Disclaimer: Doctor Who is not mine. It's very sad.
Warnings: PG-13
Chapter Three: Trust Sarah Jane... She's the next-best thing to Jackie Tyler, really. No, really!
Chapter Three: Trust Sarah Jane
Rose woke to the gentle sound of the TARDIS humming. It took a moment before she remembered where she was, and another moment to remember why. Her hand, clenched tight around the sheet, crept down to rest on her stomach. She didn't feel pregnant, but all the same, she had no doubt that somewhere beneath her fingers, there was a tiny bit of something forming, some small miracle happening, a knot unwinding and stretching its new-formed limbs.
Rose let out her breath slowly, unevenly. There was still the powerful need to tell her mother, and the equally reasonable logic why she shouldn't. It made her uneasy.
Rose pushed herself up, hand still on her stomach. She didn't want to move it just yet. She was still wearing the clothes from that morning, minus her shoes and jeans, and her bra was beginning to chafe a little. She rubbed her eyes, and brushed back her hair – which was when she realized she wasn't alone. In the corner of the room, curled up in a chair with a book, sat Sarah Jane Smith.
"Sarah," said Rose, and Sarah Jane looked up from her book.
"Ah, you're awake. How do you feel?"
"Tired."
"Stands to reason, you've been asleep far too long. The Doctor landed you here seven hours ago, and he said you'd slept the entire way." Sarah Jane closed her book and leaned toward Rose. "I should tell you first, he's not in the TARDIS. I sent him into town with Luke, partially because I needed some spare bits for Mr. Smith, partially because the attic door is sticking and he's enough of a man to think he can fix anything, partially because if I didn't give him some sort of project, he'd still be here hovering over you like a worried sparrow."
Rose nodded, her head still fuzzy from sleep. "A pinstriped sparrow."
"The very same. Luke knows to keep him away as long as possible, Luke's brilliant at that sort of thing. They'll be gone for hours, which is quite perfect, because it'll give you and I a chance to talk without interference." Sarah Jane hesitated a moment. "If you like, that is. I'm presuming you want to talk at all, really."
"Do you—" Rose's fingers contracted just a bit on her stomach, still below the covers where Sarah Jane might not have been able to see. "Did the Doctor tell you why we came here?"
"Not in so many words, but I can make a reasonable guess," said Sarah Jane dryly. "I'll never be able to repeat what he said – your Doctor does go on – but he said it was something you couldn't tell your mother, and he thought you needed a feminine ear, as apparently his doesn't suit."
"I'm pregnant," Rose blurted out, and watched Sarah Jane carefully for her reaction.
Sarah Jane, to her everlasting credit, did not immediately break into a grin, or burst into congratulations. Instead, cool as a cucumber, and without a waver in her voice, she simply said, "Oh, Rose. Come here."
As soon as Sarah Jane lifted her arms, Rose was off the bed and in them. She burst into tears again, and felt herself being rocked by the closest thing to a mother she was likely to have for a very long time. Sarah Jane played the role perfectly: she clucked, patted Rose's back, and rested her cheek on her head. When Rose finally pulled away, cheeks hot, Sarah Jane lifted her chin.
"I'm so glad it was you who told me, and not the Doctor. He makes a right mess of everything, sometimes, doesn't he? But he brought you here, so we'll give him a little credit. How long have you known?"
"An hour before I fell asleep."
"Too soon, then. I'm honored. Up you get, and take a blistering hot shower – it won't harm the baby, I promise – and meet me in my kitchen, and we'll have tea. Are you hungry? No, silly of me, doesn't matter, you'll eat something too, like it or lump it. The TARDIS is parked in my back garden, so it's just a short little walk and you're there. Do you good to have a fresh bit of scenery, I think. The TARDIS is a lovely old bird but everyone needs something new to see sometimes. Twenty minutes and I'm coming after you."
Sarah Jane patted Rose's shoulders one last time, and left Rose to pull herself off the floor and make her way into the shower. It helped – the shower washed away the fuzzy feeling she'd woken with, and Rose chose her favorite shirt and her best jeans, which gave her a confidence she only pretended to have. Sarah Jane's back garden sounded prettier than it really was – Sarah Jane was obviously not the type of person to spend her days growing flowers. Still, the fresh air, as soon as it hit her lungs, grounded Rose, and she breathed in deeply a few times before continuing into the house, where she found Sarah Jane setting out the tea in a bright white kitchen.
"Thank you," said Rose meekly, and Sarah Jane nodded briskly as she set a plate of sandwiches and biscuits on the table.
