Chapter Text
“I’m always okay.”
Rose had tried to stay at least somewhat upbeat as she gave Mickey a long-overdue tour of the TARDIS. She really had. She’d pointed out the rooms she thought he might like—the swimming pool, the bowling alley, the media room with its library of films that spanned centuries—as well as the practical ones, like the galley, the wardrobe room, and the hall of spare bedrooms. But Mickey, despite his faults, knew her far too well to be fooled. Her smile wasn’t quite as wide as usual. Her gaze was dull and unfocused. The cheer in her voice had an edge to it. The Doctor might have been okay, but Rose very clearly wasn’t.
Now, Mickey sat with her on a cushy loveseat in a small sitting room deep in the labyrinth of the TARDIS that Rose sometimes came to when she needed some time to think and didn’t want the Doctor to find her. When she’d first stumbled across it, shortly after watching her father die, the furniture had been covered with dust cloths and there had been a neglected air to the whole space. Too numb to care, she’d still decided to spend the afternoon curled up there on a chair she’d pulled the sheet from. When she’d next visited, however, the room was warm and cozy—two overstuffed, velvet-upholstered armchairs and a matching loveseat arranged in front of a crackling fire with a plush rug between them. The TARDIS had evidently approved of her new retreat and returned it to what Rose assumed was its original state. It was a bit of a sanctuary for her, now, which was good. It was exactly what she needed at the moment. Not that it was very likely that the Doctor was bothering to look for her.
Mickey’s thumb rubbed the back of Rose’s neck, his arm wrapped protectively around her where she sat, curled against him, face damp with tears that she hadn’t been able to keep back once he’d prodded her into talking about everything that had happened. For all that she’d strung him along, and despite his earlier gloating and ‘I told you so’s, now that things were truly on a precipice, he was being surprisingly decent. She was grateful. His familiarity was one of the only things still holding her together.
“Never thought I’d say it, but I think I’m missing old Big Ears right about now,” Mickey said wryly, interrupting her thoughts, and oh, there was a familiarity that Rose wished she could have. “He might have been a prick sometimes… well, a lot of the time—” Rose gave a hiccuping laugh and buried her face further into his tee shirt— “but he never would have left you behind like that.”
“Us,” she corrected automatically, and Mickey snorted.
“Nah, pretty sure he wouldn’t’ve minded leaving me. Bit of a jealous one, him.”
Rose gave another small, wet laugh. Honestly, she could just imagine her old Doctor threatening to leave Mickey on a space station or planet somewhere. He’d certainly done it enough with Jack. God, but she missed him. Both of them. But they were both long gone, that short, golden era of her life carefully boxed up and tucked away in a back corner of her mind where it wouldn’t hurt so much. “Yeah, s’pose he was.” The humor left her voice. “Now he’s all but throwing me at you.”
Mickey pulled her in closer and kissed the top of her head.
They sat in silence for a bit, only the beating of Mickey’s singular heart under Rose’s ear breaking the quiet. A sudden pang of guilt stabbed at her. With a sound of frustration, she sat up and wiped her eyes. “Ugh. I’m sorry, Mickey. You shouldn’t have to listen to me complain about someone treating me as disposable. Serves me right and all that.”
It was quiet for a few more long, palpable seconds. Rose’s heart ached. But then— “Nah.” Mickey sounded wryly resigned. “I mean, yeah, you were pretty shit to me. But I sort of got it, before, even though it pissed me off. He was proper in love with you, that one; anyone could see it. Woulda died for you. That kinda devotion, plus the universe at your fingertips? I never stood a chance. But now…”
“Now, he’s willing to leave me on a spaceship 3,000 years and two and a half galaxies from home. For some woman he barely knows.” She closed her eyes, a few more tears escaping. “It’s like he said, I guess. He’s the same man… but he’s not.” She bit her lip, looking down at her hands, before saying aloud something that she’d been trying not to think for months, now. “And he did die for me, I think. I don’t remember it all, but I’m pretty sure. I get sorta…flashes sometimes. I dunno. But I think I killed him.” She’d really hoped that she’d cried herself out, but a fresh wave of grief and hurt washed over her, and her voice wavered when she went on. “God, Micks, what am I gonna do?”
—
The next morning, the Doctor was his usual, cheerful self. “Good morning, sleepy heads! Where to next? Got a bit of space and time travel in yesterday; should we try for a new planet, today? Ooh, or a moon! I bet you’ve never been to a moon before, have you?”
“Home,” Mickey said bluntly, and the Doctor stopped his dance around the console, looking up in surprise.
“What, already? Well, I suppose that was a bit intense for a first voyage, as it were. Alrighty then, Mickey Mouse, back home it is. Rose, what do you think of visiting a moon? There’s one I’ve been meaning to take you to, ohhh, a few thousand lightyears from Earth where the snow is purple. Purple snow! Can you believe it? Well, it’s not exactly snow; it’s more—” He continued to babble as he began flipping switches and turning dials, presumably directing the TARDIS toward the Powell Estate circa 2007.
Rose bit her thumb, not looking at him and not really listening. Instead, she waited, knowing from long experience that he wouldn’t hear a damned thing she said if she interrupted, too caught up in his own cleverness. When she finally heard him pause, she spoke, ignoring his many questions, returning resolutely—if somewhat unsteadily—to the point at hand. “He means both of us.”
The Doctor wrinkled his nose and whined, “But Rose, we were just there. I mean, alright, I guess it wasn’t much of a visit; didn’t get to see your mum and all that, but—”
“Not to visit. To… go home. I’m ready to go home.”
