Fic: Don't Stand So Close To Me
Title: Don't Stand So Close To Me
Author: meself, fid_gin
Beta: unfolded73
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Rose
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I own nothing, all hail the BBC
Summary: Prior to the events of School Reunion, the Doctor and Rose confront the possibly scandalous implications of their familiarity with each other as they prepare for their undercover roles. UST ensues.
Notes: FinSoFicMo is in full swing, and this was my first goal, to finish this damn fic which has sat half-written on my hard drive since...oh I dunno, May? Suffice it to say, this episode falls at an awkward time in S2, and this fic didn't quite know where to go if it couldn't be porny. Brilliant title suggested by my beta, and of course stolen from Sting.
Rose Tyler examined herself in the full length mirror, turning first to the left and then to the right, and sighed dejectedly. While she was comfortable admitting that she filled out the dinner lady uniform much more attractively than the future co-workers she'd been introduced to at her interview earlier that day, it was hardly flattering. She didn't understand why she had to go to such ridiculous lengths to blend in anyway, when the Doctor had already assured her that he'd be wearing his traditional brown pinstripe suit to class, of course, what else would he wear? When she'd pointed out how unfair it was for her to be forced to take the lesser of the surveillance roles, he'd made a comment about her lack of qualifications for a teaching position. "Although," he'd said with a smirk, "you could be my assistant?"
"I'm not your assistant," she'd growled, and he'd sauntered out of the room, still wearing that infuriating grin.
The synthetic material of her uniform itched terribly, and she absentmindedly scratched at the back of her thigh, tugging at the collar of her blouse with her other hand and making a face at herself in the mirror.
"Better not let them see you scratching your bum at the workplace tomorrow, Miss Tyler," came a jovial voice from behind her. "Not very hygienic, is it?"
"I wasn't," she said, turning to face the Doctor. "You try wearin' this much polyester and tell me how comfortable you are."
"It's only going to get worse in that hot cafeteria, you know," he added, smiling hugely. He looked absolutely tickled at her annoyance and discomfort, and she wanted, on some level, to smack him for it. However, he had also put on his specs, and on another level entirely it wasn't smacking him which came to mind. Did he always have to look so impossibly sexy like that, especially knowing there wasn't anything she could do about it? Rose huffed, and pushed her hair off of her forehead.
"So what you been doing?" she asked, enjoying the way his long frame seemed to melt against the bumpy TARDIS wall he was currently leaning against.
The Doctor was instantly animated, crossing to her in only a few long strides and thrusting a sheaf of paper toward her. "Preparing my lesson plan! Here, have a look." She glanced at his notes, then back up at his face in confusion.
"But you wrote this in your writing. Won't they think that's weird?"
He rolled his eyes. "I hardly think our esteemed Mr. Finch has time to inspect every instructor's curriculum with all these recent staff changes. If it comes up, I'll just say they're...equations, or something," he said, waving his hand about.
"You're enjoying this, aren't you? Getting to play teacher?"
"You heard from your boyfriend, then?" he said quickly, and she guessed her gentle teasing was irritating him. He rifled through his notes, biting at his lip as he plucked a pencil from behind his ear and scribbled something out.
"Yeah...no...I mean, yeah, Mickey called earlier to make sure we got on all right at the school. But he's..." She trailed off. It was useless explaining to the Doctor that she hadn't thought of Mickey as her 'boyfriend' in ages now, probably at least since Cardiff and Margaret Slitheen and his revelation about Tricia Delaney, which had only thrown into focus her own selfish behaviour regarding how she'd treated him. She still cared about him, and still enjoyed the attention he doted on her, but it just wasn't there for her anymore, except for the small charge she got every time Mickey made assumptions about her and the Doctor. None of that would matter to the Doctor at any rate. "I'm supposed to check in with him in the next couple days, he's going to keep digging on the computer and see what else he can find."
"Mm-hmm," the Doctor hummed, now gnawing on his pencil. "No plans tonight, then?"
"Who, me? Or Mickey?"
"You and Mickey." He was still speaking around his pencil and reading his papers, and sort of circling her, awkwardly. "You haven't been home in awhile...he's not whisking you away for dinner or dancing or...anything?"
"Noooo..." she said carefully, eyeing him and trying to figure out if he was trying to get rid of her. "Should he?"
