Thanks for waiting for this chapter—and sorry for not uploading in a while! It's been a really busy time at uni!
We walked.
Outside the Top Ten, down the winding cobblestone streets, towards who knew where, although John seemed to know where he was going. He strode in front of me, or maybe I lagged behind, afraid and not knowing what was going to happen next. I stumbled over a stone in the road and had to jog a few paces to keep up with his large steps. He looked back at me, his jaw set, and I averted my gaze to the floor.
"I'm sorry," a quiet cry burst out of me.
He didn't stop but ignored me and I kept up my walk. I could smell the sea, the docks. A crazy idea popped into my head: is he going to kill me? Dump me into the water? I gazed at the back to his auburn head. Will he go back and tell the tale to the other Beatles and they can all write a song about it? Cora was quizzical, studied bass material music in Germany...
What the hell am I thinking? I shook my head a little, noticing we had arrived at the docks, among merchants selling everything from food to clothing. John strode to the edge of the docks and leaned his against a large wooden pole, looking into the horizon, into the sea. Sunrise, a beautiful orangey tone.
"I'm sorry," I said again, tentatively walking up to him, wondering if he'd reach out or not. The area was windy. You could hear the squawk of seagulls and the sound of clothes against skin as the wind toyed with the loose, baggy garments of some nearby sailors.
"This is when we first came to Hamburg," John said instead after a pause. "Do you remember?"
"You kissed me," I said. "Back in my room."
He suddenly turned around and sat against the wooden pole, part of a large fence which stretched parallel to the dock, blocking us from the expanse of water, leaving enough space for me, and I sat close to him. "You don't trust my fidelity." He said it like it was hard to get out.
"I—I'm sorry. I do, it's just that..." I thought frantically, attempting to explain away an entire history of cheating. "I—erm—" It was a paradox; I was going to either pretend that the cheating wasn't a thing and live with it or call them out on it and risk changing history.
"You doubt me," he confirmed bitterly, the words seeming to wrestle their way from a choky sounding sentence.
Millions of answers caught in my throat, but one wrestled its way from my lips. "No, I don't. I trust you. John, I trust you with my life." His fingers were catching hold of mine; his brown eyes looking straight at me. "The only reason I felt threatened was because Paul was dating Dot and then Emilia happened, and then I remembered all the strippers here, and I'm so sorry, I didn't mean a word, it's the experience and I know I sound like I'm making excuses but I swear—"
I was suddenly unable to speak for shock; he had leaned forwards and hugged me. I was caught inside a large expanse of John, feeling a full on hug. "John—"
"Don't speak. I just want to hold you."
And so I didn't. I closed my eyes and held him and let him hold me and breathed him in. "I—love—you... so much," I heard, a voice muffled in the sleeve of a black leather jacket, guilt washing over me for my rashly spoken sentence. "Fuck, I'm so sorry," I told him, my voice breaking a little. That moment—that pivotal moment—made me feel as if we were whole, or maybe it was the prellies wearing off or tiredness wearing in or the silent expanse of the ocean right next to us.
Something suddenly slipped—the shift of the solid material against my back, and I saw the whole thing like slow motion and the thought ran through my head like a dripping tap: this kind of thing only happens in the cinema, but we were falling through the air and my heart was left up at the spot where we were hugging but I wasn't; I felt John's scrabbling fingers and then a sheer drop and then cold, cold, cold water. All I could see was a murky gray, and panic rose because I couldn't see anything. Splashing. I heard bubbles, a struggle under the water. John. John. "John!" I cried out, my head rising above the water, someone calling out in German, "Da drüben! Schnell!" and an arm grabbing at mine, John's worried but commanding voice telling me to keep afloat, his attempt to keep us both afloat, his scrabbling hands trying to lift me, the heaviness of the shoes on my feet. The world shifted into focus. The dock where we were sitting on was a good two feet above our heads, a boat was coming, and we were lifted into it amidst several curses in German.
