Still They Haunt Me

Clara had always been an early riser. Even on the days she planned on sleeping in, she ended up waking up early. She didn't know why, maybe she was just so set in her ways, but it just never worked out when she tried sleeping in. It didn't matter how much or how little sleep she got, she always woke up early. And that day was no different. After showering and getting dressed, she headed downstairs for breakfast. As she stepped into the room, she noticed DI Hardy seated at a table by the window. As she walked past him, she smiled politely. "Morning!"

Raising his cup of tea to his lips, Alec read the Broadchurch Echo through his glasses. It depressed him slightly that the Latimers seemed to be fading quickly from the front page, but he also knew it would do them some good. They needed to recover as a family, and bind themselves together in order to support one another... A media frenzy wasn't going to help that. In some ways, he was thankful their names seemed to be slipping further and further back in the tabloids. Alec had grown used to being the only person in the restaurant in the mornings now, considering how much the murder case had pushed business away. So to hear a very chipper voice greeting him threw him off slightly. Without looking up, he knew it wasn't going to be Becca. He glanced up over his glasses, lowering his mug for a moment in hesitation. "...Morning."

Clara could see that carrying on a conversation with him wasn't going to be easy. She was going to have to work to keep it going. She didn't mind though. This was kind of why she was here after all, and this was the perfect opportunity. It wasn't like there was anyone else in the restaurant anyway. Not that she would've expected there to be. This reflected clearly how few guests the hotel had. "I'm Clara, Clara Oswald." She said, figuring she'd introduce herself.

It felt slightly uncomfortable for Alec, that someone was interrupting his now daily routine. He may not have been happy with the state of his life, but he didn't exactly want anyone to change it either. She was more clearly an outsider than he was. The town had descended into misery and scorn over the course of the investigation, and that still lingered amongst everyone... Yet she was as chipper as anything. Had she been someone Alec worked with, he probably would have told her where to stuff her introduction, but unfortunately, she was just someone who hadn't quite caught onto the vibe of the town yet. Alec watched her for a moment, cup of tea still in hand. He didn't have the most welcoming expression on his face, but then again, he wasn't the warmest of people. "Alec," He spoke after a moment, reminding himself not to be rude to her. "Alec Hardy."

Clara could tell that she was making him a bit uncomfortable. That was clear just based on the expression on his face. That, and she'd probably caught him off guard. She was extremely chipper, and clearly that wasn't the case with the people in this town. She was just acting how she normally would though. This was her personality. She had no reason to be in a bad mood or anything. "Pleasure to meet you." She smiled.

Alec wasn't used to people being so positive, and happy. Not even Miller could muster up that sort of attitude, not when she had met Alec at least. He had grown used to Becca's positivity, but that had quickly died off the more time he had spent in Broadchurch. No one wanted to be particularly friendly towards the person who seemed responsible for spilling all of their secrets. Optimism wasn't something was used to in his line of work. He found it best to stay professional, and serious at all times. It had taken it's toll on his personality. He found very little things to be happy about. Cheated on, divorced, and estranged from his daughter, there wasn't much to think positively of. "Yeah, you too."

[I totally thought I posted on this one ]

Clara knew that she'd caught him off guard. Her positive attitude clearly wasn't something that one saw very often in this town. She, of course, didn't expect much else with the recent events that had taken place, but that didn't mean she was going to change who she was. She was just a normally positive, cheerful person. She wasn't overly optimistic, but she wasn't really pessimistic either. She was just, well, herself. "I'll let you get back to your reading." She said, a small smile gracing her lips, as she took a seat at one of the many vacant tables.

