amberfocus | Post Pomp (1/22)

A/N: This is my post Girl in the Fireplace story, because everyone's got to write one eventually. Ten/Rose obviously then. I wrote mine back in November of 2007. I have to warn that the first seven chapters are extraordinarily dark for me and riddled with angst and I am not kidding. Still, it's worth the journey and makes it all the more worthwhile as it eases back into the light.

Story Summary: Following the events of The Girl in the Fireplace, the Doctor doesn't come back after five and a half hours and Rose is left to deal with a very dismal life trapped on a space ship with no hope of rescue. She's given up hope the Doctor will ever come for her. And maybe she's right.

Chapter One: Sixty Days

My name is Rose Tyler. That sounds like such a pretentious way to start a diary, doesn’t it? But how else? I mean, it’s my diary so I have every right to name myself in it, don’t I? Maybe this was a stupid idea. I haven’t kept a diary since I was twelve years old. But…it’s either this or madness and I’m not ready to let the madness have control.

I used to travel with a man called the Doctor. He was my life. I know, even I’m rolling my eyes at that statement. What kind of 21st century girl lets any man be her life? Even one currently stuck in the 51st century because she was just that much of an idiot? Does it help that he was a time travelling alien? No, I didn’t think I’d get off that easily. So, I was stupid. I let a man be my life. And I wasn’t his.

Sad thing of it is that I thought I was. He’d done everything but said the words. But then he started putting space between us. Not the kind we travelled in, not physical space, but emotional space. It had always been him and me. Then he invited someone else along. Then he stopped holding my hand. You’d think I would have got it then.

Maybe if I had, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Stuck alone on a rusty old space bucket, named for the woman he ran off and left me alone for. Well, not entirely alone. My friend, the one the Doctor had invited along to put space between him and me, is in a coma. I’m pretty sure he’s dying. That’s my fault. In so many ways, that’s my fault.

He’d never have asked to come with us if he hadn’t gotten caught up in a couple of our adventures. He never would have seen it first hand, the excitement, the thrill of the life we led. He wouldn’t have wanted it if he hadn’t seen it, saw the way it brought me to life.

But he’d come. And I’d said okay when the Doctor had invited him. I could have thrown a fit but I didn’t want to look like I didn’t want Mickey shoving in on us, even though I didn’t. I should have thrown the fit. The Doctor, I think anyway, would have let me have my way. And Mickey wouldn’t be dying now.

There’s other ways it’s my fault, too. I never paid attention in the med bay of the TARDIS. TARDIS, that’s the ship we travelled in. Anyway, I didn’t pay attention to what stuff was, what it did. And if I had, well, I might have been able to figure out what I needed to give Mickey to replace a tetanus shot. Or even some kind of antibiotics for the infection.

He’d fallen down a shaft on the Madame Pomp, the nickname we gave the ship, and he’d gotten a puncture wound in his leg. It became infected so quickly and I’d guessed wrong on a couple of different medications. I nearly killed him. In the long run it didn’t matter, though. He’s almost dead now, anyway. From something that a simple 21st century drug could have cured him of.

But I didn’t start this diary to torture myself with all the would haves and could haves. I started it to have someone to talk to. Write to. Whatever. Maybe someday I’ll be found by some passing space jockey or lorry driver. But I don’t think so. I think it’s just going to be me for the rest of my life. However long that is. However short that is.

I don’t want to be alone. So I can pretend you’re something real, diary. Something solid. Someone that can understand me, what I’m going through. Picture you with a face and a name. If I can think of a name. I can see your face, though. A little sharp, angular, strong cheekbones, high brow. Red hair that parts in the middle and falls to your waist. Sapphire blue eyes. A pretty girl, smart and no-nonsense, but with a wicked dark sense of humor. Someone I would have been friends with easily. Someone who isn’t him.

Rose sighed and put down the diary. It was late and she needed to check on Mickey before she went about feeding herself dinner and going to bed. She made her way to the infirmary as quickly as she could. Steeling herself she walked into the med bay, her eyes drawn to the face of her dying friend.

She put her hand on his forehead as she always did. Like it would matter if he felt the same right now as he did this morning. Nothing was going to change just because she checked it twelve hours apart. He was still hot to the touch and his skin was dry. She hadn’t been able to get any water down him in far too long.

It was futile to wish the Doctor would come back and save the day. There was no chance of that or he’d have been back in the beginning. At least she used to think that he would. Now she wasn’t sure. Maybe he didn’t care enough to come back. She was sure in the deepest part of her heart that if he wanted to, that if he really, really wanted to, he could have found a way to do it. TARDIS or no TARDIS, the man was brilliant and if he wanted to, wanted her, he’d have done it.

She wiped angrily at the tears that came unbidden to her eyes and swore at herself. She had promised herself weeks ago that she wouldn’t let herself shed anymore tears over the man. He wasn’t coming back for her. Not now. Not ever. This was her life. “Get used to it, Rose Tyler,” she whispered to herself.

In the end it didn’t matter what she had promised to herself. She skipped dinner and cried herself to sleep again, the same way she had every night he’d been gone. Every single night of the last sixty days.

2: http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/37372.html