"It's what I do. I ought to have started a support group, really – Friends of the Doctor's. FOD. What a horrible acronym, LINDA was much better. Now sit down, drink your tea, and tell me as much as you want to tell."
Rose sat at the table and curled her fingers around a warm mug. "You – you don't mind?"
"Why would I mind?" said Sarah Jane, almost laughing. "I suspect I'll want to hear every last detail. Well, not every last, you know what I mean."
"But – it's the Doctor's."
Rose almost wished she had a camera to record the expression on Sarah Jane's face then. "Well, goodness, Rose. You're sleeping in the same bed. If it was anyone else's I'd have hardly made you tea."
"I mean – you loved him."
Sarah Jane smiled and sipped at her tea. "Once. Maybe. But he wasn't your Doctor then."
Rose blinked. "I'm not this slow, honestly, I'm not. My mind can't seem to function properly, ever since he told me I was pregnant, but—"
"Wait – he told you?"
"Yes."
"Show-off," muttered Sarah Jane. "I hope he didn't say if it was a boy or girl?" Rose shook her head, almost smiling. "Good. Don't you let him find out, that cheeky Time Lord. Let him not know something for once."
"I think the TARDIS knew before either of us."
"Quite right, she's supposed to know those things. Unless she told him?" Rose shook her head again, and sipped at her tea. She could feel the warmth going down into her stomach, radiating out to every limb. "Still. He had no right to tell you. That ought to be yours to tell him."
"I didn't know, anyway. I don't think I would have known – ever since the nanogenes, I haven't – ah – been regular." Rose buried her face in the tea again, glancing warily up at Sarah Jane, who didn't look the least bit shocked, just thoughtful.
"Bit too soon to ask what you think about it."
Rose shrugged a little. "I suppose. I think – I don't quite believe it, really."
"Is it – oh, I shouldn't be asking, but I will. Is this something you wanted, Rose?"
Rose swirled the tea in her cup, watching it come closer and closer to the rim. "I had this idea, you know? The sort you think about when you're young and stupid and you believe the world is a great magical romantic place. That a handsome prince would sweep me off my feet, and carry me away from reality, and we'd end up happily ever after, kids and grandkids and puppies and all. Except as it turned out, the prince and his steed was a Doctor and his TARDIS, the happily seems to depend on if we're running for our lives at the moment, and the ever after – well, it's really ever. I mean, really ever, a really long ever. The thought of having to run for our lives with a baby in tow, or two, or three, it's not exactly labeled under 'happy'."
"I think you can trust the Doctor not to take you or the baby into a dangerous situation," said Sarah Jane dryly.
"It's not like he has a choice all the time – half the time when you were with him, I'll bet the trip began as just a little vacation, no worries, and then bam, you're running for your life and hoping whoever's chasing you gets cramp in their leg."
Sarah Jane shook her head. "Touche. All right then, don't think about what you dreamed of when you were little. Don't think of what you expected when you came back. Tell me, right now, this moment – are you happy?"
Rose looked out the window, to the TARDIS sitting in the shade of the tree. "I think," she said slowly, "I think I'm happy about it. The baby. It's a little distant, not really real. I'm tired, the idea of eating anything more than crackers puts me off for some reason, but I don't really feel like I ought to be pregnant."
"I wouldn't know," said Sarah Jane. "I skipped quite a bit, adopting Luke."
"Are you sorry?"
"Oh, maybe a little. Mostly not, especially when I see screaming babies and their harried mothers in the corner store. I don't envy you dirty nappies, either. For you, though – do you think it's a good thing?"
"Oh, probably. I don't know about me. For the Doctor – oh, it's the best thing in the world for him, isn't it? To not be the last Time Lord. That pleases him more than anything, I think. Not like it's a real beginning – just one baby. You can't really recreate an entire race with one baby. What happens in twenty years, when this baby wants babies? Who will he have them with? It's only perpetuating a dead end."
Sarah Jane shook her head. "Things have a way of working out, Rose."
"Counting chickens," sighed Rose. "I'm always counting chickens, and now I'm doing it for a baby whose heart hasn't even started to beat."
"Just being a mother. I do the same with Luke, worry about ten years down the line instead of whether or not he remembered to take his lunch to school."
Rose spoke suddenly without thinking. "If I'm pregnant, it makes it all real."
Sarah Jane gave her a cursory look then. "What's that?"
