So this is an idea that's been on my mind for months, I swear. I've tried to write it over and over and I never get it right. This isn't the whole thing, it's just a little excerpt of the story in my head, but I had to get part of it out.

Opinions? I'd love them. Also, please favorite/review this or any of my other stories. It makes me feel better. :)

Disclaimer: No claim to ownership of any recognized characters, themes, or time and space machines.

Love, Me

When Rose Tyler woke up it was to the sound of the TARDIS, humming through the vortex, and the familiar sensation of an arm around her waist.

Funny, she thought, that even after so many years, waking up on the TARDIS could still feel like waking up at home. Once the Doctor had left her and the metacrisis on Bad Wolf Bay, she'd thought she'd never see his beautiful ship again. But here she was, back in her old bed and in her own room; back home.

Rose smiled and rolled over to face her husband of five years, only to freeze as reality rushed over her. Because the man lying in bed with her wasn't her husband, wasn't the Doctor she'd woken up to every day for five years. And then she remembered.

She wasn't in the other universe anymore, she was back in her original one. She hadn't come here with her Doctor, but through Jack she had reconnected with the original Doctor. This Doctor had regenerated, had lived hundreds of years since he'd seen her last. This Doctor wasn't her Doctor.

But, after a year of pushing him away in her search for a way back, she'd spent the night with this Doctor.

And it was her own fault, too. It was a year to the day since Rose had stepped into an experimental Torchwood transporter and found herself standing in Torchwood Three with a surprised Jack Harkness. A year of wondering why no one had followed or come to get her. For a year she'd been working on Jack's version of the same machine, trying to understand why it wouldn't work to send her home. A year of missing her family, her husband – her Doctor.

And she'd been drunk.

And crying.

And feeling so very alone.

And it was so wrong.

This Doctor, with his young face and floppy hair, his youthful exuberance and his tired, sad eyes, wasn't her Doctor anymore. She was married! How could she ever return home (if I ever do get home) to her Doctor knowing what she'd done here.

On the floor her mobile began to ring, and Rose tore her eyes from the Doctor's face to find it.

"Rose? It's Jack. You need to come back to Torchwood. We figured it out, we can get you home!"

When Rose hung up with Jack, the Doctor hadn't moved but his eyes were open, watching her. He looked old again, sad, and Rose pulled the sheet tighter around her as if it could shield her from his gaze.

"You're going home?"

"Yes."

"Will you tell him?"

"I - " Rose didn't know how to answer. She had, at the worst possible moment, given up on herself and any dream of getting home, and in that she had fallen into bed with the one man she'd sworn not to get close to. This Doctor wasn't her Doctor, but he was still the Doctor, and Rose Tyler would always love the Doctor. She didn't know if that was better or worse than sleeping with someone she didn't love. "I don't know. It's sort of complicated, isn't it?"

The Doctor sighed. "Rose Tyler, you and I will always be complicated, even when we think there's nothing left to complicate."