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Powering across town in a dead run, Marty overtook the famous Hill Valley lightning storm, parting the heavy curtains of rain as the gusts pushed him onto dry asphalt.
"There's only one man who can help me!"
The back of the clock tower came into view.
The bolt of lightning that sent him home a day ago exploded on the lightning rod with a deafening crack and a brilliant shower of sparks. Marty ducked away from the sound so abruptly that he tripped and fell hard on his stomach, a block from the intersection. He lifted his head just in time to see the DeLorean vanish.
Tires squealed around the corner behind him.
Marty's eyes grew with recognition in the oncoming headlights.
Oh, shit.
Biff's De Luxe roared, shaking off manure as it bore down on Marty. Behind the wheel, Biff's eyes were glazed with the maniacal rage of a madman. Marty was only just able to stumble upright when the great black beast clipped him.
Biff slammed on the brakes. Marty rolled over, bruises flaring in protest as he scuttled backward and clambered to his feet. His adrenaline picked him up, but his leg wouldn't support him.
The car door opened and shut.
Marty's hobbling grew desperate. His high, pained gasps built to a scream as a shit-streaked Biff shoved him to the ground.
"Where is it?!"
Marty pulled himself up on the bottom stairs of the clocktower's rear entrance by his elbows. He prayed Doc heard the commotion before Biff beat him into an unconscious pulp.
Glaring at his adversary through the ends of his wet hair, Marty defiantly lifted his chin.
"I burned it."
"You what?!"
Biff's foot came crashing down on his injured leg. A soundless scream erupted from Marty as he blanked out and spiraled into otherworldly pain. A violent, primal wail then undulated off the surrounding buildings until Marty was too lightheaded to do more than whimper.
"You thought it hurt when you cost me three hundred bucks?! You just cost me millions!"
Biff lifted his weight off his foot and raised it again. The thunder goaded him on, flaring his anger, pulsing revenge into his coiled muscles —
"Hey!"
Biff's eyes snapped up.
Another flash of lightning illuminated the telltale outline of the mad scientist that lived in the Riverside mansion, wild hair and long coat whipping in the wind at the intersection. Biff had heard enough stories; he wasn't letting Dr. Brown within a football field of him. Besides, nobody would ever see Calvin Klein again if it meant that lunatic got a fresh specimen for his harebrained experiments. This asshole deserved the unique, prolonged torture of not knowing what agony would be inflicted on him next.
Biff glared at his prey as he retreated.
"Have fun getting zapped, you son of a bitch."
Marty lifted his clammy forehead from a stone stair, panting as Biff jumped into his car, yanked the gearshift, and sped away. The scent of burnt rubber and manure hung in the air, trapped beneath the storm clouds.
The wind drove chills from Marty's wet clothing into his skin. Nausea smoldered in his battered abdomen, but a mind-numbing inferno consumed his leg. He could feel his pant leg getting tighter as his lower leg swelled with hot blood. Marty wrapped both hands around his thigh just above his knee, doubled over, and moaned through gritted teeth. He weakly turned his head upward at the approaching footfalls.
"Doc –"
A jagged, incoherent howl sputtered out of the scientist. Emmett stumbled back like an abandoned marionette, well and truly spooked by his friend's improbable presence. Marty barely had the wherewithal to talk him down, but as Young Doc Brown was a superstitious nut compared to the man Marty knew, he didn't need that working against him right now.
"Alright, Doc, calm down! Relax, it's me, it's Marty!"
"It can't be you!" Doc wailed. "I just sent you back to the future!"
"Yeah, Doc, and I'm back from the future…"
The next surge of pain depleted Marty's patience. He pushed out as many words as he could in one breath, desperate for the relief only a friend's comfort could provide.
"Doc, I'm hurt. I'm really hurt, so can you please just help me? Please? It's broken, I can't move it, it —"
A scared sob burst from the boy. Emmett hesitated but kneeled at this, hands shaking as his eyes darted about in the rising winds.
"A-Are you alone?" Where was the other him?
"Yes," Marty whined as he rolled over fully. "Ah, Jesus…"
A switch flipped; Doc's mind was trying to bypass higher cognitive processes to preserve itself until it understood what was happening, but Marty couldn't answer any of his questions in this state. The aftereffects of temporal displacement might induce hallucinations, but his friend needed prompt medical attention.
"Doc, do something. Please."
Emmett threw off his coat and bunched it around Marty's leg, temporarily stabilizing it against the bottom stair.
"It's going to be alright," he said, more to himself than to Marty.
It's going to be alright.
Breathe.
"I'm going to get the car. I'll be right back."
Doc dashed through the downpour for a wheelchair and an extra pair of hands when they got to the hospital. The outdated wheelchair creaked considerably, its armrests permanently sticky from excessive sanitation despite the rain. Marty cursed when the orderly bumped his leg against the car door, but the murderous gleam in his eyes subsided when Doc commandeered the wheelchair.
