Hello friends, I have returned!
*crickets chirping*
Right... Anywho, I'm back with a new chapter! Since I am feeling very productive, I may also have a new chapter of Reincarnation, and *hint hint* maybe a whole new story.
PLEASE review
Thanks doves
She never meant to find it. She had stuffed it away in the back of the TARDIS, hiding it in the deepest, farthest room she could locate and forced the memory from her mind. She never told the Doctor what had happened to it, just let him make his own assumptions.
But here it was, against all logic, her first Doctors leather jacket. It was hanging on a rack behind a couple of dresses in the TARDIS wardrobe. Part of her screamed at her to leave, to walk away and not look back. She had never been one much for listening though, letting her hand reach up and gently touch the sleeve, memories of her big eared, gruff northerner Doctor. God those memories hurt. She could help but move a little bit closer, pulling the jacket off of the shelf and pulling it to her chest. She took a deep breath, taking in the smell of leather and dust. A unwilling sob tried to rip through her chest, though she forced it back down. It still smelt like him.
She had loved the daft old man, and though she had never actually told him so, she had the feeling that he did know. Slowly she sank to the floor of the wardrobe, feeling the TARDIS trying to comfort her with her soft humming. Unbidden tears began slowly falling down her face and she hugged the jacket tighter, letting quiet sobs rack her frame.
Why now, why did she have to find the bloody jacket now after all this time. She hadn't really grieved after her Doctor's regeneration, the Sycorax invading and everything that followed being too much. Then they had been off to some new planet, and she had forced the memories away, beat them down into a dark corner of her mind. The only thought she had given the matter was hiding the leather jacket he had once worn.
His stupid leather jacket.
Rose didn't know how long she sat by herself clutching the jacket, but it was long enough for the Doctor to come looking for her.
"Rose!?" She heard the Doctor shout. She couldn't help the tears that started down her face again. Making no effort to acknowledge the time lord, Rose curled up against the wall.
She heard the Doctor call her name again, this time closer, but still she made no sound other than the sobs that were still periodically shaking her small frame. Burying her face in the leather jacket, she felt herself transported into old memories of the big eared Doctor she had once travelled with.
Had she been looking up, she would have noticed the Doctor walk in, a slightly concerned look on his face. She would have watched as the Time Lord's face progress from shock, to worry, to anger and finally to pain as he noticed the jacket that was clutched against her chest as if it was a life raft in the middle of the ocean.
The Doctor couldn't help the nostalgia that ran through him at the sight of the jacket. Memories of his past self, how so many of them surrounded Rose. She had been his rock when he was adrift, his safety net when he was drowning.
Now he watched as his Rose fell apart over something as simple as a jacket. Moving across the TARDIS wardrobe, carefully moving around random piles of discarded clothes that had somehow made their way into the TARDIS. Kneeling beside her, he placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, not saying anything, but simply letting her know he was there. She still started, looking at him like a wounded animal.
Without speaking a word, he shrugged out of him brown jacket, leaned against the wall and gathered her into his arms. Rose snuggled into the familiar embrace, burying her face in his shoulder as even his hug brought back memories. God the old him had given the best hugs.
Unlike this regeneration of the Doctor, physical contact had felt so much more...rare. Sure he held her hand, and the occasional hug, but nothing like this. Fresh tears coursed down her cheeks, and she tried to speak, to explain why she was falling apart before him, but the Doctor shushed her, tightening his arms around her.
Rose didn't know how long she cried, but when she felt as if she could shed no more, exhaustion hit her like a tidal wave.
"I'm sorry" she whispered, not lifting her face from where it rested against his white oxford. At first the Doctor said nothing, and Rose listened to the steady beat of his hearts to calm herself.
"I may not look like him, or act like him, but I am still the same man, weelll same Time Lord."
"I know"
No more words were exchanged, as both simply enjoyed the comfort the other provided.
