#wr. thread.

[highaver]

@stormlit.

"What have you done to your hair, child?"

Covered as it was by her hood, Balfour could still see a messy attempt at pigtails sticking out from beneath her cloak. She looked as if she had just been dragged backward through the underbrush behind a speeding horse.

[serbaird]

@supportary.

ㅤGregor had been very well behaved tonight. He hoped that, above all things, Sylvie recognised this. He had not said a word while they'd been in the pub about what he wasn't sure hadn't been a slip of the tongue or maybe just Sylvie showing the deepest affection for his parents. Things were different now. It was just the two of them, their only company the summer evening breeze and the sound of the sea on the other side of the road. Gregor had his arm around her shoulders.

ㅤ“ Kind of rude of you not to tell me you were married to someone, you know, ” he said lightly. He pulled her in closer, squeezing her against his side. “ I mean, who are these in-laws you're talking about? Devastating. ”

[grenewoden]

@meiquene.

ㅤ“ I've not seen thi here before, ” he smiled, half-squinting into the sun as he stood with his hands on his hips. Robin was certain he would remember a face like hers. Even if he hadn't been in the area for all that long at all. He carried on walking beside her, back facing the direction they were strolling through the meadow, with that damn grin on his face. “ Is tha from t' village? ”

[frsthws]

@highevar.

ㅤMurdag was unhappy. This was usually so for them when their cousins descended upon the Mac Eanraig fleet, disturbing the perfect balance of the Vinsomer. They used to think that it was unforgivable. Now, as they watched Elethea sitting in their quarters, lonely and miserable as Ivor and their father had stolen Balfour away, they felt guilty for their disdain for her. Almost.

ㅤThey cleared their throat to gain her attention. They stood not far from the door of their bedroom, hands upon their hips, and Elethea would not be wrong to assume they did not wish to be saying this.

ㅤ“ My mother wishes for you to know... If you would care to stay with your brother, you may both have my quarters. ”

[highaver]

@sanitatcm. time traveller sc.

"My wife, sir?" If he was stupid in the modern day, he was even worse here. Call it a lapse in his memory: there were so many details of his new life to remember, sometimes he forgot the blatantly obvious. It was easy enough to remember that he worked in a pub, yes, but he'd not actually had a wife in years. And Clara had only been his very fake one for two weeks. The realisation hit him promptly. "Oh!" A quick scramble, then, to try and make himself seem like he wasn't the world's most terrible husband. "You've met her? You're, uh - a regular to the Hare & Hounds, then?"

[highaver]

@isbrilliant. call.

"Are you sure this isn't busywork?" Balfour didn't much trust the Doctor. Especially not when he'd sent the two of them to the arse end of London with nothing more than a load of technobabble to see them off.

[highaver]

@yes7erdays. cont.

They'd gotten comfortable, the two of them. In more ways than one. From the way that Balfour moved around the Hare and Hounds, collecting plates and cups and all else that had been discarded so haphazardly about the room, he might have looked like he'd been doing this his whole life. Like he belonged here, almost. He didn't even put on that deer in the headlights look when Clara touched him as he passed her. He stopped, of course, and smiled when she leaned against him, talking on of worker's rights, which he never had any clue about.

He must have said something in response to her. Must have. Balfour didn't have it in him to ignore Clara, and there was much to be said - fondly, if not teasingly - at her temperament, of how she could likely spark a revolution all on her own. But he had no hope of recalling the words that had just left his lips. Not a shred, with Clara's fingers at his chest, cold against his skin and pulling him closer, to where she relaxed back against the door. His own fingers tightened briefly around the edge of the plates in his hand, fighting the urge to let that usual rush of feeling force him to step back or straighten or make any move that might encourage her to let go. His other hand, naturally and without much thought, moved to cover her own; he'd always run hot, and there was no reason not to share his warmth on such a cold winter night.

"Mistletoe?" he asked, then, and glanced up, just briefly, to see what Clara meant. Ah. Of course. It was a wonder that Balfour could even feel the chill at all, from the way the usual blush spread across his cheeks and warmed his face. Returning his gaze to Clara, he managed a slight smile. Flustered and embarrassed and all of those usual Balfour Sutherland things that made him question why he ever said a damn word around her in the first place.

And something else.

"Well... I wouldn't want us to have... any more bad luck," he said, sounding as though he were trying very hard to choose the right words. Taking his hand away from hers again, he moved to rest it against the door as he leaned in. Part of him was worried he was making a fool of himself. Maybe he was, maybe Clara, teasing and wonderful and cruel Clara, would push him away at the last second, bad luck be damned. But he'd gotten comfortable - and it was so much harder to pretend he didn't fancy her, now that they spent all their time together. Which she probably knew anyway, because she was Clara - clever and aware - and he was Balfour - obvious and unsubtle, even when he tried his hardest not to be. So he took the risk, in the end, vaguely dizzy and very overwhelmed, and kissed her.

[highaver]

@yes7erdays. cont.

In a week, in a week - God fucking help them if they were still here in a week. Balfour could barely stand the thought of being here for another day. No money, no food, no phones, no way home, no... anybody, except for each other. And it wasn't to say that he minded Clara - quite the opposite, in fact, and there were few people he would rather be stranded in time with - but this was...

This was the sort of thing that he had never let himself think about happening. Always a possibility, of course, while he worked at UNIT, but it was the worst case scenario. Living your whole life in the past, no way back. No Doctor to time travel it all better. There was no protocol for this, no UNIT to help him back in this time, nothing he could rely on to make it better and not the life-ending horror it was turning out to be.

No wonder they were both snapping.

"We need to find a way to contact the Doctor. Not play fucking dress up." He raised the shirt she had stolen for him that he held in his hand, then promptly threw it to where the rest lay on top of a nearby chair. Putting those on would be accepting defeat. It would be a week, then two, then maybe a month and then what? A year? He couldn't. It scared him too much. "He's a time traveller. We don't need to blend in, he can come here right now."