A/N: Dedicated with love and gratitude to one of the real-life friends who introduced me to Doctor Who; this one's for her! Written for Challenge 72 at Livejournal's then_theres_us.
Disclaimer: I do not and never will own the lyrics I quote below; all credit goes to The Smiths.
"Take me out tonight, where there's music and there's people who are young and alive."
...
"And in a darkened underpass, I thought
'Oh, God, my chance has come at last…'
But then a strange fear gripped me and I just couldn't ask."
- The Smiths
There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
There was a night when he decided he'd had enough. He'd had enough of watching Amy and Rory snog, trying to calculate from his observations how humans could somehow manage to take in oxygen when the anatomical features used to do so were otherwise engaged.
He'd had enough, because sometimes, watching them, he'd reflect on all the times he'd wanted to learn exactly that, wanted to test his many hypotheses with a certain pair of lips on his, a certain pair of hands clutching at his neck and shoulders, twining in his hair. He'd reflect, and he'd want, and he'd have to tell himself no.
It had been a week since Amy and Rory's latest near-death experience, the plummeting spaceship only Kazran Sardick could save. Since then, they'd been all about snogging and shagging—not that they hadn't been before—and the Doctor had another s-word to add to the list: suffocating. Not only because he couldn't figure out how they could breathe, but because he couldn't suppress that viciously longing side of him any longer.
He wanted it, and there was a way he could have it.
Barring some kind of miracle, Rose Tyler would never meet this particular incarnation of his. He was sure of it, sure that the universes were sealed, and even if the walls broke down again, he told himself, would he want to see her again? He'd left her with that other part of himself, had bade her silently to be happy with, be loved by, this other self, even as he denied the stirring in his hearts, the pain, that told him he'd never forget her, even if it was the end of their story.
Rose would never see this incarnation. He had no worries about crossing his own timeline; they'd never again gone anywhere near her past after the mess with Pete. For all she knew, he would just be a stranger at a party, a charming, potentially drunken madman who just wanted a snog from a pretty girl at midnight.
On December 31st, 2010, he left Amy and Rory on a planet that chose to observe Earth's New Year's customs just for laughs, usually by throwing raucous parties unlike any that could be found on Earth (for one thing, the alcohol was several times stronger). He gave them the usual spiel about not getting into trouble and promised to pick them up in the morning; he'd be celebrating with a friend.
When she was sixteen, Rose Tyler spent New Year's Eve at a neighboring apartment in the Powell Estate. Jackie Tyler was out at her newest boyfriend's, and Rose was flying solo—she was between boyfriends and not quite up to the point of viewing Mickey in that way just yet.
There was dancing. Dancing, he could definitely do, as long as he caught a glimpse of Rose before midnight. She'd mentioned this night once—the night she'd spent New Year's Eve essentially alone. He had to wonder if that meant nothing would come of them—if he wouldn't see her after all—but disregarded the thought, wanting to try.
So he danced. Pretty well, he thought, but likely spastic-looking to an outsider's eye. Given that most of the party guests were well on their way to being very, very drunk, he didn't think any of them were doing much better.
After a time, he'd somehow gravitated towards the edge of the dance floor, edging out of the crowd to take a break, but still dancing. One of his hands hit out in a dance move yet unseen by human eyes—and straight into Rose Tyler's drink.
He was instantly showered with what smelled like beer, but he was beyond hearing the annoyed grunts of "Oi, mate!" and "Watch it!" from bystanders who got splashed as well. No, he was far too entranced by Rose Tyler, younger than his Rose but still with those vestiges of the girl he knew. In the dark, it was almost impossible to distinguish the exact shade of pink that her top was, but there were buttons that his hands itched to undo. Her hair was piled in a knot on the top of her head, and he wanted to pull it free, run his fingers through the shimmering gold. She was wearing a dark lipstick—this wasn't the Rose he knew, so he had to tell himself this Rose was different, perhaps experimenting with lipsticks to find a shade she liked (and maybe he could help her with that, knowing the exact shade his Rose had been wearing every time he'd fantasized about those lips).
He had meant to come here, so he didn't know why he was so surprised. Maybe because she'd never mentioned this, never mentioned improbably meeting an odd stranger at a New Year's party. But it wasn't improbability at all. It was the absolute certainty that he would always find a way back to Rose.
He stared at her for only a few seconds, but it was enough to make him realize that he should have reacted, either to the soaked shirt or to Rose, who looked wildly apologetic.
"'M sorry. Should've looked where I was going—" she began, but he waved a hand almost lazily.
"Not your fault; I could say the same. Might have to change, though." He expected her to point him to a bathroom or a resident of the apartment who could find him a new shirt. Instead, she grabbed his hand and started to pull him toward an empty room. "Come on—you can borrow one of Gary's shirts. He won't mind."
