Five times the Doctor tried to get rid of Rose Tyler (and one time he succeeded)

"You have to give the Doctor credit for dumping a slightly clingy girlfriend by sticking her with a clone." - Steven Moffat, ComicCon 08

It was rather ironic, he had to admit.

He freely conceded that Rose Tyler had saved his life. Literally, sure, yeah; she'd saved his neck when cosmic angst slowed his reflexes and dulled his mind just enough to need the help of a 19-year-old shop girl.

More significantly, she'd saved him from that cosmic angst itself, the sharp bitterness and inward-pointed knives that turned life after the Time War into an extended stay in Miss Trunchbull's pokey. He was a man drowning, and she was a sparkly pink life preserver, and he clung on for dear life.

And she had loved him, he knew, she truly had. But as that him tightened his grip – as she saw his looks linger, his hugs fiercen, his protectiveness slide into possessiveness – she carefully kept him at arm's length. She loved him, but she avoided the intensity of his looks and the question in that intensity by casting such looks back on Mickey, on Adam, on Jack, and never ever, except maybe once or twice, on him. Fantastic.

But then he died, big ears and daft old face reduced to flame. And from the ashes was born a man tailor-made for the tastes of Rose Tyler.

Curse humans and their superficiality! Now he looked young, and fit, and quite frankly rather adorable, especially when his hair was ruffled just so. And now she was interested.

But the Doctor was a new man. He'd inherited his ninth body's companion, but the baggage got lost in the transfer.

He didn't realize the problem until New New York. She'd unbuttoned her blouse, batted her eyelids, and shoved her tongue down his throat. It wasn't really Rose, but it was a full two minutes before he'd cottoned on to that. Of course, it would have been five seconds, had he not spent the first minute and fifty-five seconds in a blind panic.

The tables had turned, and now the unresolved sexual tension was flowing in the opposite direction. That it had been Cassandra didn't even matter – the possibility that Rose was attracted to him had suddenly entered his mind, and now he saw it in every look, every touch.

He had to begin the careful process of discouraging her, making her see that he loved her and didn't want to lose her, but that she'd better keep her attraction to herself or things would get awkward. The same message Rose had so effectively communicated to his old self. How had she managed that, anyway?

It was a blessing when they ran into Sarah Jane Smith – sort of.

He was shocked by his own reaction to seeing his old best friend – he didn't remember his third or fourth bodies ever feeling quite so strongly about their companion, yet the sight of Sarah Jane left him tongue-tied and belly-flopping, like seeing a long lost crush who'd only gotten prettier in the interim. But he knew from very recent experience that romantic attachments – romantic fancies – were not consistent from one regeneration to the next.

Rose's jealousy toward his old companion only confirmed the worry he'd felt since New New York. And after talking to Sarah in the café and hearing how she'd waited for him, he only became more sure that he had to discourage his young companion's romantic attachment. How did Rose manage to tell his old self to maintain the status quo, without uttering a single word?

"Come with us, Mickey, there's plenty of room."

"Adam was sayin' that all his life he wanted to see the stars."

"What about Jack?"

That's the ticket. He would invite along Sarah Jane.

Mickey the Idiot was a poor substitute for Sarah Jane Smith – hell, he was a poor substitute for the tin dog – but a rubbish third wheel was better than none at all.

Mere hours later, however, the Doctor found himself in the arms of a charming young lady in pre-revolutionary France.

Perhaps it had been a bit rash to trap himself in the 18th century. But there was a pretty damsel in distress, and he'd hadn't spent any quality time at the French Revolution since before his first regeneration, and frankly he could use to ditch Rose for a couple centuries. She could figure out how to return the TARDIS to the 21st century, he'd catch up with her there. If he got bored, he could always hitch a ride forward with one of his other regenerations – lord knows it would be easy to find himself in late second-millennium Europe. He could even take the time to look up some of his more far flung companions!

Well actually, he thought, amending his plans as Reinette slipped a white hand under the waistband of his trousers, perhaps he could spend a few decades in France first…

He really wouldn't have enjoyed the 17th century, the Doctor decided while trapped in the 42nd. Even if certain side benefits would have made it better than his exile in Britain in the nineteen mumbleties – and certainly better than getting trapped completely TARDISless on a single planet with Clingy McClingerson.

His tolerance for Rose's romantic fancies took a sharp downturn after her joking-but-not shared mortgage proposition. That was one adventure he had no interest in having, thank you very much, and Rose's thinly disguised enthusiasm was yet another turn-off.

