"Ah, RY2227. Lovely, lovely. Take a seat."
The fake cheer in the SPO's voice set her on edge before she'd even fully entered the room. She ground her teeth and stiffly crossed over into the room. She had just sat down when he spoke again.
"What can I help you with?" He asked. He leaned back in his office chair and stretched his arms up above his head. He crossed them and rested the back of his head against his forearms. Clara didn't deflate her tense posture.
"I want to know what you're planning. I want to know what my conditions are for my special privileges. I want to know why you're telling lies to Danny Pink about the Doctor."
Her words had been clear and confident, but when he began chuckling, she felt that surety weaken. He laughed and laughed until he began coughing for air. His laughter sputtered off in the way of gasps.
"God, you're as bold as brass, aren't you?"
She remained coldly inexpressive. After a long pause, he leaned forward. He sighed.
"I'll tell you my conditions first, and then we'll get to the rest, okay?"
She stared and waited.
"It's fairly simple, actually. My conditions consist of only one item. Little, tiny thing: stay away from the Doctor." He said, his voice coated with false cheer.
Clara narrowed her eyes slowly. "Why?" She finally asked, her voice measured and suspicious.
"Because we've got no interest in someone with his background mingling with somebody of your background."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning he's committed treason and you're known for your shockingly efficient acts of mutiny. Frankly, you don't have to have two brain cells to rub together to know that's a toxic mix."
She stared. She let her eyes wander around his eerily tidy office as she processed his words.
"I thought we'd already discussed that matter. And decided that it's better to keep us both satisfied, rather than angering us and making us want to rebel."
"Yes, that conversation took place before I realized the power of positive reinforcement. It's simple: if you stay away from him, I'll continue allowing Danny Pink, his sexual attention if so desired, and his lavish gifts. If you decide you'd rather have the Doctor, well. That's fine. You can have him here, and we'll take away visiting privileges and gift allowances entirely."
Ah.
"So I'm meant to choose between the Doctor and Danny." She surmised.
"Briefly summed up, yes. And I'm generously confident that you'll choose Mr. Pink."
Wasn't really too difficult of a decision when one of those men wouldn't even speaking to her anymore. She looked down at her lap and licked her lips. She tried to ignore the stinging in her heart.
"Okay, so, why were you planting lies in Danny's head? What's that meant to accomplish in your grand scheme?" She pushed forward.
The SPO was quiet for a moment. Clara watched his eyebrows furrow just slightly. He remained impassive otherwise.
"What?" He finally asked.
Clara stared. "You told…" she stopped. She suddenly felt uneasy, and she wasn't sure why. "You told Danny the Doctor killed children. His own daughter. But that…isn't true."
She sounded less certain come the end of her sentence than she would've like. The SPO didn't do anything for a moment. His expression morphed into one of genuine surprise a second later.
"You didn't know?" He asked. "Well, I suppose nobody here without access to our system knows, but I assumed he would've told you, considering your…intimate relationship."
She shook her head.
"That isn't how it happened."
"I can assure you it is. The Doctor was part of a terrible, terrible cult. Called themselves the Time Lords. They believed they were a superior race—like immortal beings, or gods, if you will. They were set on making everybody in our country—and later, the world—like them. They were responsible for terrible things. The very worst being the murder of children with developmental disabilities. Handicapped people did not fit their guidelines for a potential Time Lord. Your Doctor was just that. A children's doctor. Only instead of healing the disabled children that came to see him, he murdered them. He managed to take down thirty-three people in our fine government before he was finally tracked down and arrested. Even got our late Prime Minister, may his gentle soul rest in peace." The SPO bowed his head solemnly for a moment while Clara stared, her lips parted. "Awful. Just awful. I thought you knew. And I thought your visitor had the right to know the type of people you were associating yourself with."
The horror of what he was suggesting monopolized her thoughts for a moment.
"There's no way. He wouldn't do that."
"Would you like to see his official file?"
"Yes. I would." She bit.
He nodded once. Clara watched with dread and confusion as he clicked a few times on his mouse, typed a few letters in, and then slid his desk chair over to the printer underneath the window. He pulled each paper from the tray as it printed, and once he'd amassed the entire collection, he passed them over to Clara.
