( clara is right in thinking that river doesn't understand. though she tries to imagine it that sense of belonging is something that she'd never had. though in her second childhood she'd tried to find it, having amy and rory there with her, it was never anything real. she could never be real and there was always that fear that kovarian would easily rip it all away.
she tries, though. imagining that home she'd always wanted, the people that wanted her, somewhere to tell her stories at the end of the day. purpose and family )
It must have been nice. ( and difficult. that part river understood, the loneliness of not being able to tell anyone what you were really doing or the other life that you had. seeing the stars, the people that you'd met -- who you were ) To have somewhere you wanted to see after all of that.
[The pain in River's reaction doesn't go undetected. Clara softens, slowing her pace.]
It was just sad, towards the end. [The wistfulness drops from her voice, leaving it flatter, more honest.] I'd changed too much to fit in there. Everyone knew something was off, but I kept lying. And I left them all worse off, after.
[She had said a few words to her dad and gran in the last year, at most. No one from Coal Hill could ever reach her outside of class hours. Even her kids started rumors about her increasingly eccentric behavior, all of her absences and excuses whenever a crisis struck. Everyone knew she was hiding something, and no one knew what.
And then came Trap Street, and she took all those secrets to the grave.]
Sometimes I think I should've given them a clean break.
( that same sadness leaves her feeling incredibly passionately on this. when her parents had known who she was she had enjoyed the time that she spent with them immensely, almost clutching to it even though it could never make up for all of her lost years.
but it had been wonderful.
she also knew that the same thing had happened with them. people had started questioning their lack of presence, missing events, friendships. it made her certain in her guess that had she not been taken from them that they likely would have stopped travelling with the doctor, that they would have stayed on earth to raise her. the tardis was no place for a child (a decision she'd also had to make).
but it was one thing to never know something, to never have people in your life and another thing to walk away from it, to lose it )
People are important. No one more so than the people we love.
[But what if, she wants to ask, I loved the one who took me away more than the ones I left behind? Her family was left with a lifetime of her to mourn, but if she had to choose...
She would have chosen him every time. Maybe, more than anything, she just wishes that she had told her dad and her gran, so that when her death came they could have known why. They wouldn't have been left with a dusty, long-untouched apartment and a stack of therapy bills and so, so many questions.]
I still lost them all, in the end. Guess I'll never know how much better or worse it could have gone.
[Bills stacked up in her mailbox. Fish tank vacated. Clothes missing from her wardrobe. The picture she stepped out of haunts her, six weeks later. It's not worth anguishing over, yet she still can't keep wondering, worrying.]
... There's a girl traveling with me who's been alive for millions of years. All the family she's ever had, she's lost and forgotten. Left them ages in the past. I don't want to become that, either. Maybe... maybe I'm wishing for something that's not possible.
( they've quickly approached territory that river has no idea how to handle. though she keeps herself distant, terrible at making connections to the people around her, river has lost people -- both those that are strangers and the people that she's loved. she knows the pain of it and honestly her response to it is not something she would advise on. she knows it isn't healthy but river also doesn't know any other way, a product of her upbringing.
but what about the other influences in her life, others that have also loved and lost? the doctor's response also wasn't healthy. her parents-- she'd been with them that summer, had heard so much from them even trying to keep herself apart from them. hearing about her baby self had been difficult )
You're someone else. I don't know you enough to say if you are but wishing for something different sounds like somewhere to start.
[Clara casts her eyes up, at the dark sky peeking through the treetops, and reels herself back in. It's hard, talking to someone who knows what it's like for the first time, who could actually understand why Clara hurts so badly, and trying to hold her tongue. Clara needs to say it, but River doesn't need to hear it.
She walks in silence for a moment, and takes a breath, filling up disused lungs.]
[It certainly does. She had always assumed River was like the Doctor, if not actually from Gallifrey. A member of some superior, future species, at the very least. And she's not sure where Leadworth is, but it sounds like England, matching River's accent.]
[Nothing ever seems to, once you get far enough out of the city. The last time she visited her dad, his neighbors were out sitting in the same lawn chairs, gossiping the same gossip as twenty years ago. Time travel is real, right here on Earth, and it's called leaving London.]
( not that she personally remembered it, she didn't remember a lot from her early childhood days (both times) but that second period... it had been so much better )
[That's... a bit more of a loaded question, but her face doesn't falter.]
2015. November.
[She knows that's what her headstone will say, at least. What she isn't quite sure of is how long before that she was gone from Earth, how much time had passed since her last visit that she can't fill in.]
