Fluorescent Adolescent

4

Exhausted from the summer heat, nineteen-year-old Clara Oswald was relieved when she finally got back home in the late afternoon. It was a very poor way to spend a Friday, she thought, whiling away the hours in the company of a girl who had that week been thrown into a long-term relationship with grief and was, therefore, unavailable. Not that Nora Green had been available before her father had died, but now she was even more so. Clara no longer believed she had a chance, and it wasn't that she felt she'd been wasting her time – that was a bad attitude to have when helping a friend through a difficult patch – but also, she did feel like she had been wasting her time, a little.

She unlocked the front door and ditched her keys on the table; they missed their mark and went on the floor but in that moment, she didn't have the drive to pick them back up.

"You better close that door, I don't want all the cold air escaping," said Nina, from the living room – her ex she had very unfortunately moved in with a fortnight ago in preparation for second year. Five of them lived there in total, but two were at home for the holidays; that left Clara, Nina, and Joe. The following weekend she was going back to Blackpool, anyway.

"What cold air? This place is baking." Nina was lounging on the sofa in a bikini with two fans pointed directly at her. The tiny TV set was buzzing away. "What are you watching?"

"I'm not, I'm half-asleep. Get me a drink, will you?"

"'Please' would be nice…"

"Last time I checked, the entire TV license is in my name, so I think I deserve a drink." In two weeks, Nina's constant boasting that she was paying for their TV license had already got on Clara's nerves so much that she considered completely reimbursing Nina for the trouble.

"Get it yourself, I've been outside all day, I'm roasting."

"Because you're wearing black."

"I've been to a funeral."

"I suppose you took all your funeral clothes to that boy's house yesterday? Mark?"

"Mike," she corrected, "And he lives in a flat, in Henry Price. I'm seeing him again tonight."

"What about that girl? Did she appreciate you showing up to a church stinking of some bloke's cologne?" Nina said cruelly. Clara shook her head, giving up, and went into the kitchen. There were slim pickings in the fridge, though.

"There's basically nothing in here, just water."

"Oh, you'd better go to the shop then."

"I had, had I?"

"Get me some lager, and one of those big bottles of Sprite."

"Is that all?"

"Any lollies they've got."

"And will you be giving me any money?" Clara came back into the living room. Nina was still sitting there with her eyes shut. "You'd be cooler if you turned the TV off, it generates heat."

"I paid for the license, so you can pay for some shopping, can't you? You've got that job now at the coffee shop."

"Yes, my minimum wage, part-time job exists solely to fund your Calippo addiction."

"Get the lime ones, though, not orange."

"Okay. Lime Calippos. You know, I've actually got a lime Calippo right here." At that, Nina finally sat up and looked at her, and Clara flipped her off with flying Vs.

"Well, fuck you, too."

"I'm going out to buy some Magnums."

"That's bullshit, Clara, I have a milk allergy, I can't eat them."

"Yeah, exactly."

"You're really going to leave me on my own?"

"Why should I care? You're not sick, you're just being a baby. So what if it's a bit warm?"

"A bit warm," she said mockingly, "Do you know where I'm from?"

"Aberdeen."

"Aberdeen," said Nina as though Clara had stayed silent, "This is like if you went to, bloody, Egypt, or something."

"It's nothing like that. And why would I want to stay here and spend time with you when you're being a massive twat?"

Nina laughed, "You can't upset me. I know why you came back home, because you're not getting anywhere with whatshername."

"Nora," said Clara quietly.

"Exactly. Nina Two-point-Oh."

"She's nothing like you. She's actually nice." When Clara said that though, she was not sure how true it was.

"I'm nice. Didn't I pay for the TV license for everybody?"

"Oh my god, shut up. Just because you've never paid a bloody bill before in your life-"

"And you have?"

"Yes, actually, I pay my own phone contract."

"Oh, wow, you pay your own phone contract. I guess you're a real adult now."

"Piss off, it's a Razr, that's a lot more expensive than the TV."

"Yes, but that's selfish, just paying your own way. I'm being altruistic."

"You've never done anything altruistic in your life."

"I went out with you, didn't I?" she countered. Clara clenched her jaw.

