The next morning Clara left her flat and headed into central London, deciding to forgoe her planned cleaning day. There was no sign of the Doctor, she figured if he really wanted her he'd just turn up in her flat and surprise her in the middle of the night. Like he'd done a few weeks ago which caused her to have a small heart attack.
Over the course of the morning she had avoided temptation to look more closely at the phone, it now had several messages, emails and notifications. She'd browsed through the photos, but stopped when she felt it getting weird. It seemed to be various photos of landscapes and objects interspersed with occasional nights out drinking with other people. All she knew was her name was Emily.
She had debated what to wear for an hour, settling on a red and black checked shirt, black jeans, black trainers and her dark green coat. Perfect for a Saturday morning, browsing around the market. She was debating what to do after the meeting, maybe a stroll to the river, Borough Market or Oxford Street... somewhere away from Shoreditch though, she didn't want to run into any of her kids or, even worse, their parents.
She took the Northern Line to Moorgate and walked towards Liverpool Street, noticing the different crowds on the tube than during the week, lots more kids, pushchairs and people wearing denim.
She cut through Finsbury Circus, covered in works for Crossrail these days, towards Liverpool Street, stopping off for a coffee on the way. It was 1pm, she sat in the window of a Starbucks near the station debating what to do. She got the phone out, typed in the code and rang her number. After about a minute it answered.
"Hello?" came the female voice. There was faint laughter in the background, accompanied by a dull thud and a muffled, "shh!"
"Oh hello, it's Clara, you know, umm, the woman who accidentally stole your phone last night. You said to give you a call when I was at here," she said awkwardly, "so hence, you know, calling you." The English teacher in her practically collapsed at her use of fillers.
"Oh yes, hi," the voice at the end of the phone said, "and where are you?"
"At Spitalfields, well, near there. You said to call you after 12."
"Did I? I got wasted last night," said the voice, "still at home. Can you give me an hour?"
"Yes, of course, where should I meet you?" Clara said.
"Do you know the All Saints on the corner?"
Clara knew exactly where she meant, she had bought her favourite black leather trench coat from there six months ago at great expense. "I think so," she lied.
"Ok, I'll see you there in an hour."
"Yes, I will see you then," Clara said.
"Bye." The phone cut off. It was 1.15pm now. Clara had an hour to kill.
Clara flipped the phone end to end in her hands and then replaced it into her bag. She didn't rush to finish her coffee, using the time to people watch out of the window. She flipped through a discarded copy of the previous night's Evening Standard.
After twenty minutes she decided to have a browse around the market, looking at the various clothes, accessories, vintage furniture and patisseries it was near enough 2pm, so she crossed Commercial Street to wait. She fought off the urge to go inside.
About ten minutes later, she heard someone calling her name.
"Hey, Miss Oswald!" It was Courtney Woods and five of her friends all holding various shopping bags. She sighed inwardly. They started laughing.
"Hello Courtney," she said, trying not to display her annoyance, "how are you today?"
"We're out shopping, Miss," said Courtney, she smiled widely.
"I can see that, Courtney," she said sarcastically, knowing she had to engage with them or face them being unruly for the next couple of weeks, "have you bought anything nice?" This was awkward to the point of being painful.
"Just some clothes, Miss, and some makeup, and some shoes." She fished a dark green hat out of the bag and put it on. "What do you think, Miss?"
Clara spied the stranger out of the corner of her eye, deciding to use her as a way to get away. She was wearing dark blue jeans, dirty blue cons and an oversized dark purple knitted jumper. She was carrying the yellow bag she'd seen yesterday. "I like it," she lied said slightly distracted, "it really brings out the colour of your eyes."
"I told you!" Courtney exclaimed to her friends with a look of pride. "Miss Oswald likes it Tee!" she said to a friend she didn't recognise from Coal Hill, "I don't care what you think. What are you doing here Miss?"
"I am...' she paused, "meeting a friend of mine I haven't seen since I went to university." She was deliberately vague, no way was she giving any details of her life to the kids. Clara made to walk towards where the stranger was standing and caught her eye. Courtney rummaged inside her bag and pulled out a scarf.
"Do you think this scarf goes with this hat, Miss?" It was quite clear these kids weren't going anywhere. The stranger began walking towards her.
"Hang on, Courtney," she said. "Hello you!" she said brightly. Clara went in to hug the stranger against her protestations saying under her breath quickly, "please please help me, can you play along so I can lose these kids otherwise they will follow me all day."
Clara pulled away from the hug to see Courtney had put the scarf on and was mid twirl encircled by her friends. "Abbie says they don't go but I think they do, what do you think, Miss?"
Clara looked at her, "I think they look excellent together, what do you think?" she aimed at the stranger.
"I... agree," she said, confused.
Courtney looked angrily to one of her friends and kissed her teeth loudly. "Told you you were wrong." She spun to look at Clara smiling, "thanks Miss and-"
"I need to go Courtney, I see enough of you lot during the week, don't I?" She hoped they would get the hint.
