Clara sits on the school's front steps, gnawing on her thumb.

The Doctor's fifteen minutes late, and she's trying not to panic.

There could have been traffic. Martha could have called with an important update. He could have stopped for petrol…

But her heart's jackhammering in her chest, the old familiar anxiety rising.

Left behind without any warning, without a goodbye… at Christmas, in Glasgow, on the front steps of her flat, in a prison cell on Thalaxis…

She looks up hopefully at the sound of a motorbike arriving... but it's not him, just some lanky hipster boy. She props her chin in her hand and sighs.

"Sorry I'm late!" Hipster Boy yells in an incredibly familiar voice, removing his helmet.

"D-Doctor?" Clara's jaw drops. "You've got… um... fashion on you."

"Coffee, actually, partial reason for the lateness, and we'll need to get a new washing machine. Accidentally used the vaporize setting... well, accidentally gave it a vaporize setting, then accidentally used it." He looks down at his outfit. "Oh, you mean the clothes! They're Rory's. I was recently reminded that we're the same size."

"But... I had all of your clothes in the closet...?"

"Well, you'd gone to such trouble to have those mummified, and..." he drops his voice, suddenly bashful. "I thought perhaps you might like it."

Clara melts a little at his shy admission, biting her lip as she takes him in.

Objectively speaking, he does look nice; if he'd worn this costume to meet her family all those Christmases ago, she would have done cartwheels of relief.

But it's just not right.

He looks... normal. Modern. Human. Her age. Boyfriend material.

Everything Vastra had accused her of believing.

Everything she desperately needed to remember that he wasn't.

She's taken far too long to say anything, and the Doctor's hopeful expression is faltering. "No good? Not cool?"

Clara skips down the steps to stand in front of him, reaching up to touch the unbuttoned collar of Rory's shirt. "How could it possibly be cool without a proper bow tie?"

He squints at her suspiciously. "You hate the bow ties."

"You'd be shocked to discover how much I secretly don't hate the bow ties."

"And the fez?" he asks hopefully.

"Mmm. Stop while you're ahead."

He chuckles, thumbing her cheek. "I missed you today."

"I missed you too, but..." she punches him lightly on the shoulder. "That is for lunchtime!"

He smirks. "Don't recall that being on the list at lunchtime, actually. Believe it went a bit more like…"

His fingers tilt her chin upwards, his mouth descending…

"Ah! Hello, Miss Montague!"

She spins around. It's the Headmaster. Of course it's the Headmaster.

"Don't believe I've ever met your gentleman friend," he wheezes.

"Ah, yes, I'm… I'm..." the Doctor glances down at Rory's old shirt.

"Pond!" the Doctor blurts… and then his eyes light up with boyish glee. "James Pond."

He attempts to lean suavely against the motorbike, then flails when he nearly tips it over.

Clara bites her lips together, shaking her head in disbelief. "Yes, Mr. Mitchell, this is my dear friend…"

She shoots the Doctor a wicked look. "Jamie Pond."

The Doctor's mouth forms a silent 'O' of realization.

"Lovely to meet you, Mr. Pond! You really must come with Miss Montague to our school fete this week."

"Wouldn't miss it," the Doctor says winningly.

The Headmaster heads to his car, and they whirl on each other.

"James Pond. James Pond? Really? Are you out of your mind?" she hisses. "Why didn't you just say John Smith? You always say John Smith!"

"Other me already took John Smith!"

"Other you is an old man in Ealing with a completely different face! I don't think it would have raised many red flags!"

"Well, it's just for the fete," the Doctor soothes.

She blinks. "You were actually serious about going to the fete?"

"Well, why not? I mean, if I'm..."

He snaps his mouth closed, but the unsaid words hang between them anyway.

If I'm still here.

They share a long, unhappy look.

"You know what? Sod it," the Doctor declares. "You, me, fete, date. TARDIS or no TARDIS."

"You don't have to," she frowns, crossing her arms. "Don't need your pity-feteing."

"Clara Oswald, I am many things, but a pity-feter is not one of them." He raises her chin with his fingers again. "Look at this face. Does this look like a face that can resist the prospect of a bouncy castle?"

Her lips are quirking upwards against her will. "Not historically, no."

"And will there be sack races?"

"Pretty much always."

"Ah, see, there you are! I'm fantastic in the sack."

"Oi, shut up," she laughs, giving him a gentle shove.