"…Whatever. I'm going to the shop. And I'm not getting you anything."

"We'll see about that."

Only minutes after she arrived, she was back out in the hot streets, wandering down to the corner shop where she was decidedly not going to buy Nina anything. Of course, then Nina would kick up a huge fuss which would be avoided if Clara would just buy her the cheapest ice lollies she could find, but was it really worth it? She really didn't want to set a precedent that she was going to do things for Nina all the time. But, then again, wouldn't being petty make the next year of them being forced to live together – after signing the joint lease seven months ago when they were still seeing each other – even more unbearable? She didn't know what the adult thing to do was…

However, her trip to the shop turned out to be more eventful than just choosing between ice cream or ice lollies. While she did spend most of her time there doing that, after also picking up a bottle of orange Oasis (Nina didn't like orange anything) and a microwavable shepherd's pie to eat the following day after she got back from the party presumably very hungover, she also encountered an unusual man.

He stepped in front of her, blocking her way to the checkout in the narrow freezer aisle.

"Sorry, I'll just move," she tried to step aside so he could get past, but he stayed dead still. He just stood there, towering over her, dressed in thick, black clothes with his hood all the way up. "Did you want something, mate?" He didn't say a word. Very uncomfortable, Clara began to back away. He kept in step with her, approaching. "Seriously, I'm just about to leave…" He continued advancing. "You know, um, there are cameras in here, I don't think you should-" She accidentally backed into a stack of toilet paper and knocked it over. When she turned around to look, he lunged, making a grab for her throat, but stopped just before he touched her, leaving her trapped, terrified, next to a freezer. Suddenly, he could not move, and then a young girl came up behind him and grabbed him by the arm.

"I'm so sorry about this," said the girl, trying to drag him backwards. Like his joints were glued together he rigidly began to move in the direction she dragged him, "This is my, um, brother. He's a bit weird sometimes, sort of… follows girls. You know how it is."

"He's your brother? But he's white."

"Yeah, well, he's adopted, what do you know?" she countered, "Let's, uh, let's go… Jacob. This way. Better get you home. So sorry about this, again, I hope he didn't scare you too much!"

"Sure…" said Clara, though in truth she had been scared quite a lot by 'Jacob', and she could have sworn she saw something wrong with his face. It almost looked as if it was peeling off. Then again, perhaps he had just had a bad sunburn; the weather had been scorching all week.

"You should get the Magnums, by the way," the strange girl called over her shoulder, "Much better in this weather."

"Thanks…"

For some reason, at that Clara was compelled to make up her mind and did pick out a box of Magnums from the freezer cabinet, setting down the Calippos. After the incident she decided some alcohol was in order and swung by the booze aisle to find the absolute cheapest bottle of rosé she could get her hands on. Then she decided that wine of any variety was too much for her student budget to handle and picked up a plastic bottle of white cider.

She paid and heard the earth-shattering sound of somebody dumping a crate of empty, glass bottles into one of the bins around the back of the shop, which scared her half to death. The mysterious girl and her charge were long-gone.

Nina wasn't happy with her when she returned to the house.

"Did you get my lollies?"

"No," said Clara, "I told you I wouldn't. I've only got Magnums." Much to her frustration, she had to walk past Nina to get into the kitchen (she'd lost her key to the back door already).

"What the fuck, Clara? I asked nicely." Clara didn't respond, but Nina was actually getting up from the spot on the sofa she'd spent the day melting into, ready to confront her. "You're kidding," Nina said upon seeing Clara's paltry assortment of 'groceries'. "Fucking – White Ace? White Ace and no lollies?"

"You're not touching the White Ace, either," said Clara, "I'll keep it in my room if I have to, let it go warm."

Nina scoffed and leant on the kitchen counter next to Clara as she shoved her shepherd's pie into the fridge, relishing in the cool air. "I think I know how to work my way into your bedroom. I've done it plenty of times."

"It's far too hot to for you to try and use me for sex today."

"Give me a glass, then."

"Oh, I see – so, first you're too good for cheap cider, and now you're trying to – what? Let me screw you in exchange for sharing it?" Clara challenged. "Walk to the shop yourself and leave me alone."

