[fic] coals in the fireplace
Title: Coals in the Fireplace
Character/Pairing: Ten / Rose.
Rating: PG.
Summary: His life is all about choices, even when they are taken away from him.
Disclaimer: I keep checking, but I still don't own Doctor Who.
Author's Notes: Immediately after Reinette & The Girl in the Fireplace. I wrote this a few weeks ago for ladychi and decided to brush it up a bit and throw it up just to prove that I don't write only Eleven/Rose.
He wants to hold her after. His soft, human, very-much-alive Rose, with her rough accent and warm voice, with her dark roots and dark eyes; he wants to hold her, to drain away the cold knot in his gut, but she looks at him and shakes her head, a minute and sharp rejection that sends him reeling.
"Not... not right now, Doctor," and he can tell she is struggling to keep her words even, can see her fingers press desperately against the coral of the TARDIS. His ship almost seems upset at him, buzzing under the soles of his feet.
"Rose," he starts, but she is turning away, for once running away from him and not with him. It pricks his not inconsiderable anger and irritates him, the sight of her small back disappearing striking an amorphous fear that turns his blood to ice. "Rose," he says again, this time stronger, annoyed with her. Annoyed that he is annoyed.
"I don't want to talk about it yet."
"It's not like I planned it!"
"No," she whispers quietly, reluctant the moment she hears her own despicable frailty shining in that word. "But you would have stayed for her. You would have taken the slow path."
Her unspoken words float between them (you would have chosen her over me - someone you barely knew and you loved her, more than you ever would have considered with me) and he can see her heart breaking, can see her shrink against the control panel and hide from him.
"Yes. I would have," he admits because it doesn't even occur to him to lie. Lying comes to him easily most of the time, but every lie he tells her is harder than watching a sun collapse in on itself.
The Doctor doesn't say the words, that he does not dare to cross those lines with her because Rose is magnificent and gorgeous and so irresistibly beloved that he would probably throw away the world for her. And he can't do that.
Her lashes quiver and her eyes shine from defiant tears when she looks at him. "I'm sorry about... about what happened to her."
She is, she really is, because the Doctor loves so rarely, because the Doctor she has given her human heart to is so sad and lonely and utterly him that she mostly just wants him to be happy. She has no right to feel jealous, but in some ways jealousy is easier than pain (and this Doctor is so very, very good at hurting her). In the end, Rose lets him edge around the controls and bury himself into her shoulder, lets him fall apart quietly in the haven of her arms, but she wishes he could love her too.
Character/Pairing: Ten / Rose.
Rating: PG.
Summary: His life is all about choices, even when they are taken away from him.
Disclaimer: I keep checking, but I still don't own Doctor Who.
Author's Notes: Immediately after Reinette & The Girl in the Fireplace. I wrote this a few weeks ago for ladychi and decided to brush it up a bit and throw it up just to prove that I don't write only Eleven/Rose.
He wants to hold her after. His soft, human, very-much-alive Rose, with her rough accent and warm voice, with her dark roots and dark eyes; he wants to hold her, to drain away the cold knot in his gut, but she looks at him and shakes her head, a minute and sharp rejection that sends him reeling.
"Not... not right now, Doctor," and he can tell she is struggling to keep her words even, can see her fingers press desperately against the coral of the TARDIS. His ship almost seems upset at him, buzzing under the soles of his feet.
"Rose," he starts, but she is turning away, for once running away from him and not with him. It pricks his not inconsiderable anger and irritates him, the sight of her small back disappearing striking an amorphous fear that turns his blood to ice. "Rose," he says again, this time stronger, annoyed with her. Annoyed that he is annoyed.
"I don't want to talk about it yet."
"It's not like I planned it!"
"No," she whispers quietly, reluctant the moment she hears her own despicable frailty shining in that word. "But you would have stayed for her. You would have taken the slow path."
Her unspoken words float between them (you would have chosen her over me - someone you barely knew and you loved her, more than you ever would have considered with me) and he can see her heart breaking, can see her shrink against the control panel and hide from him.
"Yes. I would have," he admits because it doesn't even occur to him to lie. Lying comes to him easily most of the time, but every lie he tells her is harder than watching a sun collapse in on itself.
The Doctor doesn't say the words, that he does not dare to cross those lines with her because Rose is magnificent and gorgeous and so irresistibly beloved that he would probably throw away the world for her. And he can't do that.
Her lashes quiver and her eyes shine from defiant tears when she looks at him. "I'm sorry about... about what happened to her."
She is, she really is, because the Doctor loves so rarely, because the Doctor she has given her human heart to is so sad and lonely and utterly him that she mostly just wants him to be happy. She has no right to feel jealous, but in some ways jealousy is easier than pain (and this Doctor is so very, very good at hurting her). In the end, Rose lets him edge around the controls and bury himself into her shoulder, lets him fall apart quietly in the haven of her arms, but she wishes he could love her too.