Wolf Moon by ThroughAnAmberFocus
Title: Wolf Moon Chapter Twenty-one: Certainty
Author: ThroughAnAmberFocus
Character/Pairing: Alt!Nine/Rose
Rating: R (Adult)
Summary: Start with one happy, well-adjusted Rose Tyler living her life in the parallel world at age twenty-nine. Add one top of the line TARDIS with an attitude and a relationship problem with one angry, annoyed, crotchety old alternate Doctor who shouldn’t exist but does. Shake well.
Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, I just like to play with the characters and I will put them back gently when I'm done.
Beta: JeopardyFriendly
Warning: Adult content due to discussions of adult themes regarding sexuality and very mild swearing.
Author's Notes: Rose makes up her mind what she wants. Romance ensues.
Previous chapters: http://www.whofic.com/viewstory.php?sid=18731
Rose glanced at her watch. It was probably the twentieth time in three hours that she had looked at it. She bit her lip and looked over at the Doctor, probably for the fiftieth time in the last three hours. Three hours since he’d injected her with and taken a dose himself of the new serum and she still wanted him. When he accidently brushed against her for the third time in as many minutes to put a book on a high shelf she made a soft kittenish noise.
“Did you just mew at me?” the Doctor asked with a large amount of humor in both his voice and his eyes.
Rose ignored his question. “I thought the serum was supposed to cause a slow burn, not keep me at the same level of frustration I was already at!” she burst out a few minutes later.
“Give it time,” he told her patiently.
“Easy for you to say,” she snapped.
“No, it damn well isn’t!” he snapped back. “If it were up to me I’d be bending you over the back of the sofa right now!”
“Doctor, I--.”
“I need to go check how our flight path is doing,” he ground out at her and turned sharply on his heel. He strode out of the room and she could feel his suppressed fury radiating back from him.
“Damn,” she muttered pounding one thigh with her fist. It was so easy to assume that this wasn’t as hard for him as it was for her. He, well not him, but the other he, had forever been going on about Time Lord superiority and how his people had control over their bodies and weren’t ruled by human passions. But this obviously wasn’t true. It might even be harder, considering that up until he’d met her, he probably hadn’t been ruled by his passions at all. She at least had experience dealing with that sort of thing.
Maybe she should go to him, apologize, offer to… To what? She glanced down at her watch again. She had eight hours and fifty-five minutes to get through before she could offer him anything. And maybe in that time she could quit comparing him to his former self, too. Because he was not the same man now even if he had once been. His reactions were different, his experiences were different, his need of her, which all of him had admittedly had, was far stronger and deeper.
He was sexier. Well, maybe that wasn’t fair, but he knew what to do with his sexiness and he was willing to go after what he wanted with her, too. Not to the point of pushing her past what she wanted but certainly not brooding from across the room and never getting up the nerve to make a move, either.
He wasn’t as quick to anger despite his outburst at her oblivious comment. He seemed to bounce back faster when they had words, was faster to forgive, but wasn’t quite as easy to wrap around her finger, either. In fact if she wasn’t careful she’d be the one wrapped around his finger. Or his body. Or his--. “Stop it,” she told herself.
Hastily she turned back to the remaining stacks of books and worked on putting them away. She was nearing the end of the last stack when the gilt of gold lettering on the front of a dark red book caught her eye. She read the title slowly. On Human Sexuality: A 51st Century Treatise.
Rose set the book aside, shelved the remaining dozen books and then picked up the thick volume, feeling a strange surge of curiosity despite the mind-numbing title. Settling into the overstuffed green chair in the corner she folded her legs to one side and opened the book. She’d expected something rather dry and boring from the name, design, and lack of cover art. It wasn’t.
It would more appropriately be entitled The Joy of Sex with Aliens. And the pictures were rather eye-opening. It was quite the how-to manual of copulating with other species. She was rather surprised that the Doctor even had a book like this in his library but then she remembered that this had been Romana’s ship and it was likely much of the library’s contents had been hers. Rose ruminated on whether or not that meant Romana might have had a thing for humans.
