September 1965
It's showtime--8:00 on a September Sunday night. Marisol sits cross-legged on the floor of the living room of her sister Margo's new home in Mill Valley, California. On the black and white television, a smiling, tuxedoed illusionist has just conjured his ninth dove out of thin air. The camera switches to Ed Sullivan, who promises he'll be back with the Beatles after a word from Pillsbury. Marisol brushes her blonde fringe out of her eyes and tries to ignore the flipping sensation in her stomach and control her fidgeting. "I am an island of calm," she whispers to herself, settling her three-month-old dark-haired daughter onto her lap with a warm bottle of milk.
Nine months have passed since she last saw any of the Beatles. She's consciously avoided following their careers, but since she doesn't live in an igloo at the top of the earth she can't help but be aware of the major bullet points of their lives.
On the day Marisol's daughter Melody was born, it was announced that Queen Elizabeth had included the Beatles in the birthday honors list, naming them as members of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. Quite an accomplishment for a group of young lads in their twenties from the northern provinces.
When Melody turned two months old, the Beatles were 3,000 miles away, performing in front of 56,000 fans at Shea Stadium, the largest outdoor concert in history. Paul's sweaty, glowing face and giddy grin had been all over the news for at least a week afterward.
A fortnight later, the band spent a week in Los Angeles looking for a bit of rest and relaxation. According to Marisol's friend Donna, dozens of Beverly Hills brats hired helicopters to continually buzz the mansion where the Beatles were staying so they could take pictures of them sunbathing by the pool. The Beatles hid inside the mansion or underneath large umbrellas while helicopters hovered above. So much for peace and quiet.
Tonight, on Melody's three month birthday, the Beatles are appearing on the Ed Sullivan show. Nineteen months ago Marisol watched them perform for the same television show, live in Miami Beach. Nineteen months. In some ways it feels like she's aged ten years since then.
The commercials finally end and Ed returns to the small screen. Accompanied by a chorus of screams, the television host calls out the names of each band member. Marisol's heart jumps as she hears his name and suddenly there he is. Paul. Shaking hands with the announcer, smiling at the screaming audience, strapping on his Hofner bass. Looking even more beautiful than she remembers. His straight, glossy dark hair is a bit longer, swept forward over his eyebrows and slightly to one side. In an expensively tailored black three-piece suit and Cuban heeled boots, he looks tall and fit, his face tanned and healthy. He looks bigger to her, more filled out-- as if he's grown from a skinny boy into his man's body in just under a year. He acknowledges the crowd once more with a small flirty wave before nodding at his bandmates and launching into their latest number one hit.
Seeing them on this stage takes her back to the first time Paul appeared on American television only a year and a half ago, how excited and happy he'd looked. Since then he and his band have conquered the American charts and finished two very successful world tours. Gone now is the skinny lad with the boyish, eager to please grins and bouncy dance moves. He looks comfortable in his own skin, sexier. He moves confidently on stage, calm and sure of himself. Yet there is a new weight to his expression, a world-weary cast to those downward sloping eyes.
She watches him lean in to share the microphone with John, their faces inches apart. She nearly groans, flattened by the sight of him and what he still does to her pulse rate. John and Paul exchange a smug little smile before Paul's attention returns to the audience. It looks like someone in the crowd has caught his eye. His gaze continues to lock onto a spot on the balcony to his left.
"Well look who it is. Beatlemania still alive and well?" Marisol's older sister Margo drops down beside her and gives baby Melody's sock-clad foot a little tug.
"Looks that way." Marisol lets out a sigh without taking her eyes from the screen. "The girls in bed?"
"They're obliterated from the first week of Kindergarten." Margo regards the television for a moment, then shakes her head. "What a fucking great band they are though."
"I know. The chemistry is amazing. Four best mates who have been playing together for eight years. They make it look effortless."
The song ends and the camera zooms to Paul's face, and he seems to lose focus while introducing the next song. His attention is still fixed on someone in the audience, to his left and high in the crowd. It takes John yelling "Heyyyyy!" at the crowd to startle Paul into finishing the introduction, and Ringo's drums launch them into a loud, bluesy rock song in the style of Little Richard.
Margo snickers and points at the screen. "Check that girl losing her mind. She could be your twin. She sure has Paul's attention.
