Some Go Mad

It was near dawn when Rose stepped up the last few steps in her house. Ten minutes had lapsed into twenty and then an hour and then two as she did everything in her power to get lost on the empty streets, to convince herself that it was being away from home that made her feel lonely. The weariness of a night’s work failed dragged Rose’s feet against the floor as she ascended the stairs to the second floor.

The sun was just starting to flood her room when she opened the door and closed it quietly behind her. She ran a hand sharply over her face. Rose was never used to nights with little sleep. She had never held the desire to stay up past 10:30 for whatever reason. Now she was apparently fine with spending the better part of that healthy eight hour mark of sleep wandering the streets of London with a complete stranger.

While scanning her room through bleary eyes, Rose half expected to see that same stranger lounging once again on her bed or sitting comfortably outside of her window. There was nobody there.

Outside in the hall she heard a door open and her mother’s early footfalls padding quietly down the steps Rose had just made her way up. She closed her eyes. Today was not going to work.

Holding in a long breath, Rose started to make her way over to her closet but stopped dead in her tracks when she caught a glimpse of blue out of the corner of her eye. Her heart doubled in speed for the length of seconds it took to turn her head and see the shirt she had carelessly tossed over her shoulder just the other day. Its fabric was sprawled on the ground, wrinkled and hiding half of itself under the gap between her dresser and the floor.

Rose pushed her lips together tightly. She glanced out the window then moved her eyes and feet towards the clothing. She bent her legs and scooped it up, holding it at arm’s length and examining it carefully.

“You missed the trash bin.” She accused the object. It took the abuse silently.

Rose pressed her lips together again before gripping the shirt in one hand and sliding open a dresser drawer with the other.

---

“Is that a new shirt?” Elizabeth asked her daughter as Rose rummaged in the cupboards for breakfast.

“What?” Rose glanced down at the blue fabric loosely covering the top half of her body. “No. I don’t think so.” She swallowed then resumed her task of picking a cereal. She ignored the obvious questioning silence that radiated from her mother.

The scrape of a chair across the floor grated on Rose’s ears. Elizabeth was the only person in the family that would let that noise enter their home. Rose’s father despised the scratching noise and all four children had inherited that same pet peeve.

Rose felt her mother hold a bit of the fabric between her fingers. “You should iron it. It’s more wrinkles than anything.”

“I think that’s how it was made.” Rose shrugged through the lie as she tugged a thin box from the shelf in front of her. She remembered buying the shirt last year and knew that it had been made crisp and smooth with the only wrinkles being in the extra fabric that fell past her hips. She pushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear as she headed for the refrigerator for milk.

“I’ll be going out today. I should be home later tonight.”

Rose shut the refrigerator door and turned to face her mother. “All day?”

Elizabeth nodded her answer and stepped back to the kitchen table. She gathered up a pile of paper that had been spread across the wooden surface. “I need to meet with a few people in Queenborough. I’ll try my best to be home for dinner.”

Rose wanted to comment coldly that she had just gotten back or that Matty wanted to go to the park today. She wanted to stop pushing her hair back from her face, quit biting her nails, and say something about what was going on in their house lately, but instead she poured her milk and nodded silently, consent and understanding written clearly in her actions for Elizabeth to take as bait.

Elizabeth moved over the kiss Rose’s forehead lightly and brush hair lightly with one hand. “Tell the boys I said bye and I love them.” Rose nodded agreement and followed her mother as far as the kitchen table where she set down her breakfast and took a seat opposite from the one Elizabeth had occupied. The front door closed with a familiar click.

Rose was left to slowly stir her cereal and take a few small bites. It would be at least another hour or two before the boys decided to tumble downstairs. She could count on her father waking up within the next thirty minutes, but part of her questioned if she really wanted company right now. The other part of her argued that she had gotten plenty enough alone time last night.

Right on schedule Marshall Jackson clunked his way down the steps in his casual weekend clothes. Rose was still amazed by her father’s clean business aura. No matter what day it was or what time had just clicked by, Marshall’s hair was combed, clean, and his eyes were bright and awake. She marveled briefly at how he did it.

“Did your mother already leave?” He asked as he moved determinably towards the cupboard to find his favorite tea. Rose nodded with a small hum of confirmation. “What are your plans for today, Rosy?” he questioned as he turned the tap on and filled their old kettle.