She heard quiet, chiming laughter in her mind and realized that the TARDIS had heard her thinking. “She didn’t then?” Rose asked aloud. Again she heard the negative chuckle. “So then, did she leave this here for me to find?” The clinking of crystals echoed at a slightly higher pitch and Rose felt a definite affirmative. “I don’t suppose there is a section on Time Lords?”
A very firm negative hit her mind but she felt the ship’s encouragement to continue with the book. With a sigh she turned to the table of contents and perused it, wondering what the ship wanted her to find. One of the chapters was entitled “A Difference in Force.” Rose immediately turned to page 1834.
By the time she had finished the chapter she felt an urgent need to apply soap and a wash cloth to the inside of her head but she came away with two very important things. One was a list of pelvic strengthening exercises and the other was the name of an herbal supplement that would reinforce the lining of her interior anatomy to lessen any damage that might be done by a stronger species.
Rose closed the book and stood up. She placed it on a shelf where she could be sure to easily find it later if she needed it again. She hoped she actually wouldn’t. Some of the things in that book she’d never forget for the rest of her life and she wondered at the sheer randiness of the human species that such an…instruction manual had been needed in the first place. Although considering Captain Jack had been from the 51st century maybe it shouldn’t have come as such a surprise to her.
When she turned around she saw that a large bottle had appeared on the coffee table. Next to it sat a glass of water. With curiosity she went and picked up the jar, reading the label. Kratosbiaphyll. It was the name of the herbal supplement the book had suggested. She opened the bottle and poured out a handful of capsules, sliding all but one back in. She examined it carefully then read the instructions on the bottle. “One a day, plus iron,” she said with a giggle. “Though the way he talks Kevlar might make a better lining.” With a shrug she swallowed the herb.
Rose looked at the paper that she had written the exercises down on and decided her room might be a better place to perform those. It took her 30 minutes and she was rather convinced she was being completely silly by the time she was done, but she hoped that somehow it all might make a difference at some point. She wanted to be able to achieve this eventual mating with him without it tearing her apart. Because chemicals of control and blood serum or not, when it came down to it there was no one hundred percent guarantee that any of it would work.
With a glance at her watch she realized she’d been reading and then exercising for a couple of hours. The time had gone by rather faster than she had expected. There were five hours and 45 minutes left until it should be safe for her and the Doctor to relieve tension. Somewhere in the last several hours the idea had gone from a possibility to a probability to a certainty; a certainty that was going to happen tonight.
Despite that certainty she realized that the intensity of her hunger for the Doctor had lessened. The slow burn had finally come into play and her hormones were calming. That only meant one thing to Rose. She now wanted the Doctor with a rational mind. And that felt right. Oh, she wasn’t ready to shag him. At least not emotionally. But she was definitely ready for what came next. Which would hopefully be him first and then her.
“Doctor?” Rose’s hesitant voice came from behind him and he turned from where he was hunched over the translation circuit.
“I asked the TARDIS about her translating Gallifreyan for you,” he said. “She’s letting me tinker with it and see if we can’t get it to do so.”
“You remembered.”
“Course I did. I may be 910 years old but I’m not senile, Rose,” he said. His shoulders were tense but he didn’t snap.
“Thank you,” she said softly. She was slow to approach him. “I’m sorry, Doctor. I haven’t really stopped to consider how hard this has been on you. I’ve dealt with a sex drive all my life and you’ve not had to. This must be so difficult for you.”
He shrugged and refused to meet her eyes. “I’m better now. I’m hoping that means you are, too.” He gave a tiny nod. “The physical need is going down, but Doctor…I still want you.”
His eyes finally met hers. “Told you it’d still be there.”
