Short chapter today, sorry. ^.^
"Rose!" Fingers reached blindly for hers, just centimeters from reaching. "Hold on, I'll find something to pull you up. Stay there!" "Where would I go?" She asked, but he had already moved and couldn't see her face, couldn't see the bitter, sad smile that she gave because she knew where she could go. There was nothing. Nothing but the cliff into nothing and Rose and him. No sticks or ropes or branches. No safety. He scrambled back to the edge, but she was already slipping too far for him to dream of reaching. It doesn't mean he didn't try. "I'm sorry." She said, that bitter smile still on her face. And then she fell.
"Rose." It was a slurred, panicked whisper, a smeared dab of bright paint against the dark canvas that was the night. " Rose."
"Doctor…?" Rose's voice cut a thin slit into his nightmare, like the thin beam of light that was following her through the door to his bedroom. He shot up, his eyes darting around the room as if looking desperately for something. She slowly made her way into the room, sitting lightly on the edge of his bed beside him.
"Rose." He noticed her and the all-too-fast beating of his heart slowed. Frantic fingers fumbled across her skin – cheeks, shoulders, elbows, hands. " You're okay." He breathed as looked at him in amused concern.
" 'Course I am," She replied, a quizzical smile making its way onto her lips. "Are you?"
He didn't speak for a few long seconds in which he questioned his sanity. "I think so."
"Was it a bad dream?" He ignored her questions, holding her hand tight, like a lifeline. She had fallen into the voice she used when Tony woke up like this. (But his nightmares were of dancing eggplants and flying turtles, not of things that were all too easily real.) "Do you want to tell me about it?"
The Doctor paused and then lied quietly, shaking his head. "I don't remember it."
An ambulance wailed past, a one-float parade of blaring sounds and flashing lights that sent their shadows jumping against the walls.
Rose pulled her legs up onto the bed and folded them under herself, watching him all the while.
"You were gone." He finally admitted once the wailing siren faded to become quiet background noise. "You slipped – you were falling and I couldn't pull you back up. I watched you fall – watched you die."
"But I'm right here," she reassured him, squeezing his fingers lightly. "I'm alive and I'm right here."
"Why aren't you asleep?"
"I…don't sleep much."
"But you should."
"I'm used to it." Rose replied simply, looking towards the window before sighing. "You should go back to sleep." She rose to leave, loosening her grip on his hand.
He didn't do the same.
"Stay." His fingers tightened over hers. "Please?" (It was more a request than a question, with the added option of saying no.)
She paused for a second, ( Wondering if she should take that option and leave, but also wondering if she could. She found she couldn't.)
(He wondered where they stood, if she would protest if he pulled her closer.) (He would never know if he never tried.)
He tugged on her hand, another request with the option of not abiding. But like before, she did, sliding closer until only inches stood between them.
They both pretended to sleep as he flung an arm around her waist and pulled her even closer.
They both pretended to sleep as she reached for his hand.
They both pretended to sleep as he pressed a light kiss into her hair.
They both slept (A peaceful, nightmare-free sleep, free of crying out and waking up,) for the first time in what seemed to be years.
She wasn't there when he woke up.
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