Fic: Someday is Now (Doctor Who; Doctor (Ten II)/Rose)
Title: Someday is Now
Rating: PG
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers for 4x13 - "Journey's End"
Summary: The Doctor and Rose set up for Christmas at Jackie's.
A/N:: Gift for svanderslice in the oh_she_knows Secret Santa.
Someday is Now
“You don't have to do this,” Rose said, again, from her much-too-far-away perch on the desk in the opposite corner of the room. The Doctor squinted a bit and pressed the last of the sturdy pins into place. Rose was still talking. “Really. I know that my mum insisted, but you never listened to her before.”
“And if I were the one insisting?” the Doctor asked, hopping down from the small ladder he'd been using and moving a step back to take in the full view of his project.
One Christmas garland, securely hung over the fireplace. They used a different sort of wiring here, or maybe it was just that Jackie hadn't been rich enough to afford anything as nice as the one he'd just placed. Still, it looked good. It looked straight and yet arching enough to invoke just the right hint of nature.
“Why would you?” she asked. He glanced over at her now - she was still dressed down for the set-up of the party and she looked utterly adorable and quite perplexed. Her hair was pulled back into two messy braids, with tendrils escaping to curl enticingly about her neck. She wasn't wearing any make-up or perfume, so the pure and natural scent of Rose Tyler wound around him. She was wearing paint-spattered jeans, the ones that had a white handprint smeared across the backside from when the two of them had gotten more involved in each other than in working on their house, and a soft red shirt that tied in the front. “I know that you and my mum get along better now but are you really sure that you want to risk a Tyler Christmas?”
“I've found myself missing them in the last few years,” he said. Her eyes widened slightly. Even after almost half a year, she still hadn't adjusted to how much more he was willing to give her now. He'd spent so long holding back all the words that he'd wanted to tell her and he rather reveled in how easily they came to his lips now. You know, domestic doesn't sound so bad anymore. I never thought I'd be lucky enough to have this with you. I think we should buy a house together. You're worth more to me than every star above our heads. You scare me to death sometimes, risking your life in that job of yours. I'd do anything for you, if you'd only ask.
I love you.
He'd held himself back from telling her so many things in those days when he was just one man. It was no wonder that she was surprised when they came spilling out now.
“Yeah?” she asked, shifting over and making room for him to lean against the desk alongside her. Never one to refuse an invitation from Rose Tyler, he hurried over and stretched out his legs, putting his hand right up against hers. The temperature difference wasn't so great anymore, though her blood still ran slightly hotter than his. “You really missed Christmas with my mum?”
“Christmas just isn't Christmas anymore if Jackie Tyler doesn't have a good shout at me,” he said, bumping his shoulder against hers. She giggled and nudged him back. He resisted the urge to take things further by reminding firmly himself that they were in Jackie's house and that meant that there was a chance that she might walk in and that was a horror to be avoided at all costs.
“You didn't...” she trailed off and he tried to supply his own ending to her sentence. He didn't... have someone else's mum yell at him instead? No, that couldn't be it.
He didn't... ah! he didn't have Christmas with Donna and her family. That made more sense.
“No,” he said, easily enough. “The last time I had Christmas dinner was with you.”
Donna might have invited him but he'd turned down the offer, or near enough. Even now, he couldn't picture himself sitting down with Sylvia and Wilf, enjoying a holiday meal. Wilf, in particular, seemed to be a good person but they weren't...
they weren't...
they weren't family.
Jackie Tyler, for all her loud mouth and impossible behavior, had somehow managed to become a person that he wanted in his life. He didn't know exactly when or why. He didn't have many clear memories of his own mother, but he was fairly certain that she'd been nothing like Jackie. She'd been controlled and powerful and everything that she should be. Jackie was messy and pushy and... so entirely human.
In that, she was like her daughter.
Rose still seemed to be taking in his confession, a soft joy to be read in the tiniest curve of her mouth and the faintest tint of pink on her cheeks. It was something that he hadn't been able to fully understand before the metacrisis, that the edge of possessiveness that had been hidden in her comments about Sarah Jane and Reinette was based in insecurity. She'd never understood how deeply she'd sunk into his hearts; that no other person could possibly shake his devotion to her. He'd tried to tell her before, in faltering and useless words, precisely how dear she was to him, but he hadn't had the language.