“It’s...” She huffed and frowned and tentatively began again. “I’m clear in how I want you now. It’s different. Not just a have to have. I’d like to…tonight I want to…if it’s all right I’d like to touch you. I’m not ready to have sex but I’d like to give you pleasure.”
He closed the distance between them and hugged her. It was the first hug he’d given her that hadn’t had a sexual agenda and she relaxed into him with a sigh. “I have no objections,” he said as he released her. “As long as it’s what you truly want. Sorry, I lost my temper.”
“It’s okay. I was being thoughtless.” He returned to the console and began his tinkering again and she sat in the jump seat and watched him work. After awhile her stomach growled and she stood up. “I’m going to go make dinner,” she told him, and he realized that they’d both skipped lunch entirely that day.
“All right,” he said softly. He moved over to her side and gave her a gentle, tender kiss that lasted only a few seconds and then she walked away from him. He watched her go, his eyes on the gentle sway of her hips. He was definitely going to be making her breakfast in the morning. She’d cooked so much for him since coming on board and he didn’t want her to start feeling like he was taking it for granted. Plus, he was going to exhaust her if he had any say in the matter. No way would she have the energy to make breakfast the next morning.
Forty-five minutes later Rose was back and asking him to come to dinner. She’d changed into a pretty red dress that skimmed her curves without looking trashy then flared out at the bottom. It’d be a good dress for going dancing in, he thought as he noted the shimmery fabric. It would look amazing under pulsating lights. It would look even better in a puddle on his bedroom floor. Or her bedroom floor. He really wasn’t that picky.
“You look beautiful,” he said softly. He glanced down at himself. “And I’m a right mess.”
“Dinner can wait a few minutes if you’d like to wash up,” she told him with a soft smile.
“Won’t be long,” he told her as he left her at his bedroom door. He headed in to his bathroom to take a quick shower, noticing with a grimace that the TARDIS still hadn’t returned his dancing bananas shower curtain to him, even though she’d appropriated the pink one for Rose’s shower. She’d replaced it with a plain clear one.
He washed quickly, taking care to get the oil off his fingers but otherwise just a cursory wash to make sure he didn’t smell badly to Rose later tonight. Although she’d probably only smell pineapples the moment they got going. Best not to think about that or he wouldn’t be able to get his jeans on. He sighed, turned off the water, dried himself briskly and moved to the bedroom.
Laid out on his bed was a pair of black trousers and a button down dress shirt that matched his eyes and a black tie. “I’m not wearing a tie,” he told the TARDIS. He eyed his closet door wanting his own comfortable jeans and t-shirts, maybe a jumper, but then he looked back to the fancier clothes. “Think she’ll like me in this?”
“I think she’ll like you in anything,” the TARDIS told him dryly. “But you can at least look like you’re making an effort for our Rose.”
His eyebrows rose. “Our Rose?” he asked but the TARDIS didn’t respond further. My Rose, he thought quietly enough so that the TARDIS couldn’t hear him. With reluctance he put on the black trousers and the blue shirt, rolling the sleeves up to just below his elbow. He tucked the tie away in a bureau drawer in case they ended up in his room tonight with its bigger bed. He did not want Rose to even think he might wear a tie for any reason. No way did he want her thinking he was some uptight closet geek, even if there was a tiny streak of that in him somewhere.
He wanted her thinking he was exactly what he mostly was: fast, hard, hot for her, and rough around the edges, with a touch of tenderness just for Rose. Oh, Rassilon, he was in over his head. Thing was, he really didn’t care.
When the Doctor appeared in the doorway of the kitchen Rose looked up at him from her seat at the table. Her eyes ran over his body and then back up to his face, studying him carefully. A very slow smile started to raise the corners of her lips and as it spread into fullness it took his breath away. “Doctor,” she said with glittering eyes, “you are a gorgeous man.” She tilted her head. “Though you didn’t have to dress up for me,” she added. “I like it, but…you don’t have to change a thing about yourself. Not for me.”