"Here's some reading for you tonight, RY2227. I'd advise not letting it get into the hands of anybody else."
She couldn't lift her eyes from the thick stack of paper. The first sheet was blank except for two lines of strong, black print. The top said Inmate Name: James Gallifrey, and underneath it, Prison Number: KI369.
"You're letting me take this to my cell?" Clara finally blurted.
"Why not? You've got special privileges now, and I'm ready to go home." He rose from the desk. "Goodnight, RY2227."
She rose uncertainly. She felt terribly nervous the entire walk back to her cell, as if she were holding a ticking bomb. And perhaps, in a way, she was.
She stuffed it down the front of her trousers before she walked into her cell. She ignored the confused look her escorting screw gave her.
She collapsed down onto her back onto her bed, careful not to roll over onto her side, just in case the papers would make an audible sound. She didn't want Vastra to see it. She didn't want her to know what it said. Vastra wouldn't take on the Doctor for many reasons, but child murder was definitely one of them.
She waited until Vastra was sound asleep, and then she opened her eyes and carefully inched her top up. She stuck her fingers underneath the stack, gripped it, and carefully pulled it up and from her trousers. She rolled over onto her side so her back was to Vastra and held the first sheet close to her eyes. The only light came from the auxiliary light above the toilet that never went off. It was so dim in the cell it strained Clara's eyes painfully to read, but she was able to do it. She read through page, after page, after page, her heart rate increasing after each one. She was nearly gasping when she finished. She felt nauseated. She was certain she was going to be sick. And all at once—she remembered the things he'd told her. Namely, she remembered his response when she'd first asked him what The Time Lords did. "And as for our organization…well, that's a conversation for another time. But all you need to know is that we're feared and despised by the government. And that our main objective is to protect the human race. We weren't the bad guys, Clara. Not anymore than you were."
She didn't want to believe it was true. But she had arrest reports, court transcripts, crime scene notes and photographs, witness testimonies, even a psychiatric evaluation. It was a lot to have been fabricated. It would've taken so much time and money for somebody to have framed him with so much detail for so many deaths. The simplest answer was usually the right one, and this time, the simplest answer was horrifying.
She wasn't sure what she felt, beyond oddly violated. She stuffed the papers into the back of one of her larger books. She didn't know what she believed, but she still didn't want Vastra to find out about this. Not yet, anyway.
She curled up underneath her and John's quilt. She pressed the watch face to her cheek. Her heart was pounding so quickly it was making breathing difficult. And she felt horribly lied to. She felt dirty. If those papers were true…she'd been friends with the devil. She'd let the devil hear her getting herself off. She'd let the devil get involved in it. She'd thought about fucking the devil. She'd almost done it.
If it were true, she'd been in love with a man who was also involved with it all. A man who was getting information from her behind her back and supplying it to a wretched cult. A man who might not have ever really loved her at all, because anybody who could subscribe to that cult's beliefs didn't have the ability to love anybody. Anybody who could kill the helpless had no heart.
She'd been to hell and she'd fucked the devil's apprentice and she'd nearly fucked the devil himself.
What fucking circle did that put her in? She felt it was probably a class all its own.
"You look like shit." Vastra greeted.
"I feel like it, too." Clara murmured sleepily. She fought her way from her trousers and sank down onto the toilet seat while Vastra filled her electric kettle at the sink. She rested her elbow on her knee and her forehead into her palm as she had her wee. Vastra was watching her as she rose and tugged her trousers back up.
"What happened with the Doctor last night?"
Clara wanted nothing more than to tell her every disturbing, terrible thing she'd read and saw last night. She had fallen asleep tormented by the eyewitness accounts, postmortem results, and crime scene photos. Of children. Innocent fucking children. She still felt nauseated. She wished she could edit it all from her memory. But she couldn't, and she wouldn't tell Vastra yet either. She had to think about it. She had to decide if it was really true, and if she could bear to be the one to send the Doctor to his grave. Because if she told Vastra…if she showed her the file…he would be dead by morning.
"I got caught. Went to see the SPO." She answered shortly.
Vastra winced. "What happened?"