It took longer than it should have to realize that Rose was taking him to a bedroom. Hadn't he imagined a scenario like this—although with less alcohol involved—innumerable times? It shouldn't have been so surprising, but it was. In one universe, he was certain, he is always going to bed with Rose Tyler, but in this one, it had never happened. At least, so he'd thought.
Well, then, he thought, with a certain feeling of apprehension and euphoria as Rose shut the door behind them. Geronimo.
Barely five minutes to midnight, and he was shut in a very small, very empty room with a Rose Tyler he didn't know and couldn't quite gauge.
As always, Rose trusted strangers. Twice in her future, she will take the outstretched hand of a man she doesn't know, a man she will follow so, so much further than the ends of the earth. He supposed it was part of her overwhelming compassion, one thing he'd always loved about her—the compassion that had led her to sympathize with a lone Dalek, or to hug Elton a grand total of two minutes after she'd been yelling at him for upsetting her mum. Now, in her past and his present, she had taken the hand of a stranger who one day would be exactly the opposite, had gotten him alone, even if she hadn't meant to.
She turned away from the door, then moved to the dresser, opening a drawer and rummaging for a shirt. "Must've pulled us into Trish's room by accident; sorry… so dark in here I can barely see… she'll probably have a few shirts of James's around, though… Sorry, by the way. It was hard to hear over the music. What's your name?"
Her back was to him, so she couldn't see his hesitation. He couldn't tell her "John" or "the Doctor," so what could he say? He'd never pictured the plan going quite this well—just a kiss, he'd thought, and then off he went. But no, no, apparently he was stuck with her. Not that he minded.
She turned to him when he didn't answer, an amused smile teasing at the corners of her lips. "Wha', are you afraid I'm a stalker or something?"
He had to laugh at that, at the borderline flirty way she pushed her tongue against her teeth. "Or something," he said, almost coyly—if she could flirt, so could he, as rusty as he was.
She smirked, taking no offense, and he knew that to her, he was probably just what he'd thought—a drunken stranger flirting with a girl he had absolutely no chance with. But even if this wasn't his Rose, he felt like he had every chance in the world.
She tossed him a man's t-shirt, and he started undoing the buttons of his shirt after he'd taken off the tweed jacket and loosened the bowtie. Although there was a man undressing in front of her, Rose's eyes never wavered, and he called her on it.
That little smirk widened. "You think I'm a stalker, yeah? Might as well give you a reason—an excuse for why you won't give me your name." She laughed then, and hearing that sound again made this entire mad experience worth it.
He removed the shirt, standing, his hearts thrumming in his chest to the muffled rhythm of the partygoers chanting a countdown to midnight. Thirty seconds to make his move. "If I gave you my name, I wouldn't be a stranger. What's New Year's Eve if you can't say you kissed a stranger, eh?"
Rose took a hesitant step toward him, then another. "Boring?" she ventured, reaching out and taking the shirt from his grasp, dropping it back to the bed.
He took a not-nearly-as-hesitant step towards her, lowering his head so there was barely a hairsbreadth between their lips, so that she had no choice but to look into his eyes. "Boring," he confirmed, his voice lower than he'd meant it to be. Try as he might, he couldn't make it sound like anything other than wanting her.
Ten, nine, eight… His hands at her waist, gently, even uncertainly, because he didn't want to make this a cockup, didn't want to do any damage to the girl he barely knew and yet knew so, so well.
Seven, six, five… Her eyes refocusing on his after she'd blinked, searching his face, as if wondering how to place this feeling of familiarity, of rightness.
Four, three, two… Her arms encircling his neck, pressing her body, covered in so-torturously-close-fitting pink silk, to the warmth of his bare skin.
One.
Cheers sounded from the other room, loud and guttural and drunken. It was such a contrast to the sweetness of Rose's lips meeting his, clumsily but passionately, a kiss that deepened as her tongue traced all around his lips and then pushed between them, her hands twining in his hair, just as he'd imagined. And he realized just why all the others didn't seem to want to breathe during a kiss like this one—because breathing would mean taking his lips away from hers, which was already so foreign a proposition he didn't want to consider it, and because as much as an over-nine-hundred-years-old Time Lord hated succumbing to cliché, she literally took his breath away.
The room was lit by a ridiculously gaudy lamp, one that was strung with faceted jewels that threw scattered dots of light onto the walls. To the Doctor, it looked like so many stars, and as their shadows dimmed them, he thought of the stars going out and bringing her back to him. There are so many things that will happen to this Rose, and he longed to tell her every single one, but he was content just to kiss her in the dappled light of a tacky lamp in someone else's bedroom.
As their kisses deepened and Rose's hands became especially frantic, her low moans purred into his lips, he stepped them back to the bed, covered in a bed set that appeared to be decorated with roses. He briefly entertained the notion of it being kismet, kissing Rose Tyler in a room decorated with pseudo-starlight and cloth roses, a room she'd never meant to lead him to in the first place. He dismissed the notion just as quickly; there didn't need to be a fated reason for him to kiss Rose Tyler. There did not need to be a reason at all.