He had to clear his throat to speak. “Well, thought I ought to make the effort, what with you looking so amazing in that dress.”
Rose lit the candles in the center of the table and asked the TARDIS to lower the lights. He sank into his chair and waited until she raised her eyes to his again. “Are you trying to seduce me, Miss Tyler?”
She blushed and bit her lip before quietly admitting, “I wish that I could, Doctor.”
He reached out and stroked the side of her face with the backs of his fingertips. “I’ll take whatever you offer me, love,” he said throatily. She nodded and smiled again.
They spoke very little while dining but their eyes frequently met, their hands and knees often brushed against each other and the smiles they traded were happy and tender.
As the meal ended and the Doctor got up to take care of the dishes the TARDIS told him, “I’ll do the dishes tonight.”
“You’ll what?” he asked in surprise looking up at the ceiling.
“Don’t make me repeat myself,” she growled at him.
“TARDIS says she’ll do the dishes,” he said rising and holding his hand out to Rose.
Rose glanced at her watch. “We still have two hours before the serum achieves full power,” she said as she got up and put her hand in his.
The Doctor smiled. “I know what we can do,” he said. Slowly he led her out of the kitchen and down one of the long corridors. He eventually stopped in front of an ornately carved set of wooden doors.
“What’s in here?” Rose asked. He shrugged, smiled, and then pushed the door open. With a curious smile she stepped inside. Soft lights circulated across the ceiling and Rose heard music as she stepped into the room. Her shoes echoed against the hardwood floor. “It’s a ballroom?” she wondered.
“Yes, it is. Would you do me the honor of this dance, Rose?” he asked.
She smiled so fully at him that it twisted his hearts. “Yes, I would.” Slowly she drifted into his arms and their bodies began to sway to the music. “I could spend the rest of my life like this,” she whispered as the first song ended and the second began. “Holding you, in your arms.”
He grinned and dropped a kiss on the top of her hair. “That’s good,” he said. “Because that’s exactly where I want you. Holding me, in my arms.”
Author: ThroughAnAmberFocus
Character/Pairing: Alt!Nine/Rose
Rating: R (Adult)
Summary: Start with one happy, well-adjusted Rose Tyler living her life in the parallel world at age twenty-nine. Add one top of the line TARDIS with an attitude and a relationship problem with one angry, annoyed, crotchety old alternate Doctor who shouldn’t exist but does. Shake well.
Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, I just like to play with the characters and I will put them back gently when I'm done.
Beta: JeopardyFriendly
Warning: Adult content due to discussions of adult themes regarding sexuality and very mild swearing.
Author's Notes: Rose makes up her mind what she wants. Romance ensues.
Previous chapters: http://www.whofic.com/viewstory.php?sid=18731
Rose glanced at her watch. It was probably the twentieth time in three hours that she had looked at it. She bit her lip and looked over at the Doctor, probably for the fiftieth time in the last three hours. Three hours since he’d injected her with and taken a dose himself of the new serum and she still wanted him. When he accidently brushed against her for the third time in as many minutes to put a book on a high shelf she made a soft kittenish noise.
“Did you just mew at me?” the Doctor asked with a large amount of humor in both his voice and his eyes.
Rose ignored his question. “I thought the serum was supposed to cause a slow burn, not keep me at the same level of frustration I was already at!” she burst out a few minutes later.
“Give it time,” he told her patiently.
“Easy for you to say,” she snapped.
“No, it damn well isn’t!” he snapped back. “If it were up to me I’d be bending you over the back of the sofa right now!”
“Doctor, I--.”
“I need to go check how our flight path is doing,” he ground out at her and turned sharply on his heel. He strode out of the room and she could feel his suppressed fury radiating back from him.