"He took away my outdoors time." Clara lied automatically. She didn't want to see the Doctor. She couldn't bear to look at his face. "I have to stay in my cell."
Vastra whistled lowly. "Your boyfriend won't be too happy about that, now will he?"
"He's not my boyfriend." Clara snapped, before she could stop herself. He's an angry man who may or may not be a huge, massive, murdering liar.
Vastra arched an eyebrow. "Oh? Did you find out something last night that changed things? Perhaps about the claims your visitor made?"
"No. He was just…rather short with me." She decided half-truths were her best bet to making it out of the conversation unscathed. "He wouldn't speak to me. He's angry because I wasn't at recreation, even though it wasn't my fault."
"Ah." Clara watched her tug her top up over her head. She stared at her smooth, tattooed shoulder blades as they shifted beneath her skin. She turned once she'd tugged her new regulation top on. "Sounds like his feelings were hurt and he's unsure how to deal with it."
"Or he's a tosser." Clara corrected.
"Yeah, or that." Vastra agreed.
A silence settled over them as Clara idly watched her change. She didn't think much of it, until Vastra stopped and stared.
"See something you like, Oz?"
She sounded vaguely amused. Clara smiled halfheartedly automatically.
"I was wondering, Vastra. About your tattoos." She admitted. She stared at the interwoven pattern. She knew it covered literally every inch of Vastra's skin from shower time, and all were the same color of vibrant green, so she guessed there hadn't been years between each extremity. "Did you get it all done at once? I mean—you couldn't have, right? You would've been in the chair for…days at a time."
"Took about a week. I had bathroom and meal breaks. The artist stayed at my flat." She shared. She sank down onto her bed once she'd tugged her trousers up. "Do you want to know which part hurt the worst?"
The corners of Clara's lips twitched up immaturely. She pointed towards Vastra's crotch. "Your…"
"No, not even close, actually. That was rather enjoyable." She mused. Clara was having a difficult time believing that, but she focused on Vastra's words anyway. "My throat. They always say the spine hurts the most, and it was very painful, but there was something especially awful about it here." She cupped the front of her throat gently. "I think it was the vibrating pressure against my windpipe, partly. Made breathing difficult."
"So why do it?" Clara blurted. She backtracked. "Not that it isn't impressive or beautiful, because it is rather spellbinding. But it seems like it took quite a lot of pain and time."
"I did it because of the pain and the time." She responded, without missing a beat. Clara wasn't following. "Every one of these swirls represents a child or woman I've avenged. The jagged, zig-zag ones represent a child or woman I've failed. I'm keeping track of the work I do in here, too. I've got some space on the soles of my feet that will be filled, once I find a reliable tattoo artist."
Clara thought to the file in the back of her book. She looked down at her feet almost guiltily.
"I was also wondering how you got into this…business. What made you decide to protect women and children?"
"What made you decide not to?"
Clara looked back up, at a loss for words. She parted her lips but then closed them. She was about to say I never decided not to help women and children, but then realized that, in a way, she had. Choosing to go out of your way to avenge those hurt is a choice, just as not doing it is.
"Fair enough." She finally murmured.
She rose from the bed and opened her drawers. She pulled her clean uniform out for the day, and then opened her top drawer. She stared at all her new underwear. She was musing exactly what pair to wear when Vastra spoke up again.
"When I was growing up, my dad beat my mum, my sister, and me for years. They just took it. Eventually, once I was clever enough, and strong enough, I changedit. I was always the one who wasn't afraid of action."
Clara turned back.
"So you do it for your sister and your mum." She surmised.
Vastra laughed. "Fuck no. I do it in memory of dear old dad."
Not for the first time, she found herself intimidated and frightened of Vastra. It lessened somewhat as Vastra laughed, but she remembered to stay on guard.
"It's awful how parents fuck us up." Clara finally said. "Even the ones who don't do anything wrong. Even the ones who are great and don't mean to. We all carry something from them."
"Are you on my body somewhere, Clara?" Vastra asked curiously. It took her a moment to realize what Vastra was asking. She shook her head quickly.
"No, no. My parents were amazing. They never harmed me."
"So what do you carry from them, then?"