This Rose was sixteen and eager. As they laid back on the bed, Rose just about straddling him, she moved his hands to her buttons, urging him on with breathy sighs of supplication. He didn't want it to go much further—he'd come back for a kiss at midnight and was instead getting propositioned—but he couldn't resist undoing those buttons one by one, teasingly slow, just so she would make those pleasured noises one more time.
He slipped the pink silk off of her shoulders and down her arms, tossing it to the floor with the shirt of Gary's they'd kicked off the bed in their eagerness to get on it. Underneath, she was wearing a tank top, presumably so the black bra she was wearing wouldn't show through against the pink of the blouse. The fabric was thin and rode up easily, and it was when his hands brushed the smooth skin of her sides that she broke their increasingly feverish kisses and breathed, "Can we… not?"
This Rose was insecure still, almost afraid. Kissing was fine—kissing an older man, a man she hadn't been afraid of watching get undressed, was fine. But this Rose, he saw, was still finding herself. The lipstick was too dark, the hairstyle perhaps a mite overdone—this Rose didn't yet know what she wanted.
The Doctor, though, he knew what he wanted. He wanted not to take advantage of a girl he knew would come to trust him utterly, enough to swear that she would never leave him.
So he gave her one last kiss and nodded, and obliged when she asked him to stay.
Hours later, the Doctor's right arm was numb from having spent the night beneath Rose's body, and the hand he played along her shoulder was tingling with pins and needles. He couldn't say that he minded. It was everything he'd ever wanted and more, somehow. It was more because even a Rose that didn't know him trusted him, because even a Rose that didn't know him wanted him.
After they'd stopped snogging long enough to say two words to each other, Rose had almost meekly apologized for not being able to go through with anything, and he'd told her not to worry, that wasn't what he'd wanted. When she'd asked what he had wanted, he'd realized that what he'd wanted went so much further than a kiss. He wanted to talk to this Rose, to get a glimpse of her before he'd known her, maybe help her find a place to stand in a world that wasn't yet giving her one.
He'd spent hours listening to her, and if Rose thought anything strange of a man who would willingly sit listening to a teenage girl enumerating problems and insecurities, she never said a word. She even smiled when he gently loosened her hair from its complicated knot, letting it fall softly around her shoulders, turning her into the Rose he had once known, the Rose she will be when he tells her to run in a basement surrounded by mannequins.
After they'd talked for so long that Rose had run out of things to say, she had been content to just lie with him, her head pillowed on his arm, one hand resting lazily on his chest. When she'd asked who he was, he told her he was a traveler, just passing through. If she felt his hearts beating overtime and wondered, just for a second, if something was strange, off, she never said a word, just fell asleep in the strong arms of a stranger.
The Doctor didn't sleep, and instead took the few hours to watch her, to memorize the feeling and look of Rose Tyler sleeping by his side. Lying on his side, he faced her, studying her sleeping face, listening to the cadences of her breathing, stroking the skin of her shoulder absently with each of the five fingers on his right hand. He touched his forehead to hers, wanting so much to impart some kind of psychic information—some reassurance about her future, some message of love—but refrained, because of course he knew that she would find her way to him, and then back to him, eventually.
When sunlight streamed through the room's open window and he heard the sounds of the hungover party guests starting to wake up and leave the apartment, he knew it was time to leave, and he spent another few seconds listening to her steady breaths before he eased his arm out from underneath her and slipped from the bed, carefully enough not to wake her. He put on the t-shirt he'd never so much as started to pull on the night before, draping his jacket, shirt, and bowtie over his arm.
The Doctor crossed to her side of the bed, leaning down and pressing a tender kiss to Rose's hair, shining like molten gold in the early morning sun. Just this once, he whispered the good-bye he'd never once been able to give her, had never allowed himself to give her. And he left without looking back.
"Better a broken heart than no heart at all."
"Try it. You try it… Would you do this? Think about it, Doctor. One last day with your beloved… which day would you choose?"
He could feel it, the ache in his hearts that settled there only moments after he left her. For her, their days are simply the days to come, but for him, this was one less day of the nineteen years he could travel back to. The feeling was bittersweet—it was more than worth it, seeing her again, but at the same time, he would never know what the encounter had meant to her, would never know why she hadn't mentioned it to him. Had she had any suspicions, once she'd met him? Had she ever thought twice about the man who'd spilled her drink, kissed her senseless, spent hours gently assuaging her lack of confidence? Had it been because he'd meant everything, an experience too personal to share, or, in the end, nothing?
As he set the coordinates to return to Amy and Rory, he thought of his own words. How trite they seemed now. Better a broken heart than no heart at all. But the words were better than nothing. One last day with his beloved, that was better than nothing. And he soldiered on.