In the exam room, Marty lamented his blue jeans being sheared off at the knee, but it alleviated some of the pressure compounding his discomfort. While no apparent break distorted the shape of the leg, the extremity was red, ruddy, sallow, and bruised from trauma. By the time the x-ray results came back, Marty had quietly devolved into an exhausted delirium, incapable of tears.
The sight of the doctor broke him from the spell.
Marty pushed himself up to sit. Next to him, Doc scooted his stool closer to the bed.
"Mr. Klein?"
"Yeah?"
"Pleased to meet you. I'm Dr. Diefendorfer." The bespectacled physician finished consulting the chart before giving Marty his undivided attention. "X-rays show a break in the fibula, the smaller of the two bones in your leg."
"How bad is it?"
"You've got a long road to recovery, but I'm confident it won't be as arduous as it is for some. Coupled with the facts that it's a clean break and young bones heal well, we can send you home with some antibiotics as soon as we get a cast on."
Doc raised his eyebrows. That didn't sound bad at all.
"No need for traction or supervision?"
"Not here," the doctor said with a smile. "We'll get you hydrocodone and crutches, too, but I would recommend using the crutches as little as possible for the first week. Rest as much as you can. Once the bone is set and immobilized, you'll have relatively low pain if you keep weight off it."
"How long?"
"Six weeks in plaster with a check-up every two weeks, then a check-up two weeks after that to ensure you're properly healed before you fully resume your routines."
Marty's face fell. "Two months?"
"Consider yourself fortunate, Mr. Klein," Diefendorfer said. "It is a relatively short sentence. It's not often I get to send a patient home so soon after I diagnose a broken bone."
A hazy, pink-orange sunset gilded the windowpanes and gutters of the mansion as Doc drove the Packard up to the front door. He frowned at the ten brick stairs; they were still slick with rain despite being warmed by patchy afternoon sun. Fortunately, they were wide and shallow, but the stairs up to Marty's stay room were not.
The den would have to do. There was a guest bedroom on the first floor, but it served Doc as a storage space. Marty would be better before it was a proper bedroom again. But the guest bathroom was suitable, and Marty could access the main common rooms.
A-camping, he will go.
Marty stopped on the landing that halved the front stairs to press at a cramp in his side. Doc caught the crutches as they slid from under Marty's right arm.
"Here. Let me."
"It's all right, Doc, I got it."
"Don't be so stubborn, Marty," Doc chided genially. "I would hate to see you suffer martyrdom for climbing a few stairs with a broken leg."
Marty mumbled, "Fine," as if he had a choice.
Doc carefully put his arm around Marty's throbbing ribs and pulled him hip-to-hip. Marty hopped to the second handrail.
"On three."
Marty leaned into Doc's side to be lifted to the next stair at the end of each countdown. When they reached the intricate jeweled tree adorning the front door, Marty's abdomen hurt so much that he forgot about his leg for a heartbeat.
"Here you go, Marty. You're almost there."
After a short rest in the doorway, Marty hobbled to the den's couch. Frustration and guilt flanked him while Doc collected stuff from his stay room upstairs; he didn't want anyone to wait on him like this for two months, let alone Doc. How was he ever going to make it up to him?
You're not, he remembered then. You're going back to 1985 when you're healed.
A dull pang rang in Marty's heart.
Maybe this was the universe's way of letting him have a little more time with his friend.
However, that didn't stop Marty from effusing compulsory apologies when Doc returned.
"I'm really sorry about all this, Doc." He winced as the scientist guided his cast onto its own pillow. "This is all my fault."
"Everything's going to be alright, Marty. Somehow, we'll figure this out."
Marty silently sighed at the hydrocodone that was placed in his palm. Doc didn't even know what "this" was or how Marty had even come to be in 1955 again.
Marty dry swallowed the pill and inclined his head toward his leather jacket draped over the back of the armchair nearest the fireplace.
"In there. There's a letter from you. From 1885."
Doc furrowed his brow. "From…?"
Emmett withdrew the protected letter. The weight of reality grew dark and heavy in his hands. He huffed inwardly; Marty's go-to turn of phrase suddenly made perfect sense.
Doc stared at it, mystified, as he sank onto the edge of the adjacent armchair.
"This is from me? From 1885?"
"It was an accident."
Doc looked up at the crack in Marty's voice. He was shocked to see the boy devolve into an abrupt, emotional upheaval, chest jumping with disjointed shudders. Marty's words funneled into a tight whine.
"We were going home, Doc, but the time circuits weren't working right," Marty said with a sniff. "And then you got hit by the lightning –"
"Marty."
"I'm so sorry, Doc –"
"Marty."
Emmett pinned him with a firm eye, slowly letting up as Marty came back down. Seeing his eyes shine with frightened tears struck an errant chord in Doc's soul; how much anguish had he caused this poor kid? If this was anyone's fault, it was his, not Marty's.
Marty didn't invent a time machine.