He catches her hand and pulls her along with him, spinning her once and capturing her with both arms from behind.

"Lucy Montague and Jamie Pond," he chuckles, kissing her neck. "We've got aliases. Ooh! We can pretend to be spies."

"Mmm, yes... investigating aliens infiltrating the egg-and-spoon race," she teases.

"Shockingly probable, in my experience."

"Yeah, I've just realized, that's a standard Tuesday for you."

"And what's a standard Tuesday for you?"

She cranes her neck up to look at him. "What do you mean?"

"Well, it is Tuesday, last I checked. What would you normally do tonight?"

She blushes a little. "Grade homework. Eat toast. Watch EastEnders. Read a bit. Sleep."

"Forget I asked, new and improved question. What do you do on fun Tuesdays?"

"I… don't really have fun Tuesdays," she says sheepishly. "Work in the morning and all that."

"Bollocks. To. That," he declares. "Get on the bike."


"Okay, so, impromptu picnic plan developing minor issues," the Doctor announces.

They're huddled underneath a shop awning in a booming thunderstorm, their food still hanging in a Tesco bag from the Doctor's fist.

"Think I see a bench five awnings down," Clara squints. "Should we run for it?"

"Oh, definitely, yeah," he grins, holding out his palm for her to take.

She stares at it for a lingering second, a look of wonder crossing her face.

Then she slides her hand into his.

And they're running again, screaming and laughing every few seconds as the spaces between the awnings drench them. By the time they reach the bench, they're both soaked.

He sets the bag down on the seat, plopping down beside it. "Not certain the crisps survived that particular adventure."

Clara laughs, dancing from foot to foot as she rubs her own arms. "Oooh, the one time you don't have some enormous coat on. We're both gonna freeze."

"Nah," he grins, taking her hand and pulling her towards him. "Don't think so."

"Oh? You have a cunning plan?"

"The cunning-est," he declares, yanking her into his lap.

"Well, I like it so fa—mmph!"

His lips have claimed hers, and she winds her arms around his neck. His hands slide into her hair, and she gasps when his lips leave hers and find the tender spot beneath her ear.

"You're right," she breathes. "This is much better than EastEnders."

"Well, I do try," he purrs against her throat.

"Although the preview did look pretty riveting..."

"Riveting, hmm?" The palm cupping her knee begins a slow ascent up her skirt. "I must know more."

"There were… um… people…" she breathes raggedly as his fingernails trace a delicate trail northward. "They were… doing things… at places…"

"Can't believe you're missing it." His teeth scrape lightly over her neck.

"And there was a girl… ohhhhh… who lost some... stuff…"

"Speaking of girls without stuff," he growls into her ear, "Clara Oswald… where have your knickers gone?"

"In my bag… ahh!… had to. They developed… lunch problems."

His wicked chuckle sends a bolt of heat through her. "What sort of... lunch problems?"

"You know damned well what sort of lunch problems..."

He draws circles with his thumb. "Would these be the same lunch problems you seem to be currently suffering? You can tell me, I'm a Doctor."

"Well, once upon a time, I met a silly monk who tried to lure me into his snogbox..."

"Have to watch out for that type," he agrees, brushing his knuckles against the junction of her thighs. "Never know what fiendish liberties they'll end up taking."

"We are in the street!" she hisses, thwacking the bulge of his hand through her skirt.

"I know," he nods solemnly. "Like I said. Fiendish liberties."

He moves his hand back to her knee, rubbing little circles there. "So this monk fellow… who I'm assuming was incredibly clever and handsome… did he ever get you in the snogbox?"

"As a matter of fact, he did."

He kisses her cheek. "And were more fiendish liberties taken?"

She dips her head to his ear. "Not nearly as many as I wanted."

He swallows hard. "Ah, the plot thickens. And what did you want?"

She takes his hand, presses it to the side of her face. "Look and see."

She's truly surprised him, she can tell. She strokes his fingers encouragingly, watching his face as he closes his eyes and enters her mind.

A few seconds later, his eyes are wide open and locked on hers, shocked and amused and dark with arousal.

"Home," he growls. "Now. Or hotel room. Or shrubbery. Getting less picky by the moment."


He lifts her off the back of the bike and doesn't put her back down, holding her to him with one arm while the other tugs the sonic out of Rory's jeans to unlock her front door.

