Rose sat in her room, the familiarity of home comforting her ever so slightly. Pictures of her and Mickey adorned her pinboard and glancing at them gave her the faintest glimmer of hope that he would come bursting through her door at any second, exclaiming that he had heard the TARDIS from the pub. The sudden surge of hope was washed away as quickly as it had arrived. She had been right to object to Mickey boarding the TARDIS all those weeks ago. Of course it had just been her selfishness flaring up at the time but upon reflection he still would have been here. If only she'd made herself heard.
They'd been back home for several days now, the Doctor thinking that the comfort of her home and the reassurance that her mother was still alive would do her some good. But no. Sat in her room for days and hardly eating, Jackie and the Doctor had tried to calm her, but nothing they could say would take away the guilt Rose felt for leading Mickey away; away from his home, his friends and his job.
So they left her to it, hoping that time to think and come to terms with what had happened would succeed. Jackie emerged from Rose's room where she had left a mug of tea and a plate of sandwiches, which would probably still be there at tea time.
"No luck?" The Doctor asked, emerging from the kitchen where he had been fiddling energetically with the toaster.
Jackie shook her head sadly. "Look Doctor, I think it's about time you though about what you're doing to Rose."
That was the last thing the Doctor expected to hear and right about now he couldn't quite deal with an angry parent. An expression of pain flickered across the Doctor's face and Jackie suddenly noticed just how old and tired the Doctor looked.
"Jackie," he sighed, exasperatedly. "Rose chose to travel with me. You know I didn't force her to. She could leave anytime she wanted to."
"It's not about the Danger, Doctor. It's about what she sees…"
"The world? The universe? If you even saw a tiny part of what Rose has seen you'd never want to stop."
The look in Jackie's eyes said it all. "She met her father, didn't she? She was there when he died."
The Doctor turned around to face Jackie and she noticed for the first time the faintest glimmer of tears in his eyes. "Yes."
Jackie shook her head, angry. Yet however angry she felt she couldn't help but feel sorry for the man in front of her, who now seemed a shell of the man he once was. "You're messing with her life Doctor." She said softly. "There are some things that shouldn't be messed with, no matter how hard you want them. Surely you know that Doctor. Don't you think she's gone through enough?"
Jackie was right. As harsh as she may have sounded she was right. Rose had gone through enough, far more than anyone else before her. He had wanted to show Rose the world, make her happy and content, yet he should have said no to her request to see her father. Was he being careless in showing her time or purely being selfish in never wanting to let her go? Rose had been left by Mickey, watched her father die loving her and then watched essentially the same man reject her in the parallel world. The quiet sobs he could hear coming from her room as he sat reflecting on Jackie's words racked through his body as a constant reminder that he had caused this. He couldn't keep doing this to her no matter how hard he wished to protect her. Was it time to let her go and have her lose somebody again in himself? It was one thing to lose somebody you love in the hope that they would lead a normal life, but to go through the anguish of hurting the person you love….