Marty didn't watch his assistant endure a week of hell just to be sent home to an idiot scientist who'd obviously learned nothing from this experience if Marty was trapped in the past again, this time with a broken leg.
Doc cleared his throat. It would be best to resume their talk in the morning when Marty was a little more lucid and he, a little less morose. But as Marty continued his story, Doc was, shamefully, too curious to interrupt.
"After I got back to 1985, we went to 2015," Marty said, pulling the quilt to his chin. "Old Biff stole the time machine to give himself a book. It made him so rich and powerful that it destroyed Hill Valley. We found out he came here to 1955 and followed him. We had to get that book back."
Doc was unaware he had leaned forward in earnest.
"Did we succeed?"
Marty huffed up a rueful grin. His eyelids touched.
"That's why Biff broke my leg."
Doc undid the closure on the Western Union portfolio. He removed the aged letter with reverence, awed at its condition as he unfolded it.
"I was already gone."
Marty hummed in the affirmative.
Doc put the envelope on the arm of his chair and trailed his fingers along the rough edges. The centers of the pages were still damp from the thunderstorm. The ink held mostly; only a few words were smudged or faint but could still be read in context. He lifted the bottoms of the pages to find his signature, and there it was – signed with a flourish and a fond farewell.
Your friend in time.
Marty emitted a soft, open-mouthed snore.
Emmett smirked; he wouldn't be surprised if the exhaustion got to his charge before the drugs did. The room grayed with loneliness until Copernicus bumped his leg and lay at his feet.
Doc leafed through the letter and blew out a sigh.
What have I gotten us into this time?
Emmett reread the letter and studied the enclosed map for almost an hour.
His mind ran at full steam as sleep took him. He worried about the condition of the buried DeLorean but was eager to recover and repair it with his future self's guidance. He couldn't wait to retire to his favorite historical era but disliked that his last goodbye to Marty had to be through a letter.
His mind parsed through the information so vividly it felt like he'd never fallen asleep, just descended into a medieval chamber lined with blackboards and books to puzzle it all out.
And yet, he dreamed; he dreamed of dusty streets and a red sun, the yowl of a coyote, and the lamp on his mining hat extinguishing in a vast, underground cavern.
He dreamed of Marty never meeting him at the clocktower because he faded into nonexistence at the dance, of 10:05 PM and the heavens opening up as he stared at the still-present Delorean parked on the side of the street. He dreamed of the grief, of questioning their undeniable bond; how could he not feel the moment that Marty McFly irrevocably left the universe?
"Doc? I need help."
Emmett spun in search of Marty's voice.
"Marty."
A ragged, disembodied hiss. "Son of a bitch."
I'm here.
"Doc?"
Emmett started into the waking world. The letter, map, and envelope spilled from his lap. On the other side of the coffee table, Marty was on the verge of sobbing as he eased both feet on the floor and reached for his crutches.
Doc leapt up and snatched them from Marty's hands, eyes still hazy with nightmares.
"What are you doing? What can I get for you?"
"Nothing."
"You weren't getting up for nothing, Marty. Just tell me," Doc insisted. "You need to stay off your feet."
Marty sighed patiently, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. He grabbed Doc's arm, pushed off the sofa, and got himself up on his good leg.
"Marty –"
"I have to use the bathroom."
"Oh."
"Can I, uh…?" Marty nodded to the crutches.
"Yes. Yes, of course."
Doc fitted the crutches under Marty's arms. Once balanced, Marty tugged his undershirt straight and unsuccessfully flattened the back of his bedhead. He glanced at the pages of the 1885 letter scattered on the floor and asked, "Think we can do it?"
Doc pushed the coffee table away to give Marty more room to turn the corner.
"We'll likely have to do more than just fix the time circuits," Doc admitted, "but my future self seemed confident that any auxiliary repairs would be routine. I won't know anything until I see the state of the time vehicle, but I can't retrieve it myself."
Marty's crutches banged off the bathroom door as he shimmied in sideways.
"Can't you just," – bang – "go down and take a look at it? Make sure it's even there?"
"I don't see why it wouldn't be. Besides, I'd rather not go alone," Doc said, helping Marty face the toilet. "If it's been there seventy years, I think it can last two more months until you're able-bodied."
"But it'll work."
Doc put the seat down for him.
"It'll work."
It was essential to establish a sense of independence early on despite how little Marty could do without Doc's assistance. To foster that self-sufficiency – and increase Marty's physical comfort – Doc fitted him with baggy boxers, undershirts, and a robe. Doc followed him to the bathroom to ensure he didn't fall, but Marty could now do most of it from there.
Bathing was an entirely different matter.
Apprehension carved a comical frown into Marty's face as Doc wound a thick layer of olive-drab duct tape around the plastic bunched at the top of his knee. He understood he couldn't get the cast wet, but Doc made it feel like he was about to go deep sea diving.
"I think that's enough tape, Doc."