"Good!" The Doctor tossed his lesson plan and pencil onto a nearby chair so quickly it startled her. "Then you're free! Get changed." He was halfway out of the room before he'd even finished speaking.
"Wait, changed for what?" she called after him.
His face appeared around the corner of a clothing rack. "Well you can't go out to dinner with the dashing new physics teacher dressed like that." And then he vanished again, leaving Rose standing in her itchy uniform.
*****
She watched him carefully while they ate their casual meal at a local pub, trying to decide if he was acting strangely toward her; if this was, in fact, a date (and therefore something she could tease him about) or if he just hadn't fancied the idea of a night stuck idle in the TARDIS. It wasn't unusual for them go out for a bite to eat together, but it was a bit strange for him to be so oddly formal rather than just grabbing her hand and yanking her into the nearest chippy. He didn't seem any different, talking excitedly about the school and the UFO sightings, laughing about a recent trip of theirs to a desert moon 600,000 years in the future and galaxies away from Earth, and sipping a pint...okay, that last bit was kind-of strange. Thinking back, she couldn't recall ever having seen him drink alcohol before aside from a relieved sip of port in Downing Street. It was a little exciting, seeing the Doctor in a different light, and she could almost imagine he was just a normal bloke she was out with...a normal bloke who paused in his conversation to sonic her rare burger to medium-well like she'd requested it before resuming his theories about what aliens could possibly be responsible for the recent visitations, factoring in proximity to Earth and the descriptions of the lights in the sky.
"Okay, I give up," she said, setting aside her glass of wine. The Doctor glanced at her plate apprehensively.
"I'll admit, it's probably closer to well-done. Should still be perfectly edible, though! You try cooking a burger with soundwaves, Rose Tyler, and see how far you get."
"Not the food, that's fine." She popped a chip into her mouth to emphasize this, and studied him closely as she chewed. "What's going on with you? I mean, asking me to dinner and not just springing it on me? Drinking? You feelin' all right?"
The Doctor sipped his drink, looking toward the door. "Of course I'm all right," he said, not meeting her eyes. "Just trying to fit in. We could be here for a week or more, just trying out the local flavour."
"Trying to fit in by taking me out on a date," she teased. "People will talk." The Doctor glanced over sharply at that.
"Oh? And what will they say?"
Was he serious? "You know."
His face was the picture of innocence. "No, no...tell me."
She sighed, exasperated. "C'mon Doctor: handsome teacher, takin' out a young girl who works in the cafeteria?"
The Doctor gave a smile that could only be described as wicked, curling his tongue against his top teeth. "Are you saying that people will assume that we're having an illicit affair in the workplace? And you called me handsome!"
Rose could feel herself blushing faintly. "Something like that. And I didn't call you handsome, I just meant that's what people would say."
He clicked his tongue, pondering. "How would that work, I wonder? I mean, I said 'in the workplace', but that wouldn't be very practical, would it? What do they think, that you and I would sneak off to a supply closet between classes for a quickie or something?" He looked amused at the thought. "Not very romantic!"
She shrugged. "Hasn't stopped people at some of my old jobs."
"From shagging at work?" He gave a pitying sigh. "Humans. It's all about sex with you, isn't it?"
Rose felt her cheeks turn an even deeper shade of scarlet. "Not me, I was just saying that other people..."
"No, nonono you're probably right," he interrupted. "So assuming that we were able to control ourselves at the school, and did meet for dinner on a night like this, what do you think these people might assume would happen next, I wonder?"
Sipping her wine gave her a minute to carefully compose her answer. "Well, m'not sure, but I'd guess they'd think we'd go home together."
"Which we do," the Doctor pointed out quickly. Rose was shocked by how forward that sounded - yeah, it was true, but she'd never really thought about it like that before. Or if she had, she certainly never thought he did. "Anyway," he continued, "I'm talking details. If I'm going to be the subject of local gossip, I'd like to know what's being...gossipped."
She was confused: since when had the Doctor cared what other people thought or said about him? "Why?"
"Humour me!" he chirped. "It's not often I get to play human."
"Play human," she repeated. "You make it sound like a game."
"It is! A bit. Ish. Besides, I'm trying to fit in, remember?"
"By trying to scandalize people?" It was silly, but also kind-of adorable, she had to admit. He was actually enjoying the thought of other people imagining them as a couple! Rose smiled as his puppy-dog expression. "All right, Mr. Smith. You want to know what people at the school would say about us if they could see us right now?"
