Clara Oswald is going the long way round (alwaysbeenthere) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-12-31 09:03:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, !partner thread, clara oswald, william laurence |
Who: Clara and Laurence
What: Running into one another
When: Week leading up to Christmas
Where: Shops
Warnings: Low
Status: Partner Thread | Complete
The shops were teeming with people, though Laurence could have hardly expected it to be any different than this. Truthfully, he disliked leaving his Christmas shopping for so late. He hadn’t spent Christmas with his family in years, and his usual way of doing things was to buy his gifts while he was abroad to mail them back to his home. But this year, he was spending Christmas with his and his mother’s sister’s family, and instead of packing everything and taking up room he didn’t have in his small suitcase, he’d decided to buy things once he landed.
He was trying to decide if Spencer would prefer the red or the blue top, when he caught sight of someone familiar. He watched her for a while, a thoughtful expression on his face as he tried to place her, and then the name came to him. He put down the shirts he’d been eyeing, and made his way to the young woman. “Excuse me. You wouldn’t happen to be Miss Oswald?” How embarrassing if she wasn’t.
Shopping the week before Christmas? Well, that was always a disaster waiting to happen. Mostly because all of the last minute shoppers were freaking out and anxiety was high. And Clara was sort of, well…. Definitely not a fan of Christmas anymore. Thank you, Dreams. Between the three dreams that took place on Christmas and then her dying on Christmas last year. Well…. She was okay with canceling Christmas.
But Clara still had friends who celebrated and while her dad probably would be find with the canceling as well (besides, dads were hard enough to shop for, let alone Time Lords), they deserved some love. And so Clara found herself shopping the week before Christmas.
Hearing her name called, Clara blinked because the accent meant it wasn’t one of her former students. Odd. Looking up though, it only took a moment for her to recognize the owner of said voice. And how she had known him before. Oh hey there slight pain in her heart. Despite everything she’d gone through in the past two years, it still hurt but she had made her promise. Five minutes a day and live the rest. So it was five minutes for Samuel, and five minutes for Danny, whom she had only loved in the dreams. But it was an unexpected reminder. At least she was good at masking her feelings, instead smiling.
“Laurence, is that you?”
Laurence felt a good deal of relief in that he hadn’t misidentified the young woman. “It is. I must say, I wasn’t expecting to see you here. Are you living here these days, or are you just here for a visit?”
And she was right! It could be hard to know for certain if a person was who you thought they were, especially when it had been a few years since seeing them. Given the different lives she’d dreamt, the people she had met, sometimes it felt even more confusing. But her smile brightened when it turned out that yes, this was Laurence.
“The world is surprisingly smaller than we tend to think. I’m living here now, been doing so for about two years now.” When after months, she’d run away from the pain of losing Samuel. When she took a job that really wasn’t all that different from her own back in London but said it was an opportunity. And now she had left that job with no real plan on what to do next.
“What about you? Have you relocated or just visiting?”
“I’m just here for a visit,” Laurence answered “My cousin is to be wed, and my family and I have come for the celebrations. My brother’s officiating as well.” He couldn’t understand what had possessed Melissa to get married just two days before Christmas, but it wasn’t his place to judge, especially since his own unofficial engagement had fallen apart the year prior when Edith realized that having her husband gone for long stretches of time was not the kind of life she wanted after all. “And Sergeant Gooding? I hope he is well.”
Orange County had a way of keeping people in, but who knew. Perhaps Laurence would be able to avoid that particular pitfall. Not that Clara regretted her decision or everything that had come from the dreams, even her state of being frozen right before death. Lately she’d been feeling more lost, bored, a number of emotions she couldn’t name, but she still didn’t regret any of it.
“Well, that is certainly a good reason to visit.”
A Christmas time wedding though? Sounded stressful. Not like she really saw weddings and the like in her future. Though the smile faltered as Laurence asked about Sam.
“You didn’t hear…” Absently she brushed some hair behind her ear. There was no easy way to say it, and she still didn’t talk about it because that would make it real. Yet…. “He died about two and a half years ago in combat.”
Laurence realized he’d misstepped as soon as the smile faded from Clara’s face, though there was no taking back his question now, as much as he would have liked to. He and Gooding had never been friends, but they had been friendly and Laurence had always rather liked him. Being a military officer, Laurence wasn’t new to the idea of people he knew dying, but he regretted it every time.
“My deepest condolences,” Laurence said, with all sincerity. “He was a good man.” For a moment, he was quiet as he reflected on the brief time he’d known the man, and then he turned his full attention back to Clara. “I caught a glimpse of a coffee shop nearby here. Perhaps you would permit me to buy you a coffee?” It was a pitiful recompense, but it was the least he could offer.
No, there wasn’t much that could be done once the question was asked. Besides, if he hadn’t known then it was only right someone fill him in. Not that they had been super close but they’d been friendly and while Clara really preferred not to talk about it, even now, she knew she couldn’t always avoid it. Still, the fact it came up (and not from family) in Orange County? That was a bit unexpected.
Even so she just nodded at his condolences. And… coffee?
“Well, I never am one to turn down coffee or tea.” So she smiled some because it was a welcomed distraction even if it was just getting a bit more caught up and pointing out places for him to go. It wasn’t like he needed to be warned about the network if he were only here for a wedding after all.