Clara pulled her olive jacket on, just at the foot of the stairs, and she pushed her hair out over the hood that hung loosely against her back, taking a few steps towards the bowl in which her keys sat, just by the door, but before she could make it outside, she felt his presence behind her and she glanced back at the Doctor with a smile and a nod of her head, "Going for a walk, care to join?"
He sighed and then nodded slowly, going to retrieve his own jacket to follow her outside where she casually took step after step, concentrating on the motions because, he knew, she wanted to perfect them. Clara wanted to be seen as absolutely normal despite the odd limp and the slow gait. Both would improve and then fade away with time he'd assured her, and better prosthetics.
"You," he pointed, "Were going to leave without telling me."
Her head bowed and he could see the smirk hiding behind the curtain of dark hair as she admitted, "Seems like every time I turn around either you or my dad is standing there."
"We're just trying to help," he told her sadly, feeling slightly guilty because it was the truth. It was a silent agreement they'd made between them at the hospital – they would look after Clara.
She glanced up sideways at him, seeing the rejection in his demeanor and she reached out to give his arm a squeeze, waiting for him to glance at her to smile and say, "I know, and I appreciate it – I truly do – but was it like that before? Where I couldn't go to the toilet without a chaperone?"
Laughing, the Doctor relented, "No, I suppose it wasn't – and that was one time."
"Don't think I don't see you checking on me when I step out," she teased.
"We just worry," he admitted.
"What are you worried about?" Clara asked.
He watched her as they continued on, then set his eyes on the ground in front of them and shrugged, telling her honestly, "The answer to that question can't so simply be quantified in a set number of reasons."
Raising a fist, Clara nodded, "Go on then, tell me. Let's quantify the impossibly unquantifiable together."
He smiled before beginning, "I worry about your prosthetic leg – if you've locked it properly, if it's damaged in any way, if you're going to see every obstacle in your path and be able to react to it in the way that you should instead of the way you've been learned your whole life."
Clara raised one finger, and then spoke quietly, "Martha explained how to lock it, I listen for the clicks and check and double check to ensure it's affixed to my leg proper and I'm aware to feel for defects or abnormalities that need to be addressed and I keep myself conscious of obstacles around me knowing that I will eventually learn to walk more comfortably, but it is not the same as it was before."
The Doctor watched her lower her finger back against her palm before waiting and he sighed, "I worry about you needing help to do ordinary things and that you'll be too stubborn to ask."
Her finger lifted again and she nodded, "I am absolutely stubborn, but not stupidly so, and have asked for help when I thought it necessary." Her finger came down and she shook her head at it. "Have I not?" He merely smiled and nodded.
"I worry about you," he told her quietly, stopping and waiting for her to come to a halt to turn carefully to look at him as he explained, "I worry about your memories and what would happen if they never came back, and oppositely I worry about what will happen when they do."
Clara's finger came up as she sighed, "I've got access to scrapbooks, photo albums, eventually the internet – if you two would stop fussing about it – and if I never get my memories back, I would say I'm doing a fairly good job of creating new memories," she smiled as he did, "And if I did get my memories back, what would there be to worry about? That I remember the accident? The pain? Some tragedy you or my father don't know about and couldn't warn me about?"
He watched her finger drift back down as she took a step back towards him, balled fist still turned up in his direction, waiting. He reached out and uncurled her palm, holding it in his and then lifting it to press a kiss into it before he sighed, "I worry about you, Clara."
She exhaled, tilting her head to look down at her palm to tell him, "Then you're wrong, what you worry about is absolutely quantifiable. You worry about me, a very singular thing."
"You may be a single being, but you are never a singular thing," he breathed. "You are unquantifiable, Clara. Within your singular existence is a network of singularities stacking together throughout your lifetime. You are the outcomes and complexities of a series of decisions, all based upon memories, based upon moments, based upon the choices you've made, ever expanding; always continuing. You are beautifully unquantifiable to me – never just a singular thing, but a bouquet of ever blooming possibilities and I refuse to acknowledge that as simple. Something to be ignored, shelved, forgotten." He took a long breath, watching the way she studied him, a look of absolute focus on her face as she waited. "When I say I worry about one thing or another, it's never truly one thing or another, it's the repercussions, it's the resonance, it's how it bounces against the past and ricochets into the future. I worry about all of you, all of the time, and I understand that occasionally one has a need for privacy, for a moment, but I worry about what occurs in those moments – what occurs in your mind in those moments and I fear those moments becoming a new reality, one you don't deserve; one you can't pull yourself from…."
"You're afraid my life won't take me down the same path because of this," she surmised, brow furrowed in confusion as she told him, "You're afraid I won't become the Clara you love."
He laughed, "You don't understand – there will never be a version of you that I don't love. However you echo out into the universe, I will always love you." He intertwined their fingers and continued, "What I worry about – what I fear – is that the pain of what you've been through is hiding somewhere inside of you and I won't be there when you release it because you have a horrible habit, Clara," he pointed with his free hand, "You try to protect me, but right now I have to protect you."
"You're not human, are you," Clara said softly and he paused, afraid to turn and see sincerity in her question, but when he glanced to her, she was grinning.
