Disclaimer: Playing with two of my favourite characters in the wonderful world of the BBC.
Clara's head moved in a gentle rhythm as the Doctor breathed in the crisp clear air. The gentle breeze cooled the warmth, causing Clara to snuggle closer into the Doctor's shoulder. The sky was a pale blue, as though a painter has swirled his colours in a watery blur, streaking white clouds across his canvas. A slight wind ruffled the silver curls brushing the forehead of the timelord, Clara noticed this as she stroked them, her fingers moving steadily down his face, to cup his cheek.
"I love you, you know." Dropping down her hand she relaxed, grass prickled the back of her legs as she continued to stare, convinced that the heavens above were nothing compared to the man beside her.
"Even so, I wish I could be more…" the Doctor stopped, he had struggled to end this sentence for a while, and it plagued his thoughts each and every time. More handsome, more her age, more entertaining, more immature, younger. More like him. He was him, but then at the same time, he really wasn't, too much had changed, and even now he could scarce believe that Clara cared for him in the same way that she had cared for the idiot with the big chin.
Clara sighed, this train of thought had gone on long enough, and she was rather sick of the Doctor wallowing in this stream, he was convinced, despite all her attempts to prove him otherwise, that his predecessor had been better, and that she would have been better off with him.
"The only more that you ever need to be, is more content, and more certain that I love you, that I have always loved you and that I have never loved you more than I do now, and I shall continue to love you more each day."
Clara rolled over onto her forearms, staring at her Doctor. Her. Doctor. The man that she had saved, but also the man that had saved her. Her Doctor, as she was now prone to calling him, had only ever been the lanky, grey hair, wiry Scottish man with a peculiar preference for velvet lined coats and electric guitars. The other Doctor, the one that whisked her away had been preoccupied, had been in love with another, whilst her Doctor, her Doctor did love her, and of this she was certain. And so, she loved her stick insect of a man, who could save worlds and defeat evil beings, who knew the inner workings of all of time and space, yet could still remember her favourite tea, the book she read to calm her, the tells in her face and body that gave away what she was feeling. He knew her inside and out, and she would never have wished for anyone else to have such knowledge.
The Doctor sighed, time and time again she would reassure him, console him, convince him or her love, and still the guilt lingered, the life he had taken away, her job, her family, and she had left it all to be with him. He knew he would part with time and space to be here just right now, lying in a grassy meadow, cloud watching with her by his side. But never the less he felt the guilt.
Clara knew where his thoughts had strayed, they had done this too many a time, she squeezed hand.
"I'd leave it all again." Her voice was a whisper by now, close to his ear, soothing his thoughts.
"One day, I will fade, we know this, and you will live on, but I will not regret one day of this, every day in your presence is one more of a life well lived. A day spent anywhere else would be a waste, and I intend not to waste a single day of this precious life."
The doctor swallowed, taking in her words, they penetrated his brain, breathed into his lungs, filled his blood and pumped around his body, riocheting into his heart. At that moment the Doctor was sure, and never before did he utter a statement so true.
"I know."