"Absolutely!" He beamed, and took a drink from his pint.
"Well for one, they'd say I'm too young for you."
The Doctor blew out a small puff of air. "Hoo, they'd be bang on with that one."
"Stop interrupting." His mouth shut with an audible snap, and Rose had to fight off the giggles for a minute. She couldn't believe the words that were coming out of her mouth, the shiver of delight which went through her at the thought of another life where the things she was saying could actually be true. "Now, they'd probably point out what an odd coincidence it is that we both show up and apply for work at the same time, and then start meeting in the evening. They might even think that you pulled some strings to get me hired. And so they'd come to the logical conclusion that we must be...well, involved." She paused, taking in his expectant expression. "That's it."
"That's it?" he said, sounding offended. "Where's the scandal in that?"
Rose snatched up her glass of wine, annoyed. "I don't hear you doing any better."
He nodded. "All right...all right." His tongue came to rest against his teeth as he appeared to think deeply about the subject. "Well, we're mysterious strangers who arrived together. And you are, as you so kindly pointed out, a bit young for me. Sooo...perhaps you're a former student whom I began an affair with and enticed away from home!"
She swirled her wine around in the glass. Her face felt very warm, whether from the wine or from the fantasy of an affair with the Doctor, she couldn't tell.
"Yes," he continued, "that sounds right. It started with long looks across the classroom, kept late after class, young teacher, the subject of schoolgirl fantasy...wait, sorry, that's Sting." Rose giggled. "A quick stolen kiss...well, a slow stolen kiss, rather, and the rest was history."
"Stolen by who?" She could just about envision the scene in her mind: his tweed suit, her low-cut blouse, the smell of his aftershave and the way they'd jump apart guiltily as soon as someone walked in on them. The Doctor gave her a grin which made her shift in her seat, her stomach fluttering.
"That depends," he said. "It could probably be construed that I seduced you, being the responsible adult, however I would claim that you tempted me into it, you little tease. Now, of course I had to resign in disgrace after we were discovered, and I persuaded you to run away with me which brings us to the present: fugitives on the run, living in sin." He looked very proud of himself as he finished. One of Rose's hands was resting in her lap under the table, and she jumped a little with surprise when she felt his hand brush hers - their table was small enough, he hadn't needed to lean over to reach. His thumb stroked the backs of her knuckles and his left eyebrow quirked up in question. "How do you like it so far, Miss Tyler?"
"F...fine," she stammered. The touch of his fingers, the slightly unnerving dark twinkle in his eyes, the wine...all were making her feel off-balance, and she wasn't sure what to say next. "So. 'Living in sin', huh?"
"Oh yes." His voice was still light and unaffected, and she wondered if the hand-holding going on under the table was just more of the usual, only seeming more poignant now because of their subject of conversation. "Insatiable young thing like you, experienced older man like me, you can hardly keep your hands off of me."
"Is that right," she said dryly, giving his hand a little shake under the table. "Who can't keep their hands off who, Doctor?"
You would have had to be familiar with the Doctor's quick mood shifts to glimpse the quick flicker of panic which flitted through his eyes before he feigned relaxed disinterest, leaning his chin on his other hand. Rose saw it, and it made her wonder. Had he even been aware he was reaching toward her hand before he took it? She mirrored his actions, leaning onto her other hand, bringing their faces inches apart over the tiny table.
"So...what if that's not how it happened?" she asked. "What if you didn't seduce me and I didn't run away with you?"
He frowned. "I find that hard to believe."
"No, I mean..." She leaned in even closer, lowering her voice conspiratorially. "What if it wasn't something scandalous, and we just met somewhere and you asked me to dinner?"
"Dinner?"
"Or a drink," she continued, indicating their beverages with a nod of her head. "And we talked, and drank, and you asked me if I'd like to come back to yours."
He stared at her, seeming to have trouble following her line of logic. "To...the TARDIS?"
"Doctor, we're talking about what other people would say." She cocked her head and regarded him. "Aren't we?"
