The bells on the door jingle, and they're met by a pleasant, "Hello! Welcome to Eddie's Diner!" from the friendly girl working the bar. She's got precious orders tight in her hands, and her eyes are on the new customer. Is that a guitar swung over his back?
He advances on her, specifically her, and she smiles his direction. She really has to send these orders into the kitchen, but she figures she could at least be kind enough to tell the man how it goes around there. "Just sit where you like. I'll be with you in a second." She's about to head off into that kitchen, but he just overlaps her with a sturdy, Scottish, "No," that gets demands her full attention.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You said 'Hello.' No. That's wrong." He hangs over the bar, peers up at her. "This is 'Goodbye.'" He certainly doesn't seem to care much about what impression he leaves on people. Right now he's acting like a creep, drawing the attention of some of the diner's most loyal customers.
The barmaid peers back at him, looks him over. She hasn't seen him before...at least she doesn't think so. "Have we met?"
When he smiles at her, there is a wistful glimmer in his eye."Oh, Clara Oswald, we did more than meet." She returns the smile, out of respect but with dear apology. "I think you might have the wrong person. My name is Kay," She points at the label clipped to her bright blue uniform, in efforts to avoid any accusations of being a liar. No one really calls her by her name anyway, it's all just "Miss," or "Ma'am" or "Hey, food person!" no matter how many times she says, "My name's Kay, if you need anything." It feels good to finally put that tag into good use. "Mouché. Not Oswald. So sorry. Perhaps I just...look like someone." She really has to get to those orders right about now.
His gaze fixes on the table's scribbly patterns, which he's tracing with his left index finger. It's almost as if he's talking to the scribbles when he replies, "Oh, you look a lot like someone." Straightening his back at last so perhaps Kay can get to her work, he looks around. This place, with all these people and conversations and skillets...it's not for him. Friendliness is not for him. He gives the table a final, "Nice meeting you" tap, and takes a step away.
"Leaving?" The girl asks, seriously wondering about him now. He's a creep, those types of men her mom warned her about going into the waiting service. Yet something's just so sad about him, something about those big sad eyes. As a waitress, she does have a duty of care. Those orders can wait at least a tiny bit longer.
He stops, turns halfway back, as if just a quarter more would make him start thinking of those eggs. "Well, that's kind of why I said my goodbye. I'm taking my leave. Letting things go." He turns away, and it's a little easier now. "Goodbye, Clara."
He heads for the doors, and she watches him, very curious. It was a very curious encounter, and she should be glad she might never see him again, but admittedly, seeing him go brings her melancholy.
When he is alone in his TARDIS, he thinks. He remembers.
"When you run with the Doctor, it feels like it will never end. But however hard you try, you can't run for ever. Everybody knows that everybody dies, and nobody knows it like the Doctor. But I do think that all the skies of all the worlds might just turn dark, if he ever, for one moment, accepts it."
The people he's lost, the stars he's seen, the civilizations he's saved, but it's always the same question.
" Why? Why would I give her my screwdriver? Why would I do that?Thing is, future me had years to think about it, all those years to think of a way to save her, and what he did was give her a screwdriver. Why would I do that?"
Why?
"Oh! Oh! Oh, look at that. I'm very good!"
And sometimes, when he's caught up in his memories...
"What have you done?"
"Saved her."
...he gets an idea.