Alec was an anti-social person enough as it was. Following Sandbrook, he had essentially isolated himself for as long as he possibly could have. There was hardly any interaction outside of work, which was probably why he was so brash with Ellie... He wasn't used to being around someone so much... But perhaps social interaction wouldn't be so bad for him. Being a little more empathetic wouldn't hurt his job, or rather the lack thereof now a days. There was only so long he could go without actually socialising outside of his career. "No, no," He spoke after a moment, setting his newspaper down onto the table. "You can uhm..." He hesitated, questioning what he as about to say. "You can join me, if you like." It was an unlikely proposal, considering just how empty the restaurant actually was that morning.

To say that Clara was surprised by his offer was an understatement. She was more than surprised. She really wasn't expecting him to offer to let her join him, let alone say much of anything else to her. He just didn't come off as a very sociable person to her. In fact, he seemed to be rather anti-social, and that was why she had a feeling that this whole thing was going to be a bit of a challenge. She really didn't mind though. She liked a nice challenge every once and a while. "If you're sure..." She stood, making her ways over to his table.

"Well," Alec started, glancing out of the window onto the beach for a moment as he shifted back in his chair. "I wouldn't mind the company..." It was a slight effort for him to get some sort of natural flow to the conversation. Though that contradicted itself, and the fact he felt like he needed to make an effort was probably the issue in the first place. "It'd be awkward for us both to sit in silence anyway." Now that they had made small talk together, it probably would be awkward. He would rather invite her to sit with him and at least make an effort to engage with her than have her randomly pipe up and force conversation when the silence began to eat away at them both.

Clara could tell that this was a bit of a challenge for him. He clearly wasn't used to being very sociable or anything like that, though she wasn't going to call him out on it or anything like it. This was her in, that's how she saw it anyway, and she planned on taking full advantage of it while she could. "That's true..." She said. It wasn't like there was anyone else in the restaurant, though she was pretty sure that the rest of the hotel was just as empty.

Maybe it was a good thing for Alec to socialise with someone knew. It was unlikely that what had happened Broadchurch was ignored by the rest of the country, and it certainly had the spotlight shined on it for a fair amount of time... But from what he could tell about Clara, she didn't seem to know who he was, and what he had to do with the Broadchurch case. That seemed like a good thing for him. He would be able to talk to someone who reserved judgement, and didn't seem to assume that they knew who he was. He may have kept people at a distance, but he was still human. "It's been a while since I've seen anyone around this place." He murmured, his Scottish accent still prominent as he brought his cup of tea up to his lips.

As far as Clara knew, her act was a fairly convincing one. She didn't think that Alec had caught onto the fact that she knew exactly who she was, so she supposed that she was doing a good job at portraying an innocent women, just passing through. Hopefully she'd be able to keep up with the act for a while, or at least until she got what she came here for in the first place. "Yeah? I noticed how empty the hotel was when I checked in yesterday."

Shaking his head as he swallowed his tea, Alec pursed his lips. He let his eyes drift away, looking out the window instead. It was still early, not many people were stirring in Broadchurch just yet... It would be around this time that people would have been receiving their newspapers from Danny Latimer. He never asked, but it seemed to be a position that hadn't been filled. No one wanted to replace Danny, not when the news agents had shut down after its owners suicide. There was still so much that was shaking Broadchurch to it's core. "Not much business at the moment..." He murmured, trying his best to step around the topic delicately. "Not the season..."

Clara could see quite clearly that he was doing his best to avoid the subject. She wasn't going to press him for information, not now anyway. She knew that getting any real information out of him was going to take some time. She was willing to wait. Her career sort of depended on whether or not she got this story. She wasn't about to muck things up, not when there was already so much at stake. "So it's always this quiet around this time of year then?"

Alec would always be open with information about the Latimer case, but not to journalists. If he knew Clara's position, he would have shut down the conversation immediately... But with the circumstances, it didn't even feel right to talk about the Latimer family. Now was the time for the town to grieve, as silently as they wished. No one wanted to talk about it anymore, not because they didn't care, but because no one really wanted to face the truth. Silence came as a form of privacy for the Latimer family. "Everyone's heading home..." He explained, looking back across the table at Clara. "End of summer holidays."