Clara pulled her glass mug from the basket Danny had given her. She popped the top open, stared down at the mesh strainer inside of it, considered not answering. But Vastra had been honest with her.
"A fear of fire and survivor's guilt." She finally shared.
Vastra didn't ask anything else about it.
Before she went to lunch, she deliberately chose a pair of knickers from her new assortment. They were made of cranberry colored lace—the tiny, delicate kind that's thin and entirely translucent. They always made John painfully hard when he saw her in them; it didn't matter where they were. And despite where she was, despite the fact he wasn't even there, and despite the fact she'd never see him again, they made her feel powerful even now.
"Fuck." Vastra commented lightly. "You really do hate the Doctor now, don't you? Just walk into the servery in those. That will teach him."
"They're not for him. They're for me."
"A reminder that you could have anybody you want in here?"
"A reminder that I'm powerful enough on my own."
She couldn't have the Doctor, but that didn't mean much. She was still powerful enough that the SPO feared her. She was still powerful enough that the SPO was bribing her. She would embrace that and fuck him if he wanted to spend the rest of his life pouting over her. Fuck him for not telling her everything, for making himself so mysterious that she had no reason to think the SPO's file was wrong. And especially fuck him if he'd been lying to her the entire time.
"That's what I like to hear." Vastra finally said. "Let me know when you're ready to join Jenny and I. We'd love to include you in our little….detective service."
"Getting there." Clara admitted. She shot a side look at the book on her shelf. "Quicker and quicker as each day passes, in fact."
She didn't see him for the first half of lunch. When she finally spotted him, it was only briefly as he disposed of his tray and walked from the servery. It made her blood boil.
She'd told Vastra she wasn't allowed to go out during outdoors hours, so she headed back to her room once everybody transitioned from lunch. She used that time to pour back over the file, searching for something that didn't fit, some inconsistency.
John wouldn't have been part of this. It was the biggest hang up she had on the matter, the most confusing aspect of it all. She knew John. Despite the lying, she knew him. He had loved children. He'd gone out of his way to be kind to every child they'd ever met, including those injured or sick. He'd wanted children. He'd wanted a lot of children. How could she merge that version of him—that she knew was real, because she'd touched him, loved him, shared a life with him—with the version this file suggested. The version that would be involved in a cult that wanted to create a master race, a cult that employed a pediatrician to murder off "imperfect" (in the cult's awful, alleged words) children. It didn't make any logical sense. And more than anything, she was terrified to assume it could be true.
Danny came to visit her much earlier than he had the day prior. Outdoors period was only thirty minutes in when a screw finally located her in the cell.
"You're not permitted to be in here during your outdoors hours." He greeted.
"Needed some alone time." She stared him down. "Can I help you with something?"
He narrowed his eyes. "You have a visitor. Not that you deserve one."
Her heart lightened considerably. She could show Danny this file. She could tell him what the Doctor had said about John. Could ask what he thought. She smiled for a moment, but then quickly worked the expression from her face.
"Brilliant." She settled on.
She stuffed the file underneath the waistband of her trousers when the screw glanced away from her. She followed him down to the visiting room, collapsed down into Danny's arms on the sofa, and then pulled the file free once the screw was gone.
"I need you to read this." She said. "And I need to know what you think."
He looked ill when he finished. He passed it back to Clara and pursed his lips.
"Well?" Clara asked.
"He's fucking sick, Clara."
Clara looked down at her legs. She rubbed the coarse cotton of her trousers. "If it's true, yeah. He is."
"If it's true? How on earth could it not be true?" He demanded.
Clara was quiet for a moment.
"John was part of this cult." She finally said. She looked up at Danny. "The Doctor told me. John was supplying them with military information. He had been for years. Why would John be involved in this, Danny? He loved children. He loved people. He was good and honest and kind. It doesn't make any sense."
Her eyes burned. She felt John was being taken away from her again somehow.
"I don't believe for a second that he was. Did the Doctor have any way to prove John was part of it? Or did he just say that he was?"
Clara rubbed her burning nose. She sniffed. "No, but…he knew John's name from the start. How would he know about him otherwise?"
"Maybe he's seen your file, Clara."