“Damn,” she muttered pounding one thigh with her fist. It was so easy to assume that this wasn’t as hard for him as it was for her. He, well not him, but the other he, had forever been going on about Time Lord superiority and how his people had control over their bodies and weren’t ruled by human passions. But this obviously wasn’t true. It might even be harder, considering that up until he’d met her, he probably hadn’t been ruled by his passions at all. She at least had experience dealing with that sort of thing.
Maybe she should go to him, apologize, offer to… To what? She glanced down at her watch again. She had eight hours and fifty-five minutes to get through before she could offer him anything. And maybe in that time she could quit comparing him to his former self, too. Because he was not the same man now even if he had once been. His reactions were different, his experiences were different, his need of her, which all of him had admittedly had, was far stronger and deeper.
He was sexier. Well, maybe that wasn’t fair, but he knew what to do with his sexiness and he was willing to go after what he wanted with her, too. Not to the point of pushing her past what she wanted but certainly not brooding from across the room and never getting up the nerve to make a move, either.
He wasn’t as quick to anger despite his outburst at her oblivious comment. He seemed to bounce back faster when they had words, was faster to forgive, but wasn’t quite as easy to wrap around her finger, either. In fact if she wasn’t careful she’d be the one wrapped around his finger. Or his body. Or his--. “Stop it,” she told herself.
Hastily she turned back to the remaining stacks of books and worked on putting them away. She was nearing the end of the last stack when the gilt of gold lettering on the front of a dark red book caught her eye. She read the title slowly. On Human Sexuality: A 51st Century Treatise.
Rose set the book aside, shelved the remaining dozen books and then picked up the thick volume, feeling a strange surge of curiosity despite the mind-numbing title. Settling into the overstuffed green chair in the corner she folded her legs to one side and opened the book. She’d expected something rather dry and boring from the name, design, and lack of cover art. It wasn’t.
It would more appropriately be entitled The Joy of Sex with Aliens. And the pictures were rather eye-opening. It was quite the how-to manual of copulating with other species. She was rather surprised that the Doctor even had a book like this in his library but then she remembered that this had been Romana’s ship and it was likely much of the library’s contents had been hers. Rose ruminated on whether or not that meant Romana might have had a thing for humans.
She heard quiet, chiming laughter in her mind and realized that the TARDIS had heard her thinking. “She didn’t then?” Rose asked aloud. Again she heard the negative chuckle. “So then, did she leave this here for me to find?” The clinking of crystals echoed at a slightly higher pitch and Rose felt a definite affirmative. “I don’t suppose there is a section on Time Lords?”
A very firm negative hit her mind but she felt the ship’s encouragement to continue with the book. With a sigh she turned to the table of contents and perused it, wondering what the ship wanted her to find. One of the chapters was entitled “A Difference in Force.” Rose immediately turned to page 1834.
By the time she had finished the chapter she felt an urgent need to apply soap and a wash cloth to the inside of her head but she came away with two very important things. One was a list of pelvic strengthening exercises and the other was the name of an herbal supplement that would reinforce the lining of her interior anatomy to lessen any damage that might be done by a stronger species.
Rose closed the book and stood up. She placed it on a shelf where she could be sure to easily find it later if she needed it again. She hoped she actually wouldn’t. Some of the things in that book she’d never forget for the rest of her life and she wondered at the sheer randiness of the human species that such an…instruction manual had been needed in the first place. Although considering Captain Jack had been from the 51st century maybe it shouldn’t have come as such a surprise to her.
When she turned around she saw that a large bottle had appeared on the coffee table. Next to it sat a glass of water. With curiosity she went and picked up the jar, reading the label. Kratosbiaphyll. It was the name of the herbal supplement the book had suggested. She opened the bottle and poured out a handful of capsules, sliding all but one back in. She examined it carefully then read the instructions on the bottle. “One a day, plus iron,” she said with a giggle. “Though the way he talks Kevlar might make a better lining.” With a shrug she swallowed the herb.
