4: Rose takes a nap
The Doctor loiters around the Tardis. A stroll through the library, a walk down memory lane. Peering out of the window for a while, taking a swing at some cricket balls in the kitchen.
He's bored.
They had a very nice trip to Agh'auh (yes, pronounced much like he feels), where Rose ran around gawking at the fantastic display of colours in the air as different gases reacted in ways he was explaining to deaf ears. As he so often does. She never seems to have the will to concentrate for his excellent explanations, but goes off to look at furry animals or damsels in distress or some such instead, but then again, he is prone to putting a little more detail into it than her tiny human brain can be expected to comprehend.
Anyway, they had been having a grand old time, laughing and talking and looking around. Rose had seemed to cheer up, first clearing her mind with that long shower and then going back to her easy going self on the new pretty planet. They spent hours running across grassy fields, walking along winding paths and sitting on the bank of a bubbling creek, throwing rocks in the water. Rose had been fine.
But when they returned to the ship for a cup of tea, she didn't want to play a game of Cake or Death afterwards. Or even sit down in the study for a bit of a talk. She just claimed exhaustion and went straight to bed. Which leaves him here, alone and bored.
Now, laying down on his back in the console room and sticking his head into an opening in the wall to get to a loose wire, he thinks it's all fine and dandy. He can wait the approximately one billion and three minutes it will probably take before she wakes up and wants to do something fun again. He has plenty of tinkering with the Tardis to do.
But for some reason, a part of his mind can't stop lingering around how her hand had slipped from his so easily. When they stepped out of the ship, onto the sticky grass of Agh'auh. He took her hand in his, like he always does when she doesn't beat him to it; they stepped outside and Rose gasped and made big eyes and looked around and took a few steps and sort of... just... let go.
She is obviously not fine. Talking and laughing and all things cheery, but she's not fine. No holding a tight grip around his fingers to not break their link when he starts running towards something interesting (as if he would ever run off and disappear. Well... Alright, maybe it's a good thing she holds on. Well... Not maybe. He likes that link. Most of the times he's the one upholding it rather fiercly)? No after-tea games? And then going straight to bed? She's obviously still upset about leaving Other Rose in her world to fend for herself, but is trying to put up a facade of indifference. To think that she would try to hide anything from him – her best friend, her companion, the one who- ...rather annoys the Doctor.
She's in her room. He has half a mind to go in there and confront her about it. And, being a brilliant Timelord, half of his mind is more than enough for anything and suddenly he finds himself outside her door with his fist raised and ready.
He doesn't knock. Perhaps he doesn't want to disturb her, should she be fast asleep. Perhaps there is something else. But he doesn't knock. Instead, he gently opens the door, braces himself for a second and slips in silently.
The room is dark, except for the soft glow of a small bedside lamp. The Doctor takes a few slow steps towards the large bed, full of pillows and blankets and other fluffy attire that Rose likes to immerse herself in when she sleeps. His foot comes across the blue, embroidered pillow that she bought at the Hhufrrur market because it reminded her of her granddad. He leans down to pick it up, wondering what it's doing on the floor. Tilting his head slightly, he looks at the loudly breathing figure splayed in the middle of the bed. She is unceremoniously plopped down on top of the covers and spread out, with one arm across her face and completely out of it.
She must have been dead tired.
He listens to the air entering and leaving her lungs in rythmic waves, with the slight whirl around the scar from her tonsillectomy. If he listens close enough, he can hear her heartbeat. A steady, consoling thump-thump that he shouldn't find himself tuning in on as often as he does. When it's quiet enough, calm enough, sitting around in a rare moment of content silence listening to her heartbeat feels like an extra insurance that she's still there, with him, but it's such an intimate sound and he's not sure she would appreciate it, should he tell her.
He shakes it off, physically giving his head a shake, and sighs. He tilts his head the other way and wonders why she won't tell him about it, if she's upset. She should tell him everything. He tells her everything.
(No, he doesn't.)
Preferably everything in the world, but at least everything that matters.
It's not like he wouldn't listen.
It's not like he wouldn't care.
And he certainly wouldn't, if that's what she thinks, deny her her feelings by stating she shouldn't have them. He may not know exactly what it's like to suddenly be around your closer-than-twins twin, only to suddenly abandon her to an unknown fate like a full-body amputation, and he may press the fact that there is nothing to be done about it now. But he very well understands what it is to feel.
(Oh, does he ever.)
And sometimes, you just need to... let it out.
He steps closer to the bed, gaze fixed on the slightly parted lips below the elbow covering the rest of Rose's face. He rests briefly on the question of their taste sans lipstick, then mentally kicks himself bone-breakingly hard in the shin.
Then it all happens so fast.
An interrupted breath, a snort. An arm lifted, eyes opened. A shocked shout that shatters the silence like a grenade and stops his hearts. The Doctor shouts back, and the pillow he hasn't realised he's been hugging tightly flies up in the air and bounces off his flailing hands a few times before he manages to secure it again.
"What the hell are you doing in here?" Rose yells, scrambling to sit up.