She watched his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed, but he still gripped her hand under the table, still leaned toward her. "Um...yes?" It sounded like a question. She was suddenly very curious about the way the night would turn out if things kept progressing in this fashion. Their feelings for each other were not something they spoke about, but in the last fifteen minutes she and the Doctor had concocted no less than three scenarios in which, in a fantasy world ostensibly belonging to other people, they had become intimate. If they kept discussing the course of the evening through this filter, what would they do when they reached the conclusion, where the faceless gossipers would assume they would go to bed together?
"So, this...dinner-and-drink thing," the Doctor said. "How would it...progress?"
"Well to start with, you might take my hand under the table." She looked downward toward the table under which their hands were actually joined, and smiled softly, then caught her breath when he suddenly squeezed her hand, hard, in his.
"And then?"
Her smile morphed into a cheeky grin. "Well, then you might offer to pay for our meal and drinks."
The Doctor sat back, dropping her hand and patting at the pockets of his suit jacket. "Oh. Ah...yes." She saw he was fumbling for the sonic screwdriver again. "Do you think there's a cash point around here?"
They walked back mostly in silence, their footfalls echoing in the still night, the slight chill in the air prickling at her fingers until the Doctor took her hand to gently swing it back and forth between them as though everything were normal. As though they hadn't just been talking objectively about the best way for them to start an affair. The talking they did do as they walked was minimal and guarded, the wine she'd drunk with dinner having worn off and left her with that embarrassed shyness that comes with having caught a buzz and said probably too much. Rose wondered if Time Lords got that, figured that it must be something similar from the way his other hand not entwined with hers had not stopped tugging at his ear since they'd left the pub.
The TARDIS loomed up suddenly before them, and the Doctor unlocked the door and gestured expansively for her to proceed him. Once inside, she decided she'd simply walk back to her room and if he followed...well, then she'd figure that out when it happened, if it happened. But he wasn't following, she realised: he'd paused after throwing his jacket over its customary pillar, and was staring at the draped fabric, not moving. His demeanor had changed noticeably since dinner, and she wondered if it were possible that it hadn't occurred to him until the walk back that their conversation could be construed as flirting and not just wild speculation.
"It's a funny thing about romance in the workplace," he said suddenly, his voice soft and ponderous. "Oh sure, it's passionate, tumultuous, exciting absolutely, but it's not exactly known for lasting, is it? Usually, I understand, not more than a couple of months, and that's like...like..." He pursed his lips and blew, sounding a strange combination of both impressed and sad, and Rose wondered how incomprehensible the time span of a couple months must seem to someone who'd been alive hundreds of years. Walking to the console, he carefully avoided her gaze and began to tinker restlessly.
She nodded, taking his lead. "Yeah, like these two at the shop, Janice and Derek? They hooked up at the Christmas party one year and after they'd hardly even speak to each other."
The Doctor pointed at her as though she'd just demonstrated his point. "Exactly! Not very long term, is it?"
Choosing her next words very carefully, Rose continued. "So, seems like, if these people gossipin' about us thought we'd just...hooked up, casually, that they'd assume it wasn't going to last for long, huh?"
"That would be the logical assumption," he agreed. "Blimey, you humans make a lot of assumptions."
"True," she said, twirling a lock of her hair around a finger. "They might even think that, because we rushed into things after not knowing each other very long, we might have messed up any chance we had for anything more, y'know...later."
He hadn't stopped circling the console but he was listening, she could tell, and he froze in mid-lap at this last sentence, his back to her. She wondered if the same understanding that had just dawned on her had hit him as well: they hadn't known each other for very long, not with him as he was now. "That would be a shame," he said, quietly.
She kept going, feeling both relieved and disappointed that they'd so cleverly found a way to talk their way out of this, and also excited at the implication behind his words that his biggest problem with the idea of anything happening between them tonight was that it might make things awkward or, worse, impermanent between them. "So, they might say that if we'd really been serious about each other, we should have...waited."
Tension visibly left his shoulders, and she thought she heard him sigh. "Yeah." There didn't seem to be anything else to say, so she turned to leave, very confident now that he would not be following her, and not sure if that was probably a good thing or maybe the worst thing in the world. "Rose," she heard him say behind her, and turned to find him facing her now, wearing his serious face, and she knew that whatever he was about to say was probably not something she wanted to hear.
Finding the strength to grin, she didn't give him the chance. "Good thing I'm not going anywhere then, yeah?" Turning back toward her room, she rushed off, blushing and confused, but not before she saw him return her smile with the ghost of one of his own.