The camera has panned to an upper balcony where a slim blonde grips the railing, violently shaking a cloud of messy hair, having the time of her life, hamming it up for the television camera and screaming 'JOHN! JOHN!'
"Ha! Of course he's staring at her, she's acting even crazier than everyone else."
The song ends to enormous applause and screams and the theater darkens. The lead guitarist, George, steps to the microphone. "And now we'd like to carry on by doing something we've never done before, with a song from our new LP in England featuring only Paul, and the song is called Yesterday." As the lights come up, Paul is alone onstage with an acoustic guitar. His lips stretch in a brief grimace and he rolls his shoulders slightly before beginning to strum the guitar. There's a light sheen of sweat on his upper lip.
He's nervous without the band behind him, she realizes as he begins to sing. By himself under the spotlight, he looks as alone and vulnerable to her as a baby seal on an ice floe.
Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away, now it looks as though they're here to stay, Oh I believe in yesterday...
The melody climbs and tumbles like a feather on a breeze, reflective and melancholy, and suddenly so familiar to her...
"Baby, listen to this song, I think I dreamed it..."
Hair tousled with sleep, he'd climbed out of bed and reached for a guitar and found the right notes and accompanying chords even before he was fully conscious. The melody was so beautiful he was sure he had nicked it from some other song he couldn't recall in his conscious mind. But as he played it for Marisol and other friends and professional acquaintances, singing la-la-la on the melody in place of words, no one could recognize this song as anything other than his original creation. Yet the right words wouldn't come.
The memory brings to mind a package that arrived from England a few weeks ago, a 45 rpm record with a note "I found the words. Please call me" followed by a telephone number and an address on Cavendish Avenue, St. John's Wood, London. Without playing the record, Marisol had merely added it to the suitcase full of Paul memorabilia she couldn't bear to look at.
She notices she's been holding her breath and exhales slowly, captivated by the haunting melody and plainspoken description of heartbreak as Paul continues to sing.
Suddenly
I'm not half the man I used to be
There's a shadow hanging over me
Oh, yesterday came suddenly
Yesterday. That was it. The word described the melody perfectly. And the rest of the verse told of a man reflecting on his emotional isolation. Life and love had once seemed so easy, but something had happened he couldn't take back, and everything changed. It was a tale of a shattered love affair.
"He found the words," Marisol whispers.
She feels Melody squirm and pull away from the bottle and realizes she's been gripping her daughter too tightly. She loosens her hold and looks down. Melody's big brown eyes are blinking up at the television set. Other than her bright eyes tracking the movements on the screen, her tiny body is completely still, seemingly mesmerized by the singer and the haunting melody.
Marisol kisses the top of her daughter's soft dark hair. "I know sweetie."
Margo regards her younger sister with a frown. "So have you told him?"
Marisol chews the inside of her cheek while she considers a response. "I'm working on it." (If working on it means picking up the phone once a month, waiting for a dial tone, and slamming it down again with her heart pounding.)
Of course, she'll have to tell him. Melody's father deserves to know he has a perfect daughter, and even though Melody has a huge family of people who adore her, no one can take the place of a father in her life. She has to tell him, for her daughter's sake, and he can decide what sort of relationship he wants with her. With them.
The song ends and Paul steps back from the microphone with a tight smile and a small bow. His performance, with acoustic guitar and pre-recorded strings, was pitch-perfect--sweet, stoic, heartbroken.
"He nailed it," Marisol whispers with a relieved sigh. Tears have sprung to her lower lids and she swipes at them with the back of her hand. "Despite the roller coaster ride the last two years has been, Gogo, I am so proud of him."
Her sister leans close and rests her head on Marisol's shoulder. "He's just a guy in a band. I'm proud of YOU. Has it really been two years? Feels like only yesterday."
Marisol glances down at her perfect daughter and gives her a squeeze. "We don't believe in yesterday, do we, Melody? We believe in tomorrow."
But as she watches Paul switch to his bass guitar and announce the next song, her mind goes back to the first time she saw him. No matter how often she looks back on that magical afternoon it is always with the same question: what if she'd been ten minutes later arriving at Mrs. A's house? Ten minutes would have made all the difference. There are those critical junctures in life, when a seemingly trivial decision radically alters the course of our lives. It takes only a second really, and everything changes.