He sat just outside the door, waiting to hear the haunting, otherworldly sounds that would indicate the triumphant return of Rose Tyler, Jackie Tyler, and Mickey Smith. Two days, six cups of coffee, two beers, and a lot of takeout, and he was still there, waiting.
As he'd always done as far as Mickey was concerned.
About halfway through the first day, he heard an unearthly metallic spinning noise. Jake stood quickly, before he realized that it was only a tray filled with shiny metal equipment from a laboratory down the hall.
He saw the looks he was getting, but just ignored them. They didn't matter, the only thing he cared about right now was seeing that door open, and three people step out of it.
Jake felt his heart leap when those doors finally opened and those three people stepped out, and he thought he'd remember that feeling forever. The sinking feeling of betrayal and grief overtook that joy in less than a heartbeat, and he knew that he'd remember this one more then the first.
There was Rose, and Mrs. Tyler, and a tall chap who Jake instantly recognized as the Doctor, but just as quickly realized that there was something wrong with him. This barely registered in his thoughts because he only noticed the person who was missing from the group of three, but he thought of it all the same.
Rose and this… newcomer, this Doctor who was not, only had eyes (and hands, and mouths, and thoughts) for each other as they disappeared around the corner. Mrs. Tyler, however, stood there until he lifted his head to catch her worn but content gaze, about to speak, to offer comfort.
He couldn't take it. He didn't want her pity.
He breathed out, a huffy angry sound, and stormed down the hall and stairs, out the side door, and to a nearby small grassy park, where many Torchwood employees, including himself, had their more lengthy lunch breaks. Jake braced himself against a tree, taking deeper and deeper breaths, trying not to go mad.
"Do you ever wonder what makes it different?"
Mickey's question confused Jake, who thought the 'it' he was referring to was the box of Lo Mein they were sharing.
"What, Chinese food?"
Mickey smirked, laughing. "No, I mean parallel worlds. You know, like why you all got zeppelins and we got Starbucks?"
"Not really." Jake shrugged. He never liked it when Mickey brought up the world he originally lived in, a place where stoplights were green instead of blue and you couldn't find a Carter's Market anywhere. That faraway look Mickey got in his eyes… "That's your area of expertise, remember?"
Mickey grinned, rueful and nostalgic. "Yeah."
There was quiet, or as quiet as a park in London could be, and both men ate.
"Have you ever…?"
"No."
This time Mickey frowned, forehead creasing in complete puzzlement.
"How'd you know…?"
"That you were going to ask if I'd ever thought of the possibility to meet the parallel version of myself." Jake paused, taking a long gulp of his already half-empty bottle of Coke. "No, I haven't. It's too bloody weird to think about."
"It's not that weird! " Mickey sounded assertive, but Jake gave him a look and he added, "After you get used to it." He stared off at the groups of people passing by the park. From their picnic table, they had a perfect view of the front entrance, which was just across the square of Torchwood's main building.
"Well, would you ever want…?"
"No." Jake said
"Huh," Mickey hit his thigh in stunned amusement, then rubbed the spot he'd hit and scrunched his nose up at the ache. "Sometimes I think you know me better then I do."
Jake turned to rustle in the take-out bag for a napkin, glad he had some excuse not to look the man who was the spitting image of his deceased lover in the eye.
When Mickey's Gran died, Jake offered to take the day off to go with him to the funeral. He wouldn't be able to do much of anything without his partner-in-crime. Mickey didn't let him. He said Jake would be better off at work, and he would be fine on his own, really.
When Jake returned from lunch, he learned from the front desk that Mickey had shown up and asked Rose to go with him. Jake fumed, crushing the nearest thing he could find in his hand. After this, he rather regretted his reaction, because Rose had been there longer, why should he go. Also, he'd accidentally crumpled an important paper that he would have to rewrite before he turned it in to the big boss.
After this, Mickey grew much more restless then he had ever been, and Jake caught him sitting in the break room staring off out the window more then once. He always woke his friend out of these daydreams. Jake could tell Mickey was not just 'admiring that new zeppelin.'
There was just one drunken night, after the annual Torchwood Christmas get-together and Jake thought after that they'd get somewhere. But the next morning, Mickey only looked at him with a hung over kind of murky gaze (no one got a day off from Torchwood unless it was scheduled or they were dying.) The day after that began the Dargoril search and rescues, and to have that conversation fell off Jake's mental to-do list.
Jake never even got to ask if Mickey remembered their completely ungraceful fumble and snog in a dark corner from that night. Part of him knew that the reason he said nothing was that he didn't want Mickey, this new version of his old boyfriend, to reject him. In all reality, they were never to busy to sit down and talk, they just never talked about what was really important.
The week leading up to when all hell breaks loose in every dimension was just how one would expect it; chaotic, messy, but Jake wouldn't have it any other way. He loved being busy, loved being out in the field. He could handle days stuck at the office, doing nothing but boring yourself to death with paperwork and research and office politics, but it was just not him. Jake was busy working on trying to make sure the whole of existence didn't blink out like a streetlight switching off in the morning.
Three days before what Rose called the 'final battle,' Jake took a second to splash a little water on his face and ate something that actually counted as food. A few minutes later, Mickey slumped into the break room where they'd spent so many lunch hours and breaks (It was even the place they'd awoke after that party last Christmas).
Both men were completely exhausted, and Jake was glad that neither of them felt the need to fill the room with inane chatter. Mickey heated water for tea, fixed his drink, and sat down on the other half of the couch.
"Rose is off again, finding some woman. Says she's gonna save all the universes."
Jake nodded, suddenly struck by a worrying thought.
"Hey…"
"Hm?"
"You've been watching Rose do these jumps across reality, right into so many worlds…"
"Yeah?"
"And… she's gotten back to where you started out from?"
Mickey was cautious in answering this time. "Yeah. Why?"
"Do you…" He swallowed. "Do you ever want to go back?"
"No." Mickey said immediately. "I mean, I'll be right there through this big fight Rose says is coming, but I'm coming home." He smiled, and Jake almost believed him.