"You're really that hung up about Nora?"

"That I won't shag you once you've been slagging me off all day? Let's get something straight," Clara shut the fridge and approached Nina, invading her personal space, "I know that I'm the best you've ever had in bed, but this has to end. We're broken up, and I'm putting my foot down. I'm not going to sleep with you again, ever." Nina laughed.

"Yeah, sure. Nothing you just said is true." What neither Nina nor Clara knew was that Clara was right; they wouldn't ever go to bed together again, and though Nina wouldn't admit it, Clara Oswald was the best she'd ever had and would remain a memory.

Clara finally abandoned Nina in the kitchen, taking one of her Magnums with her, and went to stay in her bedroom instead. She'd left the curtains shut in there since leaving yesterday so it was still relatively cool, shrouded in enough darkness to make it bearable. She sat there on the bed with her ice cream and checked her phone for texts. There was one from Nora.

Thanx 4 coming

She replied immediately: Whtevr u need :) xx

For as long as it took her to finish the Magnum, she stared at her phone, waiting for Nora to reply and invite her to come over, provide moral support, maybe (finally) commit to a relationship, give her an excuse not to go to some party hosted by one of Mike Townes' friends that evening – even if she managed to win her bet about the football. But she got radio silence.

And after she'd disposed of the plastic wrapper, peeled off her funeral clothes, and had a refreshing, cold shower, she still hadn't got a response from Nora. Maybe she really was wasting her time with all that, but how could she do anything else? She was hopelessly in love, so much so that she had almost called Mike 'Nora' accidentally the previous night – and they were absolutely nothing alike.

The girl was haunting her waking and sleeping moments in a way very few people ever had before. In fact, she didn't think she'd ever feel this way again about a person – what if Nora was it? The one, if such a thing existed? Clara had always thought that was silly, but now she thought she was beginning to understand what people meant when they said you 'just knew' the person you were meant to be with. And the funniest thing was that she'd always thought, deep down, she'd probably end up with a boy – if she were to end up with anyone at all, that was.

Ultimately, the muggy afternoon – on what was forecast to be one of the hottest days of 2006 – got the better of her, and she resolved that the best thing to do was to have a nap. She was still in the grips of a lager-induced hangover since lager was the only thing Mike had to drink in his student flat last night, and decided she'd best sleep off that and the solemn mood of the funeral before heading out to collect her football winnings. So, she curled up in bed, the dampness from the shower already mingling with sweaty dampness from the heat, and found herself seduced into a midday nap with more ease than usual.

A second android had tried to murder Young Clara in the middle of a corner shop in broad daylight and almost certainly on CCTV, only to be commanded around the back of the building – corralled by Mattie – to have all its cogs telekinetically bent out of shape and then dumped into a convenient skip. They had just slammed the lid down on it when Young Clara had left the shop with a litre of chemical cider and some ice cream. The location data they'd managed to gather put the droid's commander firmly in Leeds, though that didn't help them all that much. One more though and they'd definitely manage to find out where the Last Queen of France was hiding. In the meantime, Clara had stolen an assortment of slightly soggy, convenience store sandwiches.

"I've got a turkey club or ham and egg," said Clara, offering them to Mattie. They were sitting on the ground in the back garden of Young Clara's terraced, student house, which was thankfully in the shade but still sweltering, nonetheless.

"Well, you want the egg, obviously, because you're a maniac."

"I don't know," Clara shrugged, "I like a club. It's got mayonnaise."

"I'd rather have the club." Clara handed it to her. It was already warmer than she'd like, but after skipping out on having any of the breakfasts, it had now been close to five hours since she'd last eaten.

"It's like, after midnight," she said while she chewed. "At home, I mean."

"Past your bedtime," Clara joked, then paused, "Actually, it's past my bedtime, too…"

"You could have a nap."

"I think I am having a nap," she said, "What was that 'Jacob' thing about?"

Mattie scrunched up her face, eating, "It was the first name I thought of."

"Uh-huh," said Clara, and Mattie glared at her.

"I don't know why you let whatshername walk all over you like that," she said after a few moments. They'd been eavesdropping underneath the windows ever since Young Clara had arrived home.