The Doctor stopped mid-sentence. His hands dropped from the controls, and he straightened. She could feel him staring at her, but she didn’t look up. “What do you mean?” he asked, voice quiet and… something else that she couldn’t quite parse.
“What I said.” Her arms were wrapped around herself, now. “I want to go home.”
“Why?” He sounded truly confused. “I thought…”
Finally, she looked up, meeting his eyes—those brown puppy eyes that she always let pull her back in. But no. Not this time. She turned toward where Mickey was still hovering next to her. “Can you give us a few minutes?”
“Yeah, ‘course, babe.” Mickey squeezed her shoulder and headed back down the corridor, leaving the pair alone.
Once his footsteps had receded, Rose turned back to the Doctor. “You thought what?” she asked.
“I thought you wanted—” He scratched at the back of his neck. He didn’t seem able to get the words out. Per usual, Rose thought, irritated.
“Forever?” It was the Doctor’s turn to look away. He nodded.
“So did I. But things change.”
“I don’t understand.”
Rose rubbed a hand down her face in frustration. “You know,” she told him, hearing that same frustration in every syllable she spoke, “I’m really tired of your just pretending not to understand how emotions work when they’re inconvenient for you.” Her voice shook slightly as she continued, but she breathed through it as best she could, needing him to hear her, to understand, to just admit that he knew exactly what he was doing and was choosing to do it anyway. “You’ve been around for the same few days I have. You’ve been there for the same conversations I have. You’ve had those conversations.”
“Rose…” He was looking at her again, now, and he said her name with that conciliatory tone that she knew so well. It was the one that said ‘I know you’re upset, BUT—’
“No.” She held up a hand. “Stop talking.” His lips snapped shut. She took a deep breath. “You know how I feel about you, Doctor. I know you do. And you’ve been pretty clear that, regardless of what you feel for me, it doesn’t change anything. You aren’t willing to risk your heart like that, knowing that you’ll lose me, eventually.” The Doctor made a sound of protest and she cut him off again, focusing on the frustration to keep her voice firm, pushing down the feeling of her heart shattering. “No. It’s still my turn.”
She waited until he nodded in acquiescence before going on. “I get it,” she said, watching his eyebrows rise in surprise, “I really do. You don’t want to get hurt any more than you have to. But—” and here, she held his gaze as intensely as she could, making sure he was truly listening— “neither do I. What you’re asking of me… it’s not fair. You want me to spend the rest of my life pretending that it’s fine, that it doesn’t hurt. You want to be able to run off after French courtesans and leave me stranded and have me treat it like no big deal.” Despite her best efforts, her voice cracked. “But it is, Doctor. It is a big deal.”
The Doctor’s jaw clenched. “So you’re punishing me for saving Reinette.”
Rose closed her eyes for a moment. Her next words were softer, sadder. “It’s not punishment, Doctor. It’s self preservation.” Opening her eyes again, she met his gaze, trying not to let the tears that were gathering fall. “It’s like Sarah Jane said, yeah? I can’t just wait around, hoping things will change. I need to go make a life of my own.” Taking a bracing breath, she dropped her final card. “I can’t spend the rest of my life in love with someone who’s never going to let himself love me back.”
She could see her words hit him, breaking their unspoken pact to never say it, never fully acknowledge that thing that had been lingering between them for so long she couldn’t remember what it had felt like not to have it there. His mouth opened and then closed, his usually endless stream of words running dry. He nodded once, then turned to the console, finishing setting their coordinates and pulling the final lever to set them on their way.
—
Mickey had already helped Rose move most of her things out of the TARDIS, and she was stepping out the door when the Doctor grabbed her wrist. He’d been silent for their entire journey, but now, he spoke, voice quiet and pleading. “Rose. Please. Please don’t go.”
Rose scrunched her eyes shut, memorizing the feeling of his skin on hers as a few stray tears slid down her cheeks. “I have to.”
“Will I—” He stopped and cleared his throat. “Will I ever see you again?”
She should say no. She knew she should say no.
She shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe. I need time.”
He let her wrist go, softly. “Right. Of course.” Striving for his usual nonchalant tone, he gave her a weak smile. “Well, if you ever change your mind, you know where to find me. Well. Sort of. Not really. But—”
“Don’t worry,” she told him, her answering smile feeling like the lie that it was. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and wiggled it at him. “I’ve got your number. If anything changes…”
“Any time,” he told her firmly, and she nodded.
“Just… please don’t…” The words caught in her throat, but she forced them out. “If I don’t call, please don’t come. Don’t make this harder than it already is. Okay?”
“Okay.” His voice was barely more than a whisper, and, giving in to her instincts, in case this was her last chance to do it, Rose threw her arms around him, burrowing into his chest. His arms wrapped around her without hesitation, holding her tighter than she could remember him doing in a long while—maybe since before he’d regenerated.
“I’ll miss you,” she whispered into his chest, trying to hold back her tears for just a bit longer.
“Rose Tyler,” he sighed, and she felt his breath against the top of her head, close enough to kiss, if he wanted. Like he used to, before. He didn’t. “It’s been an honor.”
She sniffed. “Take care of yourself, yeah?” Forcing her disobedient arms to relinquish their grasp on him, she stepped back. “Goodbye, Doctor.”
He nodded, swallowing, and she could have sworn she saw tears in his eyes as he silently closed the door.
When the dematerialization sequence had finished, the comforting wheeze of the TARDIS fading into nothingness, she sat down on the pavement and cried.