The beach always seemed colder in the morning, or at least that's how Clara remembered it, so that's how it felt. Wrapped in a yellow and green plaid throw, her daughter nestled against her chest, they looked out at the grey waves crashing into the rocky coastline as they hummed a tune together, waiting for the sun to begin to warm their bodies. It was creeping up over horizon, painting the sky in purples and pinks that would give way to a brilliant blue in the spots between the grey.
And maybe today it would melt away the clouds; it rarely did.
Taking a deep breath, Clara reveled in the salinity of the ocean air and she looked down at the head of thick dark hair resting against her bosom. She could see the tiny up-turned nose dotted in freckles, and she watched the round sun kissed cheeks lift slightly as the girl smiled out at the water knowing sunrise meant sand castles and exploration. It meant finding wading pools as the tide rolled out, and lifting gobs of seaweed to watch her mother make faces as she giggled; it meant critters scurrying about the rocky landscape that edged the ocean in their secret hiding space.
"Now, mummy?" The girl's voice whispered.
Clara hugged her and listened to her tiny chuckle of excitement as she breathed into her temple, "Net yet, sweetheart."
There was a restless sigh.
Laughing, Clara leaned to the left to watch her daughter's dark eyes disappear in slits as her giggles returned, and then became uncontrollable, body giving a shiver between the shakes of her laughter. Maybe they'd come too early, Clara considered, but she felt her daughter's hands slide into hers warmly and then grip, and she smiled knowing these were moments they would both remember for a lifetime. Looking to the girl who'd gone back to calmly watching the world around her, she hoped at least she would for a time.
Clara understood the memories of a child were fleeting, floating away as they grew – new memories replacing old ones; new knowledge at times warping them – but she could remember being on the beach with her own mother, huddled under a worn brown blanket decorated in pink hearts, waiting for day to replace dawn. Everything seemed simpler then, hearing her mother's voice in her ear, telling her about the boats in the distance and the way the sand would be swept out to sea and brought back again decades later with stories.
"If you listen hard enough to the wind, Clara," her mother would whisper in her ear, "You can hear those stories."
She smiled, looking back at her daughter, knowing she'd retain something of this, and she glanced out at a wave that crested and then fell against the beach with a loud crash, waiting until the rush of noise rolled away to reach up with one hand to brush the hair away from the girl's face to ask, "Maddie, will you remember this when you're older and have children of your own?"
Twisting slightly against her, the girl wrinkled her nose and giggled, "I don't want children, mummy."
She feigned disappointment, questioning, "Why's that?"
Lips dropping, Maddie stated nonchalantly, "Daddies leave," and then she turned her attention back to the ocean to ask, "Can I go play now, mummy?"
Clara remained, somewhat shocked at her daughter's statement, before mumbling incoherently and unwrapping the throw from around the child, watching her leap up and rush off. The fronts of her small feet dug holes in the sand as she ran, kicking it up behind her, and Clara felt her heart sink as she watched the girl in the little red flowered dress and black jacket drop to look into a wading pool curiously. Hands pressing into her knees, tongue settled just between her lips, Maddie studied the fish caught in those waters and then she moved to another to gasp at the new things she found.
Daddies leave.
Clara's eyes were warm with tears before she could stop them, but she pushed her hands over her cheeks to wipe them away, knowing her daughter shouldn't see her crying over that man. Not ever, she'd promised herself long ago. There was no easy way to explain to a five year old that it wasn't that daddies left, it was that when men were terrible, you ran as far and as fast as you could – especially when you were holding onto precious cargo, most especially if that happened to be your children.
And sometimes terrible men became their daddies.
"Mummy, come look at this!" The child shouted, a sound of excitement following that made Clara smile.
She stood, taking a step towards her daughter at her right, but then she noticed the faint shimmer of someone in the distance at her left and she shifted, placing herself between this person and Maddie, watching him slowly come into focus, as though emerging from a mirage. Clara pulled the throw tightly around her shoulders and she gave her daughter a quick glance, seeing her kneeling before a pool, wetting the edges of her dress, before Clara looked back at the man.
His dark pant legs were rolled up slightly, skinny ankles and bony feet awkwardly making their way along the wet sand and she narrowed her eyes to see he was in a snug grey vest, the white shirt underneath flapping against his thin arms with the breeze. Clara could see him tugging at an old bowtie wrapped around his neck and she furrowed her brow as he continued coming closer.
"You're not supposed to be here," she called out, her polite warning as she turned, seeing her daughter had moved further away, something that made her heart pound heavily in her chest.
He raised a hand and waved, then dropped it, rummaging in his pockets before plucking out a white handkerchief to flip around through the air as his show of peaceful approach, and she thought she could make out the hint of a smile on his square jaw. Clara thought maybe it was the effect of the heat in the air, or the hope she had that someone had simply crossed the dream streams temporarily, but she swore it was a sheepishly friendly smile.