"Was zur hölle?" someone said, an older man with short, cropped white hair and a mustache. "Kinder." My feet found the wooden floor of the boat and I stumbled at the sudden stability of the ground. "Your shoes," John said from next to me. "How—"
The pair of black heels he had bought me were still miraculously on my feet. I stared at him for a few seconds, how his leather jacket and jeans looked two shades darker, his t-shirt sticking to his chest, his hair plastered to his forehead, a look of incredulity on his face and then we both burst out laughing. "We fell into the bloody sea," I snorted, feeling actual tears of laugher spring to my eyes, or maybe it was relief or fear or something else. Despite the cold I stepped forwards into his freezing cold embrace and he kissed the top of my head several times while the German sailors nearby eventually broke into laughter and clapped John on the shoulder as the little boat sailed back to solid ground.
***
"They're back," I distinctly heard Paul's mutter as I pushed open the Top Ten door. I entered quietly, John behind me. "Tugendbold," I heard in German from the female beside him but I gritted my teeth and silently entered the still dark doom despite the rising sun outside. Everyone was where I left them, lounging around the main area. Paul was sitting with Emilia on the edge of the stage, not touching her, but then again what did I know. She was still wearing his t-shirt and had . scowl directed at me, Paul wasn't scowling but his face carried a tone of annoyance. George hadn't even acknowledged my arrival. He had pulled up a chair next to Ringo's drum kit and was showing an amused Ringo some chords. There was an empty bowl with a spoon next to the drum kit.
"You're wet," Paul said, a surprised look overcoming his annoyance. I saw George begin to look up in curiosity as Ringo did and then looked back down at the neck of his Gretsch. "We don't have a bath."
"No shite. Mutti!" he called, a sudden idea coming to him. "Come with me, love, I'll get us a bath." His arm round my waist, he steered me towards the stairs but I said, "Hold on a minute, John." I walked back into the room, my shoes making squishy noises on the floor. "Paul, George, ...Emilia, what I said before, I didn't mean it. It just slipped out. I'm really sorry." I waited. George still didn't look at me. Paul opened his mouth but Emilia put a hand on his. Ringo, for possibly the first time, gave me a small unexpected smile. I waited. The silence grew so thick you could cut it with a knife. Prickles of anxiety we're running down my spine, or maybe it was just the cold.
At last Paul spoke. "Go dry off, Cora, you'll catch your death of cold."
I turned around and left to see John gone. Feeling the shame return to the pit of my stomach, I started to climb the stairs. Even if they were bloody stupid and cheated all the time, this is an exception. You can't call them out. You've got to behave as a woman of the sixties. But I didn't like that either. There had to be some way to...
But I don't belong here.
More guilt, from somewhere deeper than simply insulting the boys. I didn't belong here and it showed, showed through so many ways. Feeling hot tears spring to my eyes, my worries turned to curiosity as neared the top of the stairs and heard John conversing with Mutti in German: "Warum sollte ich dich lassen, John, du bist die ganze Zeit so ein Ärgernis," was said by Mutti in a sharp tone and then "Das Geld ist nass," and then John: "It'll dry." The door opened; Mutti's glance turned from annoyance to surprise. "We've got a bath, love, come on. Next door, warm water." He thumped down the stairs, a key dangling from his fingertips; I followed, curiosity overcoming me, attempting to follow John out the Top Ten door but stopping and looking back towards the stage. George's glare met mine, like a laser beam, and I stumbled out into the street, attempting to make sense of the unfamiliar situation. Paul, George, angry with me. It felt repressed, like there was now a valid reason to be furious. The remains of John's hug lingered but still, I felt wrong, guilty.
Walking up the stairs, I saw an apartment with the door open, a rather older looking one with sparse bits of furniture that could only belong to an old German lady. Entering it and walking around, I found the bathroom wasn't hard to find. I pushed open the door. Through a haze of blurry vision with the help of a dingy light I saw a figure with only a towel round his waist leaning at the edge of the bathtub.
