Another oneshot. Another song fic.

The Doctor was aimlessly ambling through the corridors of his TARDIS, whistling an old tune and his hands tucked comfortably in the pockets of his trench coat. The song had been in his head for several hours now, and he grudgingly admitted that singing the song aloud often helped get it out.

He didn't notice where he was until he saw the light on in Rose's room. Her door was easily identified, with her name written in Gallifreyan circular. The penmanship (his?) was neat and curly (probably not his), and the symbols almost seemed to be drawn by a single golden threat.

He was taken aback when he noticed the light on in her room. She'd been quite tired after their last adventure, and she'd positively dragged her feet back to her room, giving him a goodnight smile. So why was she awake?

He knocked gently and poked his head in, catching her eye. She grinned at him, which he took as a welcome, and opened her door fully. She was wearing a ratty pair of grey sweatpants, which sat low at her hips, and an old t-shirt that he recognized from when they'd first started travelling together. She was sitting on her unmade bed, leaning against the wall, and her knees were bend, allowing him to see a small hole in the left pant leg. He wondered if she even noticed. Maybe not.

"Thought you'd be asleep," he told her, standing uncertainly in her room, keeping a good distance.

She smiled. "I was, but I couldn't stop thinking about what would happen." She held up the sixth Harry Potter, which had been previously resting on her thighs. Her tongue poked mischievously out from between her teeth, and her eyes crinkled with the grin, drawing out a smile from him as well. He could never not return one of her honest smiles. "You want to join?" She asked, budging over so that there would be room for him to join her on the bed.

"Weeeelllll," he tugged at his ear, teasing her. She rolled her eyes at his antics, but said nothing else, tucking her nose back into the book. He shed his trench coat and shoes before all but jumping onto her bed, making her squeal in surprise and then laugh at his face as he scrambled into a more comfortable position.

He ended up sitting on her right side, leaning against her and purposefully pressing against her warmth while he pretended to squint to see where she was at.

She chuckled, nudging him with her shoulder. "Get off, you lump!" She laughed harder at his response ("Oi!") and passed him the book. "You're gunna complain that I don't read fast enough anyway," she told him knowingly, "so why don't you read to me aloud?"

He gratefully accepted, feeling a slight thrill bubble in his core when she laid her head on his should and closed her eyes, listening to his animated reading with a smile firmly on her lips.

He loved seeing her like this, though he told himself it was because she was content and safe (and definitely not because she was cuddled up next to him and obviously comfortable). She was so jeopardy friendly, this one companion. More than anyone before her. It was difficult to keep her safe sometimes, but he didn't mind.

He did try his best to protect her, and not because he knew that Jackie would probably slap him again if anything remotely dangerous happened to her daughter. No, it seemed that protecting her was instinct in this body, as though it wouldn't make sense to do anything else. This body, born for her and her alone, made into the man she wanted.

He remembered being utterly confused when she hadn't seem to want him more in this body than the last, and even more perplexed when she seemed to favor old Big Ears.

He hoped she knew how he revolved around her. He thought she might.

She seemed to bring out a need for treasure hunts. Where he aimlessly travelled without any aim (usually), she searched out those in peril, dragged him on adventures to find the good guy and the bad guy and he loved it. He loved every second he spent with her, whether it was her dragging him or vice versa, into another dangerous scavenger hunt, smiles wide, hands interlocked.

The first adventure he'd taken her on still made him wince to think about. She was innocent, sweet even, and he'd decided that if he were going to be in pain then she should too, she should understand the "real world", so to speak.

So he'd taken to watch her planet burn. His had, so hers should as well.

He could still see the look on her face when she saw her burning planet. Her eyes were locked, wide and in awe, on the scorching earth. He winced. How could he have ever wanted her to see that? How could he have ever wanted her to feel as empty and hollow and damn near useless as he had?

"There's me."

And from the moment she'd said "there's me," he hadn't felt so alone in the world. He might have lost his family, his world, but he had her hand to hold. No matter how he'd hurt her, no matter how selfish he'd been, no matter how unkind, she was there for him, holding his hand and grinning her tongue-touched smile at him like he was the very best thing in the universe.

How backwards she had it.

They'd been walking along a market on Epsilonia VII when he noticed it. When he turn to point something out to his cheery companion, he turned his head to see her face, hoping for a smile, something reflected off her pink shirt.

He would have blamed it on the sunlight, on the reflections of the items for sale around her…

Except.

Except that the gold tint that seemed to reflect off of her was the same gold that made her timeline shine, tinged with gold. He frowned as he stared at her back.

"Wha'?" her confused voice brought him back to reality. His brown eyes met her hazel ones, both frowning as they stared at each other.

He shook his head, planting a smile on his lips. "Nothing," he told her, bringing his hand up. He'd meant to brush a lock of hair from her face, but in the briefest second, he hesitated. "Just a trick of the light," he continued cheerfully, his hand returning to his pocket.

He thought he caught a gleam of disappointment in her eyes.