"Hello," he sang, both hands coming up, white handkerchief still held tightly in his left. "Don't be alarmed, I'm merely coming to do a system's check – sorry for the intrusion." He bowed his head and she watched his thick dark hair flop about comically in the wind, and when he came close enough for her to begin making out the flatness of his nose and the lines on his forehead that seemed to date the youthful appearance of his demeanor, he lifted his pale green eyes to meet hers. "Registered a bit of a blip on the radar, was dispatched to make sure all was alright."
Nodding slowly, Clara looked to her daughter as she repeated, "Blip."
She turned and he was suddenly holding a tablet in his hands, long fingers sliding clumsily over screens and poking as he shifted his jaw back and forth. "Your heart monitor gave a jump, blood pressure spiked, medical concerns, you know..."
"Medical malpractice suits, more like," she interrupted on a laugh.
He glanced up at her again, another smile on his thin lips – this one amused – as he stated, "Clever clogs, exactly that." His eyes narrowed as he asked, "Are you alright?"
Clara was nodding before he'd finished his question and she gestured back at Maddie, telling him, "Just having a day at the beach with my daughter. All's well." She pointed to his tablet, "Go on, jot it down and report it, all's well."
He scribbled with a stylus and then tapped at the screen absently, staring down at the information before he sighed and the objects melted away, leaving his hands awkwardly open in front of him before his body gave a wiggle and he pushed his hands deep into his pockets, eyes finding hers again to ask, "Official documenting out of the way, are you alright?"
"You're a hologram," she laughed, "What does it matter?"
He pulled one hand out to raise a finger into the air, correcting with a broken voice, "I am an interface, and to me it matters very much."
Clara reached out to poke his shoulder, watching him rock back slightly and then he regained his footing to smile at her as she asked, "So you're a real man, plugged into the system?"
"Very much a real man," he started slowly, before finishing, "Very much plugged into the system."
She smiled.
He laughed and nodded to Maddie, "Having a good day with your girl then? All's in order?" He tilted his head knowingly as he continued, "Unofficially, anything you'd like to get off your chest? I am a particularly good listener, I'll have you know."
Shaking her head and giving him a polite smile, Clara pulled the throw tighter over her and she told him bluntly, "Nothing that's any of your concern, thank you."
Turning away from the hurt look on his seemingly innocent face, she began walking towards her daughter, when the man took several steps to her side, reminding her quietly, "I'm going to have to ask her as well, you understand, of course..."
Clara's feet dug into the sand as she slowed, hand coming up quickly to stop his forward momentum by pressing firmly into his chest as she shook her head and spat, "You'll do no such thing."
His hands came up and he offered, "I could supply you with the terms and conditions you signed that specifically state all persons within a controlled connected virtual dream state who experience technical or medical difficulty during the process require immediate evaluation and confirmation of health status or controlled connected virtual dream state must be halted until real life assessment can be determined..."
Jaw clenching tightly, Clara explained, "She's a child, please, just let us have this dream."
He frowned, "I'm very sorry, Ms. Oswald – I have to ask her, and in this particular instance, you know I have to do it here."
Nodding slowly and feeling somewhat betrayed, Clara bowed her head and then turned, calling, "Maddie, could you come here a moment."
The girl straightened, hands rubbing over her dress guiltily, and then she began to rush across the sand in a flurry of hurried steps. She arrived at her mother's side with a sly grin, out of breath, as she looked between her mother and the man she'd been speaking to and after a few huffs, Maddie asked, "Who is this? I thought no one else could come here," she added on a whisper, finger hovering over her lips, "Our secret spot."
Before Clara could answer though, the man shot out a long arm – palm extended – and told her brightly, "Hello, I'm the Doctor."
Clara's eyes shifted back to him in confusion as Maddie giggled and asked, "The doctor of what?" Then she smiled and asserted, "I know lots about doctors."
Frowning, Clara watched her daughter shake this man's hand as he grinned foolishly down at her to respond, "The Doctor is my name, bit of a doctor of everything, really, but today it's you." He looked to Clara and then back at Maddie and he crouched to look her in the eye and ask, "How are you feeling today, Madeline?"
Nodding her head back to the waters, Maddie offered, "I've seen seven kinds of fish and a crab and something mashed up that once might have been a crab." She frowned and huffed a breath before smiling again and gripping Clara's thigh to tell him, "Good, sir, I feel good today."
Head tilting back, the Doctor's mouth opened in a silent laugh before he responded, "That's good, Madeline, that's very good to hear."
"Now you know," Clara stated curtly. She nodded to the distance behind him and explained, "You can go now."
He straightened and looked her over, nodding and then telling her softly, "Honestly, Ms. Oswald, it's only a precaution – for your health and the health of your daughter – because I care." He then leaned forward to whisper, "Any other agent would have simply made a visual acknowledgement and we both know, given Madeline's current state, it's probably best to probe further than a simple superficial glance."
Clara felt her heart catch as he dropped back onto his heels to smile down at Maddie, currently grinning up at him, and Clara nodded slowly, responding quietly, "Thank you."