"Look, I'll tell you one thing about Nina; she loves arguing with people. Best thing to do is ignore her, she'll just get bored. Which is precisely what happened. And anyway, she's only jealous."

"Jealous of what?"

"She's upset because I moved on from her with Nora, and because Nora got a lot more of my attention," Clara explained.

"Your attention, of course."

"There are plenty of people in the world who enjoy getting attention from me."

"Yeah, okay, sure. You sound like Oswin."

"Oswin sounds like me. And the same is true about her – people fall over themselves sometimes trying to talk to the 'smartest girl in the universe'. Not that she has anything worthwhile to say most of the time." Thankfully, Oswin wasn't listening. "Wait," she paused, "Do you hear that?"

"What? Old people music?"

Clara listening intently, then realised she was hearing the Strokes, very dimly from inside the house. "I really am having a nap. No other reason to put the Strokes on during the day."

"I thought they're your favourite band?" Clara nodded. "And… you sleep with them on?"

"Calms me down."

"So, we get to sit here for hours while you sleep?"

"Looks that way. You can sleep, if you want; I'll keep a lookout."

"I can't, it's the middle of the day and it's boiling."

"You'll just have to keep talking to me, then."

"Great. Aren't you worried they'll hear you inside?"

"Nah. I've got my iPod on, Nina's watching telly."

"An iPod, Jesus Christ… I can't believe iPods actually existed."

"Be glad we're not carrying around boomboxes and playing tapes."

"It's just weird, though. Not having your music be part of your phone."

"What, my eighty-megabyte Motorola Razr? That's, like, one album." Mattie shook her head. "Used to have ringtones on it, they took up most of the space. You couldn't even really send pictures because they charged you a premium for it."

"What ringtone did you have?" asked Mattie, though she regretted asking immediately.

"Honestly? I think I had 'When We Were Young' set to it for ages."

"That's not very ringtone-y."

"No, well, you could have anything, to be honest. Didn't really matter. It was just a pain though, because you had to, like, download it as an mp3 on LimeWire, and the songs always sounded like shit. That or you'd pay, like, ninety-nine pence for a custom ringtone. If you think you're getting mugged off playing your holographic zombie game at the VR arcade, you've never had someone try to flog you a ringtone."

"You're enjoying this, aren't you? Being here?"

"It's just like Alex Turner said: 'Everything's in order in a black hole; nothing seems as pretty as the past, though.' I do like it, though, a little. It… feels real in a way lots of things don't."

"Like what? Like the Doctor?" Mattie asked. They'd finished their sandwiches now. Clara leant back against the wall of the house.

"Being on the TARDIS just disconnects you from everything; you're going out and doing things, but you're not a part of society, really. It's like you're experiencing the world through a window."

"Yeah…" said Mattie, unsure if she knew what Clara meant. She went into her pocket to retrieve her cigarettes. "You can't smoke out here; what if they see it through the window?" Clara thought about this for a second and then stopped what she was doing, putting the Marlboros away to take out a packet of nicotine lozenges instead. She did not have too many left, but while doing that she found something else in her coat: Retcon. She always carried some in case of emergencies. That gave her an idea.

"Wait here," she said.

"What? Why?"

"I'm going inside," she said, "You keep watch, I'm gonna drug myself with Retcon."

"With Retcon!? Why?"

"Because, if she sees either of us, it's best if she forgets," said Clara, "And since I can barely remember anything about today, I think this is how it has to be. I'll put it in that cider, nobody except me will touch it."

"You could at least try to change history, then," said Mattie.

"Excuse me?"

"It would make everything a lot easier if you did remember what happens today."

"But I don't," said Clara, "That's a fixed point in time."

"Since when could you tell if points in time are fixed or not?"

"I'll only be a minute. If any robots show up, knock on the front door and run away. I'll hear."

"Knock and run? That's your plan?"

"It's fine, trust me," said Clara, and she didn't give Mattie anymore opportunity to argue. She turned intangible and walked right in, phasing through the back door and entering the small kitchen. Already it smelled of booze and bodily fluids.