Donna had given him the words. He had so much to be grateful to Donna for, but this above all else: she'd shown him how to tell Rose everything that he'd always hoped that she'd already known.
Oh, he wished above all things that Donna had managed to beat the odds out and hadn't succumbed to the near-certain consequences of a human taking on a Time Lord mind. If his other self could have Donna with him, as a friend and a comfort, then his Christmas wouldn't be as lonely as the Doctor feared that it would be otherwise.
“It looks nice.” Rose leaned sideways, her head resting on his shoulder. He tracked her line of sight - she was looking at the garland that he'd just put up. “You did a wonderful job.”
“I'm very good with my hands,” he said, waggling his eyebrows suggestively and grinning when he felt her start to laugh against him.
“You're impossible,” she said, still chuckling. He reached over and tilted her chin toward him, catching her mouth with a kiss. She startled slightly and then relaxed into him, her lips parting and the barest whisper of her thoughts calling out to him from too great a distance for him to reach across. The frustrating thing about only ever having snogged her properly with this body was that he couldn't make a full mental connection with her. The first time they'd kissed, she'd had the whole bleeding vortex running through her head, and the second time, she'd been compressed to a tiny corner of her own mind, and so, in both cases, he'd been blocked out. He'd never know the exact shape of Rose's thoughts, the lines and curves of them, but only feel the tease of them slipping through his fingers like stardust.
Still, there was a certain excitement to be found in fumbling about with each other and learning each other by touch, rather than through a mental link. He'd never done that before - his wife, of course, had been extremely adept at the sexual link and what he'd learned from her had always worked well enough during the relatively rare times after they parted, when he'd found himself needing a physical connection - so, this, with Rose, was full of brand new feelings and surprises.
Occasionally, the surprises were a bit painful, but even those tended to be worth it in the end. Each new mistake led to a discovery and Rose was as remarkably patient with him in this as she'd been with everything else.
He ended the kiss softly, then he pressed his lips lightly against her cheek before leaning against the desk again.
“I take it back,” Rose said. He was rather pleased to note that her breathing and pulse had accelerated, she had heightened color in her cheeks and lips, and her pupils had dilated slightly. “You're incorrigible.”
“I try,” he said. He wondered if she'd be offended if he kissed her for using the word 'incorrigible'. It was slightly outside her normal vocabulary and was nearly as attractive as when she talked about bits of the TARDIS or did some play-acting for undercover work. Any words that required she move her mouth a lot were vastly appealing. “Do you think your mother would be offended if we skived off?”
“Considering how many people she actually hired to put this party together, she might be relieved that you're leaving it to the professionals,” Rose said. “And I can’t believe that you’re worrying about offending my mum. Do you feel all right?
“I’ve always liked Jackie,” the Doctor protested. Rose giggled and, well, perhaps that was a bit of an exaggeration, but not that much of one. He’d certainly always appreciated Jackie’s dilemma. “I can do ten times the job that anyone else could and your mum deserves the best.”
Rose did not look convinced, which naturally made her a faithless traitor. He bent down and snogged her for a bit longer as punishment. Rose didn't look suitably chastised when he pulled away, so clearly the answer was to kiss her until she was.
He finally had to pull away when his now-insufficient lung capacity caught up with him. Luckily, Rose was also nearly breathless, so he decided to count it as a victory. One best celebrated in a place safe from interruption.
“On second thought, I’m sure that they’ll do a brilliant job,” the Doctor said, after a moment. Rose just smiled at him, face flushed and glowing. He took her hand in his and they made their way out the door and down the hall, ducking out of the way of a hurried-looking man holding several armfuls of Christmas lights and chatting away on an ear-bud.
Ah, humans. They forgot so quickly. Rose tightened her hand in his and he amended that thought - not all of them. At the side entrance, he helped Rose on with her winter coat and submitted to her doing likewise with him. Then he slipped his hand back into hers and opened the door into a flurry of cold, white dots.
“It’s snowing,” Rose said, delighted. She tugged him outside and he wrapped himself behind her, pulling her back against the warmth of his body. Together, they blinked up at the snow, the very real, water-based snow.