Tilting his head slightly and bringing it back up, he offered, "Alien, from outer space. Two hearts, twenty seven brains." Then he asked quickly, "Are you ok with that?"
Clara laughed, "Yeah, think I am. Yeah."
He gave her hand a squeeze as he sighed and gestured at the sidewalk ahead of them with a nod of his head to tell her, "Let's have ourselves an adventure then, eh, Clara?"
"Sounds awesome," she responded brightly as they moved forward together.
Of course, while his mind took them to a blue planet in a distant future, their actuality took them on a quick trip to the park where they sat on swings, legs hanging underneath them – or at least hers did, tip of her left foot scraping lightly against the ground as she swayed. He watched her, hands clasped in his lap, with a small smile as she looked over the children on the playground a few feet away, their shouts and laughter tugging her lips upwards as his hearts broke.
"Our baby will see every swing set in the galaxy."
"You can guarantee that, Doctor? Every single one?"
"Absolutely – I'll make a list to check each off."
"You stare an awful lot," Clara told him quietly. Her hands gripped at the metal chains on either side of her as she turned to watch his cheeks go red. "It's alright," she added quickly.
The Doctor looked to the children, reaching up to take hole of the chains at his sides. Then he turned back to her and sighed, resting his head against his knuckles of his left hand where it sat. "You wanted children," he admitted, "Do you still?"
It was her turn to blush as she looked to her knees with a subtle nod before turning her eyes to look at the way he was watching her. That same curious adoration that sent her stomach twisting delightfully. "Yeah, I've always wanted them."
"Your dad says he imagined you'd have a small army," he teased.
Clara laughed and shrugged, "Maybe not an army," she spoke, "But it'd be nice to have one or two." Her smile brightened as she admitted, "A little girl might be nice," then she turned to see the sadness in his eyes, "Or a boy, I wouldn't mind a boy." Then Clara asked him shyly, "Did we want children?"
The Doctor straightened and took a breath so deep his lungs burned before he told her quietly, "Yes, Clara, we did – definitely not an army though," he ended quietly.
Her shoulders bounced as she chuckled and looked timidly back to the ground, "Were we trying?"
"Trying?" He asked.
She smiled, "To have children." Her head tilted slightly as she reiterated, "We were trying to have children?"
He coughed a laugh at the ground and then looked up at her and nodded. Then he shrugged, "I suppose we were letting the universe decide our fate."
"Ah," she replied lightly, then she told him plainly, "Perhaps the universe was waiting for the accident, get all of this nonsense out of the way," she swung her right leg up slightly, giving it a grimace before shifting to look at the man at her side to begin, "And now… Doctor?"
Clara stood awkwardly as he turned away, but she'd seen the tears he'd shed despite his efforts to hide his face and wipe at it roughly. She carefully moved around the mound of dirt between the two swings and she came to stand in front of him, reaching out for the chains at either side of him as he stared off to his right, sniffling hard while refusing to meet her concerned glare. She could feel her own chest constricting at the sight of him looking so distraught and she wondered just what she'd said.
"Can we not?" Clara asked lightly, letting her hands move down to settle themselves atop his, wrapping her cool fingers around his hands and she ducked her head while shifting forward, parting his knees to wedge herself between them. "Doctor, can we not have children? Is that what you meant? The universe…"
He laughed and shook his head and glanced up at her sadly, "No, Clara, that's not it at all."
She slid her palms inward and then dropped them atop his shoulders before cupping his neck and asking him lightly, "Then what's wrong?"
"I wish we could be how we were before," he admitted, thinking about their easy conversations and their hopeful banter about the future. A future that included their daughter in their travels. Something they'd both been looking forward to enough that he knew if he searched long enough he'd find her list to match his – 101 places they would take their baby girl.
With a nod, she asked, "Am I different? Am I that different?"
He shook his head, "It's not that, I said I would love you, no matter…"
"Then why are you crying?" Clara interrupted boldly.
He watched the way she stared at his chin, breath quickening and he understood – she had every intention of being his and she was terrified that she wasn't measuring up, despite what he'd said, because this Clara hadn't yet developed the unwavering confidence his Clara had. This Clara didn't know how tightly she had him wound around her little finger and all she wanted was her life back: a life, she trusted, because of his promises, that would be amazing.
"Doctor?" She asked, voice a hushed whisper.
Straightening on the swings, he looked up at her sad eyes and he smiled before he gave her thighs a gentle squeeze of his knees and lifted up to catch her lips, feeling his hearts swell as she kissed him back comfortably and after a moment he shifted back and he nodded, "I just want to give you everything. I want to give you the universe and everything beyond it, but right now I want to take away the pain of not knowing."
"Doctor, you make no sense sometimes, you know that," she teased, sniffling against the tears welling in her own eyes over something she didn't understand, but was nagging at her.
He ducked his head shyly before peering up at her playfully and moving his hands to her waist, giving her sides a small rub of his thumbs as he nodded, "We should head home."
"I want to go home," she told him, then held him in place to assert, "Our home."
"Clara," he began with a shake of his head.
But she repeated firmly, "I want to go to our home. I want to see our home."
With a slow nod, the Doctor looked up into the determination in her eyes, knowing how disappointed she would be if he denied her the simple gratification of a look, and he allowed, "Alright, Clara, we'll pass by our home."