She didn't know about that, but she did remember something else. She remembered how easily he'd hacked into the prison system and found information on Dr. Martha Jones. If he could find that, who's to say he couldn't find information on Clara? He'd never given her any specifics about John, now that she thought about it. Only vague comments about how much John loved her that anybody could've made up. She pressed her face into her hands.
"God. I'm such a fucking idiot, Danny."
His hand was warm on her lower back as he pulled her into his arms. She pressed her face into his neck and let out a bitter, betrayed sob before she could stop herself. He wrapped his arms around her securely.
"No you're not. You're lonely and you're trapped in here. I would've fallen for it, too." He reassured her. He stroked his hand over her back. "Things will be better now. I'll be here, okay? You don't need him."
"I don't need him." She repeated.
She felt confident and sure of that throughout the rest of their meeting. She carried the file back to her room, hid it in the back of that same book, and pulled another from her shelf. She read until Vastra got back, and then she looked up and waited to see if there had been any drama with the Doctor. But Vastra had nothing to offer gossip wise, so Clara went right back to her book.
By the time recreation came around, she was positive she didn't need him.
She went directly to the gym. She knew he wouldn't be there, and she knew that's where she needed to be. She spent the entire hour alternating between lifting weights and running on the treadmill, glad to find her muscles hadn't somehow atrophied in the time she'd been locked up. She was dripping with sweat and pleasantly exhausted on her walk back to her cell. The last thing she'd expected was to run into him—so, naturally, that's precisely what happened.
"Clara." He blurted. His hand wrapped around her wrist lightly before she could bolt in the opposite direction. She looked up at him reluctantly.
"What?" She snapped.
"We need to talk."
"No, we really don't."
She snatched her wrist from his grip and set off towards her cell. It was easy for him to match her pace with his longer legs.
"Look. I'm…sorry. Okay? I get jealous. It's fucking difficult not to be, when you're the only person I like in this place."
She refused to look up at him.
"Not interested."
"Now who's the eleven-year-old?" He scoffed.
She came to a sudden stop. He had to backtrack a bit, and then he rounded so he was standing directly in front of him. She met his eyes and ignored the thrill at the pit of her stomach as she did.
"Fuck. Off. Okay?"
She went to continue walking, but he quickly sped up and stepped in front of her again, blocking her path. She ground her teeth and tried to keep her hands from forcibly removing him.
"I said I was sorry!" He said, exasperated.
Her anger crested. There were few things that annoyed her quite as much as people blocking her path did.
"And I said I didn't fucking care. You lied to me. You lied to me over, and over, and over again, and now I have no idea who you are anymore. You disrespected me. You humiliated me. You made me think you're something that you're not—you used my dead boyfriend to earn my trust. How sick can you get."
She wanted to forcibly shove him out of the way, but her anger kept her in place. Give me a reason, she thought, pleaded. Give me a reason to fucking smack you. Please.
"I have no idea what you're talking about." He finally drew. His voice was even, and she waited to see if he'd panic or look guilty, but the expression never crossed his face. She supposed you'd have to actually have a conscience to feel guilty.
"I saw your file." She finally blurted. With those words, she got a reaction from him. His eyebrows rose and his lips pursed. It only served to make her angrier. She seethed. "I read about all those things you did. Those awful, terrible things. I can't believe you. You really had me going, didn't you? Filling your voice with sadness, weaving a story about your poor baby daughter Susan—but that's not how Susan died, is it, Doctor? Or any of those other children? You make me sick. I can't even stand to look at you."
"So you're just going to believe the file, then?" He demanded. She forced herself to ignore the way his voice was shaking.
"Well, what's my fucking alternative? All you've given me are vague comments that could just as easily fit the file's version of events as yours! It all ties in and it all makes sense. I can't believe I was going to fuck you. I can't believe I wanted to be your friend! God. God." She looked away. She had a sour taste in her mouth and she thought she may be sick.
"Right." He murmured. His voice was softer than she'd expected it to be. He looked down at the floor and away from her for a moment. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly. "So that's that, then. I just have one last question for you, Clara."
"What?" She snapped.
"What do you think is in your file?"
"Mum," she began. She stared down at her morning toast, smothered with honey and cinnamon, like it always was. She took a deep breath. "I don't want you to send notes with my lunch anymore."
