— Ah. He'd been expecting some preamble, some look at that I already got your tea you know what happened last time I left you alone for two minutes at a cafe ahahaha and he was looking forward to that, that time to gauge Clara's mood. Time to work out how much detail she's been afforded and how many blanks he needs to fill, because suddenly he's not feeling entirely confident about the whole thing. What he did wasn't good, and perhaps it won't sounds quite as bad without having lived it in person (which is also part of the issue - he doesn't want to hide from Clara) but it's still...

The Doctor manages to tug on a smile, fond and accepting, nods gently with the question. His hands clasp together and fall into his lap, and for the moment he thinks feeling like a caught out schoolboy is both appropriate and wildly not.

"I frightened him. Badly. It wasn't... it wasn't good."

Meeting her eye on the last, sheepish and sorry, a vision of 'and isn't that just me all over?'. He'll get to the nitty gritty. First, he needs to manufacture a gentle slope instead of a sudden drop, and he supposes that will have to do.