Before doing anything in the kitchen, however, she crept into the living room to check whether Nina was actually asleep. No doubt she would hear Clara rustling around in the fridge otherwise and come to check none of her special yoghurts were being stolen (she had always been extremely precious about her yoghurts). Nina was definitely out, lying prone on the sofa still in her bikini with the CRT television buzzing away.

Clara retreated into the kitchen and decided to take Mattie's advice once again, taking advantage of the fact she did, indeed, have superpowers. Rather than risk opening the fridge, she turned her hand intangible and felt around inside until she found the bottle of White Ace and phased it back out through the door. And then she pulled the same trick to drop a tiny Retcon pill inside without having to open the bottle at all. It fizzed a little but completely dissolved very quickly, ready to be drunk by her younger self that evening.

But she did not immediately leave the house. Instead, she decided to look around and reminisce. There were still a few cardboard boxes stacked up around the place, most of them Joe's who had decided not to unpack just yet. She knew the entire house was very quickly going to become invaded by student refuse; there would be dirty clothes everywhere, a stack of junk mail they weren't bold enough to simply throw away, and perhaps the worst crime of all: rows of empty, glass bottles lining the windowsills to show off how much alcohol they'd consumed. Currently though, it was still inoffensive.

She headed upstairs and found her own bedroom, leaning close to the door as the Strokes continued to croon from within ('Ize of the World'). She didn't hear anything else and gingerly stepped through the door itself; it was why they called her 'the Phantom', after all.

Young Clara was fast asleep on top of the sheets on her side, her phone on the pillow next to her from where it had fallen out of her hand while she waited for a text from Nora. There was only one six-foot bookcase in there and it wasn't quite full; the beginnings of her book collection that she would hopefully never stop growing.

Arranged carefully in a glass box and set on the desk was the thing she had been most interested in seeing: her seashells. She walked around the bed to see them and stooped down. There were only six in there so far, with the pretty conch shell in the middle that she had picked up from Blackpool Beach when she'd gone for a walk with her dad after her mother's funeral. It was also the memory of the first cigarette she smoked. Soon enough there would be a shell to represent her impending break-up with Nora, and then happier times; one collected when she'd gone back home after graduating. Eventually, a relic from a long walk on the beach at midnight with the Eleventh Doctor where he had first divulged to her his 'soulmate' theory. It was strange to see it so incomplete.

The last thing she did was pick up the flip phone as carefully as possible; this was the days before phones had passcodes, so she could read its entire contents as soon as it was opened.

And then a train hit her.

This phone had been purchased in 2004 – her first bill she'd paid herself after getting a part-time job in a coffee shop in Blackpool, a preamble to landing the exact same job in Leeds – before her mother's death. And still stored within were texts between she and Ellie.

She had wanted to nose through Nora's messages but found herself completely frozen.

March 5th, 2005: See u tonight for shopping.

"Don't look at this," said a voice in her head. Oswin appeared in front of her. "Put the phone away."

"I… it…" she had tears in her eyes already, struggling not to make any loud noises.

"I know," said Oswin softly, reaching up as if to take the phone out of Clara's hand herself – though of course, she couldn't. "Do you know what the number is?" Clara couldn't answer. "If you remember the number, I can get the texts for you to have. I promise." Clara did not know how she had ever lost something so precious. "Please, put it away. You need a clear head."

It broke her heart all over again to close the phone with the messages still on the screen. She dropped it on the floor and fled before her Younger Self could see her, entering the bathroom and switching on the taps so that she could wash her face in cold water. Oswin appeared in the bathroom mirror behind her.

"How's the Doctor?" Clara asked quietly.

"Panicking. I'll tell her you're still okay. You are still okay, aren't you?"

"I'll be fine," she whispered, splashing water on her face and wiping away her tears and some of the day's accumulated grime. "I hate this weather; it's driving me mad." She covered her face with her hands, frustrated, for a few long seconds, breathing deeply until she managed to compose herself. Oswin waited patiently. Clara changed gears. "What was your ex-girlfriend like?"

"You've met Flek lots of times," said Oswin, taken aback.

"Nina."

She paused for a moment.

"Horrible. Abusive. Messed my brain up a little bit." Clara nodded. "Why?"

