Things That Are (Ten/Rose, Journey’s End, 12A, 1/1)

[preserved_ginger]

Title: Things That Are
Rating: 12A
Characters/Pairings: Ten/Rose
Disclaimer: Regrettably, I am not the BBC.
Thanks to: glory_jean for excellent beta-work; and helygen for convincing me it wasn’t horribly unlike the book.
Author's Note: I’ve been working on this for what feels like for ever. Inspired by, and an homage to, Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited, I began it intending to work through my Journey’s End issues. Given that I feel roughly the same about it now as I did before, I’m not convinced it worked ;D
Summary: It’s not that he wants to. It’s because he has no choice.

“But I saw today that there was one thing unforgivable – the bad thing I was on the point of doing, that I’m not quite bad enough to do; to set up a rival good to the Universe’s. Why should I be able to understand that, and not you? It may be a private bargain: that, if I give up this one thing I want so much, however bad I am, I won’t quite despair of myself in the end.”

When at last the two of them had a moment to themselves, alone, away from her mum and the other Doctor and Donna, she felt it highly reminiscent in some ways of how it had been at the very beginning of her time with this version of him. It seemed as if the two of them would dance around the most important things for ever, while refusing to deal with them in any coherent manner. The only thing they had to fear, indeed, was fear itself.

Neither wanted to be the first to speak.

Eventually, the Doctor drew her a little further away from the others, into the corridor. Her eyes were fixed on him the entire time, as if reinforcing an old and precious memory against that old thief, Time.

He held out his hand to her silently, just as they stopped walking, and just as silently she took it. Without breaking eye contact, his other hand moved to cup her chin, and then touched her cheek with the lightest of caresses.

And he was radiating waves of pain.

“Here we are in the corridor, scavenging a bit of privacy for ourselves,” he began quietly, gently. “Although why it takes so much effort to catch a minute out of time to say good-bye, I’ll never know.”

The anguish in his eyes grew visibly stronger and although she could hardly bear to watch him, neither could she quite tear her eyes away.

I can’t believe this. You can’t be doing this to me ... not now. I came all this way ...

“You say so little,” she began hesitantly, unsure of herself in this surreal situation, “yet use more words than you need.” Her voice was tight with a pain similar to that which he telegraphed so clearly with his eyes. “Still, it’s you. Why I’m surprised, I don’t know.”

“You know, don’t you?” His voice sounded strangled, as if he were struggling to get words out.

“Ever since that other version of you — and I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me how that happened, are you?” She chuckled humourlessly, as he shook his head. “I thought not. I suspected, ever since I set eyes on him. And now, you’re confirming it.”

“Then you worked it out before I did. But, then, you’ve always been smarter than anybody – and I include myself in that – ever gave you credit for. Oh, my Rose. If I thought you could understand, then maybe I could bear to let you go. At least, perhaps, bear it better. I can’t let you stay with me, Rose. I can’t. Can’t let myself be with you – not now, not ever again. But him?”

He nodded back along the corridor ... without elaborating. The rest didn’t need saying.

“He can. If you’re willing, of course. You and he can live that fantastic life you deserve, safe with your family. Live everything I’ve ever dreamed. It’s the one thing I can give you, Rose. And I give it, gladly.”

“I know you do.”

“I wish I believed you. Then again, you always have been better to me than I’ve ever deserved.”

Let's not start that again. That’s not fair. It’s hard enough facing the fact you’re trying to leave me, after everything you said; don’t try to make me feel guilty about it on top of everything else.

“What about you, though? What are you going to do?”

“Always thinking of others; the domestic approach.” As she made a face he grinned devilishly at her, another of the lightning-fast mood changes she still found so disconcerting. “That’s what I love about you, Rose. But you know my answer, anyway; or at any rate, you should by now. I’ve the TARDIS. Same old life. Last of the Time Lords.”

“On your own?”

She was near to tears by this stage, but even then she could see how he ached to hold her, and kiss the pain away, but could just as easily equally see how he would never dare to let himself.

“You know the whole of me, Rose.” He was grinding the words out now, she noticed, each one seeming to cost him a huge effort. “You always have. And how there’s something about me that’s always been wrong. Right from the very beginning, I’ve always felt different. Out of place, so to speak; unwanted. An outcast, to an extent. And I’m not the man you knew. Not any more.”

“But —”

She started to speak, but he cut her off.

“Let me get this out, Rose. Please?”

He looked entreatingly at her with the puppy-eyed expression on his face that she had never before managed to resist. She shook her head – not wanting to believe what she was hearing – and kept quiet.

He continued, inexorably, a deep melancholy creeping slowly in to his tone.

“You've always been someone I could believe in, and that’s more precious to me than I could possibly tell you. But the worse I become – and I’m not going to lie to you and tell you differently, Rose, you’re worth more than that – the worse I become, the more clearly I see that I can’t drag you down with me. That’s what it would mean, starting a proper life with you; no matter how much I want it. And I do want it, Rose. You can’t imagine how much.”