I've been to later, though. That's... just where my linear life ends.
( her expression sombers a little. she'd only meant to ask where clara had travelled to but-- )
I'm sorry, Clara.
( and yet hadn't she dropped hints in all conversations? reckless actions teaching her something, losing people. no wonder the birthday was troubling her )
[She wasn't reaching for some kind of sympathy, is what she wants to say. Instead, she just shakes her head.]
It's a long story, and it's not a very nice one, but I'm fine. [Yeah, okay, she cries every night and every black bird makes her clam up, but she's fantastic.] Wine always helps, though.
( river doesn't believe her, if only because dying and being fine doesn't seem like they go together. it does make her quicken their pace a little -- there's wine they need to get )
Maybe we can convince them to be generous. It is for your birthday.
( casually pretending that this is a normal shopping trip and not some weird place )
Well, it is my deathday. Surely there's a discount for that.
[Of course, that would require explaining immortality to a liquor store employee in the wee hours of the morning, but she's had to pull together worse speeches.]
( that newest revelation almost makes her stop, surprised both by how casually she says it. river supposes that once a conversation has started it makes it easier to keep going but also-- )
Clara-- ( but no. she hadn't wanted sympathy before, river was able to take that hint, and even if she did say something what exactly would she say? ) If there isn't we'll have to make one. I can be fairly persuasive.
[It has the bones of a flirtation, but not the heart. Clara speeds up a little, heels crunching on dead twigs. She wraps her arms around herself, a mechanical reaction to cold, even though she barely feels it.]
... Last time I was tramping around a forest in the dark, I got kidnapped by Vikings.
( it's a testament to the fact that she's taking the conversation serious that river lets the flirtation just slide on by. but next time, clara, when the tone isn't so sad you bet she's gonna get your mind racing )
Vikings? ( now that is interesting ) I'm not certain that there are anything here but that would be an improvement on what probably is here.
[Clara nods, but then goes quiet for a moment. She's had six weeks to wrap her head around it all, but it's the first time she's had to voice it. When she does, it's with a flat distance, almost detached.]
My life on Earth ended in 2015. My body's buried in a churchyard up in Lancashire, and I heard the funeral was lovely. But I had the advantage of a very clever best friend who wouldn't let me go gentle into that good night.
[He did the raging against the dying of the light; she was just along for the right.]
Do you know what an extraction chamber is? Bit of handy Time Lord tech?
( she almost regrets asking. though they had been discussing clara's life (and death) she didn't really need to ask about her death, about why she'd died or how or--
but river had and clara had answered. not that the answer was particularly satisfactory )
I've heard of it.
( river had done her research and though most gallifreyan technologies were written only as myths or legends river was good at discerning the truth from it. she didn't need to ask what it was or who it had been. even why. he hated ending )
They're not often used.
( though gallifrey had also been lost for a long time )
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she tries, though. imagining that home she'd always wanted, the people that wanted her, somewhere to tell her stories at the end of the day. purpose and family )
It must have been nice. ( and difficult. that part river understood, the loneliness of not being able to tell anyone what you were really doing or the other life that you had. seeing the stars, the people that you'd met -- who you were ) To have somewhere you wanted to see after all of that.
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It was just sad, towards the end. [The wistfulness drops from her voice, leaving it flatter, more honest.] I'd changed too much to fit in there. Everyone knew something was off, but I kept lying. And I left them all worse off, after.
[She had said a few words to her dad and gran in the last year, at most. No one from Coal Hill could ever reach her outside of class hours. Even her kids started rumors about her increasingly eccentric behavior, all of her absences and excuses whenever a crisis struck. Everyone knew she was hiding something, and no one knew what.
And then came Trap Street, and she took all those secrets to the grave.]
Sometimes I think I should've given them a clean break.
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( that same sadness leaves her feeling incredibly passionately on this. when her parents had known who she was she had enjoyed the time that she spent with them immensely, almost clutching to it even though it could never make up for all of her lost years.
but it had been wonderful.
she also knew that the same thing had happened with them. people had started questioning their lack of presence, missing events, friendships. it made her certain in her guess that had she not been taken from them that they likely would have stopped travelling with the doctor, that they would have stayed on earth to raise her. the tardis was no place for a child (a decision she'd also had to make).
but it was one thing to never know something, to never have people in your life and another thing to walk away from it, to lose it )
People are important. No one more so than the people we love.
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She would have chosen him every time. Maybe, more than anything, she just wishes that she had told her dad and her gran, so that when her death came they could have known why. They wouldn't have been left with a dusty, long-untouched apartment and a stack of therapy bills and so, so many questions.]
