The Pounding of my Heart

Chapter 9 - Two to Eight

It was Friday, and the skies were clear and blue. I awoke early, and finding nothing to do, wandered out onto my balcony. From it, I had a view of the beach and ocean. Sitting down on the lounge, I stared out at the ocean, watching the seagulls and the waves crashing on the shore. Then something caught my eye, something floating on the water. What could it be? Well, whatever it was, it was heading straight for our island. Quickly, I ran inside and put on a robe, which I had forgotten to do before. Then I searched my drawers for a pair of binoculars, I could see clearly that it was a small boat, and to my astonishment, there were four boys on it. One was in the water, pushing from behind. Two seemed to be doing nothing but laughing. The other made me giggle a little. He was paddling with a red and white guitar. Still, something that wasn't so funny about the craft, was that it was slowly but surely sinking. Loaded down with a bunch of equipment, it was no surprise.

Just then, the door on the balcony next to mine opened, and Paul came stumbling out into the daylight.

"What are you doing out here?" he asked.

"Look!" I exclaimed. "There's someone out there; four boys in a boat, and they're sinking!"

"What?" he shouted, glancing out at the ocean. "Let me see those binoculars!" Finding that I couldn't reach him to give them to him, I threw them.

"Watch it!!!" he yelled, but it was too late. I had thrown them a little too hard, and they went sailing over Paul's balcony and landed with a crash on the cement patio below.

"Oh, oh," I commented.

"Oh, oh is right," Paul said turning a bit red. "Those are, rather were, mine you know."

"Paul, this is no time to get mad; those boys are out there sinking!"

"They are, huh?" They've landed!!!" He pointed to the shore. Sure enough, they had, and just in time too; the sides of the boat were collapsing.

Both of us quickly ran downstairs to find out what this was all about. They all lay on the sand sort of studying our house.

"I swear I saw a girl!" we heard one of them say as we drew nearer.

"Yeah, sure," another said.

"Probably just a bunch of old fogies live here!"

"Oh yeah, then where are they?" one asked as Cilla and I came running down the beach with towels in our arms. Paul had went and gotten her out of bed, so as to prove that old fogies didn't inhabit this island.

"Hi there..." Cilla said in a sexy voice as she wrapped a towel around the tallest one.

"Well, hello..." he replied.

Meanwhile, I had rushed over to the wettest one; the one who had been in the water pushing, and wrapped two towels around him. He smiled. The others, who weren't wet, were busy raising their eyebrows, probably at Cilla's baby-doll pajamas. She had forgotten to put on her robe.

They all accepted our invitation to come into the house for some breakfast, still not knowing what awaited them there, four smiling Beatles. For some reason, they didn't seem too pleased about them being there either. That is, all except one, the tallest one with long blond hair.

"Gee George, ya know I've watched you so much George, and think you're really fab!"

George smiled. "Would you like to tell us how you got here?"

Agreeing, we all sat down to breakfast, but Paul just couldn't stop laughing about something or other. The breakfast conversation was very interesting that morning. The tall one did most of the talking. His name was Richard.

"Gee, what a cute name!" commented John.

"Oh, shut up!" yelled Ringo.

The one who was pushing from behind was Bill, and the others were Jim and Pat.

"I'm Jane Mansfield!" interrupted Paul. Everyone looked at him. "Well..."

"But who are they?" asked Richard, pointing to Cilla and me.

"I'm Pauline," I said.

"And, I'm Cilla," Cilla said, smiling.

"Well, now that we've gotten acquainted," said George, "could you tell us how you happened to float in?"

"That's another long story, "began Richard. "You see, all four of us have a group we were going to call 'Richard's Rotheads.'"

"Really? A group with guitars and all?" interrupted Cilla.

"Yes, a group with guitars and all," he replied. "Anyway, we were on this ship called 'The Queen"."

"I've heard of a ship called 'The Queen'," interrupted Cilla again.

"That's wonderful," he said. "We were playing aboard this ship, and..."

"Did the ship have a pool?" asked Cilla. At first, he just sat and stared at her.

"Yeah, it did. Now, where was I?...Oh yeah! We were playing aboard this ship, and this old lady came up and requested a Strauss waltz, and well..."

"What was the name of the waltz?" Cilla once again interrupted.

"I dunno, his fifth symphony or something...anyway..."

"Strauss didn't write any symphonies," she insisted.

"Would you keep your mouth shut?" he tried to ask politely.

"Apologize!" George said to Cilla.

"What for?"

"What do you mean, 'what for?' Just do it!"

"I don't have to follow your orders!"

"Oh yeah, I'm bigger than you!"

"Don't start with that bigger than stuff now!"

"I can if I want!"

"Would you chaps mind settling this later?" asked Ringo.

Finally, they shut up.

"Now, continue, Richard."

He nodded. "Now tell me, would you even try to play a waltz on your guitar? Of course not! So, I got sort of mad and told her she was crazy and a few other things. With my kind of luck, she just happened to be the captain's wife, and we got thrown off the ship, guitars and all."

"You're invited to stay here as long as you want," I told him.

So, they did.

That afternoon, the weather was positively rotten, hot and dusty. So, to my brilliant suggestion, we all went swimming. Cor, did the water feel good! Everything was fine until Richard came along. Upon jumping in the pool, he discovered that he had eaten too much lunch, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't swim or even stay afloat. Ringo, noticing that he was starting to sink, quickly jumped in to the rescue. Dragging him out of the pool was hard, but Ringo did it all the same. (Especially considering that Ringo couldn't swim either.)

"He doesn't look too well," commented Ringo.

"Yeah, maybe you should take him to the doctor's," suggested George.

"Why not?" asked John. "Ringo and I'll go."

"I'll go with you too," said George. "I have to get a new guitar for Paul anyway. You know, the one Pauline smashed?"

"All right then," said Ringo. "We'll have to leave now." So, they did. Cilla, feeling all lonely without George, went up to her room to read.