Evergreen

Gold light breaks behind the houses,
I don't see what's strange about this.
Tiny bubbles hang above me.
It's a sign that someone loves me.
I can hardly stand up right.
I hit my head up on the light.
I have faith but don't believe it.
It's not there enough to leave it.

Everything I love is on the table.
Everything I love is out to sea.

I have only two emotions,
careful fear and dead devotion.
I can't get the balance right,
with all my marbles in the fight.
I see all the ones I went for,
all the things I had it in for.
I won't cry until I hear,
because I was not supposed to be here.

I'm not alone.
I'll never be.
And to the bone,
I'm evergreen.

(The National, Don't Swallow the Cap)

It must have been on a Sunday that he saw her for the first time. After all, there weren't many other possibilities to find him wandering the beach during the day – not that he wandered the beach during the night, that would be weird, wouldn't it? Looking back, it was hard to remember the first thing that came to his mind when he came across her. Indifference? Mild curiosity? Surprise? People walking their dogs were fairly common, after all. But not so much in the middle of bloody freezing February at seven in the morning when the sun was barely kissing the horizon.

The Doctor was on his way home, with the firm intention of going straight to bed following a very long and tiresome night at the practice. But one, his back was killing him and he needed to stretch his legs. Two, Tardis, his six-year-old rough-coated Jack Russell Terrier was begging for a walk and three, he hadn't seen the sea in a while and he yearned for its soothing presence. Odd, for someone who had spent most of his life far from the ocean, he now missed it like crazy when they were separated for too long. He didn't need to go near the water. Just seeing it from afar and feeling its breath wash over his every pore was enough.

Now, though, he felt he had to come closer. His bed could wait. He was very conscious of the fact that the practice could call him any minute with an emergency, and he was losing precious time that he should spend sleeping. But the temptation was too strong. Sure, he could pretend that he was only curious about the dog, which Tardis had noticed before him. It was a beautiful fawn Briard. Young, by the look of things. Running around in circles around his owner. But he saw dogs at his practice every day. On the other hand, girls racing like crazy on the beach having intricate one-sided conversations with their pets were a rarer occurrence.

They were playing some kind of game, he could tell. Although he wasn't sure who was chasing who in that scenario. Tardis, who was showing even more curiosity at the spectacle than him, approached the duo and started running her own circles around the bigger dog. The girl had a hood over her head, and it was difficult to see her face or guess her age. From her quick movements and endurance though, the Doctor imagined she was in her early twenties.

Tardis was now saying hi to the Briard properly, and the Doctor was surprised to see that his owner was older than he had first thought. In her early thirties, he guessed. Still a good few years younger than him, that was for sure. She had laugh lines at the corner of her lips and eyes. This, he saw clearly when she smiled at him. A warm, earnest smile that immediately hooked him.

"Hi," she said, keeping her hands in her pockets to warm them. It was colder there, near the water. Especially when you weren't running like a lunatic with your dog.

She looked a bit uncomfortable. The Doctor surmised that she hadn't expected anyone to show up at 7AM on a Sunday morning to see her frolic about on the sand. He smiled to reassure her. Going a bit goofy around dogs - he could definitely relate, after all.

"Hi. That's a beautiful dog you have. I love Briards, although you don't see a lot of them."

"Thanks!" she beamed, clearly touched.

Their dogs had apparently become fast friends. Funny how it went like that, with dogs. With just a sniff, they knew whether they should keep away, simply say hi, or become the best buddies on planet Earth. If only it were so simple with humans…

She removed her hood since the sun was finally making a welcome appearance, and the Doctor was able to see her face better. And it was a very lovely face, no doubt. High cheekbones, brown almond shaped eyes, a small round nose and full lips.

"I don't think I've ever seen you before on the beach. I come every morning. Granted, I've only moved in a month ago…"

"Oh, you live around here?"

"Yeah, my house is over there," she replied, pointing vaguely towards Horsey. "It's a 15-minute walk across some fields, but it's nice."

Horsey was tiny, he wondered why he hadn't seen her before. But then she did say she had only been here for a month, and through quick but worrying mathematics, he realised that he had probably not stepped foot outside his house for close to a month, except to drive to and from his practice. And it wasn't like he did the weekly shopping around – he ordered everything to be delivered at the practice – or, Heaven forbid, went to Mass every Sunday. She didn't actually look like a church goer either, although that didn't mean much.