And despite the temperature, the Doctor couldn’t remember ever being warmer.
~the end~
Rating: PG
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers for 4x13 - "Journey's End"
Summary: The Doctor and Rose set up for Christmas at Jackie's.
A/N:: Gift for svanderslice in the oh_she_knows Secret Santa.
Someday is Now
“You don't have to do this,” Rose said, again, from her much-too-far-away perch on the desk in the opposite corner of the room. The Doctor squinted a bit and pressed the last of the sturdy pins into place. Rose was still talking. “Really. I know that my mum insisted, but you never listened to her before.”
“And if I were the one insisting?” the Doctor asked, hopping down from the small ladder he'd been using and moving a step back to take in the full view of his project.
One Christmas garland, securely hung over the fireplace. They used a different sort of wiring here, or maybe it was just that Jackie hadn't been rich enough to afford anything as nice as the one he'd just placed. Still, it looked good. It looked straight and yet arching enough to invoke just the right hint of nature.
“Why would you?” she asked. He glanced over at her now - she was still dressed down for the set-up of the party and she looked utterly adorable and quite perplexed. Her hair was pulled back into two messy braids, with tendrils escaping to curl enticingly about her neck. She wasn't wearing any make-up or perfume, so the pure and natural scent of Rose Tyler wound around him. She was wearing paint-spattered jeans, the ones that had a white handprint smeared across the backside from when the two of them had gotten more involved in each other than in working on their house, and a soft red shirt that tied in the front. “I know that you and my mum get along better now but are you really sure that you want to risk a Tyler Christmas?”
“I've found myself missing them in the last few years,” he said. Her eyes widened slightly. Even after almost half a year, she still hadn't adjusted to how much more he was willing to give her now. He'd spent so long holding back all the words that he'd wanted to tell her and he rather reveled in how easily they came to his lips now. You know, domestic doesn't sound so bad anymore. I never thought I'd be lucky enough to have this with you. I think we should buy a house together. You're worth more to me than every star above our heads. You scare me to death sometimes, risking your life in that job of yours. I'd do anything for you, if you'd only ask.
I love you.
He'd held himself back from telling her so many things in those days when he was just one man. It was no wonder that she was surprised when they came spilling out now.
“Yeah?” she asked, shifting over and making room for him to lean against the desk alongside her. Never one to refuse an invitation from Rose Tyler, he hurried over and stretched out his legs, putting his hand right up against hers. The temperature difference wasn't so great anymore, though her blood still ran slightly hotter than his. “You really missed Christmas with my mum?”
“Christmas just isn't Christmas anymore if Jackie Tyler doesn't have a good shout at me,” he said, bumping his shoulder against hers. She giggled and nudged him back. He resisted the urge to take things further by reminding firmly himself that they were in Jackie's house and that meant that there was a chance that she might walk in and that was a horror to be avoided at all costs.
“You didn't...” she trailed off and he tried to supply his own ending to her sentence. He didn't... have someone else's mum yell at him instead? No, that couldn't be it.
He didn't... ah! he didn't have Christmas with Donna and her family. That made more sense.
“No,” he said, easily enough. “The last time I had Christmas dinner was with you.”
Donna might have invited him but he'd turned down the offer, or near enough. Even now, he couldn't picture himself sitting down with Sylvia and Wilf, enjoying a holiday meal. Wilf, in particular, seemed to be a good person but they weren't...
they weren't...
they weren't family.
Jackie Tyler, for all her loud mouth and impossible behavior, had somehow managed to become a person that he wanted in his life. He didn't know exactly when or why. He didn't have many clear memories of his own mother, but he was fairly certain that she'd been nothing like Jackie. She'd been controlled and powerful and everything that she should be. Jackie was messy and pushy and... so entirely human.
In that, she was like her daughter.
Rose still seemed to be taking in his confession, a soft joy to be read in the tiniest curve of her mouth and the faintest tint of pink on her cheeks. It was something that he hadn't been able to fully understand before the metacrisis, that the edge of possessiveness that had been hidden in her comments about Sarah Jane and Reinette was based in insecurity. She'd never understood how deeply she'd sunk into his hearts; that no other person could possibly shake his devotion to her. He'd tried to tell her before, in faltering and useless words, precisely how dear she was to him, but he hadn't had the language.
