dingdongsnogbox:

But the Doctor totally had that conversation with Clara in the Tardis out of some sort of doomed from the start attempt to keep him from falling into the same trap he fell into with Rose. Clara has always had a separate life outside of him, which has helped to maintain some sort of slight distance between them despite their closeness, but now she’s made him more of the sole focus of her life and he’s scared over just how attached he’s becoming. He’s scared because he knows he’s just going to get used to having her with him all of the time and want to cling onto her and never let go, and then he’ll have to go through the unbearable pain of not having that constant companionship when he inevitably loses her. It’s like when Eleven tried to wean Amy and Rory off of him to try to make the pain of losing them in the end more bearable. Of course he’d much rather Clara spent her entire life with him, but the rational part of his brain is screaming at him to put some distance between them and encourage her to focus on other things before she breaks both of his hearts. And now I’m totally not ready for Clara to leave this series because the Doctor is going to be an absolute mess of a man and nobody needs to see him like that.