Rose looked at the paper that she had written the exercises down on and decided her room might be a better place to perform those. It took her 30 minutes and she was rather convinced she was being completely silly by the time she was done, but she hoped that somehow it all might make a difference at some point. She wanted to be able to achieve this eventual mating with him without it tearing her apart. Because chemicals of control and blood serum or not, when it came down to it there was no one hundred percent guarantee that any of it would work.
With a glance at her watch she realized she’d been reading and then exercising for a couple of hours. The time had gone by rather faster than she had expected. There were five hours and 45 minutes left until it should be safe for her and the Doctor to relieve tension. Somewhere in the last several hours the idea had gone from a possibility to a probability to a certainty; a certainty that was going to happen tonight.
Despite that certainty she realized that the intensity of her hunger for the Doctor had lessened. The slow burn had finally come into play and her hormones were calming. That only meant one thing to Rose. She now wanted the Doctor with a rational mind. And that felt right. Oh, she wasn’t ready to shag him. At least not emotionally. But she was definitely ready for what came next. Which would hopefully be him first and then her.
“Doctor?” Rose’s hesitant voice came from behind him and he turned from where he was hunched over the translation circuit.
“I asked the TARDIS about her translating Gallifreyan for you,” he said. “She’s letting me tinker with it and see if we can’t get it to do so.”
“You remembered.”
“Course I did. I may be 910 years old but I’m not senile, Rose,” he said. His shoulders were tense but he didn’t snap.
“Thank you,” she said softly. She was slow to approach him. “I’m sorry, Doctor. I haven’t really stopped to consider how hard this has been on you. I’ve dealt with a sex drive all my life and you’ve not had to. This must be so difficult for you.”
He shrugged and refused to meet her eyes. “I’m better now. I’m hoping that means you are, too.” He gave a tiny nod. “The physical need is going down, but Doctor…I still want you.”
His eyes finally met hers. “Told you it’d still be there.”
“It’s...” She huffed and frowned and tentatively began again. “I’m clear in how I want you now. It’s different. Not just a have to have. I’d like to…tonight I want to…if it’s all right I’d like to touch you. I’m not ready to have sex but I’d like to give you pleasure.”
He closed the distance between them and hugged her. It was the first hug he’d given her that hadn’t had a sexual agenda and she relaxed into him with a sigh. “I have no objections,” he said as he released her. “As long as it’s what you truly want. Sorry, I lost my temper.”
“It’s okay. I was being thoughtless.” He returned to the console and began his tinkering again and she sat in the jump seat and watched him work. After awhile her stomach growled and she stood up. “I’m going to go make dinner,” she told him, and he realized that they’d both skipped lunch entirely that day.
“All right,” he said softly. He moved over to her side and gave her a gentle, tender kiss that lasted only a few seconds and then she walked away from him. He watched her go, his eyes on the gentle sway of her hips. He was definitely going to be making her breakfast in the morning. She’d cooked so much for him since coming on board and he didn’t want her to start feeling like he was taking it for granted. Plus, he was going to exhaust her if he had any say in the matter. No way would she have the energy to make breakfast the next morning.
Forty-five minutes later Rose was back and asking him to come to dinner. She’d changed into a pretty red dress that skimmed her curves without looking trashy then flared out at the bottom. It’d be a good dress for going dancing in, he thought as he noted the shimmery fabric. It would look amazing under pulsating lights. It would look even better in a puddle on his bedroom floor. Or her bedroom floor. He really wasn’t that picky.
“You look beautiful,” he said softly. He glanced down at himself. “And I’m a right mess.”
“Dinner can wait a few minutes if you’d like to wash up,” she told him with a soft smile.
“Won’t be long,” he told her as he left her at his bedroom door. He headed in to his bathroom to take a quick shower, noticing with a grimace that the TARDIS still hadn’t returned his dancing bananas shower curtain to him, even though she’d appropriated the pink one for Rose’s shower. She’d replaced it with a plain clear one.
