Rating: K+(mention of character death)
Spoilers: "Journey's End"
Characters: Rose, humanTen, some OCs.
What It's About: This is a sort of follow-up to "Many Ways To Say I Love You", all about Rose in the parallel universe. There might be a follow-up later, I don't know yet.
Warning: If THAT scene in "Journey's End", or "Many Ways To Say I Love You", made you cry, this might do as well. But it has a happy ending.

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The Life and Times of Rose and John Smith

She hears the TARDIS engines as it disappears. Stands staring at the spot where it used to be. He wraps his arms around her, holds her. She's still getting used to the idea that the Doctor is here, with her, and in the other universe at the same time.

She's vaguely aware of her mum nearby, calling Pete and arranging transport back to England. Torchwood send a helicopter to pick them up, it only takes a few hours. Not like the last time, when they drove for days following a voice to that empty beach in Bad Wolf Bay.

HE settles in remarkably well. They all know they can't call him The Doctor. Not now, not here. He becomes John Smith, and goes to live with the Tylers in their frankly enormous house, and takes a job at Torchwood with Rose and Pete.

His scientific and technological expertise means that he quickly becomes a respected employee of the Institute. A little eccentric, he tends to ignore anyone trying to impose a dress code, and works to his own schedule. It soon becomes legend that Dr. Smith never turns in reports when he is supposed to. A few sharp looks from Ms Tyler and the Institute learns to live with it.

Outside of work things are less smooth. Rose finds it difficult to accept that this is really him, really the man she loves. He looks and talks like him… he has all the same memories… but when she's lying next to him in bed at night, she rests her head against his chest and feels his single and oh-so-human heart beating, and she wishes that she could go home to the TARDIS again, see Jack and Mickey and Sarah Jane, and even Martha and Donna again… see him again.

Then she sees his sleeping face, so peaceful on the pillow next to hers, and puts those thoughts to one side. That world is gone. She can't get back, not now and not ever. Over time she learns to accept her situation. She throws herself into her life again, where before she would simply drift through the days. She organises a party for her baby brother's second birthday – a children's party during the day, where the kids have a great time and the adults make fools of themselves messing around with facepaint and balloons and cake. (She has a photograph in her purse of John at the party, with his face painted like Spiderman and icing from the cake around his mouth and Tony laughing in his arms. It's her favourite picture. He professes to hate it, saying it makes him look silly, but she loves it all the more because of that.)

In the evening, when Tony's been put to bed and the other children have been taken home, the adults clean themselves up and don their best eveningwear for the second party – starting with dinner, then drinks in the lounge and music and dancing. She ends up in his arms, slow-dancing to the music of some singer unique to this world, she can't remember the name. In that brief, perfect moment, she realises that she is truly, perfectly happy.

That night is the best she's had for a long time. It ends with his tux and her dress on the floor of the bedroom and them in bed. Two weeks later she finds out that she's pregnant. Of course he is the first person she tells. His face lights up at the thought of being a father again. He proposes to her on the spot, gets down on one knee and proffers an imaginary ring. She shrieks and hugs him, and accepts.

If Rose's reaction to his proposal was exuberant, her mother's was more so. Jackie immediately started planning an engagement party for the happy couple. She gets so caught up, and pesters them with questions so often, that they elope – taking a flight to the Caribbean and finding a beautiful little church to get married in. He wears the blue suit and his ubiquitous trainers, she wears a white dress with a pattern of roses, that reaches her knees. They spend two weeks there – wedding and honeymoon combined – and return to England. Jackie is remarkably calm when they show up tanned and smiling at the house. She consoles herself by giving them a lavish celebration party.

They buy a house together. Not as large as the Tylers', but comfortable. Three bedrooms, a sitting room, a big study, a garage that swiftly gets converted into John's workshop. There's a state-of-the-art kitchen, and everything they could want. They have a big garden, with a fish-pond and a big old weeping willow. While on maternity leave from the Institute, Rose plants a lot of flowers, and by the summer the garden is a riot of colour.

Neither Rose nor John sees much of it though, because Rose goes into labour on July 5th, and John rushes her to the hospital in his old, but well-looked-after car. After a long labour, a beautiful little girl is born. The first time Rose holds her daughter, she looks into the baby's eyes and sees that they are exactly like John's.

There is much debate over the little girl's name. All traditional Gallifreyan names are vetoed, for obvious reasons. John tries in vain to convince her that "Jack" is a good name for a girl. His other suggestions are equally familiar to her… Sarah Jane, Martha, Donna… and he mentions a few others that can only be the names of former companions – Tegan, Nyssa, Romana, Jo, Dorothy, Peri. She feels awkward about naming their little girl for one of his old friends.