He spotted the golden thread several more times, as she moved into the sunlight, it would sparkle, not visible to her, but distracting for him. Was it some sort of clue? A hint from the universe about … something? He didn't know, and he suddenly felt weighed down by his less than great telepathic abilities. He'd once been able to read and shuffle through the timelines in his head with ease, but it seemed this was not the case in this enthusiastic tenth incarnation.

He knew the moment he started to feel down on himself, Rose would notice. He tried to comfort himself in knowing that he was, no matter what he said to Rose, rather vain, and would always find something about himself that he liked.

He liked his hair.

And his manly, hairy hands.

And his voice.

He liked that Rose liked him.

But soon his self-assurances were no longer enough, and again he began to feel the weight of several worlds on his shoulders. And she knew it, just as he'd assumed she would. It helped, quite a lot, that she still looked at him like that.

That look that made him feel like the most important man in the universe, if only to one, small, pink and yellow human. She looked at him like she couldn't believe she'd found him – as though through her struggles and her trudging through the mud in the life that was never for her, she'd found a diamond, gleaming. And much like Rose, rather than pocketing the diamond and ignoring her struggles, making a living off the riches, she'd wiped down the diamond using her own sleeve and shared it with the universe, saving them while still marching through her own trench.

She was something else, his Rose.

He kept his daydreaming to himself, of course. It was completely innocent at first. He imagined seeing his favourite places with her, holding her hand as they walked through the red grasses of Gallifrey…and became more imaginative and less innocent. He imagined what it would be like to kiss her after a dangerous adventure, kissing her in the console, kissing her wherever. Kissing her when she thought she didn't know she was crying.

Ashamed, he distanced himself from her, and he tried to convince himself that his sudden decision wasn't the reason for her sadness.

He was wrong, obviously, but he tried anyway.

She said that word. She'd said forever.

He knew that that was impossible. She could spend her forever with him, but his forever would go on long after she would pass. He would move on, just like he had with all his companions. He would wish her well, leave, and never go back.

And she would die eventually, where he would go on living.

Or, at least, existing.

But he would accept her lie. He would take her hand and run with her and pretend that they would spend forever together, traveling the universe and laughing and smiling.

He would take her to Woman Wept (still a favourite place of his), and ask her how long he would stay with her.

She'd look at him, a small smile on her face, a promise in her eyes, and a vow falling from her lips.

Forever.

It was just for him, that promise.

"Doctor?" Her voice cut through his reverie.

He was standing stiffly at the door of the library, his hands in his pockets and his shoulders back. He'd meant to come in to watch a movie with her, or maybe read a book, but he'd stopped at the door, catching sight of her.

She was curled up on the couch, feet tucked underneath her, a blanket covering her legs and wrapped in…his old leather jacket? He frowned at it, then looked at her in confusion.

She looked up from the book on her lap, catching sight of him. She grinned sheepishly, "I was cold."

"You didn't want to start a fire?" He gestured to the fireplace, which was empty.

Rose grimaced. "Thought about it, but I couldn't stop reading." She held up the book in her hands. It was the seventh Harry Potter. She'd devoured the sixth weeks ago, and was now well into the seventh.

His face dropped. "What?" You've been reading it without me?"

She grinned her tongue-touched smile and held up her hands in surrender, the book still in her left hands. "Start the fire and come on then."

He grinned and quickly started up the fire. He didn't see Rose's smile falter as she watched him work, and he didn't think that the old fireplace would remind her of a certain adventure in which she'd almost lost him, and the only time she'd ever felt abandoned by the Doctor.

He finished with a flourish and turned to her, a mad grin on his face. She smiled back, though her answering grin was not as wide as before, and lifted the edge of the blanket that had been draped over her legs. The Doctor sat close to her, so close his thighs touched her knees.

She changed position so that her side was against his, passed him the book, and rested her head on his shoulder. He took the book and her arm fell across his chest. He had to remember to breathe at her closeness, at her Rose-ness.

One of the advantages to being in the TARDIS was the utter timelessness that came with it. There was no late, no early, no night, and no morning. They could just stay in the library, leaning on each other, and read until the book was done.

There were several things that gave the Doctor hope. There were civilizations that lived of jam alone (wouldn't that be wonderful? To live only off jam?) and he'd seen selflessness for the better cause, he'd seen love.

But he didn't think he'd ever felt love, not like this. There had never been so strong a feeling that he felt his world revolve along a single person. And he never thought that it would give him hope, that one person.

That one, most selfless, happy, brave, most clever young human he'd ever met. A pink and yellow human whose smile alone could end wars, whose valiant actions already had, whose love for him had already broken several rules and laws of time and of the Time Lords.

So for now, he would continue to accept that one lie that she didn't even realize she was telling. He would take it in stride because it was better to be with her for her short timespan anyway. He'd selfishly keep her for as long as he could, because he wanted her, needed her, to stay with him.

And so, quite unknowingly, he'd let her interweave her gold timeline with his shining blue, and find her place in his hearts. She'd told him everything she didn't realize he needed to hear, not out of obligation but because she really felt them.

For her, he could take one lie.