She has to wrap her legs around him — not that she minds — and they go crashing into her front hallway, slipping and sliding on the puddles of water forming around them.

They're utterly drenched. He rests her on the edge of the hall table, yanking off his helmet as she unbuckles her own. The helmets crash to the floor, followed by a hail of thuds and wet slaps as rain-soaked boots, sweaters and shirts join them.

Down to just his jeans and her skirt, he swings her down from the table and pulls her by the hand into the lounge, pausing a moment to aim the sonic at the hearth, which roars into a blaze.

"When did you —?" she starts to ask, but loses all interest in the fireplace upgrade when his lips find her neck and he yanks the blanket off the back of the sofa.

She takes it and unfurls it in front of the hearth, sinking down onto the middle and looking up at him. He's frozen in the act of removing his belt, uncertainty in his eyes.

"Clara," he whispers. "If you have any doubts… if you think you'll have any regrets. Please stop me now."

She reaches up, hooks her index finger in his waistband and tugs. "Get. Down. Here."

He crawls on top of her slowly, holding himself up to gaze down at her in the firelight. "Did I ever tell you that I painted you once?"

"You did?"

"I did not do you justice," he marvels, running his knuckles down her jawline.

Clara hides a wince. She's trying to hang on to her heart, here, and when he does things like this — acting like she's something precious and exquisite, treating her with borderline reverence — she can feel it slipping right out of her hands.

"Well, now you can paint another one," she quips, "And you'll know where all the naked bits go."

She can see it flash within his eyes: surprise, hurt, rejection. She shakes her head, turning his jaw and forcing him to meet her gaze.

"It's not… I don't… you're leaving soon," she says, placing his hand over her heart. "Please don't take this with you."

He stares at her for a long moment, a million emotions crashing over his face.

Then he bites his lip and nods.

As swift as a switch-flip, his tender, serious expression is gone, masked by a teasing grin.

"Clara Oswald," he purrs, "I'm going to do things to you that I don't normally condone under any circumstances."

"Oooh, and he brings out the dirty talk," she forces herself to volley back, relief and disappointment crashing together painfully in her chest.

He brings his mouth down on hers, his thigh sliding between her own...

But it's... off, the mood a little ruined, the energy between them spiraling down instead of up. She's thinking too much, she can tell he is too, and she racks her brain for a way to put things right again.

She tears her lips away, points at her head. "Do you want to…?"

He smiles sadly. "No, Clara."

"Well, I mean, what you said about Time Lords and ankles… and I don't mind…"

"No, Clara," he says more firmly, lifting himself up. "It's a bad idea."

"But… why?"

He rolls off of her, onto his side, and tugs both her hands to his chest in a mirror of her earlier gesture. "For the same reason you gave."

"Oh," she breathes, pulling her hands back.

He props his head up in his hand. "Now you know how I feel, I suppose."

Her nose wrinkles. "I do?"

"I don't do… this." He points between his naked chest and hers. "Nearly never, and especially not with people I'm close to. You say you're holding back because I'm leaving soon... well, try being twelve hundred years old. Everyone leaves me soon."

She rolls onto her stomach, pillowing her head on her crossed arms. "I know. It's the real reason I wouldn't live on the TARDIS."

"What? It was?"

"Mad-eyed monk banging at my front door," she smiles wistfully. "Funny and smart and kind and silly, so full of life. Knew I was in proper trouble, and that was all before the magic travelling snogbox. But that's when I realized how careful I had to be."

He's listening intently, his eyes searching her face.

She raises herself up on an elbow. "Why do you think I told you to come back the next day and ask me again?"

At the time, he'd assumed she wanted a day to think it over... but he knows her better now. "You already knew you'd say yes. You were seeing if I'd actually come back."

She nods. "You hadn't exactly known me a long time... from my perspective, anyway. For all I knew, you just went around picking up the first shiny bit of tinsel you saw on the ground."

He frowns, but says nothing.

"I could tell, even then, how hard I could fall. How much you'd mean to me, and how there was no way in hell I could ever mean that much to you."

Now he does open his mouth to argue, but she shushes him.

"I've been a guest at two of your weddings, Doctor. I've met three of your wives; I know there's at least five others. When your history is written, I won't even merit a chapter. I'll get a paragraph, if I'm lucky. You'll forget all about me."

"I will never forget you," he insists.