“I’m supposed to get a phone call today if I got that job at Mr. Hammond’s office.” She said around a mouthful of cereal and milk.

“I plan on taking Matty and Andrew to the park. Danny is going to stay at a friend’s house, but I’ll drop him off on the way.” Marshall made his way over to the fridge then peeked out from behind the open door. “Would you mind picking up some eggs today?” he asked.

Rose nodded and moved to put her dishes in the sink just as she heard the first stirrings upstairs that marked her brothers waking up. “I can go now.” She smiled at Marshall and offered her youngest brother a rub on the head as he darted past her and into the kitchen, eyes bright and searching for Elizabeth.

Rose closed the front door behind her and brushed more hair out of her eyes.

---

Getting the eggs home safely had been the least of Rose’s worries. After avoiding the uneasy feeling that had made a home in her stomach, she had decided that biting her nails over the phone call she hadn’t received yet was on the top of her list. The phone still hadn’t breathed a note by the time Marshall had returned with his two youngest sons. He had given his daughter a comforting smile when he noticed her form glued to the left side of the couch. But even the quick kiss he had planted on the crown of her head had done nothing to calm her.

It was a day wasted, Rose decided when the sun was beginning its lazy descent and Andrew was helping Marshall set the table for dinner.

It wasn’t until the food and drinks had filled the table that Rose remembered her mother’s missing presence. She glanced around the table but seemed to be the only one that was acknowledging the empty chair beside the one Daniel would be occupying if he wasn’t spending the night at his friend’s house. She dismissed Elizabeth’s absence for the rest of the meal and didn’t think about it again until later that night when, from her wide awake position on her bed, she heard the front door open.

Everyone had abandoned the television in favor of their own bedrooms, but as she counted what she knew to be her mother’s footsteps, Rose couldn’t help but struggle to remember hearing Marshall’s heavy walk up the stairs.

It came in whispers at first. A shift of the couch cushions here and a pause of silence there. Gradually it got louder until Rose dumbly wondered what the neighbors would think. She only bothered to catch a few words as she counted the glow in the dark star stickers she had impulsively bought today and arranged on her wall with therapeutic care.

Jobs and money and didn’t they have four children to feed?

Rose stopped counting the stickers in groups of four and continued on with triplets. Her imagination skipped between a recorded phone message apologizing about the lack of opportunity that could be provided to her by a business firm and a crisp white page listing why she wasn’t qualified to work a copy machine.

Money and bills and Matthew really missed you, Elizabeth.

I know and sorry and no, I didn’t get it.

From then on it was a careful game of playing sleep when Rose heard her bedroom door open for a brief moment of parental worry before being shut again with care. Then she was free to move from the bed, straighten the clothes she hadn’t changed out of, and shift around her dark room in search of her bag.

Rose had never been a dreamer and never been a teenager ready to run away from home, but she knew what to do and knew her window was easy to maneuver out of and down from. The grass muffled her solid landing and she started down the road after skirting carefully around the neighbor’s imaginary property lines.

It was dark and Rose had no idea which direction was the right one, but her pace was hurried enough to convince her mind that every step she took was progress. It wasn’t long before she was running and practically throwing herself around every corner she came in contact with.

She counted by threes in her head.

It wasn’t until she had slipped past the busy lights of a crowded street that she realized where she was supposed to be heading. Her feet quickened again and she skidded to a halt only two feet from the impossible blue box.

He was waiting.

“Have you ever felt…not right?” Rose asked between long breaths.

The Doctor let both eyebrows soar high above his sparkling eyes “I’m always right.” He answered with a smirk of a confidence and a gleam of amazement in his eyes.

Rose shook her head and huffed. “Not two plus two equals five not right.” She clarified with surprising patience. “Not belonging not right.”

Something sobered in the brown eyes before her and Rose was able, for once, to keep up with the shifting pattern that slowly bathed the man in a darker light. A long silence stretched between them. Rose finally caught her breath but found herself withholding the precious oxygen from her lungs.

The Doctor took a small pace to the side and pushed the door of his blue box open with a slow creak. “Care to show me what you mean?” He asked with a softer smile than before.

Rose nodded.