"My Nina's downstairs as well."

"And what's she like?"

"A lot worse than I remember." Clara sighed and then languished for a while longer, until finally telling Oswin, "You can go. I'll be alright."

"Are you sure?" Clara nodded. "Tell me if you need anything."

"I will. I will." Oswin disappeared in the blink of an eye and Clara was all alone in the decrepit bathroom of her old student house. After staying there and doing all the breathing exercises she could remember, she forced herself to leave before getting caught out. Young Clara was still asleep in her room and Nina was asleep on the sofa; aside from the phone dropped on the floor, there was no sign of any disturbance. Mattie was fidgeting in the back garden.

"There you are! You were gone for ages."

"I know, sorry," said Clara, sitting back down at her side and wrapping her arms around her own knees.

"What's wrong?" Despite Clara's best efforts, she apparently wasn't very good at hiding her feelings.

"I looked at her phone; she still has text messages from my mum on there."

"Oh." Mattie didn't know what to say.

"I'll be fine. The Retcon's been delivered. Nobody saw me."

"You said that grief like this will get easier over time."

"If you process it properly. I never did. I'm a terrible example; you don't want to be like me."

"Can you take the phone, or something?"

"Oswin said she can get me the texts," Clara repeated, now clinging to this hope.

"…I don't get it, is she just watching you all the time?" Mattie wanted to change the subject but didn't want to seem insensitive for doing so – but wasn't it Clara's job to look after her, rather than the other way around?

"No. We have an empathy link. It's different to the mind-patch – I have it with all the Echoes. She's just the strongest because I spend the most time with her. I'm fine, really." Shaking a little, she took a cigarette out of the packet – no longer concerned with whether the house's residents would see the smoke – and lit it after a few attempts with the lighter in her trembling hands, taking in a deep and desperately soothing cloud of tobacco.

"Why don't you quit?" Mattie asked again.

"Who can quit smoking when things like this keep happening? It'd take someone a lot stronger than me." She blew out smoke through her nose and leant back against the wall, trying to clear her head. "Never smoke, Matilda. Not for any reason."

"I wasn't planning on it, even if you are a bad influence on me. Doesn't Moore have a problem with it?"

"She's not a fan," said Clara, "But I don't smoke where any of the kids can see me. Except you, of course."

"And yet, everybody knows you do."

"But how much of that is your fault, hm? Anyway, Lorna might complain, but she's not going to reprimand me. Do you know why?"

"Nope."

"Because I'm a good teacher."

"Some teacher who can't even tell me the key themes of Macbeth." Mattie thought she was succeeding at changing the topic and getting Clara to calm down.

She finally relented, "The key themes of Macbeth are madness, prophecy, ambition, and tyranny. In my opinion. Do you want to go over some revision technique? Close reading?"

"There's nothing else to do. How long are we going to be waiting here for? Until you leave to go to football boy's party?"

"It looks that way. Come on, then. I suppose it'll take my mind of things." She took out her phone and searched through her e-book library until she found her digital copy of Macbeth, which was almost as heavily annotated as every physical edition of it she had. "I just have one condition."

"What's that?"

"You can't tell Tom I went through Macbeth with you, I don't want to undermine him."

"Clara, I'm not gonna tell anyone. The last thing I want is people thinking you're giving me special help at school."

"People aren't picking on you, are they?" asked Clara seriously, "For living with teachers?"

"No, they think it's cool because every boy at school fancies you. And Steph. Do you know she tried to pay me fifty quid to steal some of your underwear?"

"She what?"

"She said, and I quote, 'It's fine, they don't have to be used.'"

"How many games of House of the Dead could you have got with fifty quid in stolen knickers?"

"About fifteen with inflation the way it is."

"Blimey. And you refused that free money?"

"Well, first of all, I don't want anything to do with your knickers; and second of all, Steph doesn't have fifty quid in the first place."

"I'm glad to see you're not selling my lingerie for profit," said Clara, "That's all we can ask. Now, then." She showed her phone to Matilda, who groaned, and then cleared her throat: "Act I Scene I. 'When shall we three meet again? In thunder, lightning, or in rain?'…"