Author: meself, fid_gin
Beta: unfolded73
Pairing: Tenth Doctor/Rose
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I own nothing, all hail the BBC
Summary: Prior to the events of School Reunion, the Doctor and Rose confront the possibly scandalous implications of their familiarity with each other as they prepare for their undercover roles. UST ensues.
Notes: FinSoFicMo is in full swing, and this was my first goal, to finish this damn fic which has sat half-written on my hard drive since...oh I dunno, May? Suffice it to say, this episode falls at an awkward time in S2, and this fic didn't quite know where to go if it couldn't be porny. Brilliant title suggested by my beta, and of course stolen from Sting.
Rose Tyler examined herself in the full length mirror, turning first to the left and then to the right, and sighed dejectedly. While she was comfortable admitting that she filled out the dinner lady uniform much more attractively than the future co-workers she'd been introduced to at her interview earlier that day, it was hardly flattering. She didn't understand why she had to go to such ridiculous lengths to blend in anyway, when the Doctor had already assured her that he'd be wearing his traditional brown pinstripe suit to class, of course, what else would he wear? When she'd pointed out how unfair it was for her to be forced to take the lesser of the surveillance roles, he'd made a comment about her lack of qualifications for a teaching position. "Although," he'd said with a smirk, "you could be my assistant?"
"I'm not your assistant," she'd growled, and he'd sauntered out of the room, still wearing that infuriating grin.
The synthetic material of her uniform itched terribly, and she absentmindedly scratched at the back of her thigh, tugging at the collar of her blouse with her other hand and making a face at herself in the mirror.
"Better not let them see you scratching your bum at the workplace tomorrow, Miss Tyler," came a jovial voice from behind her. "Not very hygienic, is it?"
"I wasn't," she said, turning to face the Doctor. "You try wearin' this much polyester and tell me how comfortable you are."
"It's only going to get worse in that hot cafeteria, you know," he added, smiling hugely. He looked absolutely tickled at her annoyance and discomfort, and she wanted, on some level, to smack him for it. However, he had also put on his specs, and on another level entirely it wasn't smacking him which came to mind. Did he always have to look so impossibly sexy like that, especially knowing there wasn't anything she could do about it? Rose huffed, and pushed her hair off of her forehead.
"So what you been doing?" she asked, enjoying the way his long frame seemed to melt against the bumpy TARDIS wall he was currently leaning against.
The Doctor was instantly animated, crossing to her in only a few long strides and thrusting a sheaf of paper toward her. "Preparing my lesson plan! Here, have a look." She glanced at his notes, then back up at his face in confusion.
"But you wrote this in your writing. Won't they think that's weird?"
He rolled his eyes. "I hardly think our esteemed Mr. Finch has time to inspect every instructor's curriculum with all these recent staff changes. If it comes up, I'll just say they're...equations, or something," he said, waving his hand about.
"You're enjoying this, aren't you? Getting to play teacher?"
"You heard from your boyfriend, then?" he said quickly, and she guessed her gentle teasing was irritating him. He rifled through his notes, biting at his lip as he plucked a pencil from behind his ear and scribbled something out.
"Yeah...no...I mean, yeah, Mickey called earlier to make sure we got on all right at the school. But he's..." She trailed off. It was useless explaining to the Doctor that she hadn't thought of Mickey as her 'boyfriend' in ages now, probably at least since Cardiff and Margaret Slitheen and his revelation about Tricia Delaney, which had only thrown into focus her own selfish behaviour regarding how she'd treated him. She still cared about him, and still enjoyed the attention he doted on her, but it just wasn't there for her anymore, except for the small charge she got every time Mickey made assumptions about her and the Doctor. None of that would matter to the Doctor at any rate. "I'm supposed to check in with him in the next couple days, he's going to keep digging on the computer and see what else he can find."
"Mm-hmm," the Doctor hummed, now gnawing on his pencil. "No plans tonight, then?"
"Who, me? Or Mickey?"
"You and Mickey." He was still speaking around his pencil and reading his papers, and sort of circling her, awkwardly. "You haven't been home in awhile...he's not whisking you away for dinner or dancing or...anything?"
"Noooo..." she said carefully, eyeing him and trying to figure out if he was trying to get rid of her. "Should he?"
