Rose Tyler had been to many places, too many to count. For instance, there was New Earth, Barcelona (not the city, the planet) and - how could one forget - Raxacoricofallapatorious. Until she arrived in Forks, she had thought she'd seen it all.

She hadn't planned to land in the middle of someone's bedroom in the middle of the night, honest to God she hadn't. She blamed it on the Dimension Cannon. Whoever was in charge of building that thing back in the Torchwood of Pete's World (the name had stuck, somehow) was definitely going to hear from her - it wasn't like they had time to travel and jump across universes and worlds as they pleased. There were only so many rifts left that allowed them to journey without damaging the very fabric of reality and, on top of that, their entire system of universes was in desperate need of saving. The stars were going out, and she had to find someone before it was too late, specifically the Do-

"What are you doing here?"

She was so startled by the way the silence was broken all of a sudden that she literally jumped with fright. Embarrassed at her reaction (she had been taught better than that), she composed herself again very quickly and turned to face the direction from which the voice had come. Additionally, her brain went on auto-pilot to register information: an American accent. Where the hell had she ended up?

The soft light of the nightlight standing on the desk allowed for Rose to observe the girl cowering on the bed. She seemed marginally younger than herself - she thought seventeen would be her best bet. Long, brown hair. Dark circles under eyes the color of chocolate. Surrounded by shelves upon shelves of books, but as Rose experimentally ran her fingers along the backs of them, she noticed that every single romance novel (including Romeo and Juliet) had been turned around so the title was hidden from immediate view, unless a person were to take the trouble to take the book into his hands. Huh. Weird.

As the stranger cleared her throat, Rose whirled around again and focused on the task at hand. Can't really afford to become distracted. "I'm so sorry for barging in on you like this. Please don't be scared. I'm not going to hurt you or anything. This may sound totally crazy, I know, but I'm simply passing through. Don't you...em... wanna go back to sleep or something? My name is Rose Tyler, by the way."

Rude and not ginger. The words echoed through her head, and she was momentarily forced to close her eyes. Blinking furiously as if that would make the pain and feeling of loss mysteriously disappear, she extended her hand.

"Bella.", the brunette responded calmly and shook her hand.

Smiling, Rose sat down on the bed next to her, Indian-style. "So, how come you're not freaking out and calling the police?"

She shrugged. "For one thing, my father's the chief of police. Also, I've seen many things you just would not believe."

The blonde chuckled. "Try me."

She hadn't expected Bella to wince, as if physically recoiling from a particularly unpleasant memory. "It's just that it has to do with-"

When silence had fallen over the room for a good thirty seconds, Rose decided that she wasn't going to get an answer anytime soon. "Ex-boyfriend?", she prompted gently.

The grimace on the other girl's face was all the confirmation she needed.

"Tough break-up?" She laid a consoling hand on Bella's shoulder, who shook her head in a violent manner. "Not really. At least, not in the sense of a, a, a mutual, consensual s-s-seperation..." Noticing her stutter, the brunette shut up.

"So he left you, hm? How long's that been?" Rose could sympathise. It would explain her sudden distaste for literature involving romance, too - judging by the sheer amount of that floating around the room, she must have been head over heels for that guy. Okay, so she must be going through a post-relationship depression phase. After an appropriate interval-

"Three months.", Bella sobbed into her shoulder.

What? She frowned and leaned back a little to look into her eyes. "So, what have you been doing these past weeks? What are your plans?"

The Torchwood employee was met with a dull glare. "I'm still in school, though I can't say I enjoy it. But, you see, I have to. Cha- my dad threatened to send me to Arizona, back to my mom's, if my grades were too low. Also, I've had to promise to talk to my friends at least once a day."

Rose was shocked. "What about you? You can't just live your life for your parents, that's not the point! Talking to your friends should be a normal thing that makes you happy, not a duty! It's been three months already and you're still grieving? Hasn't it ever occured to you that he wasn't worth it?"

Whatever she had expected, it wasn't what Bella finally ended up saying. "Edward-", her face was actually distorted as she spoke his name, "was perfect. I wasn't good enough for him. That's what he told me and he's right. He was so beautiful and intelligent and such a gentleman. Why would he waste his precious time with me of all girls? He could have anyone he wanted. I'm lucky I even got to spend the year we've been together with him, is all. What else can I do now that he's gone forever?" Her shoulders slumped; all the fight that had blazed in her eyes as she defended her mysterious ex had gone out of her.

Rose's eyes widened in disbelief. "Listen to yourself!", she exclaimed. "If you have so many issues, how could you have even been happy with him?"

Bella's face was a perfect blank of incomprehension. "What do you mean?"

The blonde sighed. "I mean that you couldn't possibly have been happy. You must have been thinking about how worthless you are the entire time you guys spent time together. That's just torture. A relationship should be between two equals and I really shouldn't be the one telling you this!"

"But..." Bella tried to form a coherent sentence and failed to come up with a decent counterargument. "What if I told you that he was a vampire?"

Rose grinned in excitement. "Now that's interesting! How come he didn't bite you? Or got burned up by the sun? I doubt you only met at night-"

"No, no.", the brunette corrected. "He's a good vampire - he doesn't drink human blood. Also, the thing about the sun is a myth." She lowered her voice as if sharing a secret of national importance. "When they go out into the sun, they sparkle."

The inhabitant of Forks was dumbstruck as she watched Rose double over in laughter. There were tears streaming out of her eyes in an effort to stifle her laughing fit, but it was not much use. "They- oh, this is brilliant! Sorry,", she giggled after she had apparently calmed down after what seemed like hours, "it's just that I know someone who would simply love to meet him. To think-"

"I want to become a vampire, too! It's just not fair, he's over a hundred years old and has the body of a seventeen-year-old. And me? I'm older than him!"

Rose stopped laughing. "What? You're not serious. Okay, so I can't exactly berate you about the age gap, but becoming a vampire? How old are you, anyway? No matter, it's still way too soon to make such a decision. What if he turned you into a vampire and then broke up with you again after a year? What would ya do then?"

Bella shook her head with determination. "Oh no, he wouldn't do that, because then I'd be a match for him. I'd be beautiful and not so disgustingly human anymore. Also, I'm eighteen.", she spit out.

"Wha- so all you've been saying can only mean that he was a superficial jerk that wasn't in it for the long haul. Also, what's wrong with being human?" Or he was afraid she was insane.

"No! I-" Bella closed her mouth again, resigned. "You wouldn't understand. Our love was unique and now my life is just... empty." She assumed the tone of voice of a sulking infant.

She didn't see the way Rose's mouth formed a hard line. The trace of bitterness in the blonde's voice was what made her raise her head again. "Oh, believe me, I can relate to a love lost. That is, I could if what you told me could lead me to the conclusion that you actually were in love. But as your primary concern seems to be someone's outward appearance, I really don't think it would have worked out between you either way. You sound like a broken record, listing reasons for how perfect he was, when without him, you have no friends and feel alone. That's unhealthy. You should have moved on by now, or at least tried to get him back. Now, you're just wasting your time rotting away while you could take matters into your own hands and live."

Bella was staring at her with her mouth agape. "You're wrong.", she whispered.

Rose rolled her eyes and sighed. She could recognize a hopeless case when she saw one - she simply hoped that one day, the poor girl would come to her senses.

When she realised that the Dimension Cannon was in working order once more, she was having a hard time remembering when the last time was that she had been so relieved. With a friendly wave to the mostly unresponsive, exasperated Bella, Rose Tyler disappeared from Forks, Washington.

She couldn't wait to tell the Doctor about all of this when she found her way back to him.