For Tomorrow - McLennon AU

9.

6th November, 1955

"Who's comin' home today?!" Paul heard a voice call out from the hallway, immediately recognising it as John's. He laughed at the other boy's excitement, watching as he walked swiftly through the door, followed by Mimi. "Spoiler, it's you!" He pointed to Paul.

Even Mimi couldn't help but laugh at him.

"He's very excited." She explained to the boy in the bed, who was carefully moving his legs so they'd dangle off the edge.

"Indeed I am, Elizabeth!" He shouted from the other end of the room.

"Surely I'm not that excitin'..." Paul joked, turning to look at the boy while Mimi took off the cast on his foot.

"That's where you're wrong, Paulie."

"Right, ignore him Paul." Mimi smiled, wrapping a new bandage around the boy's foot. "John, can you get Paul his clothes that you leant him."

"Of course."

A few seconds later, John appeared infront of Paul again, holding out his clothes to him.

"I'll take them." Mimi spoke, standing up. "Paul's gonna have a go on his crutches and walk to the changing rooms." She grabbed them from the side of the bedside table, placing them in his hands.

They weren't the crutches that you put your hand through the holes and grabbed onto the handles, that he was used to. They were big things, that went under his armpits so that he didn't have to put much pressure on his hands as he used them.

"I'll gather your things, Paul." John told him, watching as the younger boy lifted himself up and began to use his crutches.

"Thanks." Paul added, concentrating on putting his non-sprained foot on the ground as he and Mimi walked out of the room.

To say he was nervous was an understatement. He had been in the 50's for a week now, and for 65% of that time, he was in bed staring at the walls, and for 45% of that time he was asleep. A little part of him thought that once he went outside, everything would be normal again. That it would look exactly like 2019, and he had just been on some weird drugs.

But he knew that wasn't going to be the case. Paul had received enough proof that none of this was a joke... It was real, it was happening, and he would just have to go out into the cold November air of 1955 and deal with it. Until he came up with a solution.

"Are you excited, Paul?" Mimi asked him, keeping her hand close behind his back incase he fell.

"Yeah, a little nervous though..."

The last time I was out there I was all alone in a field, completely out of it.

"I bet. But don't worry, you'll soon get used to them." She explained, pushing the door of the changing rooms open.

She obviously thought that he was nervous about being on crutches, which he sort of was. But nothing made his mind restless like the thought of being in a whole different decade to what he was used to.

What was he going to do?

-

The wave of fresh air that hit Paul's face as he walked out of the doors felt amazing to say the least. But his breath soon hitched as he saw what he could only recognise as an old fashioned car drive down the road, heading for the smallish car park, which was full of them. The car park looked nothing like what he remembered running through.

That was the moment he remembered where he was. He tried to keep his vision set on the floor, but he just couldn't... He was so curious as to his surroundings. The boy looked up and back to the building he was just inside. It was the same one alright, the same one he had ran out of. But it was different here.

He remembered running out of the same doors and around the corner, over the other part of the car park and to the housing estate. But none of those houses existed in 1955, so instead, all he could see was a mass of a green field, with a slight white tint from the snow that had almost fully melted.

"Be careful here, Paul. Don't want you to slip." Mimi said, leading the boys over to her car. It was a small, light blue mini, which Paul found very cute.

"I'll hop in the back, Mimi." John said, opening the door at the left side and jumping over the seats as there was only 3 doors.

Mimi helped Paul into the passenger seat, placing his crutches at either side of him, before retreating back to the drivers side. He turned to put his seatbelt on, only to realise there were none.

"Uh..." He accidentally said out loud.

"You okay, Paulie?" John asked, eyeing him strangely from the backseat.

"Y-yeah..." He nodded. "Are you?"

"I'm fine. More happy now that you're out." John smiled, as Mimi now climbed inside.

"Right boys, I say we go straight home." She placed the keys in and started up the engine, John reaching forward to turn on the radio.

The car began to move, as Paul clutched onto the necklace around his neck, watching as the hospital slowly became more and more distant, until he couldn't see it at all.

Things were about to get real.