"Good!" The Doctor tossed his lesson plan and pencil onto a nearby chair so quickly it startled her. "Then you're free! Get changed." He was halfway out of the room before he'd even finished speaking.
"Wait, changed for what?" she called after him.
His face appeared around the corner of a clothing rack. "Well you can't go out to dinner with the dashing new physics teacher dressed like that." And then he vanished again, leaving Rose standing in her itchy uniform.
*****
She watched him carefully while they ate their casual meal at a local pub, trying to decide if he was acting strangely toward her; if this was, in fact, a date (and therefore something she could tease him about) or if he just hadn't fancied the idea of a night stuck idle in the TARDIS. It wasn't unusual for them go out for a bite to eat together, but it was a bit strange for him to be so oddly formal rather than just grabbing her hand and yanking her into the nearest chippy. He didn't seem any different, talking excitedly about the school and the UFO sightings, laughing about a recent trip of theirs to a desert moon 600,000 years in the future and galaxies away from Earth, and sipping a pint...okay, that last bit was kind-of strange. Thinking back, she couldn't recall ever having seen him drink alcohol before aside from a relieved sip of port in Downing Street. It was a little exciting, seeing the Doctor in a different light, and she could almost imagine he was just a normal bloke she was out with...a normal bloke who paused in his conversation to sonic her rare burger to medium-well like she'd requested it before resuming his theories about what aliens could possibly be responsible for the recent visitations, factoring in proximity to Earth and the descriptions of the lights in the sky.
"Okay, I give up," she said, setting aside her glass of wine. The Doctor glanced at her plate apprehensively.
"I'll admit, it's probably closer to well-done. Should still be perfectly edible, though! You try cooking a burger with soundwaves, Rose Tyler, and see how far you get."
"Not the food, that's fine." She popped a chip into her mouth to emphasize this, and studied him closely as she chewed. "What's going on with you? I mean, asking me to dinner and not just springing it on me? Drinking? You feelin' all right?"
The Doctor sipped his drink, looking toward the door. "Of course I'm all right," he said, not meeting her eyes. "Just trying to fit in. We could be here for a week or more, just trying out the local flavour."
"Trying to fit in by taking me out on a date," she teased. "People will talk." The Doctor glanced over sharply at that.
"Oh? And what will they say?"
Was he serious? "You know."
His face was the picture of innocence. "No, no...tell me."
She sighed, exasperated. "C'mon Doctor: handsome teacher, takin' out a young girl who works in the cafeteria?"
The Doctor gave a smile that could only be described as wicked, curling his tongue against his top teeth. "Are you saying that people will assume that we're having an illicit affair in the workplace? And you called me handsome!"
Rose could feel herself blushing faintly. "Something like that. And I didn't call you handsome, I just meant that's what people would say."
He clicked his tongue, pondering. "How would that work, I wonder? I mean, I said 'in the workplace', but that wouldn't be very practical, would it? What do they think, that you and I would sneak off to a supply closet between classes for a quickie or something?" He looked amused at the thought. "Not very romantic!"
She shrugged. "Hasn't stopped people at some of my old jobs."
"From shagging at work?" He gave a pitying sigh. "Humans. It's all about sex with you, isn't it?"
Rose felt her cheeks turn an even deeper shade of scarlet. "Not me, I was just saying that other people..."
"No, nonono you're probably right," he interrupted. "So assuming that we were able to control ourselves at the school, and did meet for dinner on a night like this, what do you think these people might assume would happen next, I wonder?"
Sipping her wine gave her a minute to carefully compose her answer. "Well, m'not sure, but I'd guess they'd think we'd go home together."
"Which we do," the Doctor pointed out quickly. Rose was shocked by how forward that sounded - yeah, it was true, but she'd never really thought about it like that before. Or if she had, she certainly never thought he did. "Anyway," he continued, "I'm talking details. If I'm going to be the subject of local gossip, I'd like to know what's being...gossipped."
She was confused: since when had the Doctor cared what other people thought or said about him? "Why?"
"Humour me!" he chirped. "It's not often I get to play human."
"Play human," she repeated. "You make it sound like a game."
"It is! A bit. Ish. Besides, I'm trying to fit in, remember?"
"By trying to scandalize people?" It was silly, but also kind-of adorable, she had to admit. He was actually enjoying the thought of other people imagining them as a couple! Rose smiled as his puppy-dog expression. "All right, Mr. Smith. You want to know what people at the school would say about us if they could see us right now?"