Clara smiles softly. "Doctor… you already have. For me, that part happened years ago. You moved on and you never looked back."

"You're not a paragraph, Clara. You're the reason there's a second half of the book. And when you jumped into my timestream, you wrote your name on every page."

She chuckles a little. "Most of that was invisible ink, though. And my original point stands. Compared to you, humans are mayflies."

"I don't... want it to be that way..."

"But it is. You just said it yourself... that's why you don't do this." She repeats his earlier gesture of pointing between them. "And don't think I haven't guessed why you almost did it tonight."

"Clara..."

"This isn't about me. There's not some special, shaggable quality I have that the others didn't. I don't doubt you're attracted, but I've seen the women you travel with. Hell, the last one was an actual fashion model."

She sits up, covering her bare breasts with her arm. "This almost happened because you know that Trenzalore's coming. You're a soldier, getting one last piece before you... ship out to the front."

He stares at her... gobsmacked, furious.

"Tell me I'm wrong, Doctor. Tell me that's not what changed. Because the timing's quite suspect."

"You're wrong," he growls.

"You're lying."

"Well, you're half-right... but for the wrong reasons!" he explodes.

He lurches upwards. "You think things changed because I found out I was going to die? As long as you've known me, Clara, I've thought this was it… my last face, my last life. I've known I was going to die on Trenzalore for ages now. You didn't show me my death; you showed me my life, continuing on, for longer than I'd ever dreamt possible."

"Okay," she says, arms still crossed and looking away. "Okay, I'm sorry I said the soldier thing. I know you're not... like that. You're right… I was wrong."

He crouches in front of her, turning her face towards his. "I said you were half-right. You did show me something that terrified me. You showed me that my time with you was almost over."

He searches her eyes, scowls at what he sees there. "You don't believe me."

Clara sighs. "I want to. I wish I did. It's just… actions speak louder than words, you know?"

He frowns.

"I would have stayed with you forever if I'd thought you actually wanted me to," she says. "But you sent me away, stood me up, and ditched me… over and over and over."

She bites her lip. "The friends I have now… Martha, Mickey, Jack... even Craig feels it a bit, I think… we've all got that little twinge in common, you know? Not quite ranking up there. Martha and I've talked about it quite a bit. Her coming after Rose, me coming after Amy. Even being a first face didn't make me special enough to keep."

"Clara?" His voice is low and simmering with frustration.

She sighs. "Yeah?"

"This is going to hurt."

He takes her by the shoulders, and slams his head against hers.

Gorgeous, sexy Amy Pond… who he'd loved first as a seven-year-old, and then like a sister.

Ferocious Donna Noble, the no-complications best friend he'd so desperately needed.

He shows her his awkward, painful memories of Martha, letting her feel how much he'd admired her as a person… and how it hadn't been anything close to enough.

And then he shows her Rose.

Rose Tyler, who'd dazzled him through two incarnations. Rose Tyler, bright as the sun, bringing him out of the darkness. Rose Tyler, torn away from him in an instant.

He'd waited too long to tell her he loved her… three times.

The list flies by, a flipbook of lovely faces. Some more like friends, some more like daughters or students, only one like Sarah Jane Smith.

And then he turns the camera on Clara herself.

Oswin, who'd entranced him without so much as a glimpse of her. Victorian Clara, who he'd desperately bargained with the universe to keep, then ransacked the cosmos to find again.

And the real Clara... the Impossible Girl, a potentially deadly mystery. He'd been so suspicious, he'd tried so hard to keep his distance... and yet the air had hummed with electricity whenever she'd been around, fogging his judgement and magnetizing his hands.

Greedy, eager, he'd jumped from Wednesday to Wednesday to Wednesday with no pause in between. There was such a thing as too keen, and she'd made him the definition.

He shows her his secrets, the moments of weakness that had left him feeling sick and ashamed. The console levers he'd thrown just to graze her breast with his arm, the glances up those too-tight skirts when she climbed the stairs. All the times he'd feigned ignorance about the TARDIS deleting her bedroom, quietly hoping that Clara might ask to use his.

He feeds her his terrified agony as he'd watched her walk towards his timestream, his overwhelming joy when he'd pulled her back out, his impotent rage when he'd learned of what had happened to her in the years since he'd regenerated.

Clara's gasping, rubbing her head, staring at him with wide, awestruck eyes.

"Don't you ever tell me you don't mean that much again," he snarls.