"What?" the Doctor yells back. "I'm- ...Not- ...What are you doing in here?" Rose gives him a wide-eyed stare. "I mean... Time to get up!" He pulls the corners of his mouth apart to plaster a grin over the heartattack. "Time to... get going somewhere." When she doesn't respond he finds his composure. "Oh get a grip, Rose, it's just me. What do you want for breakfast?"
Rose's mouth opens and closes a couple of times before she meekly answers. "I don't know... The usual?"
"Right! Off I go then."
He quickly leaves with the blue pillow still in a tight embrace, considers going back to return it but decides against it, feeling that the horrified expression on his face needs to stay uncensored for a while longer. That was not a turn of events he had imagined for that scenario (not that he has, ever, imagined that scenario. Rose, dark, bed- Have not!). There was something so completely wrong with it all, so wrong that a thought he hasn't had because it can't exist because it mustn't be because if it does his life is over – that thought seeps into his mind.
During a slightly awkward breakfast the Doctor tries to calm down. Rose is munching on a piece of toast, which is perfectly normal. She adds a bit of milk to her tea, which is perfectly normal. She spills crumbs everywhere, which is perfectly normal. She talks about football, which is... well. Sort of new.
"Do you remember that game we saw where each of the three teams had to sacrifice a goalie to the others before it could begin?" he asks, smiling over his cup. Rose's face scrunches up in a withheld giggle before she can vacate her mouth of bread.
"I know, that was hilarious, right?"
He reaches for another piece of toast. "Really? I'm pretty sure you were kind of upset about that."
"Oh... well... In retrospect it's kind of funny though..." Rose takes another mouthful, chewing thoughtfully.
"Yes, I suppose." The Doctor spreads a thick layer of jam over his toast. "Forgive and forget, eh?"
"Right! It's like, um, a waste of energy, you know. You can't care too much about stuff. Someone does something, you get over it, you move on. Forgive and forget."
The Doctor licks the jam off his thumb. "So you forgive and forget that I tried to send you away that time?"
Rose looks at him. "You know I do. Long as you don't do it again." She takes a sip of tea.
"And you forgive and forget that I didn't let you keep that unicorn from Erythrocythea you loved so much?"
"Benji? He would have just made a mess all over the place!"
"And you forgive and forget that I took that picture you drew of us?" The words are out of his mouth before he knows it and his throat constricts as he realises he just spilled that thing that he wasn't supposed to spill. Keeping a straight face he downs his tea.
Rose stares at him. For a painful second he fears she's going to try to kill him, or laugh at him or both, not knowing who would be more embarrassed – her for drawing the picture or him for taking it. The next second he spends wishing for dear life that she will kill him and laugh at him and chastise him for all eternity for doing such a weird and invasive thing, because it's what he thinks Rose would do. Then again, he can't be sure.
Rose purses her lips and shrugs her shoulders with a lift of her eyebrows. "Whatever."
That's not right. Is it? The Doctor sets his cup down, gently, breaths for a moment and then looks up, all smiles. "Right then. Good." She could have forgotten all about it. Or she could just not care about it, which he finds surprisingly hard to imagine. It's as if he wants her to feel embarrassed about the sodding picture. "Good. Because I thought you might have wanted to keep that to yourself." Cor, why is he still speaking of this?
"Well", she says, and now there's a becoming blush to her cheeks, "you could give it back. If you don't mind."
"Of course! Well, if I can find it. Probably lost it somewhere. With all the mixing and mingling", the Doctor rambles as ge gets up and clears the table, clings on to his waning hope and suggests a trip to sunnier pastures.
They lie on their backs on his coat in the grass, looking up at the sky that looks just like the one on Earth. There are a few clouds chasing by, a slight breeze across the meadow. He turns his head to look at her.
"Do you still feel bad about the parallel you?"
Rose has her eyes closed to the sun, a light smile playing on her face. "Not really... It's like you said, there ain't nothing we can do about it so why bother, eh. 'Cause we can't go back and help her anyway, right?"
"No, we can't. It's physically impossible. Besides, even if we could, we couldn't. It would destroy the universe."
"Well, there you have it then."
A few seconds pass while he keeps his eyes on her face, searching.
"You're not the right Alice", he states. She turns to him, squinting to the light.
"What?"
He turns his head back, looking at a pillow-shaped cloud. "You know, that book. Alice in Wonderland."
"Oh, right." She smiles crookedly. "I love that story."
"They'll be coming out with a movie in a year or two."
"Yeah? Is it any good?"
"Nah..." he drawls, chin jutting out. "Not enough romance."
"Hm."
After a few seconds of stillness, he stands up. Towering above her he regards her coldly.
"Get up."
Rose looks confused. "We going somewhere?"
"Back to the Tardis." He leans down for his coat and almost tugs it out from underneath her. He starts walking and she has to take a few running steps to catch up with his long, determined strides.
"Why?" she calls, sounding annoyed. He doesn't look back to answer.
"Like I said. You're not the right Alice."
A/N: With winks to LauraXTennant (See! If you REVIEW enough you could get your will done!)