"But Miss-"
"Our friends are waiting for us, we need to go," the stranger said, to Clara.
"Courtney... and friends... I will see you on Monday, enjoy your weekend."
"You too, Miss," Courtney said. "Glad to see you are going out enjoying yourself after what happened to Mr Pink."
"What?" said Clara, taken aback. "Go on, go!" she snapped, waving them away. "Or... extra homework next Friday!" Clara grabbed the stranger by the arm and walked quickly in the opposite direction to the group. "We need to get as far away from that," she pointed with her thumb behind her, "as possible... right now."
"Ok..."
"Bye, Miss!" Courtney shouted down the road.
She crossed the road back into the market where it was busy, stopping to look behind. The group were walking towards Shoreditch High Street.
"Oh, thank god for that," Clara leant against the grey granite entrance gates, "I'd have still been there on Monday morning! That never gets any easier. Thank you," she smiled. "I suppose I should introduce myself, I'm Clara," she held out her hand.
"Emily," the stranger said, shaking Clara's outstretched hand with her own. "Do you have my phone?"
"Oh yes, yes I do," Clara said, getting the handset out and passing it to her, "here you go."
"I can't believe I almost lost this," Emily said, putting it in her back pocket, "has some really important photos on there." She retrieved Clara's phone out of her own bag offering it out, but snatched it back before Clara got hold of it.
"Am I allowed it back or...?" Clara said, confused.
"Why is Jane Austen texting you..." she held out the screen towards Clara, "this?"
Clara couldn't help but laugh out loud as she read the text message and blushed bright red. It was a picture message of Jane standing next to an oil painting of them both, pointing and grinning. Jane was on the left of the painting, Clara was on the right with a moustache and a goatee beard drawn on in black paint. The caption read, 'Sense and Insensibility.'
"That," she thought of an appropriate answer, "that is... a very long story."
"Are you for fucking real?" said Emily, incredulous.
"It's kind of a thing we do," said Clara, trailing off, looking away. "Totally explainable, but a very very long story."
"You are completely mental, that is the only explanation," Emily said, her facial expressions displaying a mixture of curious distain.
"So are you going to give me my phone back or..?" Clara said, slightly impatiently.
"And what were you doing apparently on the moon with that girl with the hat?" Emily said, more interested.
"Oh yeah... I'd forgotten about that," she smiled to herself. "That, again, is a very long story," Clara sighed, "I don't have to explain myself to you, a complete stranger."
"No you don't," she said, smiling. "But you can... if only to say thank you for lying to that girl."
"Lying? About what?" Clara asked.
"The hat and the scarf," Emily laughed, "her friend was right, no way did they go. Isn't there some sort of teacher code that says you don't lie to children?"
"Yes there is," Clara nodded, laughing, "unless that child is the most annoying or disruptive in the school... or you are an exceptionally good liar."
'And which applies?" Emily asked, intrigued now.
"Both," she said, with a glint in her eye.
Emily held out Clara's phone to her. "You can have this back," she tugged it back slightly as Clara got hold of it, "on one condition."
"And that is?" She wrestled this phone free of Emily's grasp.
"I've had a really shit couple of days and need a distraction, fancy telling me that Jane Austen story over a drink?"
Clara thought for a minute, she had nothing better to do, and she felt bad. "Sure," she said. "Coffee or drink drink?"
"You're buying, I don't mind, the least you can do," Emily said dismissively.
"Ok then," Clara said, thinking where to go, "there's a bar around the corner, we can try there?" She walked towards the market.
"Can I just make a phone call?" Emily said, "I just need to let someone know what I'm doing. Just in case you turn out to be a serial killer."
"Yes, yes, of course, go ahead," Clara said. She continued walking.
Emily found her phone, tapped it a few times and then put it to her ear. "Hi, it's me," she said before pausing, "yes I've got it," she looked at Clara. "Yes," she smiled, turning around and walking away slowly out of Clara's earshot.
Clara looked at her own phone, the Doctor had called her 45 times. She ignored it, there were a couple of read messages from her dad, that picture message from Jane and the messages Emily had sent her.
Emily walked back, "I'll call you when I'm done, yeah?" She laughed. "Bye." She walked back to Clara, "so where are you taking me?"
"Do you know BE 1?" Clara said as they walked.
"Yes," said Emily, nodding. "Got chucked out of there a couple of years ago."
"For what?"
"I don't actually remember, off my face on pills probably, wasn't a great time for me personally."
"I see," Clara said, not wanting to pry further. They approached the blue hoarding of the bar
"You mind if I smoke?" said Emily, taking out a packet of ten Marlboro menthols, offering one to Clara from the box.
"No thanks, I don't smoke, but go ahead," she smiled.
Emily took a lighter from her pocket which didn't spark up after two goes, she shook it a few times and lit the cigarette off the small flame once it got going, shielding it from the breeze.