The chopping of the knife stopped. She could hear the kitchen clock ticking and the far off sounds of her dad singing in the shower. She couldn't lift her head.
"Okay," her mum finally said hesitantly. "Might I ask why?"
Clara turned around in her chair, until she was looking back at her mum. She'd turned around in front of the counter too. She had obviously tried to measure out her expression, but Clara could see the hurt in her dark eyes.
"I'm sixteen." Clara finally reminded her. She shrugged. "It's just kind of…babyish, isn't it? I mean, I don't know anybody who still gets cute little notes from their mum in their lunch bag." She paused. "I don't know anybody whose mum still packs up their lunch, for that matter."
Her mum licked her lips nervously. She nodded a moment later.
"Yes, of course. You're right."
Clara lifted her toast. "I've got to start doing it on my own. You know?"
Her mother's heels tapped along the floor as she approached the table. Clara felt the warm pressure of her lips against the top of her head as she dropped a quick kiss.
"I'll do my best, love."
Clara smiled. "That's all I ask."
She went to school, came home, did her homework, talked to Nina on the phone, got into an argument with her dad, had dinner, went to bed, and then she choked on smoke.
She wasn't sure when it had started. One moment she was asleep—and the next she was hearing shouts and shrieks from downstairs. The most commanding yell of them all was her mother's voice, shrieking for her. She was a good girl; she always obeyed her mum. So she jumped from the bed, crossed to the door, and yanked it open. The smoke rolled into her with a force she hadn't expected. Her eyes burned and blurred. Her lungs seized. She doubled over and hacked, so overcome with a lack of oxygen that she didn't remember the basic rules of fire safety. She couldn't process what was happening. She was asleep. And then she was awake. And now her house was breathing soot.
Her body remembered what her mind didn't. She fell to her knees. She army crawled across the hall, coughing the entire time. She couldn't open her eyes. The dry, popping heat made them water to the point of uselessness. She needed to get out, she needed to find her mum and dad, she needed to open her eyes, she needed to breathe—and when she finally did open her eyes, she realized she should've stayed in her bedroom and made a jump from the window.
"MUM!" She shrieked. The stair bannister was smoking. She wasn't sure if it'd caught flame already and somehow gone out, or if it was about to. "MUM! DAD!"
Where were they? She had to know. She needed to know. What if they were in their room? What if they were trapped? She turned to head back towards their bedroom, but right as she did, her mum appeared at the foot of the stairs. Clara's mind shut down at the image of the fire devouring her front hall. Her mum had no choice but to jump up three of the stairs. She half fell and half ran up them; she skidded to a stop on her knees beside Clara once she reached the top. She was blurry behind the tears blurring Clara's eyes from the heat.
"Clara, Oh, God. Clara, come on, love. We've got to get out. We can't—we can't go back downstairs. We have to go out the window. Come on, follow me, it's all right."
She hooked onto her mum's orders. They both rose to their feet and ran through the thick smoke, bent over at the waist to keep their noses closer to the ground. They ran into Clara's room, and Clara had the selfish, silly urge to grab things. Her teddy bear from when she was young. Her school bag. Her favorite shoes. Her 101 Places to See book. All at once, the reality of what was happening hit her. Her chest narrowed. She was struggling to breathe.
"Through the window, down we go," her mum urged. Her mum shut the door behind them, and for a moment, all Clara could think was: she thinks she can lock out the fire. She was stuck, immobile. When she finally shook the shock off, her mum was tying the end of three knotted bedsheets to the end post of Clara's bed, making a makeshift rope Clara had only ever seen work in films.
"I don't know if the knot around the post will hold, so you go first. I'm going to hold it here, to make sure." Her mum ordered.
The crackling was more of a roar now. Clara's heart had migrated to her head. The pounding made it nearly impossible to think.
"Not without you, Mum!"
"Clara Oswald, you go out there, now!" Her mum ordered. "Go, go! We don't have time for this! Go!"
The severity of the situation slammed into Clara when the door gave an odd, alarming pop!. She hurried over to the window. She threw her legs over and sat on the edge. She wrapped her legs and her hands around the sheet, and then she looked at her mum.