Emmett rhythmically passed the roll of tape over and under Marty's thigh several more times.
"Just a bit more." Finally, he ripped the tape and gently smoothed down the end. "We don't want to risk you getting a skin infection from excess moisture inside the cast."
Once the bath was ready, Doc scooped water into a metal pail and forced it to rest upside-down at the foot of the tub, partially submerged. Satisfied with the semi-vacuum holding it to the bottom, Doc pulled Marty up from the closed commode.
"Right here, Marty. Easy does it."
Marty braced himself on the white, rounded edge of the deep tub. He paused to evaluate his position and plan his next move; as great as having an excuse to lounge in a hot bath was, the excuse hindered the range of motion required to enjoy said bath.
"How do I do this?"
"Get your heel on the bucket and lean back into me," Doc said. He stood behind Marty and hooked his elbows underneath his friend's arms to support him as he awkwardly straddled the tub. "I'll lower you in when you pick up your other foot."
A countdown. On three, Marty picked up his good leg, and Doc effortlessly settled him into the heavenly heat of the water. The cool wall of the tub made Marty arch his back in surprise. He hissed out a curse.
"Ah, Jesus." The goosebumps hurt.
Doc scooped water into a – a gravy boat and poured it around the sides. When he finished, Marty skeptically accepted the floral porcelain; didn't Doc have something less stately to be used as a rinse cup?
A knock came at the front door.
Emmett rolled up a towel and laid it on the back of the tub for Marty's neck.
"Alright if I get that?"
"Yeah." Marty laid back, wiggled his heel to test the stability of the bucket, and rested his arms on the tub's edge. "I'm great, Doc, thanks."
"I'll be back in a minute. Don't try to stand up."
Emmett went down the hall to the front door. Heaven help him if it was a future version of Marty trapped in 1955 again. He'd walk out right of his house and straight to the madhouse.
It was not Marty.
It was Marty's parents.
Mendel, have mercy.
George extended his hand.
"Good afternoon, Dr. Brown. It's a pleasure to meet you. I believe you already know my girlfriend, Lorraine," – Marty's future mother smiled shyly, patting George's arm – "and I'm George. George McFly."
Doc absently accepted his hand as the sun emerged from behind a cloud.
"I know. That is, I know of you," he amended, smile flickering in and out. "You're… Marty's friends."
"Yes," Lorraine said, happy to be recognized as such. "And, you see, we're worried about him. There's a rumor going around school that Biff hit him with his car after the dance."
"You don't say."
"People heard them fighting outside the gym," George said. "I've heard a lot of other outlandish things about what happened, but… well, let's just say I wouldn't put it past Biff to let his anger get the better of him."
"I thought since Calvin was staying with you," Lorraine said, tucking a curl behind her ear, "you might be able to tell us if he's all right. No one's seen him at school."
"We knew he was leaving town soon," George said, "but with everything we've been hearing, we wanted to be sure."
The smash of a certain gravy boat came from down the hall.
Emmett volleyed a dismissive smile when Copernicus started barking.
"Doc? Hey, Doc!"
Damn it.
"I-I'll be right there," Doc called over his shoulder.
"Is that him?" Lorraine asked, eyes shining.
"Sounds like him," George said.
Lorraine gasped, trying to see around the scientist into the house. "Calvin–?"
"No, no, that's not him," Emmett said, quickly stepping into her line of sight. "That's my twin nephew, Kevin. Er, Calvin's twin. Who is also my nephew."
"Oh."
"Kevin is just–"
"Doc!"
" – having some trouble with our latest experiment. And I'm– I'm happy to say that the rumors are just that," Emmett said, retreating as casually as possible. "Calvin went home Saturday night. I saw him off myself."
"Oh, what a relief," Lorraine sighed, smiling at George.
"See? I told you he was fine."
A crash.
More barking.
"Doc!"
George and Lorraine's brows knit with concern.
"Do you need some help, Dr. Brown –?"
"No! No, that's kind of you, but no. We'll handle it. I'm really sorry, I– I must be going," Emmett said through the crack in the door. "I'll tell Calvin you stopped by."
"Thank –"
Doc slammed the door and flew to the bathroom.
Marty was not lying unconscious in the middle of the floor, impaled by porcelain shards, thank God.
Copernicus was in the tub, repeatedly smacking Marty in the face with his wet tail. He barked at Doc as Marty sputtered helplessly behind him. The pieces of the broken gravy boat cut through the water's sheen coating the floor like an armada of interpretive art.
"Ahhh! Ah haa!"
"Great Scott!"
Emmett lunged over the treacherous tiles to get Copernicus to stop pawing at Marty's cast. The excitable dog tried evading his master; his paws kneaded Marty's lower half for better footing, causing colorful curses to spew from his "tub time" companion.
Doc finally got Copernicus under the belly and hoisted him out. Before he could stop him, Copernicus trotted into the hall, vigorously shook the excess water from his fur, and happily padded toward the kitchen.