"Absolutely!" He beamed, and took a drink from his pint.
"Well for one, they'd say I'm too young for you."
The Doctor blew out a small puff of air. "Hoo, they'd be bang on with that one."
"Stop interrupting." His mouth shut with an audible snap, and Rose had to fight off the giggles for a minute. She couldn't believe the words that were coming out of her mouth, the shiver of delight which went through her at the thought of another life where the things she was saying could actually be true. "Now, they'd probably point out what an odd coincidence it is that we both show up and apply for work at the same time, and then start meeting in the evening. They might even think that you pulled some strings to get me hired. And so they'd come to the logical conclusion that we must be...well, involved." She paused, taking in his expectant expression. "That's it."
"That's it?" he said, sounding offended. "Where's the scandal in that?"
Rose snatched up her glass of wine, annoyed. "I don't hear you doing any better."
He nodded. "All right...all right." His tongue came to rest against his teeth as he appeared to think deeply about the subject. "Well, we're mysterious strangers who arrived together. And you are, as you so kindly pointed out, a bit young for me. Sooo...perhaps you're a former student whom I began an affair with and enticed away from home!"
She swirled her wine around in the glass. Her face felt very warm, whether from the wine or from the fantasy of an affair with the Doctor, she couldn't tell.
"Yes," he continued, "that sounds right. It started with long looks across the classroom, kept late after class, young teacher, the subject of schoolgirl fantasy...wait, sorry, that's Sting." Rose giggled. "A quick stolen kiss...well, a slow stolen kiss, rather, and the rest was history."
"Stolen by who?" She could just about envision the scene in her mind: his tweed suit, her low-cut blouse, the smell of his aftershave and the way they'd jump apart guiltily as soon as someone walked in on them. The Doctor gave her a grin which made her shift in her seat, her stomach fluttering.
"That depends," he said. "It could probably be construed that I seduced you, being the responsible adult, however I would claim that you tempted me into it, you little tease. Now, of course I had to resign in disgrace after we were discovered, and I persuaded you to run away with me which brings us to the present: fugitives on the run, living in sin." He looked very proud of himself as he finished. One of Rose's hands was resting in her lap under the table, and she jumped a little with surprise when she felt his hand brush hers - their table was small enough, he hadn't needed to lean over to reach. His thumb stroked the backs of her knuckles and his left eyebrow quirked up in question. "How do you like it so far, Miss Tyler?"
"F...fine," she stammered. The touch of his fingers, the slightly unnerving dark twinkle in his eyes, the wine...all were making her feel off-balance, and she wasn't sure what to say next. "So. 'Living in sin', huh?"
"Oh yes." His voice was still light and unaffected, and she wondered if the hand-holding going on under the table was just more of the usual, only seeming more poignant now because of their subject of conversation. "Insatiable young thing like you, experienced older man like me, you can hardly keep your hands off of me."
"Is that right," she said dryly, giving his hand a little shake under the table. "Who can't keep their hands off who, Doctor?"
You would have had to be familiar with the Doctor's quick mood shifts to glimpse the quick flicker of panic which flitted through his eyes before he feigned relaxed disinterest, leaning his chin on his other hand. Rose saw it, and it made her wonder. Had he even been aware he was reaching toward her hand before he took it? She mirrored his actions, leaning onto her other hand, bringing their faces inches apart over the tiny table.
"So...what if that's not how it happened?" she asked. "What if you didn't seduce me and I didn't run away with you?"
He frowned. "I find that hard to believe."
"No, I mean..." She leaned in even closer, lowering her voice conspiratorially. "What if it wasn't something scandalous, and we just met somewhere and you asked me to dinner?"
"Dinner?"
"Or a drink," she continued, indicating their beverages with a nod of her head. "And we talked, and drank, and you asked me if I'd like to come back to yours."
He stared at her, seeming to have trouble following her line of logic. "To...the TARDIS?"
"Doctor, we're talking about what other people would say." She cocked her head and regarded him. "Aren't we?"