"I want you to come with me!" She pleaded. Her chest hurt. She couldn't breathe. She didn't want to leave her mum. "Please, Mum!"
"It'll break if we go at once. We'll fall. You could break something. I love you, you go on, be a good girl. I'll see you in a second."
You wanted to do things all on your own, didn't you, Clara? She realized then, staring up at her mum, that she wasn't ready to do anything on her own yet. She had been stupid. She wanted to tell her mum that—she wanted to tell her that she didn't mean it, that she still wanted notes with her lunch, but she was skidding down the sheet and she didn't remember moving. She hit the ground hard and sat there for a moment, shivering and gasping with fear. Her mind was stuck on a loop. She couldn't think and she couldn't breathe and everything was blurry. She looked around the yard. She spotted neighbors, and her dad was above her, but where was her mum?
She looked back up at her bedroom window. Her mum's back was to her now. Clara could see the flames rising and licking up her walls. She didn't understand why her mum wasn't coming down the sheets, too. But then she felt the soft texture against her thighs. She looked down at the ground in front of her and stared at the makeshift rope. It must have slipped. It must have ripped. She didn't know—but it was with her, and it wasn't up there. Her mum didn't have it anymore. She couldn't get down.
"Oh my God, oh my God, no, no, God—" her dad was saying things that didn't help. Why wasn't he helping? Clara rose to her feet. She made to run to the door, but one of her neighbors grabbed her and held her tightly. She fought against his grip. She shrieked and screamed until she heard her mother shrieking and screaming. She had never heard anybody scream like that. She had never heard her mother make sounds like that.
"JUMP, MUM!" She shrieked. She writhed in her neighbor's arms, struggling to get towards the door. "JUMP OUT, MUM!"
She was terribly lightheaded, and for a moment, all she could do was shut her eyes. The neighbor spun them around. He mumbled something about how fast fire spreads. She didn't hear her mum screaming anymore.
It was all gone then. When everything was back, she was lying in the back of an ambulance with an oxygen mask on. And it was only her father beside her.
"Where's mum?" She tried to say, but attempting to speak with the mask on only made her choke. A paramedic leaned over her face and told her something she couldn't hear. She looked at her dad. He was bent over at the waist, sobbing hysterically. He didn't have to answer her.
"You're refreshingly involved in our discussions this term, Clara. What's your favorite thing about Dante's work?" Her professor asked. "Personally, for me, it's the cheeky references. Always was a bit of a history lover."
The heat from her takeaway coffee cup was burning her palms. She gripped it tighter. She was giving honesty a shot.
"I like that the deepest circle of hell isn't fiery." Her voice was measured, careful. Admitting things about yourself could be dangerous. People sometimes got greedy; you'd tell them one thing about yourself, and they'd want to know twenty more things. She was vigilant about the damaged parts of herself she gave away.
Her professor blinked. She watched her consider what she'd said with mild confusion.
"Yes, I suppose it's interesting."
"It means the worst thing isn't burning. The worst thing is freezing."
"Yes…you could take that view of it, sure."
She nodded once.
"So I really like that." She completed.
Clara had a migraine and sand in her hair. She was not having the best day.
"Hi!"
She flinched in shock and jolted upright, accidentally flinging the heavy material of her jacket off her face. The bright, brutal sun sent sharp waves of pain piercing along her skull. She reached up and grasped her head with gasp, shutting her eyes once she'd caught of glimpse of who'd snuck up on her. It was who always snuck up on her.
"You've got to stop doing that!" She scolded, irritable in her pain. She sank back down onto her blanket. "One day I really am going to shoot you. How'd you find me, anyway?"
He cheerfully plopped down beside her.
"You always come here when you don't want to be found. Which makes me think you only want to be invisible to everybody but me."
"Don't flatter yourself, Smith. I'm just a creature of habit." She muttered. She reached over and grasped her jacket. She dropped it back over her face, relieved when the sudden darkness softened the pain behind her eyes.
He reached for her hand. She wedged it underneath her back before he could do anything but graze her palm with his fingers.
"What are you doing out here?" He asked, not the slightest bit upset by her aloofness.
