What If

Chapter 16

It started to drizzle as Paul, George, and I walked down the street with books and guitars in our hands. I wouldn't mind rain except for the fact that it made my hair frizzy beyond belief and it stressed me out just to think that I was out in public looking like that. But what can I do about it now, right?

Paul and George were talking about a fight that had happened earlier in school. I hadn't seen it, but they both had, discussing who it was between, what is was about, and how badly they had hurt each other. I wasn't really listening. I was just kind of zoning out in my own little world, looking at the buildings we were passing by, still trying to convince myself that all of this was real. If it wasn't, I would've woken up by now, right?

"What do you think, Colleen?"

Paul's question passed right through me. I didn't even hear him. I was too busy staring blankly at old houses.

"Colleen?" Paul asked again.

I snapped out of my trance and looked at them looking at me questionably. "Oh, sorry," I apologized.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just thinking to myself."

"Oh yeah? Whatcha thinking about?"

I hated Paul always asking me these questions. They were hard to answer without bringing up what I already knew. Geez, what do I say? I thought to myself. 'Just wondering whether or not I'm in a coma in the future.' Awesome. "Uh . . . nothing really." I didn't really have an excuse. "Just thoughts."

Paul scoffed at this. "Just thoughts?" he asked. "Is something on your mind?"

"You can tell us, you know," George added.

I smiled. George was adorable in a way. It was the shyness thing. "Nah, I'm good. I'm not worried about anything. What was your question?"

"Oh," Paul said, continuing on the previous subject. "I was just asking what you thought about Seymour breaking Haden's nose. There was blood gushing everywhere."

I laughed. Blood didn't bother me. "Ew," I said. "I wish I saw it."

"It was one hell of a fight to miss, Colleen."

We were right at John's door. I looked at the house up and down as Paul knocked for someone to let us in. The house wasn't anything special. Look-wise, anyway. It stuck out no way from the rest of the crowd. If someone went looking for John Lennon's house by themselves, they wouldn't even stop to look at this place. They would've just walked right by.

The door swung open and standing there was a woman, clearly aging by the minute in a very old-fashioned, even for this time, flower-print dress. I recognized her immediately as John's Aunt Mimi. Her eyes went right to me as I suspected they would. An unfamiliar seventeen year old girl about to hang out with three teddy boys alone in a bedroom I was sure was going to catch her attention.

"Hello, Paul. Hello, George," she said, not looking at either of them, scrutinizing me with every blink of her eyes. "And who are you?"

It wasn't exactly polite. I could say that much. She wasn't hiding that she clearly didn't want me in her house. I cleared my throat and said "Hello, I'm Colleen."

"John didn't mention he was having a girl over." She did a close-mouthed sigh and reluctantly opened her door wider. "John's upstairs in his room."

"Thank you, Mrs. Smith," Paul said politely, the three of us walking in.

The house reeked of smoke, but was otherwise spotless. I guess Mimi did a lot of cleaning. She said nothing more to the three of us as we walked through her house and up the stairs. I noticed the scent of smoke getting stronger. I guess we're getting closer to John's room, I thought.

Paul swung open the door without knocking and said "Hey, John."

John was on his bed, strumming a guitar in his hands, and smoking a cigarette loosely in his mouth. His room was dirty, magazines and clothes lying everywhere. He had stacks of records in the corner and had a very tiny record player in another corner. I looked at his bed and cringed to myself. Who knows how much . . . stuff . . . was on there? He looked our way, immediately to me, and smirked. "Well, hello."