They walked a bit together in silence, watching their dogs playing by the water's edge and splashing themselves silly. Tardis would be covered in sand and he'd have to hose her down a bit. Oh, well. He didn't expect he'd be able to sleep much anyway.

"I'd better go and get some rest," she said after a while.

The Doctor nodded, too tired to realise that just because that's what he was planning to do on a Sunday morning, it wasn't what any normal person would do.

"Yeah, I should go and do the same," he eventually replied.

"Late night partying?"

"I wish!" he laughed. "No, just working late. You?"

"Same."

She smiled. Call him a sap or an over indulger of poetry, but with the sun shining in her wind-swept hair, she looked heavenly. Her brown hair had red flecks that particularly caught the light and his lingering gaze. He hoped he didn't stare at her too much. It was good to be reminded that he could still appreciate a beautiful woman when he saw one. He wasn't completely dead yet.

"What are you doing here so early in the morning?" he asked.

"I'm a translator, I keep strange hours."

"Oh, that's nice! So you work from home?"

It wasn't every day you came across translators, so he was interested. A bit of originality in his life and the conversation would keep him awake until they made their separate ways. But they didn't. As she was telling him about the deadlines she had to meet for clients across the ocean, she turned right towards Horsey Corner instead of left.

"You live in Horsey Corner?" he asked in astonishment.

"Yeah, bought a small house there. It's tiny but lovely."

The Doctor stopped in his tracks.

"You're the new person who moved in by the Old Chapel guest house," he realised.

She stopped as well, their dogs continuing undisturbed since they knew the way well.

"How do you know that?" she asked, a bit mistrustful now.

"Horsey Corner is super small, everyone knows everyone," he explained. "I live right across from you. The white house on the left."

"Oh, you're the drug dealer!" she exclaimed.

"I'm the what?"

"Big house, black fancy car, only parks in the middle of the night a few days a week, never switches on any light inside…"

"And with all that your first thought was drug dealer?"

She shrugged, but didn't dissuade him. Or run away, that was always good.

"And now what do you think?" he asked, gesturing to his self. His unthreatening self – he hoped, at least.

"Well, I had never seen you before," she pointed out correctly.

"I'm almost never home," he admitted, "I usually sleep at work."

She looked puzzled by that answer, but didn't ask him to elaborate. Was he to remain the creepy – possibly dangerous – neighbour she'd do her best to avoid in the future? He certainly hoped not. To diffuse the atmosphere and, hopefully, better his chance at seeing her again, he started walking again slowly and explained his situation.

"I'm a vet. My practice is just outside Hickling. Not far from here, but I often end up sleeping there after surgeries."

Bingo, she liked him again. Never underestimate the power of the word "vet" with girls. Especially the ones who had pets. That was a cheap shot, but then he wasn't always above them. Most often than not, it didn't go anywhere – he was hopeless in every other aspect of his life, after all – but at least he wouldn't antagonize his new neighbour the first time he met her.

"And I'm a night owl anyway, I'm at my best after midnight." A beat. Realising how it might have sounded. "For surgeries, I mean. I mostly do surgeries at night." He was in dire need of sleep. And shutting up, he definitely needed to shut up. He'd won her back, no need to scare her once more. But the Doctor couldn't help it: sleep deprivation plus new beautiful girl to impress, and he was on a roll. Talking a mile a minute about his practice, his passion, his work. Looking back, he couldn't for the life of him remember what he prattled about.

They were soon at her door, although they had passed his house first, and she waved him goodbye.

"Have a nice rest! Maybe I'll see you around, if you're not too busy."

So he had come off as a workaholic. What a surprise. He was, yes. Although his work wasn't just a job for him, it was his life. Still, she had an impish smile when she said that, so perhaps she hadn't bought all of his shit. Good. There was still hope she didn't see him as a complete egomaniac arsehole.

And that's when he realised he hadn't even asked her name. Or what she was doing in the middle of bloody nowhere in Norfolk. He'd just pontificated about his calling for science and animals. Good going there, Doctor. Not an egomaniac at all.

