What If

Chapter 4

I waited forever for the final bell to ring. I wanted to see the pre-Beatles play so bad! I was tapping my pencil anxiously on my desk. I was so excited that I couldn't think too much about how George was in another one of my classes. We must've been in the same grade, or as they say in England, the same year.

I watched the clock impatiently. The last minute seemed to be the slowest of them all. The moment the sound echoed through the classroom, I shot out of there like a bullet. I ran to my locker and put everything I wouldn't need away.

"Hey there." I closed my locker to find Paul standing there with the biggest smile on his face and a guitar case in his hands. "Are you ready to go?"

I smiled shyly and said "Yeah." I looked behind him to see George standing there awkwardly. His body was stiff and eyes were glued to the floor. His left hand was clasped tightly to his backpack and his right hand was holding a guitar case.

Paul followed my gaze and said "Oh, I hope you don't mind. My friend, George, is coming with us. He's in the band too."

I felt a pang of pity for George seeing how shy he was, but then I remembered his future. He deserves it, I thought. "Yeah, that's fine," I said, actually meaning it. "I know him. He's in my math and German class."

George looked up from the floor, surprised I had actually noticed him. I saw a little bit of red come to his cheeks. He smiled a little. "Yeah, I am," he spoke up. "I'm surprised you noticed."

I smiled. "I have a thing for faces." That was a lie. I was actually terrible with faces, but what else was I going to say? George seemed happy with that anyway.

I was actually happy that I was with both of them instead of just one. There was much less of a chance that one of them would try something. And God forbid if we got into some sort of trouble. Two was better than one in that situation.

We walked out of the school and onto the sidewalk in the opposite direction of my house. The sky had turned gray, so the air was getting colder, but nothing I couldn't handle. I was a strong girl.

"So, Colleen," Paul said, striking up a conversation. "Tell us more about yourself. Do you play any instruments?"

I had a rather long list of what I used to play, but to keep things simple, I just said "I play the violin."

"The violin?" George spoke up for the first time. "That's fab! I would love to hear it sometime!"

"Yeah," Paul cut in. Jerk, I thought. "I think all of us in the band would love to hear it. I'd just have to talk to John first."

John! I had completely forgotten he existed. I had both disgust and excitement battling it out in my stomach over hearing his name. I wanted to meet him, but I also wanted to spit on him.

"Oh, no!" I rejected, remembering where we were with the conversation. "I have way too much stage fright to ever play in front of someone! I can't even play in front of my own mother."

"Then why play at all?" asked George.

"For myself," I answered. "I like it."

Then Paul changed the subject. "What's New York like?" he asked. "I've always wanted to go there."

Let's see, I thought desperately. New York in the 60's. "Um, there're homeless people everywhere and it's dirty. There's trash on the streets. And the smog, forget about it." Of course, I was only talking about the city. I didn't live in the city. I actually lived in a very small rural community. But they were talking about the city, so I gave them my thoughts about the city.

"Well, Ed Sullivan is there, so it can't be that bad," Paul said.

"Yes," I said, smiling. "And there's Ed Sullivan." There was a momentary pause. "How far away is this practice place anyway?"

"We're almost there."

And he was correct. Just a minute later we came upon this gray decrepit warehouse that looked abandoned. Paul opened the door for us and then stepped in himself. And there he was. Sitting on a crate, playing chords on the guitar with a cigarette in his mouth, was John Lennon.