Marty tucked his arm into his stomach, doubled over it, and put his forehead on the tub's edge. A groan straggled out of him. Scrapes sang out from where Copernicus stepped on him.
"Did he tear the plastic?"
"I don't think so."
"I'm sorry, Marty," Doc said, turning on the tap again. "I meant to close the door."
Marty lifted his head as the fresh, hot water leached some pain from the inflamed scratches.
"Who was at the front door?"
Doc chuckled, kneeling to push the towels and broken porcelain into a pile under the sink. "Your parents wanted to make sure you were all right after hearing a rumor that you'd been hit by a car."
Marty felt the familiar knot of flirting with nonexistence cinch in his heart. They had to have heard him screaming just now. He looked over his shoulder at the curtained window above him, dripping with paranoia.
"What did you tell them?"
"That you went home."
"Good."
"And your twin brother is now staying with me."
"Oh, come on, Doc –"
"They heard you, Marty, and it's just in case they see you," Emmett said, overriding Marty's whine as he turned the water off. "Knowing our luck, they'll be strolling by when we're out for one of your follow-ups, and if they don't know you, they're unlikely to approach us."
Marty watched a drop of water slither down the plastic on his leg and into the tub.
He flexed his submerged hand.
"I'm gonna be okay, though, right? Nothing's undone?"
"You're not going anywhere, kid."
A lopsided grin gentled Marty's face. Emmett put a clean towel within Marty's reach and headed out to give him some well-deserved peace and quiet.
"Hey, Doc?"
"Yes, Marty?"
"Shut the door this time."
"You bet."
Santa Claus waved to the parade goers and the television cameras from atop his marvelous sleigh in Times Square. A two-story rocking horse pulled the lush pine forest float, and Santa's pink, blue, and white reindeer were positioned just over the tips of the evergreens, golden antlers winking in the winter sun.
Marty's stomach growled.
It was no surprise that Thanksgiving snuck up on them. Marty, who had never seen Doc cook something that involved more than boiling a pot of water, whittled his daydreams of Grandma Stella's picturesque table to fit on the TV tray next to him. A hot turkey sandwich and parade would suffice.
But not for Doc.
Doc had a displaced time traveler – his friend – in his care again, thirty years away from home with a broken leg and a defunct time machine. After this, Marty would never get to spend another Thanksgiving with him, so Emmett decided he could do better than breakfast cereal, boiled eggs, and beef stroganoff to commemorate the day.
And it was tormenting the hell out of Marty.
The thick, savory scents of turkey, potatoes, casserole, and bread mingled in Marty's empty stomach as the parade ended. Unable to wait for Doc to come get him, Marty got up on his crutches by himself, went down the hall, and peered into the kitchen on his left.
"You need any help?"
Doc smiled into the potatoes, vigorously whisking butter, milk, and parsley into them.
"I've got it. You sit."
Marty entered the dining room, rolling his eyes at himself and pulling out a seat with the end of his crutch.
What were you going to carry, dumbass?
Doc had a small fire going, more for aesthetics than warmth. The vines in the expanse of golden stained glass on the far wall glowed in welcome as the noontime sun poured through the adjacent picture window. Marty smiled at the pile of board games on the buffet.
He is so losing at Clue.
Doc brought him a heaping plate of home-cooked fare. Certainly not as vibrant or flavorful as Grandma Stella's Thanksgiving plate, but all the more delicious because Marty didn't expect it. Even after he was full to bursting, Marty inhaled the slice of chocolate pudding pie smothered in whipped cream Doc brought him as he set up the Monopoly board.
Hours later, as Marty bedded on the sofa for the night and Doc elevated his cast on a mound of pillows, Marty knew he'd never had more to be thankful for.
"You know, Doc, I'm really glad you found me."
"I'm glad you found me, my boy."
The following Monday, Marty had his two-week follow-up. Another x-ray confirmed the break was still present but healing without complication.
"Keep doing what you're doing," Diefendorfer said. "It's coming along. Now that you're experiencing less pain and are used to the cast, boredom will be your biggest obstacle."
"Obstacle" was an understatement.
This was a war.
Marty counted himself very lucky to be healing in such a lavish residence, but walls were still walls, and sometimes he thought he saw them inching closer. He tried to ignore his claustrophobia by reading books by the fire in the living room, watching TV, and doing crossword puzzles in the newspaper. He tried to play Doc's weird organ. He doodled on his cast. Copernicus got tired of fetch, and he got tired of the scientist's record collection.
Whenever he wanted to talk Doc into letting him go with him to run an errand in town, he thought of his teenage parents – of Biff – and wondered what disguises he could pull off.
No, cabin fever was not kind to the mending McFly.
It didn't help that December came out of nowhere. Christmas choirs and future holiday classics played on the radio, intensifying Marty's homesickness. Jennifer loved the way Bing Crosby crooned "White Christmas", and he missed the way his dad swatted silver tinsel from his clothes whenever he got within a foot of the Christmas tree.