Rose bit her lip – she hadn't meant to say it aloud, but now that it was out— "It's too easy to pretend sometimes, that it's all just an odd dream, and I'm still nineteen and we haven't been to Canary Wharf, and the last two years of me being here, and the five years with Mum and Pete in the other world, they're just a day-dream. Maybe I'm just pretending that there was blue custard that made me something other than human, and I really do only have the one heart, and nothing's changed, not really."
"Some things have," said Sarah Jane, with a pointed glance. "Or I'll have to restructure my opinion of your honor, Miss Rose."
Rose blushed. "Oh. Well, it's not like I'm exactly comparing then and now, not then, am I? And maybe that's just part of the very nice dream."
"Only very nice? I'm disappointed."
Rose set down her mug. "If the baby is real – it makes it all real, don't you see? It means I really won't see my mother again, and I'm really not human any longer – and it means…" She took a breath. "Forever is real too. I said I'd stay with him forever. And if that's real – forever is such a long time."
"Rose—"
"It's not that I don't still want forever," said Rose quickly. "But – so much can happen in forever. It's too much time. More than I thought I'd ever have, decades more. Everything will have changed by the time I really do finally die, everyone I know will have died before me, the world will be entirely different, including me. And how will I know that I fit in forever? What if I hate it? Does anyone really want to live so long that everything you recognize has turned to dust?"
For a moment, Sarah Jane was at loss for words, and Rose sat back again, arms wrapped protectively around herself. It was more than she'd meant to say – more than she'd really thought about before, too, but upon saying it, she'd felt instantly better, and the words were right, once spoken.
"That depends," said Sarah Jane finally, and Rose looked up to see her serious expression. "Do I have a hangover, in this forever of yours? Because if so, then I'll pass."
Rose wasn't sure if Sarah Jane was being serious or not. Her expression and tone was perfectly calm and rational, but there was a small quirk on one side of her mouth, and Rose instantly responded, trying not to laugh.
"All right – a forever with no hangover. And first-class tickets to anywhere you'd care to go."
"Ah, there you have me," declared Sarah Jane, and reached for a sandwich, which reminded Rose that they existed. "And plenty of tea."
"Ah, sorry, no tea," said Rose. She bit into the sandwich; it didn't taste half awful, and Rose wondered if she dared risk having another bite, or if the nausea would return.
Sarah Jane sighed. "No tea? Is there at least sticky toffee pudding?"
"Oh, yes, and it doesn't even make you gain an ounce. But nothing on the telly but reruns of Blue Peter."
"You're too hard, Rose Tyler," accused Sarah Jane, shaking her sandwich at the girl. "Could I at least have Daniel Craig to keep me company?"
"Not the Doctor?"
"Oh, he's your Doctor, not mine. And really, all I'd want in forever is Luke. Forever isn't so bad if you can share it with someone you care about."
"No," said Rose, thoughtfully. "I don't suppose it is. But—"
"No, Rose," said Sarah Jane firmly. "No buts. Forever, with the Doctor, and as many additions as you see fit. And sticky toffee pudding. What do you think?"
Rose smiled, suddenly deciding she was ravenous. "Sarah Jane?"
"Yes?"
"Do you have any sticky toffee pudding?"
Sarah Jane grinned at her and was at the refrigerator in a flash, pulling out a small package wrapped in foil and plastic. "My weakness! I'll pop it in the microwave and it'll be ready in moments. You'll eat every bite, now – for the next nine months, you're eating for two."
"Fourteen months."
Halfway through unwrapping the pudding, Sarah Jane froze. "Fourteen?"
"The Doctor says Gallifreyan pregnancies last fourteen months. It's in a book, somewhere in the TARDIS library."
"Fourteen months?"
Rose nodded, and Sarah Jane tossed the pudding into the microwave vehemently, and slammed the door so loudly that Rose jumped.
"Forget happy," said Sarah Jane with new resolve. "I say we string him up by his egotistical tail-feathers."
When the Doctor and Luke returned an hour later, they found Sarah Jane and Rose in the kitchen, both dissolved in laughter, tears rolling down their cheeks. The remains of the sticky toffee pudding were on a plate in the center of the table, two spoons laying nearby, along with several near-empty mugs of cold tea, numerous teabags, a plate of prawn mayo sandwiches, and two lipsticks.
"Ah, hello?" ventured the Doctor, suddenly very nervous.
The women turned to look at him, and the laughter intensified. Luke watched them for a moment, and then looked to the Doctor for explanation.
"Every time," the Doctor sighed, and left Luke in the kitchen to ponder the oddness of older women.
