Rose opened her eyes, smiling. She had dreamt of something exciting and wonderful, but what? It had left her mind as soon as she woke up. Nevertheless, she still felt great, which was rare for 7am, especially these days. She sat up and shook her head. She had the feeling you got when you were going on holiday, or on Christmas Eve as a child. No Rose, she told herself, you are just going to work. It is a normal Tuesday, and feeling this excited will not help you concentrate.
'Rose, are you alright?' Mickey asked, watching her stare dreamily into space.
'What? Yeah, yeah I'm fine' she replied. She looked at the clock on her monitor display. It was only 11.15, but she was craving some fresh air.
Mickey cut into her thoughts again, 'This admin stuff is so boring. How long is it since we actually did any fieldwork? Like a week or something! Come on Rose, you're the boss, can you not ask someone else to do this?'
'Mickey, come on, you know we're short staffed. Why don't you take a break or something?'
'If I go for 10 minutes now, I can still have my full lunch in an hour, right?'
'Yes Mickey' she sighed. He bounded out, grinning at her. She smiled: it was quite amusing being in charge of him, dictating what he could do. Standing up, she stretched out, and headed to the lift. Some sunshine would go well with her 'holiday feeling'.
Rose sat on a bench in the nearby park, breathing in the summer air. It was a nice day. Maybe the weather was just making her feel good. But she didn't really believe that. Something else was going on with her, like an outside influence on her feelings. She had, for the past 18 months, felt pretty crap on the whole. The only time she had really been constantly happy was when David was born. But even that high had faded over time, and most days she was just dull. Until today, anyway. Today was different.
Somebody sat on the bench, and she automatically shifted away. She didn't like sitting next to strangers on park benches: they usually turned out to be weird. She avoided looking to her right, as looking them in the eye would be awkward. It was probably a man, as he had sat down quite heavily, and he was probably staring at her.
'You know, it's rude to ignore people' said a familiar voice. Rose felt like her heart had stopped. She could hardly bear to look, in case she was wrong. But she had to. She turned her head, and inhaled sharply.
'Doctor!' she cried, flinging her arms around him. For a short time, she breathed him in, pressing herself as close as she could, before pulling herself back to look at him.
'How…how are you here?'
'It's a long and technical story' he smiled, 'which I can entertain you with later.'
She grinned and hugged him again. He looked just the same, and she felt like the long 18 months since she had last seen him had dissolved into nothing.
'Can you stay long?'
'Not really.' Her face fell. 'It took a lot out of the TARDIS to get here, and if we are going to get back, we need to leave within 2 or 3 hours.'
'So I can come with you?' She was smiling so hard her face began to hurt.
'Of course you can! I mean, that's why I came. Rose, I want you to come back with me.'
Rose's phone bleeped. It was a text from Mickey: 'where r u? been back from break 4 ages, u ok? x'. She quickly typed a reply: 'im fine, just been caught up wiv something, meet me at my mums in 15 mins? something 2 show u! x'
The Doctor looked over her shoulder. 'Oh no, can I expect a slap from your mother? I'm sure I've done something wrong!'
'Well, maybe! But she loves you really Doctor.'