Marty tried to focus on the fact that he was due to get his cast off the day after Christmas. He would be here for the holiday; that was that. And he wouldn't be a Grinch about it, not when these were his last days with Doc.
His friend was not an overly festive fellow when it came to decorating, but Marty convinced Doc to get a tree over the weekend. Marty decided to handle the rest; some decorations were better than none. He spent two days hunched over the coffee table trying to perfect the paper snowflake before he gave up and switched gears to paper chains on Friday morning.
Doc chuckled from the den's entryway at the mound of old newspapers and Marty's determination to keep the strips of a consistent width. He broke the boy's concentration long enough to hand him a mug of decadent hot chocolate – as a parting gift.
"If you'll be all right here for a couple of hours, I'm going to go down to the lab and check on things there," Emmett said. "I haven't been there in a few days."
"Yeah, I'll be fine," Marty said. "Thanks."
Doc gave him the morning newspaper, already folded to the crossword puzzle.
"Do you need anything else before I go?"
"Could you turn up the radio?"
"Sure."
"And, uh, if you've got more tape in the lab, I'm running low."
"You bet. I'll be back in a bit."
But Doc's motivation waned when he walked into the lab.
Plummeted, was more like it.
There was so much to be done. So much kinetic energy buzzing in his bones, but it was too hampered by exhaustion to be freed.
Taking care of another person was taxing. Knowing he was relied upon so often and much wore Emmett out, physically and mentally. Moments he tended to himself were few and far between; even when Marty slept, Doc struggled to stray out of earshot. Now his vigilance was taking its toll.
Emmett moved a pile of records out of the armchair.
Forty winks. Forty winks, and he'd do something or the other toward getting Marty home again.
He wanted to go to Delgado. The need to know if the DeLorean was even salvageable gnawed at him constantly. While his future self was sure he had this all sorted out, his future self was again the reason Marty was stuck here. The man's mathematics may be sound, but Emmett's trust in his judgments fluctuated.
If he sent Marty back to his future self again, how did he know the kid wouldn't end up stranded in a different time where he couldn't help him? What if Marty was burned at the stake, brought before a guillotine, or contracted a deadly illness?
What if he looked up into the summer sun one morning and its light swallowed him whole?
Emmett started awake in the armchair, on his feet before he realized it. He flapped the front of his sweaty shirt off his flushed skin as he mechanically breathed back into the present. The moment he found higher ground, however, he heard a crash outside and staggered toward the door.
To his horror, Marty sat in the middle of the driveway, muttering curses with his crutches akimbo on either side of him.
"Marty! What on earth–"
"I just hit a divot the wrong way –"
"Come here. Let me have a look at you."
"I'm fine, Doc."
"You're lucky you didn't break your other leg! I told you I'd be right back."
Upright on both crutches again, Marty fixed the scientist with a level glare.
"You've been gone seven hours, Doc."
Marty woke up the following day to a wheelchair waiting to take him to the dining room.
Why Emmett hadn't thought to get one for him the day he broke his leg confounded him; he blamed his preoccupation with his mental health. Marty could wheel himself down to the lab at his leisure when Doc got the ramp on the front stairs, but he always insisted on wheeling Marty to and from the lab himself.
"The last thing we need is you careening off the driveway into a tree. Or the street."
Marty thinned his lips in agreement; he did have the worst luck with cars lately.
Spending afternoons in the lab did wonders for Marty's outlook. For once, he was tired from exertion rather than boredom. He didn't feel like a waste of space when writing down the inventory Doc called out or untangling extension cords. He studied the map and letter between frivolous pet projects and crossed the days off his countdown calendar.
On the day of Marty's four-week follow-up, Dr. Diefendorfer continued to be impressed with his progress.
"Everything is looking great, Mr. Klein. You're in the final stretch."
Marty's mood dampened again.
Emmett eyed his friend as he sat on the couch after the appointment.
"Everything all right, Marty?"
"No."
"What's wrong?"
Marty wet his lips, shrinking under the watchful gazes of the four scientists perched on Doc's mantle.
"What if," – a shaky sigh – "what if this is messing things up, Doc?" It was eating him alive in the middle of the night when he couldn't sleep. "You're supposed to be developing the flux capacitor right now, not babying me."
"I'm caring for you," Doc corrected, narrowing his eyes. He sat on the edge of the armchair, picked up his threaded needle on the coffee table, and continued stringing popcorn for their tree. "If the space-time continuum has a problem with that, it can take it up with me."
That's what I'm worried about.
A piece of popcorn broke on the tip of Doc's needle.
"There is plenty of time to develop the flux capacitor, Marty."
"Yeah. You're right."
Remembering his promise to make the most of their time together, Marty mirrored Doc and halfheartedly resumed stringing his popcorn garland. His budding anxiety soon intruded on their companionable silence.
"Still, you'd rather be doing that than this, right?" Marty asked, glancing at his leg.