"Have a migraine. Hiding from Pink. Don't want to do exercises. And if you tell him, I'll kill you."
"I'm hiding from Rand." He admitted. "He's not very happy with me."
"Oh? Because you're rubbish?"
"Hey!"
"What? You are. You refuse to shoot your gun."
"I hate guns."
"Well, it's a good thing you're in the army."
"Ha, ha," he said. She heard the blanket rustle. She guessed he'd stretched out beside her. "Are you going to be there this Wednesday?"
"Haven't I met you the past two Wednesdays?"
He ignored her comment.
"Yes, but I rescheduled a phone call with my mum for our meeting, so I wanted to make sure it was still happening."
Clara resisted the urge to lift the jacket and look at him. She smiled before she could stop herself.
"Aren't you a great son. Making scheduled calls to Mummy and all."
He was quiet for a moment. "Don't you make calls to your mum?"
Clara's heart pulsed with pain. She was glad her face was covered.
"Not since 2005."
"Oh," he sounded bashful and a bit embarrassed. "Sorry. Bad relationship?"
"She's dead, actually."
"Oh," he repeated, though this time it was more of a nervous squeak. "I'm sorry. How?"
"Bit forward of you."
He sputtered. Clara took mercy on him.
"It's fine. She…um. Our house caught fire." Her eyes were hot.
"Oh. Oh." He repeated, for what felt like the hundredth time. "Oh. That's why you're…oh."
For a moment, all she could hear was the far off sound of Pink yelling something. She wished she could've taken her words back.
"At least you made it out." He finally said, with a voice full of tenderness that Clara felt was inappropriate for how long they'd known each other.
She wasn't sure what to say back to that, so she didn't say anything at all. He continued.
"My mum's a bitch, really. Kind of an awful woman. I lived with my dad growing up because she 'couldn't handle' being a full-time mum. But I still bend over backwards for her. The love kids have for their parents is mad, right?"
Clara thought about the nights she still felt paralyzed with sorrow.
"Yeah." She agreed. "I don't think anybody ever outgrows needing their parents, anyway. I used to think, once I was a certain age, I'd be all right without them. But I still need my mum for at least one thing nearly every day."
"It's amazing. Kids are amazing. Even kids that have grown up."
"Adults. The word you're looking for is adults." She deadpanned.
He pressed on. "I can't wait to have kids. They'll love me mad like that."
She thought about his silly, affectionate nature.
"You'd be a good dad." She agreed.
"The best. I know I would." She could hear the smile in his voice. "I'd like eight daughters."
Her laughter was slightly inappropriate and automatic.
"Oh, my God."
"What?"
"You're serious?"
"Yeah," he said defensively. "I am."
"Eight. Eight daughters?"
"Yes. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight."
"What's wrong with sons?"
"Don't get along well with men."
Clara shook her head, amused. "Do you have any idea how insane life would be with eight small kids running around?"
"Yes. And it'd be amazing. I'd be the best dad ever. I'd never let anybody hurt them and I'd teach them everything."
Clara shook her head.
"Good luck finding somebody who wants eight kids."
"Thanks. Maybe a schoolteacher. They're used to having loads of kids."
Clara smiled, once again thankful her face was covered.
"That's what I was going to be, you know. Before the army. Maybe still will, after the army."
"So how do you feel about the number eight, Clara?"
She laughed. "Piss off, Smith."
"Nah. I think I'll stay right here." He admitted. He scooted closer, just enough to bring the side of his body against hers. She told herself it was her headache that kept her from moving back. She was tired, overheated, pained, scattered. That's why she moved a little closer to him, too.
"How's the migraine?"
"Migraine-y."
"So I suppose this would be a terrible time to sing the entirety of the Phantom of the Opera to you."
"Yes. Yes it would." She said dangerously, threat heavy in her tone.
"Okay, just checking."
He was quiet for an astounding three minutes.
"You're really odd." Clara finally shared.
"Yeah, and you know what else?" He agreed.
"What?"
"I think you like it."
Ordinarily, she would've argued. But she had a migraine. She smiled into her jacket, and when he reached over to grab her hand again, she let his fingers wrap all the way around hers before she pulled away.