Ch 18

Sitting in the quiet of the garden with Rose pressed against him, John thought if he could freeze this moment in time and just stay like this forever he would be content. The sun was shining, the bench they were sitting on was shaded by a large tree and he had the woman he loved in his embrace.

"Penny for your thoughts," Rose looked up at him.

"I was just thinking," John smiled down at her, "that if this were my last moment in this plain of existence l would consider my life worthwhile."

"Nice," she laughed, "but luckily for us, you're going to stick around for a lot longer."

"How can you be so sure of that?"

"You'd better," she mock-growled and grabbed him by the shirt front, "if you die on me, I'll kill you!"

Wondering exactly how that would be possible John looked into her eyes and saw them twinkling with mirth and realised she was only joking. It would take a while to understand her sense of humour, The Doctor hadn't quite gotten the hang of that, and so John had to learn this on his own.

"As much as I'd love to spend the rest of the day like this," Rose said, "I promised you some exploring, and I always live up to my promises!"

She stood up and offered her hand, "come on, things to do and see!"

Taking her hand John rose from the bench and let her take the lead.

Rose remembered her first days on this version of Earth, how she let her heartbreak and misery over losing The Doctor colour her world so much that everything seemed so lifeless and dull. It was only with the love of her mum and Pete's tender affection towards her that she started to come out of the heavy cloak of misery and start to see this world as her home.

Seeing Pete's estate through John's enthusiastic and wide eyed curiosity was like she was taking in this splendour for the first time. His fascination with even the most mundane things like the stack of fire wood that had developed some fungus, to the way the back of the estate curved down towards a small brook made her smile.

When he ran his hands over a moss covered tree with a look of concentration, his tongue peeking out from his slightly parted lips she felt as if his fingers were touching her, not the softness of the green lichen.

She moaned quietly as he stroked the tree once more and her knees felt a bit wobbly.

John heard this and turned his attention back to her, "are you all right?" he asked.

"Oh yeah, fine," she nodded swallowing hard. Then clearing her throat she gestured to a spot in the distance, "there's a Koi pond over there."

Taking in her slightly flushed appearance John took her by the shoulders and bent down to get a better look at her, "are you sure you're OK?"

"Just great, thanks," Rose wanted to grab him by the hair and kiss him hard enough to make him forget the local wildlife, but she remembered her promise to show him around. Promising herself once the tour was over, all bets were off, she took his hand once more, "let's go look at the posh fishies!"

Her resolve to not jump his bones then and there was weakened considerably when upon reaching the pond John rolled up his sleeves, knelt down in front of the pond and stuck his hands into the water. The fish seemed to play along and swam between his outstretched fingers making him giggle delightedly. And if at all possible made her love him more.

Needing to do something she followed suit and she was up to her elbows in the coolish water, being tickled by the Koi as they had a game of tag around their hands. After a bit Rose scooped up some of the water and splashed John with it. He looked startled for a moment before returning in kind.

Rose, playing dirty, jumped to her feet and ran around behind him. She gave him a shove, pushing him into the pond., as he fell he grabbed onto her and pulled her in with him and they both tumbled into the water laughing.