Donna had given him the words. He had so much to be grateful to Donna for, but this above all else: she'd shown him how to tell Rose everything that he'd always hoped that she'd already known.
Oh, he wished above all things that Donna had managed to beat the odds out and hadn't succumbed to the near-certain consequences of a human taking on a Time Lord mind. If his other self could have Donna with him, as a friend and a comfort, then his Christmas wouldn't be as lonely as the Doctor feared that it would be otherwise.
“It looks nice.” Rose leaned sideways, her head resting on his shoulder. He tracked her line of sight - she was looking at the garland that he'd just put up. “You did a wonderful job.”
“I'm very good with my hands,” he said, waggling his eyebrows suggestively and grinning when he felt her start to laugh against him.
“You're impossible,” she said, still chuckling. He reached over and tilted her chin toward him, catching her mouth with a kiss. She startled slightly and then relaxed into him, her lips parting and the barest whisper of her thoughts calling out to him from too great a distance for him to reach across. The frustrating thing about only ever having snogged her properly with this body was that he couldn't make a full mental connection with her. The first time they'd kissed, she'd had the whole bleeding vortex running through her head, and the second time, she'd been compressed to a tiny corner of her own mind, and so, in both cases, he'd been blocked out. He'd never know the exact shape of Rose's thoughts, the lines and curves of them, but only feel the tease of them slipping through his fingers like stardust.
Still, there was a certain excitement to be found in fumbling about with each other and learning each other by touch, rather than through a mental link. He'd never done that before - his wife, of course, had been extremely adept at the sexual link and what he'd learned from her had always worked well enough during the relatively rare times after they parted, when he'd found himself needing a physical connection - so, this, with Rose, was full of brand new feelings and surprises.
Occasionally, the surprises were a bit painful, but even those tended to be worth it in the end. Each new mistake led to a discovery and Rose was as remarkably patient with him in this as she'd been with everything else.
He ended the kiss softly, then he pressed his lips lightly against her cheek before leaning against the desk again.
“I take it back,” Rose said. He was rather pleased to note that her breathing and pulse had accelerated, she had heightened color in her cheeks and lips, and her pupils had dilated slightly. “You're incorrigible.”
“I try,” he said. He wondered if she'd be offended if he kissed her for using the word 'incorrigible'. It was slightly outside her normal vocabulary and was nearly as attractive as when she talked about bits of the TARDIS or did some play-acting for undercover work. Any words that required she move her mouth a lot were vastly appealing. “Do you think your mother would be offended if we skived off?”
“Considering how many people she actually hired to put this party together, she might be relieved that you're leaving it to the professionals,” Rose said. “And I can’t believe that you’re worrying about offending my mum. Do you feel all right?
“I’ve always liked Jackie,” the Doctor protested. Rose giggled and, well, perhaps that was a bit of an exaggeration, but not that much of one. He’d certainly always appreciated Jackie’s dilemma. “I can do ten times the job that anyone else could and your mum deserves the best.”
Rose did not look convinced, which naturally made her a faithless traitor. He bent down and snogged her for a bit longer as punishment. Rose didn't look suitably chastised when he pulled away, so clearly the answer was to kiss her until she was.
He finally had to pull away when his now-insufficient lung capacity caught up with him. Luckily, Rose was also nearly breathless, so he decided to count it as a victory. One best celebrated in a place safe from interruption.
“On second thought, I’m sure that they’ll do a brilliant job,” the Doctor said, after a moment. Rose just smiled at him, face flushed and glowing. He took her hand in his and they made their way out the door and down the hall, ducking out of the way of a hurried-looking man holding several armfuls of Christmas lights and chatting away on an ear-bud.
Ah, humans. They forgot so quickly. Rose tightened her hand in his and he amended that thought - not all of them. At the side entrance, he helped Rose on with her winter coat and submitted to her doing likewise with him. Then he slipped his hand back into hers and opened the door into a flurry of cold, white dots.
“It’s snowing,” Rose said, delighted. She tugged him outside and he wrapped himself behind her, pulling her back against the warmth of his body. Together, they blinked up at the snow, the very real, water-based snow.
And despite the temperature, the Doctor couldn’t remember ever being warmer.
~the end~