In the end, they reach something they both like, and the little girl is named Marion Jacqueline Smith. Marion's grandparents adore her, and she is spoilt by just about everyone. Rose and John and Marion live their lives, and they are happy.

When Marion is three, Rose has her second child. A boy this time. Oddly, this time there is no conflict over names, and the little boy is named Jack Michael Smith. Two years later, Marion starts school, and John notices something odd.

It has been six years since that day in Bad Wolf Bay, and she has dealt with numerous stresses at work, as well as raising two small children. But she still looks the same as she did on That Day. He considers mentioning it, but it isn't causing any problems, so he lets it slide.

Five years on, however, she still looks exactly the same. John is aging just as he (and his other self) predicted, with the first traces of grey appearing in his hair. But Rose is now in her thirties, and barely looks older than twenty. Marion is twelve now, and Jack nine, and when they are out as a family he notices people looking at them in the street. He guesses that they are thinking how Rose could look so young and have children of those ages. He even catches a few filthy looks tossed his way, by people who assume that Rose is his younger girlfriend or mistress or the nanny that he's having an affair with. One night, when the kids are in bed, he raises the issue with her.

He is surprised when she turns to him and he sees tears in her eyes. She confesses that she thought he hadn't noticed. She tells him how scared she is, and he holds her in his arms and tells her everything will be all right. He looks into her eyes, and sees something there… a faint flicker of gold among the brown. And with that he thinks he knows what is keeping her from aging. He doesn't tell her. He doesn't want to hurt her. Instead he reassures her, and tells her that he'll look into it, and do some research.

Ten years later. Marion works at Torchwood now, she's their rising star, having apparently inherited her father's gift for science as well as his eyes. Jack is at college, and showing all the signs of being just as brilliant as his sister. John now looks like any other man in his mid-fifties. Rose looks exactly the same. They've had to lie. When Rose was thirty-six, they went on a family holiday together, but only John and the children returned. He told everyone that his beloved wife had died in a tragic accident on holiday. The only people who knew the truth were John, the children, Jackie, Pete and Tony. In fact, they staged Rose's death and funeral, while she hid under a false name. Marion and Jack were old enough now, so John told them that they had to pretend their mum was dead, because otherwise she'd be taken away and they'd never see her again.

(That was not entirely a lie. He really was concerned that if anyone found out about Rose's inability to age, people would want to take her away from her family to study her.)

Two months after Rose's "funeral", she returned home. She had dyed her hair dark brown, and acquired coloured contact lenses to make her eyes look blue instead of brown. John told everyone that she was his late wife's cousin Ruth, who had come to live with them to help look after her "niece" and "nephew". John and "Ruth" resumed their relationship in secret, and Marion and Jack were under strict orders never to refer to her as "Mum" when other people might be around.

Twenty years later, Marion and Jack have both left home. Marion is married, with twin boys. Jack is very intelligent and an incorrigible flirt, with a long string of exes. Rose isn't quite sure how her son ended up quite so much like his namesake in the other universe, considering that she hasn't seen Jack Harkness for over forty years and her son has never met him. John is an old man now – he has long since retired from working at Torchwood, though he still spends time in his workshop. Now that the children don't live with them it is easier for them to have a relationship. Over the last twenty years, Rose has changed her identity twice. Currently she is Alice Noble, a live-in carer employed by his family. Ironically, he does need a carer. One consequence of aging normally is that he now has arthritis, and finds it difficult to walk much further than between his bed and his study. She sees him shuffling slowly from room to room and thinks sadly of the old days when he was young and vigorous and always running about saving some planet or other.

It is not long before John becomes too weak to get out of bed. There is nothing in particular wrong… no horrible disease ravaging his body. Simply old age. Rose sits at his bedside and talks to him. A doctor comes to the house regularly to check on him, and one day the doctor takes Rose to one side, and tells her that it would be a good idea to contact John's family, as he will not last much longer. She nods solemnly, and says that she will.

John Smith dies peacefully, in bed, surrounded by his family. Rose is at his side, holding his hand. Around him are Marion, her husband and sons, Jack and his wife and daughter, and Tony and his family. Afterwards, a small wake is held, and people who worked with John at Torchwood come to pay their respects. The funeral is held at a small church near the house, and he is buried in the graveyard outside, near Pete and Jackie Tyler and the empty grave that is supposed to be Rose's.

