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Sometimes, its so easy to forget she isn’t a few months shy of twenty-one. At least, it is now. When I first met her, one year, seven months, and nineteen days ago, it was all I could think about. It nagged me with every scrape, every bruise, every singed strand of hair. It ate at my hearts, making them burn with guilt, when I would send her off to work her own personal brand of Rose Tyler magic on whatever mystery we were embroiled in. In the beginning, it was so easy to masquerade behind cool confidence when we reunited. I’m fine. See Doctor! Her smile would say, though my conscience screamed that she was frail, breakable, only nineteen. The longer her hand was in mine, though, the more difficult it became to keep the charade up. I don’t think she’s noticed though.
She spent most of her twentieth birthday enslaved as concubine to the War Lord of Maltraxis, and all I could think was that she was young, human, and so inexperienced. The fear and rage were so hard to keep in check in those tortuous twenty hours I spent trying to hijack the prison transport I was confined to, getting the men who had been locked up when their planet had been invaded to safety, and infiltrate the nearly impregnable fortress that was her prison. Twenty hours, the word impregnable burning deep in my gut with the intensity of twenty exploding suns, and twenty candles waiting to be lit in the galley of the TARDIS, were not symmetry I could ignore. How I dreaded what I’d find. How I raged against the thought that a day meant to celebrate her utter uniqueness to the entirety of the cosmos would have turned into a day that would scar her for the rest of her life.
Yet, the moment I made it to the fortress, I was reminded of the concept that haunts, or haunted I suppose, my people: age is pointless. There she stood, clad in nothing but an opaque turquoise dress and a broken slave chain trailing from her ankle, with a stun rifle in her hand, blood trickling from her nose, right eye swollen shut, and a victorious smile that put twenty thousand Gallifreyan sunsets to shame. The War Lord lay unconscious, bound, and gagged at the gates, as his feminine conquests ran to their husbands and fathers and brothers. That was the day I stopped worrying about her age, because Rose Tyler can’t be defined by orbits around a star. Like I was saying, sometimes, it’s so easy to forget.
However, there are moments when I’m reminded, but it doesn’t scare me anymore. It inspires me. What’s ridiculous, is it isn’t ever in her moments of grandeur. It’s in moments like these, stolen moments, singular slivers of time when she doesn’t know I’m looking. I can’t help myself, though, from looking. I know it’s inappropriate, that she’d be furious or weirded out, but here I am, in her bedroom door, watching her in the soft glow of the galaxy spiraling on the ceiling over her bed. Rose Tyler at peace. Rose Tyler oblivious. Rose Tyler asleep.
These early hours are my favorite, because she seems so tiny, delicate. Her blonde hair isn’t quite rumpled yet, but still slightly damp from her pre-bed shower. I can smell the jasmine and vanilla shampoo and conditioner from here. Two separate locks of the silky strands hang across her face, one along her jaw and the other over her nose. Her face is clean of makeup, well mostly, as there is always just the slightest smudge of eyeliner in the outer corner of her left eye. She breathes through her mouth, but she doesn’t snore. Her petal like lips are parted just so, and each breath whispers across them like a prayer. Her left hand is on the blanket, the tip of her thumb resting delicately against her chin, and her right is wedged under her pillow.
There’s a difference in her fragility when she’s like this. Rose Tyler awake is as fragile as a Warp Star amulet. One wrong move, one offense, or one malignant deed and she’ll explode. Rose Tyler asleep is a fragile as spun glass, candy floss exposed to water, or Jakolian moonflowers in the heat of the sun. At least, that’s how she seems to me. Everything about her relaxed, unguarded, and content state seems so pure, the epitome of innocence. In these fleeting moments, I remember that she’s only been alive for twenty orbits of her planet. I hate being reminded, and yet, I love it.
She always sleeps facing the door, always. I know, because I’ve spent over an hour for two hundred nights transfixed in my observations. I’m well aware that this is an absolutely shameful habit, but I can’t stop myself. No, I don’t want to stop myself. I can’t explain it, but something about her face has entranced me from the night we met. It’s almost like he didn’t do what he did when I look at her. Her eyes haunt me in a way that makes me feel like he didn’t push the button, even when they are closed. I don’t know if haunt is the best word, but it’s the closest definition I can find. I’ve never been drawn to physical appearances like I am to hers, and when she sleeps, I can look without fear of her seeing me.
I’ve never dreamed of anyone the way I dream of her either. That’s the thing that draws me to her door every night. If I stand here long enough, drink in her peaceful aura deep enough, then maybe I won’t be trapped in that barn when I do give into exhaustion and sleep. Maybe I won’t dream I’m in the dark, dank, cold cell with two old faceless men who hate me, who accuse me with words I can’t ever remember. Three out of five sleep cycles, it works. Tonight, however, it didn’t.
So I stand here, jumperless, jacketless, bootless, watching her breath stir her hair, tasting the flavor of her hormones shifting in her dreams, and inhaling the sheer innocence of her trust and unconditional compassion left by a kiss on my cheek before she murmured goodnight and shuffled off to bed. For just a moment, I can be at peace too. I can marvel that she is only twenty, but has a fire and love and determination that would shame the entire High Council. I can forget, no, I can pretend, that I was ever him. In these moments, these stolen seconds, I’m John Smith, human, watching the woman who somehow reminded me that I’m capable of love, of saving people, of being atoned, sleep soundly. I should be ashamed, should mentally flog myself for humoring such fantasies, but as Rose’s lips twitch up with a smile in her dreams, I can’t.
“Doctor.” Rose’s eyes have fluttered open, and I know I should pretend I’m just poking my head in for a check. Yet, that’s impossible with the door wide open, my shoulder firmly against the door frame, arms crossed, and a stupid lovesick smile on my face. “What’s wrong?” If only she knew, nothing is wrong as long as she whispers to me like that, so damn human, so damn accepting, and so thrice damned worried.
“Nothin’.” If only she knew I dream of fire and blood and infinite screams. I’m glad she doesn’t, because then she’d want to fight them off for me. Twenty and a half seconds of silence, and Rose Tyler rubs her eyes. That smudge of mascara only spreads. “Jus’ makin’ sure you’re sleepin’ well.” Maybe I can too, since I heard her voice.
“Liar.” I feel my stupid grin failing. “This’s three nights in a row.” She yawns softly and blinks at me. Her smile is adorably lopsided with sleep as her eyes droop shut. “Don’ just stand there. Plenty of room...” Those soft hands pat the sheets behind her, and I know I should refuse. I know I should run, to forbid myself this invitation. Twenty seconds tick by, and she’s kicking off the sheets. My hearts freeze, because I’ve never seen what’s under her sheets. I’ve never seen what clothes make her sleep so peacefully in her cocoon of downy blankets. Now I have, and my hearts drum again when she stumbles over and takes my hand. Rose Tyler sleeps in my jumpers, and I’m done for at that monumental fact.
“I shouldn’t.” My mouth and brain protest, even as my feet and hearts betray them. Rose Tyler is pushing me onto her bed, her sleepy grin destroying my excuses as I fall.
“You’re gonna.” She’s in my arms, and I’m wrapped in her cocoon. “Sweet dreams Doctor.” Her lips are warm and damp as they press into my chest, and I’m too forgiven to refuse.
“Sweet dreams Rose.” Like her words are spell, I slip into the darkness, and the only thing I dream of is her fingers laced with mine for eternity.