There came a sigh from his thin lips and then he nodded bashfully and she swore his cheeks reddened just a tiny bit before he allowed, "With your permission, I'll be assigning myself to your case file – ensure that, should there be any future issues, a familiar face for your daughter would be around to check on you."
Maddie gave a small hop and looked up at Clara, giving her the subtlest of nods and Clara brushed a hand over her dark hair, exhaling as she glanced back at the Doctor and responded hesitantly, "Permission granted."
With a cheerful grin, he extended his hand and Clara reached out to take it, understanding this was an official acknowledgement of her statement and she gave it one quick shake before withdrawing her palm and watching him wave to Maddie before blinking out of existence. She frowned, and then looked out at the calm ocean and the birds shrieking overhead.
"Does the sky seem bluer, mummy?" Maddie questioned curiously.
Clara laughed, but she did have to admit, it was brighter and bluer than she'd ever seen in a dreamscape and she bent to tickle her daughter quickly, listening to her laughter before she said, "Let's go exploring!"
Her daughter rushed away with a squeal and before she knew it, they were lying back in the sand, her daughter spread over Clara's crossed legs, the girl's fingers tracing clouds in the sky as she breathed up at her, "I'm tired, mummy."
Nodding, Clara reached forward to touch her temple, just as she kissed her forehead, and she whispered gently on a nod, "Then go back to sleep."
She jerked awake in bed, breathing erratic as she reached up to tug the nodules off each of her temples and the one at her chest to toss them onto the machine that sat atop her bedside table. Clara opened her eyes and looked to the darkened room before turning to glance at the blue display on her digital clock, seeing that it read five in the morning. More than enough time, she told herself as she pulled herself out of bed for a quick shower before readying for work and rushing out the door, knowing she could have a few minutes if she hurried.
The car zipped through the light early morning traffic on her instructions towards a hospital in the heart of a city of glistening silver spires and soon Clara was listening to her heels click along the recently polished floor as she made her way through the lobby and onto the lift, then into the halls, scanning her badge at security pads to allow her access into the ward and then the private room. It was her father's doing, the autumn colored walls and a framed painting made to resemble a window overlooking the fake skyline of London, and Clara smiled every time she moved through that door remembering his words as she looked to her child, lying in a hospital bed, as if lost to a dream in a deep sleep.
"If she wakes, Clara, she should be home," he'd told her.
Of course, it wasn't allowed. Maddie required monitoring and physical therapy and sadly it was more affordable for Clara if the girl remained in the care of hospice. The only other option was quitting her job, or hiring a full time nurse, and risking her daughter's health by taking her home – the latter she refused to do. Her daughter had been through enough, she'd decided long ago.
Quietly moving around the bed, Clara switched on a television that hung against the wall and she smiled at the cartoons, raising the volume and looking to Maddie's pale face, completely still in spite of the noise, and then to the machines beside her. They beeped, lines racing their way in zigzags of differing heights across a screen in an array of colors, and she took a long breath knowing her daughter's condition hadn't changed. Chances were slim they ever would, she knew. But she held onto that slim chance, smiling at the girl as she sat calmly in the chair beside her, reaching up to brush her fingers through thick bangs the mirrored her own.
"That was a funny adventure last night, sweet pea," Clara told her. "I'm sorry we were interrupted." On a laugh, she continued "But did you see his bowtie? Wasn't that the silliest thing you've ever seen?" Clara watched her daughter breathe in and out steadily, her small chest rising and falling with the lines on the screens beside her. She ran the backs of her fingers over the girl's smooth cheek and touched her heart, feeling for the familiar beats as her eyes closed. "He was a silly man," she offered, hands shifting to take the small one lying on the bed in front of her.
Lifting it to her lips, she pressed a warm kiss to Maddie's fingers and felt her throat constrict remembering just how they used to hold her hand. How they used to twirl her hair and scribble with crayons and smash at her food. Clara could remember the first time she held that very hand and how those slender fingers had wrapped themselves around her thumb as they cried together.
Dreams, she knew, could offer memories of touch, but they couldn't replicate it in the same way. At least that's what everyone would always tell her. After a year of dreams, she wasn't sure that was the exact truth. She wasn't truly sure what the truth of it was at all except that she knew what her daughter felt like and she felt it every night they spent together.
"Mummy's off to work, Maddie, but I promise I'll be back."
With trembling lips, she settled her hand back on the bed beside her tiny body and for a moment she watched it, hoping against hope that just one of her fingers would twitch. They would tell her it was some automatic reflex, they'd done so before, but Clara waited anyways. For just a minute; the same minute she gave completely to hope every time she visited. Some sign that Maddie understood her mother was there in that moment – because she never remembered in dreams and it broke Clara's heart every night. Maddie knew of only their dreams, but she had no knowledge of the time in between and Clara swallowed the lump in her throat over the thought as she bent to kiss the girl's forehead and then each of her cheeks before forcing herself to walk from that room.
Forcing herself to leave her daughter behind.