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He couldn’t take another minute without seeing her face.
As soon as his eyes locked onto hers, the relief was overwhelming, and before he knew it he was sweeping her up into his arms. No such thing as too tight a hug when it came to Rose Tyler, the Doctor thought.
“D’ya miss me?” Rose teased, as he pulled back just enough to flash her a grin and take in her face once more. “And don’t you dare say that the whole face-in-a-telly thing was an improvement.”
The Doctor feigned offence. “Me, making a joke out of a deadly serious occurrence? I would never. I just wouldn’t get the right reception….” He trailed off, barely trying to keep a straight face, and was promptly rewarded with a comically exaggerated groan from Rose.
His grin faltered as the facade faded, and Rose let out a shaky sigh. Immediately he pulled her back into him, one arm snaking back around her and the other’s hand sinking into her hair as she pressed her cheek up against his chest. They stayed locked in their embrace for a few moments, silently drinking the other in, before the Doctor couldn’t bear to not see her face any longer. Slowly, he brought the hand on her back up, fingers skimming the rough denim of her jacket sleeve. He could’ve sworn he felt a shudder as his fingers reached her neck and danced up the side of it, coming to rest by her ear. His other hand had been reluctantly withdrawn from her hair, but it wasn’t too long before he used it to tuck a stray curl of hair behind her other ear and left his hand there.
Cupping her face in his hands, his eyes roved over her every feature. The slightest blush appeared on Rose’s cheeks as she was appraised by him, and she tried to distract herself by looking to the side at Tommy reuniting with his gran. But as her eyes returned to his and she could see the depths of the universe swirling within them, she became completely entranced. Her eyes fluttered shut as his thumbs began to gently stroke her temples.
“You know” she mumbled softly “you can’t touch a girl like this and not expect her to melt into a puddle, even if she’s your best mate — must be in our biology or something.”
The Doctor hummed. In agreement? Annoyance? Rose wasn’t sure she could tell. But in the next moment his lips pressed lightly onto her forehead and all thoughts cleared from her mind.
Rose let out a nervous chuckle. “Doctor, as much as this is lovely, it’s really not helping”. Her breaths were short and shallow and she wondered if the Doctor could sense the quickening of her pulse.
As he drew back from her, Rose could see conflict flit across his face. Then almost as quickly as it had come it disappeared, replaced by a raised eyebrow and soft questioning eyes. He still didn’t let go of her face, perhaps unconscious of the fact that his fingers were unwilling to part from their reconnaissance mission along her hairline.
Slowly, so as to give her the chance to pull away if she wanted, he lowered his forehead to hers. Rose’s eyes fluttered shut for a moment as the Doctor’s nose brushed hers, and opened them again to find his eyes dark and troubled.
“Hey”, she murmured softly, “I’m here. Look, face back, good as new! I dunno what’s happened to my pores either but they feel good, it’s just like when I’d go around Boots slapping all the face mask testers onto my cheeks at once to see what they’d do.”
That managed to draw an amused sound from the back of the Doctor’s throat, and in a split second of bravery Rose reached up to briefly press her lips to his cheek. “Not sure about my lips though, just getting a second opinion” she said cheekily.
The Doctor groaned. “You know, you can’t just kiss a bloke like that and not make him want things that he can’t have.”
Rose’s breath hitched as she noted his words mirroring her own. Her reply was soft as she toed the line between them. “Who says he can’t have those things?”
His voice was flat as his hands dropped to his sides. “Life, the Universe, and everything. Face-sucking entities of unknown energy galavanting around the TV sets of London.” He scoffed. “No need to tempt fate when the cosmos plays with mine on any old whim it has.”
Rose opened her mouth to protest, but was interrupted by Tommy calling her and the Doctor over to him. She sighed, slotted a hand into his, and pulled him along firmly towards Tommy and the beginnings of a street party. “Come on, I’m dying for some juice and cake — oooh I think they have butterfly buns!”. She knew just how to pull the Doctor out of the beginning of a gloomy spell, and he smiled at her fondly.
“Butterfly buns!” he exclaimed, grateful for the change of topic. “Just what about the little bits of cake on top makes them taste that much better than main bit of the cake below?”
Rose laughed, and swung their hands between them. “I think a contest is in order. How many samples do you think we can collect between us — for science of course?”
“Most cake collected gets to eat the top bits of them all?” The Doctor offered, a mischievous glint in his eye and a wicked smile on his face. “You’re on”. He gave her hand a squeeze before releasing it and making a show of wiggling his fingers.
”Challenge accepted. Gimme a head start through, these shoes are made for dancing to Elvis and not… Oi, come back that’s not fair!” Rose shouted to the Doctor’s rapidly disappearing figure which was making a beeline to the cake table. Grabbing her dress up in her hands, she made a start after him and made what she thought was heroically good time in her heels.
The Doctor won of course, but that didn’t stop Rose from grabbing a handful of his haul and running away with them cackling. It was probably for the best, the Doctor thought, eyeing up the iced buns — if he filled up on cake he wouldn’t have room for the scones. Or little finger sandwiches. Or pastries! Grabbing one of everything he could see, he meandered in the direction she had run, his heart a little less heavy than it had been before.