She watched his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed, but he still gripped her hand under the table, still leaned toward her. "Um...yes?" It sounded like a question. She was suddenly very curious about the way the night would turn out if things kept progressing in this fashion. Their feelings for each other were not something they spoke about, but in the last fifteen minutes she and the Doctor had concocted no less than three scenarios in which, in a fantasy world ostensibly belonging to other people, they had become intimate. If they kept discussing the course of the evening through this filter, what would they do when they reached the conclusion, where the faceless gossipers would assume they would go to bed together?
"So, this...dinner-and-drink thing," the Doctor said. "How would it...progress?"
"Well to start with, you might take my hand under the table." She looked downward toward the table under which their hands were actually joined, and smiled softly, then caught her breath when he suddenly squeezed her hand, hard, in his.
"And then?"
Her smile morphed into a cheeky grin. "Well, then you might offer to pay for our meal and drinks."
The Doctor sat back, dropping her hand and patting at the pockets of his suit jacket. "Oh. Ah...yes." She saw he was fumbling for the sonic screwdriver again. "Do you think there's a cash point around here?"
They walked back mostly in silence, their footfalls echoing in the still night, the slight chill in the air prickling at her fingers until the Doctor took her hand to gently swing it back and forth between them as though everything were normal. As though they hadn't just been talking objectively about the best way for them to start an affair. The talking they did do as they walked was minimal and guarded, the wine she'd drunk with dinner having worn off and left her with that embarrassed shyness that comes with having caught a buzz and said probably too much. Rose wondered if Time Lords got that, figured that it must be something similar from the way his other hand not entwined with hers had not stopped tugging at his ear since they'd left the pub.
The TARDIS loomed up suddenly before them, and the Doctor unlocked the door and gestured expansively for her to proceed him. Once inside, she decided she'd simply walk back to her room and if he followed...well, then she'd figure that out when it happened, if it happened. But he wasn't following, she realised: he'd paused after throwing his jacket over its customary pillar, and was staring at the draped fabric, not moving. His demeanor had changed noticeably since dinner, and she wondered if it were possible that it hadn't occurred to him until the walk back that their conversation could be construed as flirting and not just wild speculation.
"It's a funny thing about romance in the workplace," he said suddenly, his voice soft and ponderous. "Oh sure, it's passionate, tumultuous, exciting absolutely, but it's not exactly known for lasting, is it? Usually, I understand, not more than a couple of months, and that's like...like..." He pursed his lips and blew, sounding a strange combination of both impressed and sad, and Rose wondered how incomprehensible the time span of a couple months must seem to someone who'd been alive hundreds of years. Walking to the console, he carefully avoided her gaze and began to tinker restlessly.
She nodded, taking his lead. "Yeah, like these two at the shop, Janice and Derek? They hooked up at the Christmas party one year and after they'd hardly even speak to each other."
The Doctor pointed at her as though she'd just demonstrated his point. "Exactly! Not very long term, is it?"
Choosing her next words very carefully, Rose continued. "So, seems like, if these people gossipin' about us thought we'd just...hooked up, casually, that they'd assume it wasn't going to last for long, huh?"
"That would be the logical assumption," he agreed. "Blimey, you humans make a lot of assumptions."
"True," she said, twirling a lock of her hair around a finger. "They might even think that, because we rushed into things after not knowing each other very long, we might have messed up any chance we had for anything more, y'know...later."
He hadn't stopped circling the console but he was listening, she could tell, and he froze in mid-lap at this last sentence, his back to her. She wondered if the same understanding that had just dawned on her had hit him as well: they hadn't known each other for very long, not with him as he was now. "That would be a shame," he said, quietly.
She kept going, feeling both relieved and disappointed that they'd so cleverly found a way to talk their way out of this, and also excited at the implication behind his words that his biggest problem with the idea of anything happening between them tonight was that it might make things awkward or, worse, impermanent between them. "So, they might say that if we'd really been serious about each other, we should have...waited."
Tension visibly left his shoulders, and she thought she heard him sigh. "Yeah." There didn't seem to be anything else to say, so she turned to leave, very confident now that he would not be following her, and not sure if that was probably a good thing or maybe the worst thing in the world. "Rose," she heard him say behind her, and turned to find him facing her now, wearing his serious face, and she knew that whatever he was about to say was probably not something she wanted to hear.
Finding the strength to grin, she didn't give him the chance. "Good thing I'm not going anywhere then, yeah?" Turning back toward her room, she rushed off, blushing and confused, but not before she saw him return her smile with the ghost of one of his own.