cdybedahl | Drabble: Rose/Reinette

Which, obviously, contains stuff about the (at the moment) latest Dr Who episode.

"He is worth it, isn't he?" the frenchwoman says. "The Doctor is worth the monsters."
Somehow, she manages to look less out of place in the derelict spaceship than Rose feels. The woman, Reinette, Madame de Pompadour, carries with her a sense of authority. An expectation that the world conform to her, rather than the other way around. It's not she who's out of place, it's the spaceship that's not suiting itself to her.
"Yeah," Rose says. "He is."
Reinette turns to leave. She's almost through the time portal when an impulse strikes Rose.
"Wait," she says. Reinette stops and turns back to her.
"What has he told you?" Rose says. "What do you know of him?"
Reinette walks back to her. Rose can feel her presence when she comes close. Now, she understands how this woman can be the unofficial queen of France. Who would even think of disappointing her?
"He never dares tell us much, does he?" Reinette says. "Us brief lives in his eternity. What would be the use, when he'd just have to tell another in a little while?"
Rose doesn't know what to say. She just stands there, looking at this beautiful woman who has in so short a time caught the Doctor's full attention. There is some jealousy in her heart, but curiosity is stronger. What is it about her that grabs him? What was it about herself that made him invite her to come along? How is Rose Tyler like Madame de Pompadour?
"Have you kissed him?" Reinette asks.
"Sort of," Rose says. "Not really. In a way."
"I did," Reinette says. "I stole a kiss when he came to see me. An impulse."
"Oh," Rose says. Just like that. Which she's thought of, of course, but never dared. She'd still have to be there afterwards to face the awkwardness. Or so she always thought.
"I envy you and pity you," Reinette says. "To be with him so much more, yet with no more hope of ever connecting. It must be the most delicious torture."
Suddenly, before Rose can react, she bends forward and places her lips on Rose's. They're soft and warm, and she is urgent and insistent. Rose opens her lips and receives her, her heart beating a million miles a minute. She could not tell how long the kiss lasts. It is brief, and eternal.
"Who else do we have to turn to, but each other?" Reinette says when they have broken apart. "At least now you have kissed lips that have kissed his."
Memories bubble up in Rose's mind, memories of Sarah-Jane Smith. Alone, with no partner, no children, no Doctor, nobody but a tin dog. Sarah-Jane Smith, asking her to look her up some day. And suddenly Rose knows why, for who else would know what it was like but someone else who had travelled with him? Who else could understand?
A last look over a shoulder, and Reinette vanishes through the time portal. Rose makes a sound she doesn't even know the meaning of herself, a strange mixture of sob, sigh and laughter.
Then she hurries off to help the Doctor save Reinette.