I still lost them all, in the end. Guess I'll never know how much better or worse it could have gone.
[Bills stacked up in her mailbox. Fish tank vacated. Clothes missing from her wardrobe. The picture she stepped out of haunts her, six weeks later. It's not worth anguishing over, yet she still can't keep wondering, worrying.]
... There's a girl traveling with me who's been alive for millions of years. All the family she's ever had, she's lost and forgotten. Left them ages in the past. I don't want to become that, either. Maybe... maybe I'm wishing for something that's not possible.
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but what about the other influences in her life, others that have also loved and lost? the doctor's response also wasn't healthy. her parents-- she'd been with them that summer, had heard so much from them even trying to keep herself apart from them. hearing about her baby self had been difficult )
You're someone else. I don't know you enough to say if you are but wishing for something different sounds like somewhere to start.
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She walks in silence for a moment, and takes a breath, filling up disused lungs.]
Where did you spend time on Earth?
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( always travelling. there had been a few times she'd stayed in one place but, other than growing up, it had never been for more than a few months )
But mostly in Leadworth. It's where my parents lived.
( which possibly messes with clara's expectation of her given her earlier denial of being on earth that much )
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I haven't heard of it.
[A bit apologetic, but also curious.]
I'm from Blackpool.
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Not many people have.
( small villages were like that. river had at least head of blackpool even if she'd never gone )
But it's been a long time since I've been.
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[Nothing ever seems to, once you get far enough out of the city. The last time she visited her dad, his neighbors were out sitting in the same lawn chairs, gossiping the same gossip as twenty years ago. Time travel is real, right here on Earth, and it's called leaving London.]
What century?
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21st for Leadworth but I'm usually in the 52nd century.
( living a semi-linear existence. it depended on the day )
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I was born in 1986.
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( not that she personally remembered it, she didn't remember a lot from her early childhood days (both times) but that second period... it had been so much better )
What was the furthest point that you saw?
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2015. November.
[She knows that's what her headstone will say, at least. What she isn't quite sure of is how long before that she was gone from Earth, how much time had passed since her last visit that she can't fill in.]
I've been to later, though. That's... just where my linear life ends.
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I'm sorry, Clara.
( and yet hadn't she dropped hints in all conversations? reckless actions teaching her something, losing people. no wonder the birthday was troubling her )
I think that wine sounds like a very good idea.
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[She wasn't reaching for some kind of sympathy, is what she wants to say. Instead, she just shakes her head.]
It's a long story, and it's not a very nice one, but I'm fine. [Yeah, okay, she cries every night and every black bird makes her clam up, but she's fantastic.] Wine always helps, though.
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Maybe we can convince them to be generous. It is for your birthday.
( casually pretending that this is a normal shopping trip and not some weird place )
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[Of course, that would require explaining immortality to a liquor store employee in the wee hours of the morning, but she's had to pull together worse speeches.]
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Clara-- ( but no. she hadn't wanted sympathy before, river was able to take that hint, and even if she did say something what exactly would she say? ) If there isn't we'll have to make one. I can be fairly persuasive.
( even without the lipstick )
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[It has the bones of a flirtation, but not the heart. Clara speeds up a little, heels crunching on dead twigs. She wraps her arms around herself, a mechanical reaction to cold, even though she barely feels it.]
... Last time I was tramping around a forest in the dark, I got kidnapped by Vikings.
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Vikings? ( now that is interesting ) I'm not certain that there are anything here but that would be an improvement on what probably is here.
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[Yep, keep thinking about the Vikings and not whatever's lurking in these trees, just out of sight.]
One of them's traveling with me now, actually.
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( the one that had lived for millenia, river assumed. thought there was one thing that river was now curious on )
Though-- how are you travelling?
( you just said you were dead. not that river had questioned her status here but back home? )
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My life on Earth ended in 2015. My body's buried in a churchyard up in Lancashire, and I heard the funeral was lovely. But I had the advantage of a very clever best friend who wouldn't let me go gentle into that good night.
[He did the raging against the dying of the light; she was just along for the right.]
Do you know what an extraction chamber is? Bit of handy Time Lord tech?
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but river had and clara had answered. not that the answer was particularly satisfactory )
I've heard of it.
( river had done her research and though most gallifreyan technologies were written only as myths or legends river was good at discerning the truth from it. she didn't need to ask what it was or who it had been. even why. he hated ending )
They're not often used.
( though gallifrey had also been lost for a long time )
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