Doc's eye twitched as a third piece of popcorn crumbled on the end of his needle.
"Marty, please," he said, lips pinched in concentration as he speared his next piece of popcorn. "This is just something that's happened. I am content to ensure your comfort and recovery. Besides, it's the least I can do after you saved me."
Marty looked up sharply.
"What?"
Doc's lips disappeared inside his mouth.
Marty's parted in disbelief.
His bright eyes latched onto his future mentor, throat tight. He prepared to parry every denial Doc voiced, but instead, resignation softened Doc's demeanor.
"I haven't read it yet."
"B–" Marty's eyebrows furrowed. "You… know."
"How could I not know?"
At Marty's confused silence, Doc admonished him with a small smile.
"Marty, for someone so adamant in telling me about my future for a week – adamancy that leaves little to the imagination, mind you – you haven't made mention of it for a month."
Marty swallowed. Doc's eyes twinkled dully.
"I can only deduce that you succeeded before I was trapped in 1885."
The dying fire popped. Marty stayed silent, eyes down.
"I know what that letter says, Marty. I know what you've been trying to tell me. I may not know the specifics yet, but I will. When I'm ready."
"I just didn't want anything bad to happen to you."
"And because of you, it doesn't. Or, it won't." Doc waved his hands in the air to clear away the confusion. "I'm going to be fine, Marty. My letter to you proves that. Your very presence here, right now, proves that. Because you wouldn't be here if not for me."
Marty's shoulders fell at the way Doc's voice tapered from guilt.
"Don't do that, Doc," he said. "I'm here because I couldn't walk away from a fight. That's it. You hear me?"
He took Doc's hand and squeezed, making the sullen scientist look him in the eye.
"This is just something that's happened. Okay?"
Emmett squeezed back.
"Okay."
Marty held up Doc's forgotten popcorn needle. Emmett widened his smile in thanks, picked up another piece of popcorn, and rolled his eyes when it split on the end of the needle.
Marty smirked.
"How are you so bad at this?"
"Why are you good at it?"
Impatience put a wild gleam in Marty's eye the week before Christmas.
He could taste the electricity snapping off the DeLorean in his daydreams. He wanted the reassuring lungful of icy stainless steel that hallmarked a successful time jump. He wanted his guitar and his skateboard, Pizza Hut, and Michael Jackson. He missed Jennifer, his family, the guys; he missed school, for God's sake.
Marty frowned sympathetically at the tired, time-stranded soul in the bathroom mirror. Just a bit longer, he told him. You don't get Doc once you get home.
Marty hated talking to himself like this, but it worked when the homesickness hit. Doc would be alive in the past, but Marty struggled with the reality that Doc would also die there. By 1985, the Doc Brown living in 1885 would be long since dead, and Marty would go mad trying not to investigate it and eventually lose.
Just a bit longer.
Marty defiantly donned his festive cheer to combat the morbidity looming in his psyche's periphery. In the lab, he popped the wheels off a broken office chair Doc found on the curb and mounted them to a short stool. The following day, on Christmas Eve, Marty rested his knee on the pillow strapped to the wheeled stool so he could easily move about the kitchen; Santa needed cookies tonight, after all.
Doc made a face over Marty's shoulder.
"I have a rolling pin?"
"You have three."
That night, as they pretended there were inches of snow quietly piling outside the window, Marty and Doc settled in with their sugar cookies and eggnog to watch The Honeymooners' Christmas special. The dim star atop the popcorn-draped pine glowed in reverence, privileged to witness this beautifully mundane evening forever woven into their bond.
The clock struck midnight.
"Merry Christmas, Doc."
"Merry Christmas, Marty."
Christmas morning had come and gone by the time Marty woke up. Gene Autry greeted him with "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" as salty swirls of ham and egg noodles lured him to the kitchen at half past twelve.
Marty poked his nose into the refrigerator, cupboards, and covered dishes as Doc tossed slivered almonds into the green beans.
"Looking for something?"
"Yeah, what's for dessert?"
"Popcorn."
Marty raised an uncertain eyebrow over his shoulder toward the Christmas tree in the den.
"Popcorn?"
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Marty smiled up at the Essex's marquee from the front seat of the Packard.
"I think we've been cooped up long enough to take in a matinee," Doc said blithely. He lobbed the gear shift into park. "I don't know how you feel about Jules Verne, but I've been dying to see this film for a year."
Marty couldn't have cared less what movie they were watching; being out of the mansion for something other than a doctor's appointment had him grinning ear-to-ear.
Laden with concessions, Doc slid into the back row and helped Marty get settled in the aisle seat nearest the door. It was uncomfortable, cramped, and sticky, but Marty basked in it. He threw his coat over his knees as a blanket, slumped in the chair, and felt his mouth water as Doc passed the popcorn. He dug into it like he hadn't eaten in a week.
"Calvin?"
