disclaimer: anything you recognize does not belong to me.

notes: spoilers for the 50th anniversary special, the day of the doctor, like seriously major spoilers, don't read if you haven't watched! otherwise this is mostly just mindless eleven/clara fluff.

In his dreams, Gallifrey falls a million times over, and the smell of smoke and screams never quite leaves him in his waking hours. He walks around with it like an anchor on his chest, weighing him down into the sea where, perhaps, he could forget more easily of the children he had burned that day, forget the way they'd cried as they took their last breaths of smoke and fire, smoke and fire, always, always smoke and fire.

But the Doctor does not walk beneath the sea, and the world above is nothing but memories of the people he has failed to save. When he sees the painting, he reaches, almost involuntarily, out to catch the hand of his companion, the girl whose love could ground him like no other, and her warmth encloses him almost immediately.

He is lucky, he thinks as he surveys the planet he had called his home before he'd burned it into the skies, lucky that he has her, lucky she stays with him. Lucky that she loves him, because if Clara didn't love him, he's not sure he'd still be here at all.

-:-

"Do you ever dream?" she asks him on nights too lonely to quantify in hours when his only comfort is the sight of her, warm and vibrant against the silvers and blues of the TARDIS' interior, her favorite mug filled with her favorite tea clasped in her hands like a lifesaver. Like she needs one at all – Clara is a girl who can save her own life and his and everyone else's, twenty times over, without even hesitating.

"Of course I dream," he tells her, looking up from the control panel to smile at her, and in the light she looks something like a dream on her own, like a dream he'd dreamt years ago, long buried and lost in his subconscious, but a dream nonetheless. "Everybody dreams."

Her next sip of her tea is long, giving her time to think. He wishes she wouldn't, because the next logical step in the conversation is about his nightmares, about the dreams that make him want to die, and there is nothing he'd like to discuss less, no matter how understanding she would be and, perhaps, because of that.

Clara's words, when they come, surprise him out of his spiral into dark thoughts right back into the reality of having her alive and safe inside the TARDIS. "But what do you dream about?" she asks, tilting her head over the top of her mug and looking at him like there's nobody in the world she'd rather be talking to. The way she makes him feel like the only important person around might be dangerous, if he didn't trust her with his life. It might still be dangerous.

"The same thing everybody dreams about," he tells her, and the memories of his past companions, his friends and his family, blur in his mind as he looks at her and thinks of home. "Where I'm going."

-:-

"She's a pretty girl, your Clara," his previous incarnation tells him at one point, as casual as if he's discussing the weather when what he's talking about is so much more important than anything in the heavens. "Smart, too. I can see why you chose her."

"Of course you can," he replies, thinking of Clara's smile, Clara's laugh, Clara's touch, Clara's strength. "You chose her, didn't you?"

The other him chuckles. "Yes, I suppose I did. She's a good choice – good for you. For us."

"She's always been good for us," he agrees. "She saved me – saved us all, actually, more than once. Too often to count. She's incredible."

His past self looks at him knowingly, and says quite solemnly, "Don't fall in love with her," like it's a secret that the Doctor should never fall in love with Clara Oswald. Like it's a secret that he already has, that he always has, that he always will.

Don't fall in love with her, because even his past lives know just how easy it is to fall in love with Clara.

-:-

One brisk winter Wednesday, he arrives with plans to take her swing dancing in a different decade, to a picnic on a planet five million light years away, off and away on another grand adventure. Instead he finds her with a boy, looking prettier than a picture in a blue dress that looks new. The boy is her age, so maybe not exactly a boy, and he's tall, fair-haired, hazel-eyed, and looking at her like she makes the sun shine.

In all fairness to him, that's exactly what she does. When she notices him, too quickly for him to even contemplate sneaking away and leaving her on – on this date and coming back another day, she jumps up in delight and waves.

"Doctor!" she calls, like he hasn't already attuned himself to her voice and visage since the second he stepped off the TARDIS, like he could have missed seeing her sitting there. He smiles at her anyway, because she's Clara, his Clara, and her hugs still smell of strawberry shampoo and lemon soap and home.

"This is Matthew," she explains once they part, turning back to her date with shining eyes, "Matt, this is the Doctor – remember I was telling you about him? Doctor, Matt works at my school." All this in a rush of breath, so clearly excited for him to meet her friend, so he smiles at Matthew despite the churning in his stomach.

"Ah, yes, the infamous Doctor," Matthew says with a grin that makes it easy to see why she seems to like him so much, "I've heard a lot about you, most of it good. Pleasure to finally meet you."

"Yes," he says, "pleasure to meet you, Matthew, whom I have heard nothing about," and he looks pointedly at Clara, who rolls her eyes. "Will you be joining us today? We're off to see a planet made of precious metals!"

Matthew smiles a little wistfully, but shakes his head. "Nah, sorry, I've still got work to catch up on, so I'll have to pass. Maybe another day?" His gaze travels over to Clara and his smile seems to brighten. "See you around, Clara."

"See you," she says with a smile equally as bright as his, and it's a wonder the skies above them could still be so grey.

-:-

She's laughing as she watches him fiddle with the controls, her voice light in the heavy air, "But you're not going anywhere!" she says matter-of-factly, "you're just wandering about!" and her words ring like church bells in his mind. Twelve hundred years of adventure and she's still right. All he's been doing is wandering about.

"I suppose you're right," he tells her, pausing in his fiddling to look at the heart of the TARDIS. "I don't know where I'm going, really," because home is gone, and all he's left with are a box and a girl with a heart made of gold.