She watched him as he stood there looking at her, a whole host of emotions crossing his face; and then suddenly something seemed to break in him. Before she could react properly, he had her in his arms and was kissing her. He was still full of surprises – which was one, achingly familiar, facet of the man’s personality that hadn’t changed a bit.

Just the one kiss; gentle at first but the tension between them kept building and building until one of them – or was it both of them at once? She could never afterwards remember – deepened it. The next thing she knew, she was leaning against the corridor wall with the Doctor as close to her as was physically possible – and he was kissing her frantically, as if his life depended on it.

Perhaps it does. What do I know?

Almost as soon as the kiss began, it ended. Somewhat out of breath, she said the first thing that came into her head.

“Oh, believe you me, Doctor, I can imagine, very well indeed.”

She watched, unable to think of anything to say that might help, as he forced himself to break away from her and move so that there was some distance between them. She started towards him, then, thinking only to bring him comfort, but stopped short at the wild look in his eyes. His voice, when he spoke again, was in the saddest tone she had ever heard.

You can almost hear in his voice the tears he refuses to let fall.

“Rose — I can’t. I can’t.”

The waves of mental agony coming off him spiked at that and it was almost overwhelming. It reminded her of the early days with her first Doctor, a man damaged almost beyond help. She had thought she’d helped him with that, if only a little – he had seemed so different, her second Doctor, with his fondness for babble and clever humour. But it seemed she was wrong. This Doctor was as brutalised and damaged as the one before had been, if not more so. Except, this time, the grief and rage and pain had been turned inward – and by his own hand.

He was exactly the same man she had left, and yet he was impossibly different.

“Oh, Rose. If only it could be different. But there’s no help for it.”

His voice, thick with emotion, wobbled clearly at this, and he moved back towards her to pull her into an embrace. She went into his arms without further comment and, for a moment or two, they held each other. It felt to Rose as if time had reversed itself and everything was the way it had always been. He clutched her to him in a manner that belied his vehement insistence that she stay in this rabbit-hole of a universe, with the Other. But how could she do anything to change things when he was so adamant? He’d never been somebody who could admit to being wrong, even when it most closely concerned him; evidently that was not a trait that had changed in the long years since she had seen him last. She felt him drop a kiss into her hair before he spoke again.

“So now we’ll both be alone. Well, I say ‘we’, but I mean me, of course. You’ll be with him, in the TARDIS.” He pulled away enough to be able to show her the piece of coral that would turn itself into a new TARDIS one day. There was not even the faintest glimmer of joy in his expression as he made an attempt to smile at her. “The Doctor and Rose, in the TARDIS. As it should be,” he said, voice cracking.

He let go of her completely then, turning away from her with the pretence of putting the piece of coral back into his pocket, but she saw him cover his face with his hands as his expression crumpled. She suspected that he was closer to tears than she’d ever seen him – barely, barely hanging on – and that he didn’t want her to see him weep.

She watched his shoulders shake as he tried to hang on just that little bit longer. Gradually, his shoulders stopped shaking, and she was about to open her mouth when he spoke, his voice choked full of the tears he adamantly forbade himself to shed.

“You’ll be here,” he said, and it was agony to have to stand there and listen to him. “And I’ll be there, back in the other universe. We’ll never see each other again, you and I, and there’s no way I could even begin to make you understand.”

Unable to see him in such distress and not at least attempt to comfort him, she moved forward to cup his face in her hand and watched him close his eyes and lean into her touch.

“I don’t want to make it easier for you,” she said. “When I think back to how we used to be, how you said that you’d never do to me what you did to Sarah Jane, I’m so angry with you I can’t bear it.”

His eyes opened again at that and she could look deeply into them and see how they were gone dark with pain. He looked to her as if he were about to speak, so to forestall him she placed a silencing finger on his lips.

“He isn’t you, and we both know it,” she continued. “And if, as I think you do, you feel the same way about me as I still do about you —” she cut herself off at that point, looking him in the eyes; he didn’t say a thing, and merely nodded “— then I don’t need to hope your hearts break,” she continued, addressing his shoes because she could not bear to look at his face and say this.

“Why?” he asked her, seemingly confused.

“Because,” she said, “I already know they have.”

Comments

[helygen.livejournal.com]

No matter how many times I read this, I adore it. I love the melancholy tone, and the inevitable sadness, and the heartbreaking honesty of it. And yes, it's made me cry. Again.

[espoiir.livejournal.com]

Oh my god. This was painful. It was so tragic and so beautiful it was simply painful to read. How amazing. How brilliant! I am quite subdued right now, after that. I feel slightly crushed. I could feel both of their pain so vividly. You are fantastic. Bravo!

[maniacalshen.livejournal.com]

:(

Maybe she should have grabbed the coral, cracked him in the head with it, and had Donna pilot them back to their universe.

But seriously, very depressing but well-written fic!

[requialexa.livejournal.com]

Wow. That Naw well be my most favorite story of yours! It was so elegant and poignant and completely perfect! I love the surreal start to this inevitable conversation-the way the both have to speak but refuse to say what ought to be said. I adore the way the Doctor loses control and must kiss her... It's all here... everything that should be there- and so beautifully written! Thank you!