Marty's eyes sprang wide at his mother's voice. He gasped so suddenly that a kernel flake clung to the back of his throat, and he doubled over into a coughing fit, trying to hide his face.
"I think that's Kevin," came George's whisper.
"Oh, that's right."
Marty sucked down half a soda to dislodge the kernel. Doc's hand belatedly thumped hard on his back, just as stunned by the materialization of Marty's teenage parents as he was.
Marty reluctantly sat up as niceties and "Merry Christmases" were exchanged. His dad wore a green flannel button down, hair styled smart, and his mom sparkled in a sugar plum-pink sweater trimmed in white fur. He never knew his parents to be Christmas Day moviegoers, but they had just started dating. They wanted to spend every moment together, but it wasn't quite time to meet the family over a big holiday meal.
Marty subconsciously leaned back into Doc.
His hand tingled.
"Oh, my goodness, if you don't look just like your brother," Lorraine marveled. "I'm Lorraine, and this is George. I'm sure Calvin told you all about us."
"W-Well, yeah, of course, he did." Marty flashed a tightlipped smile. "You're the ones he said were meant to be."
The young lovebirds chuckled shyly at this, an "Oh, that Calvin," hooting out of George. "Do you call your brother Marty, too?"
"No, I call him Dave– Damn it."
"Dave?"
Doc clapped Marty on the arm to silence him. "Calvin certainly likes his nicknames."
"Did you get to see him over the holidays?" Lorraine asked.
"Just a phone call," Doc dismissed with a shrug. "He's abroad."
Marty looked over his shoulder at Doc. "He is?"
Emmett elbowed him. He saw something shift in Marty's eye – something mischievous.
Marty huffed indignantly.
"My brother is vacationing in Europe for Christmas, and I'm stuck here watching a fish movie?"
"It is not a fish movie," Doc countered haughtily. "It is a screen adaptation of one of the greatest books by one of the greatest authors of all time."
Marty arched an eyebrow. "Of all time?"
"Yes!"
"Nobody even reads H.G. Wells anymore, Doc –"
"It's Jules Verne, and yes, they do, you illiterate little —"
George cleared his throat. He and Lorraine plastered tense, polite smiles on their faces as Doc and Marty's glares landed on them.
The projector came on. George put his arm around his girlfriend.
"Maybe we should take our seats now, Lorraine."
She nodded immediately, offering the disgruntled men a kind smile in parting.
"Merry Christmas."
Doc and Marty locked their heated gazes on the retreating couple until they took their seats too close to the screen.
Marty held up his fist.
Doc bumped it.
"Fish movie?"
"Illiterate?"
While Marty slept soundly in the afterglow of Christmas, visions of sugar plums and Chuck Berry dancing in his head, Doc spaced out the pieces of his letter and slowly slid them together.
Your friend,
Marty
Marty and Doc craned their necks to see over the nurse's shoulder as the cast cracked open. His leg was not shiny and brand new; the skin was red, dry, crisscrossed with impressions of the bandaging. The hairs on his legs were smashed and bent into the skin at odd angles. A slight odor wrinkled their noses.
Dr. Diefendorfer laughed. "That's perfectly normal, I promise."
"So, I'm good?" Marty asked, wiggling his toes and flexing his foot. The sensation was so foreign.
"You're healed," Diefendorfer said, "but you must ease into daily activities. It might take a day to get your balance."
Marty held Doc's arm as they crossed the parking lot to the Packard.
"It feels so weird having a shoe on this foot again."
When they returned to the mansion, Doc parked at the bottom of the driveway. Marty's ankle was sore from the extended immobilization, but his gait improved by the time they got to the front steps – steps he proudly climbed unassisted.
Emmett steered him past the entrance to the den to the carpeted staircase.
"I thought you might like to sleep in your bed for a change."
Marty flopped face-first into his new pillow and fresh sheets with a happy sigh. He forgot how much he missed sleeping in a proper bed. He got to shower without wrapping his leg in plastic and duct tape, wear regular pants, and navigate the house without banging his crutches or wheelchair into everything.
He could chase Copernicus down to the lab where he and Doc officially — finally — threw themselves into DeLorean Recovery Mode.
They leisurely packed the tow truck with mining gear, hitched the trailer, and tucked the map and letter into the passenger-side visor.
Doc put the camera in the cab.
"Don't worry, Marty," he said later that night. "With any luck, you can drive the time machine out of the mine tomorrow and straight into the future."
Marty pressed his lips together as a fuzzy rendition of "Auld Lang Syne" came from the TV. The tinsel on the tree shimmered in the black-and-white footage of the ball drop in Times Square.
1956.
Marty clinked their beer bottles together.
"You ready to boot me out, Doc?"
Emmett chuckled; he'd been ready to house Marty indefinitely if he'd missed the lightning strike.
"It might not be the worst idea for you to go to your final follow-up on the ninth," he suggested out of the corner of his mouth. A shrug. "Better safe than sorry."
Marty smiled.
"You're the doc, Doc."