Afterwards, Marion says goodbye to the mourners and gets the family back to the house, knowing that her mother needs time to say goodbye by herself.

Rose silently blesses her daughter's foresight, and knows that her children and grandchildren will be all right. She touches the headstone, tracing the inscription with her finger. It reads "JOHN SMITH, DEARLY BELOVED FATHER AND GRANDFATHER" with the date of his death and his assumed birthdate underneath.

She whispers. "I love you", and lays a bunch of roses on his grave before picking herself up and leaving. As she reaches the exit, she finds that although most of the others have left, Marion is waiting for her.

She allows her daughter to drive her home, while she contemplates her future without John. Over the next few days, she talks to lawyers about his will and Marion and Jack help her sort out his belongings. One day, Jack goes to his father's workroom to sort through the things he left, and finds a box on a shelf with a old envelope tied to it. He takes it down, and see the single word ROSE in fading ink on the envelope. Jack fetches his mother, who gasps when she sees it. When John was alive, the workshop was his private space. Rose had never spent much time in there… he must have left something for her. Jack looked concerned, and asked her if she was all right. She nodded, mouth suddenly dry, and slowly picked up the envelope. He left quietly. She wondered how she had managed to produce such wonderful children, and carefully opened the envelope.

Inside there was a sheet of paper, folded around a small, hard object. The paper was a letter, and as she unfolded it the object fell out. It was a key. A very familiar, but very ordinary-looking, Yale key. One of the keys to the TARDIS. She realised he must have left it in the pocket of his blue suit one day… and when John put the blue suit on, it was still there. She clutched the key tightly, and turned her attention to the letter. It read:

My dearest Rose,

I know you have been through a great deal these last years. I know it has been hard for you, watching me grow older while you remain young. There was a day, years ago, when the children were young, when we spoke about what has happened to you. I told you I would investigate, do you remember?

That day, my beautiful Rose, I saw something in your eyes that I did not feel I could tell you about. A flicker of gold, lasting only a microsecond. You will remember Jack, who you left behind in the other universe. But you do not know that a long time ago, when we fought the Daleks on Satellite Five, Jack died. But you returned. You had absorbed the Time Vortex to come back, and you brought him back to life. You brought him back forever… the next time I saw him he could not die. At the time, I thought I had taken the energy out of you, but I now believe that some of it remained. I believe that the Vortex energy inside you is preventing you from aging, just as it is keeping Jack from dying.

Now. You're probably wondering why I left you this note, this box. Was it you who found it, I wonder, or one of the children? I suppose it doesn't matter. All these years I have loved you, Rose, and yet sometimes I think you still want to go back to him. I know you love me, and I know we had a good life together, but I realised all those years ago that one day you would be left alone, and I wanted you to have the opportunity to go back to him, and to the life you left behind. Inside this box is a device that will take you back. I left you a key with this note… there is a keyhole in the device. When you are ready to go back, insert the key into the keyhole and it will transport you to the TARDIS. I regret that this device will transport only one person, and can only be used once. If you choose to use it, good luck.

I love you, Rose,

John

She sinks to the floor, tears running down her face. She reads the letter again, then reaches for the box and slowly opens it. Inside is a disc-shaped object, about an inch thick. It resembles the teleport devices that Torchwood invented a long time ago, with some modifications. She finds the place for the key, and sighs.

Later, she talks to Marion and Jack. Shows them the device, and the letter. She asks their opinion. They surprise her by telling her that they think she should go. She tells them that she doesn't want to leave them or their families. They say that they're grown up now, and that because she's spent thirty years hiding her identity their families don't know her anyway. She knows her grandchildren only through the photographs that they give her, and the children think that their grandmother died before they were born.

After several days of careful thought, Rose makes a decision. She's going to go back. Marion and Jack were right. She loves her children, but they are adults now and they will be fine without her. They have their own families now. On the day she chose to make the journey, she stands in the garden of the house she and John shared for so many years. She takes one last look at the house and garden, and says goodbye to her wonderful children (she still doesn't know how they became so wise). She looks like she did on That Day, so long ago now. The wig she's worn every day is discarded, as are the contact lenses. She has a few possessions – clothes, photographs, keepsakes and of course the letter John left her – in a small rucksack.

She hugs her children for the last time, then takes the key in one hand and the device in the other. She slowly slides the key into the keyhole, and a bright light shines from the device. She can no longer see the house, the garden or her children.

When the light subsides, she realises she's been holding her breath and lets it out in one long sigh. She looks around. She's standing in the TARDIS, near the console, and everything looks just as it did the last time she was here.

And then she sees him.