"Sweetie, won't you come sit with us?"
Rose showed absolutely no sign of even having heard the question asked. It was like she wasn't really there – she hardly even blinked. Standing motionless at the edge of the garden, back turned against her mother, she gazed up at the night sky. The table on the verandah was set with candles and plates, a bottle of wine and a bouquet of freshly picked flowers. It was dark where she stood. The light from the house only vaguely reflected itself in her hair.
They were all waiting for her: her dad and little Tony. Jackie. And him. She knew they were watching her, but she couldn't face them.
There wasn't a single cloud in the sky that evening. The stars seemed brighter than usual and as she observed them, it was almost as if they were whispering, singing quietly into the darkness. She noticed their twinkling, and it struck a chord somewhere deep inside of her. They shone with the power of the nuclear fusion burning within them – suspended up there, in a realm she no longer had access to. In a way, they represented everything that she had once had, and had since lost.
The air was cool and the lawn strewn with glistening dew. As he moved across it, the sound of his rubber-soles against the wet grass betrayed his otherwise soundless movements. She hardly even took note of his hand gently wrapping itself around her wrist. The touch meant nothing to her.
"Rose," he said softly.
The first few days, the mere sound of that voice would reduce her to tears. Every smile, every familiar expression, every time she would accidentally catch his scent, she would be filled up for a single moment with blissful joy – before realisation would hit her like a punch in the gut, knocking her off her feet. Again and again, she was torn apart. Every day. Every time he looked at her.
He was never imposing – he was far too gentle to force himself on her – and yet, he seemed to always be there, in her presence, but at the corner of her eye. Like he was watching over her, or simply waiting – but waiting for what? It drove her mad; seeing him passive like this – pensive, patient. It wasn't at all how he was supposed to be. He was supposed to be a force of nature.
"Rose," he said again. "Will you please look at me?"
She tore her eyes from the sky and gazed into his face. There were no stars in his eyes. His fingers touched her hand, but the gesture was bleak, a shadow of the determination and passion of him. Transparent and incomplete.
"If you would just talk to me, tell me what you need."
"You know who I need."
She didn't even think before saying the words. He looked at her, but didn't reply. They stood as statues, frozen as they gazed into each other, and she saw, as she had done before, in his glossy, brown eyes that he understood. She saw that when he closed his eyes at night and listened to his own heartbeat, he felt the same thing as she did now; that there was something missing. That there was an insurmountable void surrounding him on all sides.
The faint sound of cutlery against porcelain clinked away behind them. Stepping forward, Rose pressed her cheek against his chest and he gently wrapped her into his arms.
There it was: the single heartbeat. The only noticeable testament to his origin, pounding away in her ear like a drum.
"I'm not what you need. But I'm afraid I'm what you've got."
"Is that what my life is reduced to now?" said Rose into the fabric of his shirt. "Settling for the next best thing?"
He let out a small sigh.
"But he did want the best for you, Rose. In his mind, I'm sure he still believes that he made the right call. That I am what's best for you." A low, bitter laugh slipped out of her. "I'm everything he could never be. I'm safe. Human. Like you."
Rose began to squirm in his arms, closing her eyes against the dark of the night, but he held her tightly. Talking about him made her want to run. Just run until she found some place where their paths would cross again. At the same time, she was just so tired. Like saying goodbye a second time had finally drawn the last spark out of her.
"I never asked for 'safe'."
"I doubt it would have made any difference if you had. You're too dear to him."
"'Too dear'?" she said, suddenly tearing free from his embrace. "For what? Too dear to have a choice? Too dear to get to decide who I spend the rest of my life with?"
Her eyes were wide-open, glowing; tinted with anger and sorrow now. His hands were at his sides, his brow slightly furrowed. Suddenly, without warning, words started falling from her lips at an increasing speed; jumbled sentences trying but failing to encapsulate the devastation, the abandonment and the feeling of looking into his face and being reduced into a million tiny pieces. During it all, he said nothing and did nothing. He watched her quietly, waiting for the words to drain.
And they did drain, eventually. The garden had fallen silent. The others had gone inside, probably made uncomfortable by the intimate scene acted out right next to them.
They were both quiet for a moment. Then she looked up at him again, staring straight into his eyes as she said: "He took the easy way out."
"What are you talking about?"
She shifted her weight, but her eyes were relentless.
"He chickened out. He couldn't bare the thought of being with me – of watching me grow old and decay and die. My mortality overwhelmed him to the point where he would rather lock me away some place, than to actually, properly face it." She drew a shuddering breath. "Is that love? Is that what you call it?"
Tears snaked their way across her weary face, resting for a short while at the tip of her nose and at her chin, before falling to their demise. His face was unchanged. He didn't try to contradict her.
"I never had a choice. I've realised that now. Between him and me, he was always the one calling the shots. I thought that, maybe if we … maybe, it could change, maybe he would see me as an equal. I've sacrificed so much, only to be rejected."
"And after all that," said he after a moments silence, "your love for him remains unfaltering."
"Yes."
"It's what he taught you. Never to give up hope. Never stopping believing that things always turn out for the better, in the end. Isn't that so?"
"Yes."
She clenched her hands into tiny fists at her sides. Stepping toward her, he smiled softly, sadly.
"I am from him, but I could never hope to be anything like him." Reaching for her hands, he added: "I have accepted that. But there is one thing you have to understand about me, Rose Tyler."
She hesitated for a few seconds. "What's that, then?"
"He loves you – and that goes beyond anything or anyone that ever came before you. I know this, because I was created with that passion, already burning inside me."
He paused for a few moments, looking steadily at her face. His hands were soft in hers. He braced himself, slightly raised his face, then continued to speak. His voice was honest and clear.
"It's as if all of those voyages through time and space – all the planets and stars of the universe, and all the beauty of the entire creation, have all been gathered and comprised into this single immaculate being: into you. You may find it hard to believe, and he might have unusual ways of showing it, but there is nothing truer in the entire the universe." He paused again, catching his breath. "And if you want to wait for him, or if you want to go back and seek him out among the stars, I'll be there, by your side, through everything."
She shivered.
"Y-... you would do that?"
"As long as my heart's still beating," he said with a smile.
Breathing deeply, he let go of her hands and allowed some space to come between them, as if giving her room to breathe. They didn't exchange any more words. Rose turned to face the sky and he, mimicking her, did the same. They stood apart from each other, their hearts beating out of sync, but their eyes observing the same stars.
Rose tried hard to hear them whisper, but they had fallen silent. The stars were just lights now; beacons from some far off place, like fragments of memories slipping through the cracks. They were the echoes of times passed, quietly bleeding into the night.