Sleep came surprisingly easily. And when he went back to the practice around four for his day's surgeries, he felt more refreshed than he should have been. He even managed to leave at a reasonable hour (meaning before midnight), and he couldn't help but watch out for the presence of his newly discovered neighbour when he arrived home. The lights were on, and he felt tempted to ring her doorbell, just for the hell of it and to prove a point. What point, he wasn't so sure. Instead, he went to bed at a decent hour and set his alarm clock for 6.30. If he got lucky, maybe he'd see her on the beach the next morning. And maybe he'd remember to ask for her name.

The Doctor did find out her name. As well as many other things about her, in the following weeks. He hardly managed to see her on the beach every morning, but on the days when his surgeries didn't last until three in the morning and nothing awful had happened to a pet that was brought to his practice, he'd be there. And they'd talk, whilst their dogs played and barked and caused mayhem. Their conversations were nothing to write home about and inconsequential, but they grounded him. They were a breath of fresh air from his day to day life at the practice, which he spent either worrying over some pets or assaulted by their owners' distress and, more often than not, anger. He couldn't save everyone, and whether the Doctor was the misplaced vessel of their grief or simply the quickest and nearest outlet for their rage, he'd found himself many a time wishing his calling had been for something else.

But it wasn't to be – saving animals and getting them out of pain was his vocation. He loved it and would keep on doing it until he keeled over – probably during a surgery, and probably sooner rather than later, at the rate he was going. Dealing with the clients' feelings was just part of the package. That being said, when he managed to fix a cat or a dog successfully, their happiness could fuel him for days. He'd feel like he was on top of the world until he came crashing down, beat by biology one more time, his ego left in tatters (as it should be).

Clara – for that was her name - didn't ask him a lot of questions about his work. Until one morning, after a particularly gruelling couple of days. Jack, his closest colleague, had ordered him to go home to get some rest around 6AM, but the Doctor knew sleep wouldn't come for him in his state, so he'd went to the beach instead, sans Tardis, who had remained at the practice, and sat down on the cold sand to wait for the sunrise. And Clara.

She did a double take when she arrived, as though she wasn't sure it was him. She got her dog off lead as she usually did, but instead of following him to the water's edge, she sat down on the sand next to him without a word.

"Where's Tardis?" she asked after a few minutes of silence.

"Left her at the practice. I'll be getting back soon enough. Just needed a wee break."

"Do you want me to leave you alone?"

He was grumpy. He sounded grumpy even, and he hoped Clara didn't take it personally.

"No."

The Doctor watched her dog in the distance. Splashing, running around and barking at seagulls without a care in the world. It reminded him why he was doing the work he was doing. This dog was fine. This dog was alive and well and cared for.

"You never told me why you named your dog Mycroft."

There was reproach in his tone, as if it was something Clara should have explained a long time ago. But bless her, she didn't take this personally either. Or pointed out that he hadn't explained why his dog was called Tardis.

"My friend got a dog for her equestrian centre in Cornwall. She named him Sherlock, because she'd always wanted to have a dog called Sherlock. The other three dogs from the litter were supposed to go to a shepherd. But one of the pups was afraid of sheep so he was useless, the poor thing. So my friend took him in for a while but she couldn't handle two dogs. And I'd fallen in love with him at that point so I agreed to take him, even though I was living in a tiny flat in London at the time."

She still hadn't answered his question. Clara smiled in a non-condescending way – he didn't have to ask again - and it warmed him a bit.

"Mycroft is the name of Sherlock Holmes brother in the Arthur Conan Doyle's novels."

The Doctor finally nodded, the fact that the story behind her dog's name was so convoluted pleasing him, somehow. All was right with the world. People would keep on having pets and coming up with silly names for them. A simplistic view on life, but one that mattered to him on that particular morning.

He felt better, and didn't snap at her when she finally asked him how he was.

"I haven't seen you in a while, are you ok? Was it a bad one at the practice?"

"Make that several," he replied.

He breathed in deeply, and in fragments and broken sentences told her about the past few days. The pets that survived and the ones that didn't. The owners who hugged him and the ones who almost came to blows with him. The surgeries that filled him with joy and the ones that plunged him into despondency.

"I should come and visit your practice, one day. Not that Mycroft needs it. Just to see where it is and say hi. Hickling is just an hour walk's away, after all. It would make for a nice break during my day."

At the time, he thought it was a great idea. Yeah, he could definitely do with Clara coming around. He didn't know her well and had only met her a few weeks before, but talking with her definitely brightened his days. So seeing her at his practice, especially on a bad day, would be very welcomed indeed.

If only he'd known…