And Your Girl Can Sing

Chapter 12: A Day In The Life

"You haven't done it yet?"

Blimey I didn't know this kid was so inquisitive. I cast what I hoped was a disdainful, sideways glance at George and said, "That's none of your concern."

He crunched some of his corn flakes. John had gone out to buy some earlier that morning, a rare form of affection that I was surprised at. Maybe he was in a generous mood. "You really haven't? John must really like you, then."

"A lady tells no secrets," I said delicately, blushing slightly. But it was true. John and I had done nothing... well, not nothing. But we hadn't reached that point yet. And for the first time I realized that John really "did like me," as George put it. For the past few nights I had been sleeping in Rosa's spare room and John would pop in to say goodnight but we would just talk, not needing to go any further than that. He really did respect me. I felt slightly emotional, and took a swig of milk to disguise my melting heart.

"Shut up," Pete Best said, saving me, skipping the corn flakes and making himself jam on toast. "You did it in the Indra and we were all there to witness it."

I burst into peals of laughter. "Really?" George ducked his head, his cheeks the color of roses, and gave a slight smile. "Yeah... I sometimes wonder what happened to Ingrid."

***

There was a red lamp in the boys' sleeping quarters; it had little camels embroidered onto it. The lightbulb itself wasn't red but the lampshade was, which made the light come out all nice and warm and gave the room a cozy atmosphere. I remember looking at that lamp a lot during one particular rainy afternoon, a few days after we had arrived in Hamburg.

John and I had slipped in to talk for a while before the show and the conversation had drifted to talking about Paul. I sat against the headboard of John's bed while looking at the little camels embroidered into the lamp. John sat pretzel legged opposite me, our legs touching.

He was playing with my hands, his index finger was making its way around to touching each of my fingers, touching each gently before moving onto the next one. He had the most gentle touch I had ever felt, not to mention the electric shock that I felt whenever one of his fingers came into contact with mine.

"All the birds John has brought round were okay. There's something about you I... I just don't like," I recited. John looked up at me, a hard look. "What did you say? Paul said that? I'm going to go give him—"

"No, no, no," I looked up, alarmed. "Please don't go do that. It's okay. I told him off."

"Bloody hell," John said. "He's never this bad with anyone."

"I told the bugger off," I explained. "I think I said something like... We're in fucking Hamburg... um, I think I continued with James Paul McCartney, there are fucking strippers everywhere, if you haven't noticed."

John had frowned a little when I had said "bugger." "What's wrong?" I asked him.

"Nothing," he said, and rubbed the back of his neck. "I mean, McCartney is one of my best mates. I s'pose I had kind of hoped that the two of you would have been all right together."

"Me too," I said sadly. I really had wanted to be friends with Paul—that would have taken the cake, McCartney and Lennon? That would have been a dream come true. But alas, Paul and I were like oil and water, for some unknown reason I tried to puzzle out.

"And then he said... erm... You know your Lennon isn't the most faithful boyfriend in the world? He's probably cheating on you or something."

John's sudden reaction was scary; he looked at me with such an angry look I felt scared, and then I regretted telling him about what Paul had said. There are certain things you shouldn't be telling your boyfriend. I was then suddenly aware of the whole best friend/girlfriend dynamic that I had screwed up. Stupid, stupid, stupid, I said to myself, and muttered it a little, and then John was squeezing my arm.