One Hundred and Eighty Two Days ~ (a TenRose Fanfiction)

Christmas Exchanges

~Chapter 14

(Bit of a long chapter, mainly fluff. Will edit this later and correct any spellings, but for now I'm writing the next chapter! Promise things will get better in the next few chapters XD)

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-Rose's POV

Christmas comes around quicker than we could've thought, and it's Christmas morning before I know it. I wake up to the sound of my bedroom door opening, and I open my dazed eyes and glance around the room. I see him straight away; the Doctor stands at my bedroom door with a massive grin on his face, in his usual pinstriped suit and spiked up hair. Oh, that hair. I grin back hazily and he walks over.

"Merry Christmas!" He says cheerily.

"Happy Christmas!" I smile, still not finding the energy to pull myself out of bed. He sees this and grabs my hands, pulling me up, now laughing.

"Now come on! Presents!" The Doctor pulls me onto my feet and drags my by my hand out the room, just like a four year old on Christmas morning. I stumble as he drags me, my legs still captured in sleep. We're both laughing as we make it to our little living room, and the Doctor leads me to the glass balcony doors, where he opens the curtains and reveals the scene outside. It's snowing for sure, and the whole town is covered in a blanket of white, a scene which looks like it should be captured in camera or painted into a perfect picture. I practically gasp at the sight before me, and the Doctor looks over at me wearing a grin just as big as mine.

"Come on, presents" he says, and pulls me over to our small tree which we got from the local maker, decorated with a few flimsy baubles and some lighting arranged my The Doctor. We sit down and pull our presents out from under the tree. We've both got about four or five each, from colleagues, our bosses and each other. I get perfume and chocolate from some of my colleagues, and then it's the Doctors turn. He opens his first present which is from a man called Dave, or Mr Fox, apparently head of English, which is a fountain pen and chocolate.

"That's nice" I comment.

"I've never known how to use these things" the Doctor says, holding the pen up to his face and inspecting it.

"I'll show you later" I smile. He thanks me and we finish opening our presents until we've only got each other's left.

"You go first" I say with a smile, and hand him the present I got him. I struggled so much, usually I have a pretty good idea, but It took me a while to figure out what I wanted to get him this time. Luckily Lucy at work's quite the artist, and helped me make the gift, she knew exactly what we had to do, even though she was very puzzled to what the gift actually meant.

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-The Doctor's POV

Rose hands me over her gift to me with a smile, and I take it from her. It's round and rather small, and slightly rounded at the top. She nods at me and I pull back the TARDIS blue ribbon, and carefully unwrap the pale blue wrapping paper. We've done gifts before, every Christmas. But now this moment feels more special than before. Suddenly the wrapping is gone and I'm left with a beautiful snow globe. Inside sits the TARDIS, beautifully carved and painted deep blue, every detail engraved so the snow globe sits perfectly in my palm. And in front of the TARDIS, stands a tiny version of me and Rose, staring upward, me pointing at the stars in the snow. Then I realise that's from last Christmas, when I'd first regenerated. I feel all chocked up when my eyes find hers. Her hands are clasped nervously tight in her lap, and her eyes are smiling brightly.

"R-Rose. That's amazing! How did you...?" My eyes drift back to the snow globe, and I shake it, watching the snow fall around us.

"Lucy at work helped me, she used to go to an art college in London and had to make a snow globe for one of her projects, so I had a bit of help." Rose says a little shyly with a smile. I smile back and thank her again. I move to hug her but she stops me.

"All hugs at the end" she says. I nod and smile, handing her over her present. Again, this took me ages, and I'd spent countless nights sat up working on it, but now it's done.

***

-Rose's POV 

Very pleased with the Doctors reaction to his present, I let him hand over mine. It's again small, but wrapped delicately in TARDIS blue tissue paper. I smile and pull the tissue paper away, and before I look I close my eyes, wanting to capture every part of this moment. Usually if just rip away the wrapping, but today feels different, and more special than before. As these presents were actually bought and made with money we made ourselves.

"Can I open?" I ask.

"Of course" the Doctor says, and I can tell by his voice he's smiling. So I open my eyes and stare at the gift sat gently in my palm. It's a necklace, a silver necklace, with a flat, circular charm on the end. I look closely at the charm, and it's very clear it's a Gallifreyan symbol of some kind.

"Your name," the Doctor says, and I lift my eyes to his "In Gallifreyan"

"How did you...?" I say, utterly bemused at the beautiful gift.

"I carved it." He says a little sheepishly, and tugs at his ear.

"You made this, for me?" I say.

"Of course I did" he smiles a little anxiously "you like it?"

"I love it!" I say, and wrap my arms tightly around him, practically crushing him.

"Hugs are allowed now then, yeah?" he laughs. I nod, laughing, feeling tears prickling behind my eyes, "Happy Christmas." The Doctor says with a smile.

"Happy Christmas!" I say again, and we pull back from the hug. Finally something dawns on me "Doctor! Christmas lunch at the pub!"

"Oh yes! I completely forgot!" The Doctor smiles "What time is it?"

"4:30 I think" I say, trying to remember what Mike had told me, wiping a tear of happiness from my flushed cheek..

"Bit late for lunch" the Doctor says with a sniff.

"Well, it's tradition I guess" I say.

"Okay, so Christmas dinner later, but now...a Christmas movie?"

"Of course" I smile widely. Best Christmas ever.