would it take for her hair color to grow out? Or should she just dye it again?
She pinched a few strands between her fingers and thought that she’d just leave it alone for a while. This was a different life that she was starting, and for now, she wanted to be a different Rose. She wanted to be the Rose Tyler that came home with the Doctor every night, and held his hand while he made adjustments on his new sonic screwdriver, and ate frozen macaroni and cheese with the Doctor and her little brother. The Rose Tyler that left for India was a workaholic who couldn’t think about anything except the dimension cannon and stopping the darkness. She wasn’t going to be that person anymore and it started now.
She brushed out her hair carefully, and then wandered out to the common room to see what he had gotten himself up to while she was cleaning up.
She paused in the doorway, at the sight of him lying asleep on the couch, the blanket tossed haphazardly over his lithe form, and his bare feet sticking out over the edge of the couch. Her heart leapt in her chest, and she just stood there for a long time, watching him. This time, when he let out a little snore, she didn’t turn and run, but instead clasped her hand over her mouth and giggled.
The Doctor snored sometimes. Who knew?
She quietly padded across the room and crouched down beside his face and watched him for another moment. His face was relaxed, peaceful, and like that afternoon, Rose found herself wondering how long it had been since the last time he had slept. She looked down the couch, and traced his figure all the way down to his little bare toes, and she shook her head again, thinking about just how much she had changed.
She reached out, and softly shook his shoulder, and he jerked awake.
“Doctor,” she whispered quietly. “Come to bed.”
She took his hand, and watched as he glanced down at their joined fingers in wonder, and then looked back up at her with surprise. “Are you sure?”
“It’s much more comfortable than the couch,” she said with a smile. “And I want to wake up next to you tomorrow.”
She gave his hand a little tug, and silently, he followed her into her room, and into her bed, where she curled up against him.
And together they slept.