Pointless McSutcliffe

ALL MY LOVING

I like to think that, if Stu and Paul had, like, a long distance relationship or smtn, they'd definitely write each others letters a lot, and Paul would sign all of his with 'All My Loving', and Stu would press kisses into his with lipstick ((there's this one fic where they become friends and possibly lovers out of their shared interest in makeup and I'm obsessed with it, so, headcanon accepted)).

Okay so. Idea.

What if, somehow, by some odd reason, little Paul (like 14 or so) ends up accidentally mailing a letter meant for someone else to Scotland and Stuart is the one who gets it?

Idk, mayhaps he was trying to send it to his friend Linda who moved from America to Liverpool and from there to a farm on the scottish countryside, and they write back and forth, and her family is neighbors with the Sutcliffes, and one day Stu gets the mail and thinks the letter is addressed to him, so he writes back, a bit confused but also intrigued as to who's this person from Liverpool and why would he write to a stranger.

And a couple days/weeks later ((idk how fast was mail delivered on the 50s, sorry)), after clearing up the misunderstanding with that girl next door, he gets another letter from the stranger, politely introducing himself as James Paul McCartney, 14 years old, aspiring musician, equally intrigued and interested in making acquaintances with him.

And soon enough they find themselves writing letters back and forth almost on the daily, sending pictures and drawings and pressed flowers and stuff.

They tell each others almost everything, that freedom of befriending strangers, knowing they can keep your secrets because they know no one else around you to spread them.

Stuart tells Paul about how suffocated he feels by his parents, how sick he is of being held up to impossible expectations because he's the oldest of his family, but also how his mother practically smothers him and tries to keep him from anything remotely fun.

The only thing that makes him feel free is painting, so he spends an awful lot of time locked up on his attic, turned into an art studio. At age 16, when he started writing to Paul, he had a scholarship for the Liverpool Arts Institute, was so excited to finally leave home and learn more, but his parents wouldn't allow him to be so far from home all by himself, so they made him stay, something he resented them by for quite a while.

All those things he pours out on his letters, and Paul reassures him and promises him it'll all be alright someday.

Paul understands him perfectly, having an overprotective father as well. While he understands his reasoning, feeling worried he might lose him after having lost his mother too, he still feels trapped and wants more than just being part of the church's choir or playing piano or looking after his brother his whole life.

Talking back and forth with Stu, who tells him about big art cities like London or Hamburg or Paris, he decides he wants to travel and to learn more about what's out there. Like every liverpudlian teenager out there, his biggest dream is never seeing Liverpool again.

As time goes by and the lads grow up, they slowly stop writing each other so much, each busy with their lives and school and new friends and so.

At ages 18 and 16, they end up meeting under most fortuitous circumstances, though.

Stuart's father's job ends up sending him indeed to Liverpool, and Stu takes his chance to enroll himself at the Arts Institute before his parents can tell him anything. In there, he meets one John Winston Lennon, with great ideas and devil-may-care attitude.

Paul, younger and studying in a private school, shouldn't be supposed to meet either of them. But Johnny has a band. And Paul plays guitar. And a common friend introduced them about a year before.