A/N: This is just a short prompt fill from a tumblr prompt: "Twelve walks into a bookstore cafe during a rainy day and sees Clara for the first time since getting his memory 'wiped'." Of course it's sad.
Coincidence
There are times when he remembers her face better than others.
Of course he could attempt to fix the memory wipe that only partially took her from him manually, but he ruled that out several times. There were fluxes and whatnot to consider; biological stressors that would be too great for even his heightened Time Lord physiology. The universe didn't have to survive, only he and Clara, and taking him out of the equation would have been a bit rash considering the goal.
So instead he wandered, traveled, hoping to find the thing that would flip the correct switch in his brain and he could run back to her. Every so often he would see something: a dimple, impossibly large eyes, a smile… but it would leave him within minutes. It was, very possibly, his age creeping up on him—not many Time Lords had lived as long as he did, let alone regenerated as much as he had, and it was very possible this was the beginnings of senility in his advanced age.
No, not him. He was a lot of things, but senile was not one of them. Old, well, he started being old a couple millennia before his time trapped in the confession dial. Thinking about it made the hairs on the back of his neck bristle—the only way he would curse would be to curse them, and there was little else he wanted to do as he wandered about the galaxies, nowhere to hang his hat. Maybe that's why he stopped wearing one, after his chin stopped being so big and his hair all floppy. Back then he could pop into the Ponds', put his Stetson on a peg by the door, and everything would be fine. With Clara, he didn't need to hang a hat anywhere—at first he was afraid to, but then he realized it was because everywhere was home with her.
Today his travels landed him in a small, rainy little town in a human colony whose name he didn't bother to learn. It's often rainy on this planet to some degree, he quickly surmised, as very few people seemed bothered by the weather. He, however, was suddenly missing the days he carried around an umbrella as he ducked into a storefront. It was a café, a tiny hole-in-the-wall type of place that served things unpronounceable even with the translation circuit going at full-blast, and it was one that allowed him to play for a coffee and sandwich instead of kicking him out for loitering. He finished up his song set and plucked his payment from the counter, sitting down in a corner with his back to the rest of the patrons.
"Can I join you?"
The Doctor glanced up mid-bite to see a woman standing next to him with her own drink and a pastry. He looked around and saw that there were plenty of empty tables; she was asking for a reason.
"As long as you don't mind having your back to the window," he said with a mouth half-stuffed with food. He watched as she sat across the table from him, attempting to read her. Brown hair, brown eyes, pale skin, a tiny button nose, eyebrows that were neat though rivaled his… the face she wore sent a pang through him, one that he only halfway understood.
"You played well," she said, motioned towards the guitar leaning on the wall. "What was that last one called?"
"'Clara'," he replied.
"She must've been very pretty."
"It's difficult to remember," he frowned. "I lost my memory of her, you see, and while I know she was there, no matter how hard I think about her, I can't recall what she looked like."
"There have been worse reasons to write songs about a girl."
"A woman… and I suppose you're right." He took a long sip of coffee, feeling warmth pool in his stomach as the sugary, milky liquid went down. "We traveled a lot, so I'm traveling to see if I can find her again."
"…and you're sure she's out there?"
"There's no way she isn't."
"That's a lot of faith you have in her."
"I don't have faith in much these days, but I do in that she's somewhere, possibly looking for me as well, and that one day we'll run into one another again, because I need to thank her for everything. I can never thank her enough and I don't know if she knows that."
"Maybe she does, and she travels around hoping that one day you'll have her back again," the woman replied. The Doctor raised an eyebrow—that was rather specific—and watched as she bit into her pastry. "Maybe she travels because there were two people for her in the entire universe: one of them is dead and the other is you."
"I don't…"
Silently, the woman reached across the table and placed her hand on his face. A mental link connected between them and suddenly everything came flooding back to him. He blinked the tears from his eyes, amazed at his fortune.
"Clara…?"
"Look at me, Doctor—keep your eyes on me," she ordered. "We're working on a way… Ashildr and I are working towards finding a cure for this memory loss of yours. Obviously, we haven't found a permanent one, but it works while you're looking at me."
"I've tried figuring out a manual way around it and there is none that could work without killing me in the process."
"There's a way according to the Time Lords. We were able to get this far basing things on the Silent Priests' defenses, but it only goes so far."
"How long has it been?"
"Doctor…"
"How long has it been?"
"It's been twenty years since I last saw you, and it was another thirty-seven before that, and twelve before that, and… it's been a long time, Doctor."
He scowled at that, though took her hand from his face and held it in his own. "Why does it feel like this is the first time we've seen one another?"
"…because that's how your brain is functioning right now." Her eyes did that inflating thing that he so clearly remembered—he remembered!—and she too had to fight tears. "Just know that we're trying, okay?"
"It hurts not knowing when I'll finally remember you properly," he admitted.
"I know."
"It's never going to end, is it?"
"I wish it would, and then we could be together again, like good old times."
"Just the Doctor and Clara Oswald in the TARDIS."
"Just once, the universe will have to bend the rules."
The Doctor grinned, knowing she was right. "Since this won't last forever, at least let me get this in, or I won't forgive myself," he said. Standing up, he stepped forward and leaned down, pressing his lips to hers. Coffee and lemon tart, time and stardust, tea and bread; his senses overflowed and he closed his eyes, savoring the kiss until he stood upright again.
Wait… why was his head all filled with cotton fluff? Why was he standing there? Who was this woman?
"I'm sorry… erm… let me get my guitar before your dining partner comes back," he said, diving for his instrument. "Thank you; I must get going."
"See you around then, space cowboy," the woman teased. He started at her for a moment before walking out the door. The last thing he thought of himself as was a cowboy—how American. Then again, she did sort of look a little like a waitress in an American diner he met once. Must have been coincidence.
Yeah. Coincidence.