He did have to give the girl some credit, he admitted, as he lowered himself into the pit's gaping maw. She'd felt the awkwardness of her little settling down speech before it was finished leaving her mouth. Perhaps, he hoped, perhaps his multiple attempts to pick up other women – failures though they were – had gotten home to Rose that he just wasn't a one gal forever 'n ever sort of guy. She had to know, right?

He reached the end of his rope.

"That's it," Ida said mournfully. "That's all we've got."

The pit opened its mouth to him, promising a much more enticing adventure than the domestic one waiting on the surface. His options were sorely limited, and though he felt bad about making Rose fend for herself in the 42nd century, he was never one to choose the more passive of two gameplans.

"Tell Rose…"

He paused. What could he say? Tell Rose he's sorry? Tell Rose he really does like her an awful lot, but the prospect of shacking up with her in an insides-proportionate-to-the-outsides house was more terrifying than a bottomless pit? Tell Rose he's sorry the body she's in love with is much less interested in her than the body she'd dismissed? Tell Rose—

"Oh, she knows."

And he let go.

The Doctor felt terribly guilty. More so than usual.

His original plan – send Rose to Pete's World, where she'd be safe and gone – had succeeded in effect if not intent. He'd meant from the start to trap her in the parallel world against her will – just because there was a little delay while she fought back didn't change the fact that things had gone according to design. He'd fulfilled his duty to his former self's attachment to the girl – even took a page from his tactical book on jettisoning the companion when Daleks were involved – so why did things still feel incomplete? Rose was safe, Rose was happy, and Rose was gone. For good. Right?

Better check.

A bit of jiggery-pokery with the TARDIS and a supernova later, and he was waiting for the Tylers to drive to Norway.

"You look like a ghost," said the projection of Rose, her hair flying disorientingly in the still TARDIS air.

He adjusted the sonic screwdriver and her image clarified. And Rose Tyler stood where she'd stood for the better part of two years, and told the Doctor about her new job and family and life in Pete's World, and he allowed himself a smile at the knowledge that he'd done the right thing.

She began to cry when he reported her official death, but that was understandable. Nevertheless, the Doctor fiddled nervously with the sonic screwdriver that was holding open the window between the dimensions.

She'll never see him again, he said, and her face contorted with a futile attempt to hold back tears.

"I…" she started, choking on a sob. He knew then what was coming, what she would say, unavoidable after all his efforts.

"I love you."

"Quite right, too," he said with a small smile. She gamely twisted her mouth at him, face obscured by hair blowing in a wind he did not feel. She was waiting for a more substantial response.

"And I suppose," he started tentatively, "if it's my last chance to say it…"

He considered for a moment, and she choked back a sob.

"Rose Tyler."

And he lowered the sonic and broke the connection.

Rose was back.

Trying to ditch Rose Tyler was like throwing away a boomerang, the Doctor decided. Bad riddance to good rubbish.

He'd missed her, certainly, but he'd hoped she was happy, well-adjusted, coping – that having said a proper goodbye was the closure palliative he'd denied Sarah Jane. That the ambiguity with which he'd not-responded to her misguided declaration of love was enough to satisfy her, without giving her cause to wait for him.

No such luck, he realized, as Rose admitted she'd made herself interdimensional cannon fodder to get back to him.

He couldn't very well keep her. For one thing, she'd picked up a really annoying lisp in Pete's World, and he's already adopted one unfortunate accent from her without adding on another.

And then there was the problem of this spare Doctor. Who had very conveniently just made the Daleks go poof. Hmm…

"That's me, when we first met," the Doctor said, standing on the beach at Bad Wolf Bay, and he really wanted it to be true. Genocide was genocide, right? His creepy doppelganger had slaughtered the Daleks, ergo he would be properly Post Traumatic Stress Disorder'd out, ergo he'd be all over Rose, right? Right?

Rose grabbed the lapels of the other Doctor and kissed the hell out of him. Actually, the other Doctor seemed to be kissing the hell out of Rose right back. This syllogism was working better than he'd hoped.

Without glancing back, the Doctor stepped into his TARDIS and left behind Rose Tyler and her Doctor once and for all.

It was a good thing Donna Noble shut the TARDIS door behind her, or it wouldn't have been there to hold her upright as her knees buckled.

"Did you see his FACE?!" Donna hooted. The Doctor doubled over, tears streaming down his cheeks.

"Let that be a lesson to you, Donna Noble," the Doctor said once he'd caught his breath enough to lecture. "There is only one way to dump an ex proper. Leave 'em behind, strand 'em in a parallel universe, hell, even kill 'em, and they'll always find a way back. So you know what you've got to do?"

"Give 'em a clone?"

"Give 'em a clone."

Shaking slightly with the laughter of the DoctorDonna, the TARDIS slipped quietly into the vortex.