"That's ok," she says, standing and walking over to him so she can press her half-full mug of tea into his hands. "You don't have to know where you're going. You'll end up where you're meant to be eventually."

He takes a sip of her tea and smiles at her. "What would I do without you?" and she laughs and pushes herself up on her toes to press a kiss to his cheek that lingers for days afterwards, though she can't possibly know that.

"You'd be lost," she says jokingly, but her words ring far more true than she could imagine, and when he falls asleep that night, his dreams are filled with her for once. She would like Gallifrey, he thinks. She would like him as he was.

-:-

He waits until dinner in a restaurant somewhere in New Orleans in a different decade before broaching the subject over a bottle of wine, "How come I've never heard of Matthew before?" as nonchalantly as possible. Clara looks up from her menu and smiles at him in a way that makes it terribly hard to be annoyed.

"Are you upset I didn't tell you about him?" she laughs as he makes a face at her. "Don't be silly, Doctor. It's just that I hardly get the time to tell you the boring, mundane details of my life when we're off saving the world, you know. Priorities, and all that."

He waves his hand dismissively. "Well, we're not saving the world right now. Tell me about him. I need to make sure he's good enough for you, don't I?" as if anybody could be good enough for her, the girl who'd jumped into time streams to save him and the world, the girl too impossible to exist, and yet she did.

"Good enough?" Clara giggles, collapsing back in her seat. "He's just a friend! You don't need to interrogate him, I promise!" But her fingers playing absently with her napkin tell a different story than one of just friends. He wishes he could be better at pretending it didn't bother him.

He's her best friend, though, so he only smirks across the table, raises an eyebrow at her. "You like him," he says lightly, like the weight of the statement doesn't knock him back. "Come on, I can see the way you looked at him."

"That's absurd," she informs him primly, and reaches out to snatch up her glass of wine for a distraction. "Did you really bring me to the Quarter just to grill me about my rather lacking love life?" she demands.

"How could your love life, of all love lives, ever be lacking?" he grins at her, leaning across the table and waiting for the smile to spread across her cheeks like it always does. "You're telling me you don't leave a trail of broken hearts wherever you go, Clara, really?"

"Shut up," she laughs, tossing a crouton from her salad at him and having it bounce off his chest. "Why, have I broken your heart, Doctor?" she asks with a teasing smile.

"Every day," he says loftily, but her smile is too bright for him to continue the lie.

-:-

There are nights when he dreams of happier things, of Gallifrey standing, of companions old and new alive and happy and at his side once more, of planets that never burned and children that never died. He dreams of the man he could have been, if Gallifrey had stood.

He wakes up from these dreams in an even worse state than his nightmares. Those nights, when she's not with him, he calls Clara.

"Hello, Doctor?" she says when he finds the strength to dial her number, her voice sleepy but still clear through the phone. "Is everything okay?" always worried, she is, always worrying about him, like he deserves her caring about him, like he deserves her at all.

"Yes," he manages after a moment of letting her voice sink into his skin, "everything – everything is fine, I'm sorry," the apologies tripping off his tongue, not entirely meant for her but for his people, for the children, for his home. "I'm sorry, Clara."

"Don't be sorry," she whispers into the phone and he can practically feel her next to him, always warm and bright and beautifully alive. "I'm here, Doctor. Don't worry, I'm here."

And she is, she always is. He doesn't think he could love her anymore for it if he tried.

-:-

"Dare I ask how you liked my past selves?" he asks grandly upon re-entering the TARDIS after their latest adventure, buoyed on the joy of the knowledge that Gallifrey falls no more. She's sitting on the steps, studiously reading the book he had abandoned to greet her, and she turns around at the sound of his voice with a smile on her face.

"Is that a trick question?" she laughs, jumping to her feet and walking over to the control panel to meet him halfway. "They were just as delightful as you, Doctor. Perhaps even more so."

He makes a face at her. "You wound me, Clara, you do," he declares, pressing buttons to enter in new coordinates that he'd just made up in the moment. "They both certainly seemed enchanted by you."

She giggles, hopping up on the edge of the panel to watch him do his work. "Are you jealous, Doctor?" she teases, swinging her legs and leaning over closer to him.

"Of myself? I think not," he grins, pulling a lever to get the TARDIS moving and then situating himself in front of her. "Should I be?"

Clara rolls her eyes and pushes her foot into his side, only hard enough to tickle. "Don't be ridiculous," she says, sliding down off the panel until she's standing with her back against it and a smile on her face as she looks up at him. "Is this like when you were jealous of Matt?"

He sputters, staring down at her in indignation. "I was never jealous!" he exclaims. "Where would you get that idea?"

She laughs and says, "I know you, Doctor," as simple as it needs to be, and he finds himself leaning down without even really thinking about it. Everything with Clara is far easier than it should be, but maybe that's why he likes it so much – why he loves her so much. She tastes like peppermint tea, and all he can think as he kisses her is that if it weren't for her, he might never have found the courage to save Gallifrey.

"Thank you," he whispers when they part, and she doesn't have to ask what for. She only smiles and kisses him again, a promise waiting on the other end of another adventure.

"Let's go home," she tells him with a smile, fingers intertwining in his, and home meaning Earth or meaning Gallifrey, whichever one, it doesn't matter, because he's got her at his side. He presses his forehead to hers and lets the sensation of her in his arms wash over him for a moment.

"Let's go home," he echoes, and his smile reaches his eyes for the first time in a long time as he looks at Clara and thinks of home.

a/n: if you read this far, i'd really appreciate it if you dropped me a review, please and thank you!

and DON'T favorite without reviewing, thank you.