He washed quickly, taking care to get the oil off his fingers but otherwise just a cursory wash to make sure he didn’t smell badly to Rose later tonight. Although she’d probably only smell pineapples the moment they got going. Best not to think about that or he wouldn’t be able to get his jeans on. He sighed, turned off the water, dried himself briskly and moved to the bedroom.
Laid out on his bed was a pair of black trousers and a button down dress shirt that matched his eyes and a black tie. “I’m not wearing a tie,” he told the TARDIS. He eyed his closet door wanting his own comfortable jeans and t-shirts, maybe a jumper, but then he looked back to the fancier clothes. “Think she’ll like me in this?”
“I think she’ll like you in anything,” the TARDIS told him dryly. “But you can at least look like you’re making an effort for our Rose.”
His eyebrows rose. “Our Rose?” he asked but the TARDIS didn’t respond further. My Rose, he thought quietly enough so that the TARDIS couldn’t hear him. With reluctance he put on the black trousers and the blue shirt, rolling the sleeves up to just below his elbow. He tucked the tie away in a bureau drawer in case they ended up in his room tonight with its bigger bed. He did not want Rose to even think he might wear a tie for any reason. No way did he want her thinking he was some uptight closet geek, even if there was a tiny streak of that in him somewhere.
He wanted her thinking he was exactly what he mostly was: fast, hard, hot for her, and rough around the edges, with a touch of tenderness just for Rose. Oh, Rassilon, he was in over his head. Thing was, he really didn’t care.
When the Doctor appeared in the doorway of the kitchen Rose looked up at him from her seat at the table. Her eyes ran over his body and then back up to his face, studying him carefully. A very slow smile started to raise the corners of her lips and as it spread into fullness it took his breath away. “Doctor,” she said with glittering eyes, “you are a gorgeous man.” She tilted her head. “Though you didn’t have to dress up for me,” she added. “I like it, but…you don’t have to change a thing about yourself. Not for me.”
He had to clear his throat to speak. “Well, thought I ought to make the effort, what with you looking so amazing in that dress.”
Rose lit the candles in the center of the table and asked the TARDIS to lower the lights. He sank into his chair and waited until she raised her eyes to his again. “Are you trying to seduce me, Miss Tyler?”
She blushed and bit her lip before quietly admitting, “I wish that I could, Doctor.”
He reached out and stroked the side of her face with the backs of his fingertips. “I’ll take whatever you offer me, love,” he said throatily. She nodded and smiled again.
They spoke very little while dining but their eyes frequently met, their hands and knees often brushed against each other and the smiles they traded were happy and tender.
As the meal ended and the Doctor got up to take care of the dishes the TARDIS told him, “I’ll do the dishes tonight.”
“You’ll what?” he asked in surprise looking up at the ceiling.
“Don’t make me repeat myself,” she growled at him.
“TARDIS says she’ll do the dishes,” he said rising and holding his hand out to Rose.
Rose glanced at her watch. “We still have two hours before the serum achieves full power,” she said as she got up and put her hand in his.
The Doctor smiled. “I know what we can do,” he said. Slowly he led her out of the kitchen and down one of the long corridors. He eventually stopped in front of an ornately carved set of wooden doors.
“What’s in here?” Rose asked. He shrugged, smiled, and then pushed the door open. With a curious smile she stepped inside. Soft lights circulated across the ceiling and Rose heard music as she stepped into the room. Her shoes echoed against the hardwood floor. “It’s a ballroom?” she wondered.
“Yes, it is. Would you do me the honor of this dance, Rose?” he asked.
She smiled so fully at him that it twisted his hearts. “Yes, I would.” Slowly she drifted into his arms and their bodies began to sway to the music. “I could spend the rest of my life like this,” she whispered as the first song ended and the second began. “Holding you, in your arms.”
He grinned and dropped a kiss on the top of her hair. “That’s good,” he said. “Because that’s exactly where I want you. Holding me, in my arms.”