'I'm trying to give up," she said, taking a large breath in, turning her head away to blow the exhaled smoke into the wind and not into Clara's face. "So where are you from? That's not a London accent you have is it?" Emily asked, holding the cigarette up to her mouth to take another drag.
"No it's not," Clara agreed, "I'm from Blackpool originally, about as northern as they come, but I've lived here for about six or seven years... how about you?"
"Bristol."
"I went to Bristol fairly recently," Clara said.
"Oh yeah?" Emily took a large drag of the cigarette.
"A couple of years ago, the Doctor-"
"The bloke that keeps calling you?"
"Yeah, he was supposed to drop me off in London but only got me as far as Bristol."
"What part?"
"Some estate, I can't remember the name, but his TA... car, his car broke down and I had to help him fix it."
"You don't strike me as a mechanic..." Emily laughed.
"I'm not, I met a guy called Rigsy who was on community service and got him to help me."
"All of your friends sound like drug dealers," Emily said, slightly under her breath, taking another drag.
"I suppose they do, don't they!" she realised. "Ever been to Blackpool?"
Emily shook her head, exhaling a plume of smoke. "Isn't it all hen parties and illuminations and stuff? And a poor man's Eiffel Tower?"
"Mainly, yes," she found it hard to disagree, "hence why my parents moved down here."
Emily finished her cigarette and threw it down inside a nearby drain. "Thanks for that," she said.
Clara pushed the door and walked in towards the bar. "So... Emily, what can I get you?" Emily picked up the cocktail menu and cast her eye over it.
"Amaretto and coke? Too early for cocktails." Emily said. "Still a bit drunk after last night."
"What can I get for you ladies?" said the bartender after a few seconds.
"Amaretto and coke and..." Clara looked down the wine list, "a glass of the Zinfandel for me."
He disappeared a little further along the bar and reappeared shortly with the two drinks. "Thanks," said Clara handing the bartender her card. He tapped it on the reader and handed it back to her. She hoped the next twenty minutes or so wouldn't be too awkward.
A couple had just left a table by the window behind them, Clara walked up to it and put her bag on the seat. She moved the two drinks onto the table, swapping them for the two empty glasses. She shrugged off her jacket and put it over the back of her chair.
Emily took a seat and then a sip of her drink, staring out of the window.
"So what brought you to London?" said Clara, trying to break the ice.
"I moved down here after my gap year," Emily said, "with my girlfriend and a friend from back home."
"Where did you go travelling?" Clara asked, interested.
"Goa, and then Mexico," she looked out of the window again.
"Nice," Clara said, impressed, "I have so many things I want to see, I always just end up going to different places. The Doctor takes me travelling all the time."
"Are you seeing him?" Emily asked, reading between the lines.
"What? No! He looks old enough to be my dad, coupled with the fact he looks like a magician. Maybe when he was younger when he used to wear fezzes and bowties, but not now. God no." Clara laughed. "All purely platonic."
"Your life is fucked up," Emily shook her head, "some old man takes you travelling. Sounds a bit creepy to me."
"I guess it does to an outsider, but he has taken me to some awesome places, and after Danny died he was really there for me," Clara said, looking at her wine as she swirled it around her glass.
"Who's Danny? Your brother? Boyfriend?" Emily fished for information.
"He was my boyfriend," Clara said, taking a sip of wine. "I was talking to him on the phone and he got hit by a car."
"I'm sorry," Emily said.
"Thank you, it's ok, the Doctor tried to help me save him, but it was too late. Do you remember when those clouds formed over the graveyards and rained?"
"What?" Emily said, perplexed.
"Never mind, it was then," Clara said, "I was a complete mess for weeks and the Doctor helped me through it." She smiled at Emily.
"So he's like a bereavement counsellor then?"
"Not really, but I guess so. He helped me get over it," said Clara, "he takes me to some amazing places."
"Like where?" Emily asked.
Clara blurred a few of the minor details. "We've been to a twenties dress up night on the Orient Express, an underwater city, a haunted mansion, a Viking reenactment, a Lunar training facility, Las Vegas by the way of a Communist submarine..."
"I wish I'd had someone like that to help me," Emily said, "to just escape and take my mind off stuff. Maybe you could give me his number?" she laughed.
"Unless you want an old Scottish man turning up in your bedroom at all hours I wouldn't advise it," Clara said, smirking.
"Old man turning up in your bedroom unannounced? That is just fucking weird, no thanks. You know, I can't work out if you are just crazy or making this stuff up," Emily looked at her closely, finishing her drink. She didn't make any movements to leave.
"What do you think?" Clara said.
"I think I want another drink, you still haven't told me about Jane Austen." Emily said. "I read all the messages, she seems like a right laugh."
"You won't believe me," Clara said, blushing.
"Maybe not, but I am enjoying the free drink," Emily said.
"Same again?" said Clara.