𝐘𝐄𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐃𝐀𝐘 ── PAUL McCARTNEY

XVII. I'LL FOLLOW THE SUN

Friday the 17th of October 1958

Playing music was what Paul wanted far more than passing his exams. I tried to stay neutral on the matter. It was very difficult for me as someone who was very much on the side of things. I was very much used to John and Paul around me almost always. John was here extremely often and the two would work on their original stuff, listen to records and attempt to replicate and mirror what they heard. It would go on for hours. I'd be outside hand washing the laundry and I could hear it from outside. It was often a secret joy that would bloom in my heart to witness the two playing together. It was so special.

I would forever carry those in my heart and treasure them ⎯⎯ even the lucid John Lennon. He was a boy grappled with pain and loss and it would forever pain him. I would back away and surrender if that's what it took for him to tolerate me more. I had nowhere to go and it made me try so hard not to take this whole beer thing to heart. It was a mistake kissing Paul but not a mistake somehow. I cannot bring myself to regret it but I could not afford to let myself forget the dangers of it.

The lamp cast a dim light in my shoe-box room drawing me back to my newfound reality. At times I'd forget where I was ⎯⎯ that I had woken up on a footpath, dizzy, distorted and very much confused with Paul McCartney looming over me.

I was reading before bed and I could still hear Paul splattering and coughing down the hall. The poor thing. He had suffered the past couple of days with the flu. I had been playing nurse bringing him hot tea and homemade soup when I wasn't working. Jim would chuckle at my antics, calling me a sweetheart. I think it had saved him from Paul's dramatics and how he was one to suffer from the man flu.

I liked being domestic. A homemaker of sorts. I found value in it. I made sure Mike and Paul had ironed school shirts and folded them neatly. I made sure all three had there lunches set for the day when I left for the bakery early in the mornings. It made me feel somewhat useful and use up time in my days.

I knew it got stuffy when you had a guest or visitor in the house for long lengths of time. I tried my best to minimise that and do things how they all did it.

I knew we had a lamb roast on Sunday lunch after church to St. Barnabas and then bubble and squeak for dinner. I knew how Mike liked his socks folded and that he was always loosing them. I knew that Paul would hyperventilate if I arranged his records the wrong way. I knew that when we had guests that weren't family Jim would use his late wife's special tea-set and tray and bring out the good biscuits.

I tried to fit in the best I could and tune myself to what I was expected to. I hoped it was working. I still had phrases and wording of my own that were odd and my oblivious nature to certain things such has events or appliances sometimes were clearer than others. But I could blame it on my Australian-ness. I was from another country of course. Not to forget another time.

I turn the page of my novel. It was Virgina Woolf's 'To the Lighthouse.' I was just beginging the second section of of 'time passes' when I heard Paul continue to cough. I stand and my pink cotton nightgown falls to my ankles and I tug at my sleeves quickly don my purple dressing gown.

I flick the switch on the chrome torch and open the door ⎯⎯ the door hinges squeak and I flinch at the loud sound. I trudge over to Paul's room. I open the door and I shine torch light on Paul's face and he quickly covers his eyes.

"Oh love, cut it will you?" Paul complains and coughs. I switch off the light and stand in the dark.

"You're coughing a lot. Do you need something?" Paul coughs again. "Do you need some warm water and salt? It'll sooth you're throat when you ⎯⎯ I'll go boil the kettle."