"Shite! John you scared me—argh—I'll leave," I said, the tears in my eyes falling, leaving me with a clear vision of a shirtless John with simply a towel and a protecting me from seeing everything else. His smirk morphed into a look of concern upon seeing me. "What's wrong?" He stepped towards me and in doing so the towel dropped and I shrieked, "John!"
"Nothing ye haven't seen before."
"Bloody—put it back on," I demanded, my eyes shut. "It's on," he said, and I replied, "I know when you're lying."
"Now it's on. C'mon love."
I opened one eye and saw the black towel round his waist. There was a tub behind him, but mostly, it was a bathroom, a shabby but proper washroom, not like the bucket they had at the Top Ten. "Why are you crying?" he asked, and I forgot for a second that I was, feeling the ghost of tears on my face. He opened his arms to me and I stepped into them. I felt his gentle finger brush the side of my face and come back wet.
"Look at you. You'll catch bloody pneumonia and then what will we do. Take that off. I'll help you." Shivering, I watched as his hands wrapped around me, feeling the tug of the zipper on the back of my dress, the smoothness of the plastic thing as it unzipped my dress into two pieces, changing its shape. The garment fell to the floor and I was left in sheer stockings, my shoes, and a simple black bra. "John—"
"If we share the bath, one of us won't have to freeze waiting," he said matter-of-factly, but I could see his brown eyes staring at me and I felt the lack of clothing on my body in his stare. The water was still running and he reached his hand back and fumbled with the taps, turning them off, all the while gazing at me.
"Give me a towel," I said suddenly, feeling unreasonably naked, and annoyed with myself for feeling that way. He reluctantly reached for his waist but I laughed and said, "Not that one, love, you know that." A black towel was produced and I wrapped it around myself quickly. "John, I'll just wait outside, just—"
"Why can't you see?"
I paused, already turned out to the door. "What?"
"Why can't you see how beautiful you are?"
I'll be honest: I didn't see that one coming. I thought it would be something about his needs. But it wasn't and it surprised me. He continued: "I mean it. I'm not just saying this because we're standing here in our knickers, it's something more." I stared back at him, a pleasurable red rising to my cheeks, clutching the towel round my torso, looking at him who had just told me this and also told me. I'm not good enough. You don't want me. You don't trust me. All his words, not mine, and yet—
"You bloody arsehole!" I could sense the hurt, the beginnings of my denial seep through my voice and I sealed it with a shove at him. He didn't shove back, which somehow made it worse; he let me hit his chest, his arms, his hands, all the while moving backwards towards my bed. He didn't say anything and so I filled that space with a slap on his cheek, causing him to reel and sink to the ground. "You disgusting, you, you—say something, damn it, say something!"
"What's there to say?"
"What's there to say?" I repeated. "You go do this and then ask me what's there to say? Hit me, Danny, hit me—" I grabbed his arm and brought it towards my face; he stiffened and I fought against it. "I'm not going to hit you. Not now, not ever. You know that!"
For a moment everything was still and I looked into his eyes and saw beneath a slightly longer haircut which had grown out from the Oasis-styled hair he had when he first asked me out that day on the playground. I saw a promise he made to me and I saw the hurt he had in breaking it and I dropped his hand, dropping to my knees next to him. "Is that it, then?"
"What do you mean?" There was a distinct note of panic in his sentence. He looked towards me. "No, no, that's not it—"
"We're finished. I don't want things to be the same way as—"
"You can't compare me to them. Fucking hell, Cora, that hurt. That really hurt. Listen, I know that what I did was—"
"We're done, can't you see that?" Always at the climax I never cried. A few seconds ago I was screaming at him at the top of my lungs but now, now I had grown silent, like a statue, the way I had learned as a child. "Get out."
"Cora—"
"Go. Don't make this harder than it has to be. You know that."
"No, no, listen to me, please, Cora—"
"Love?"
"John?" I blinked.
"Cora? Scared me for a second." His facial expression looked incomplete: he was waiting for my response. Both of us standing without clothing, shields lowered. I knew then. I knew he was different from my other. But was he? You're a right bloody witch, I thought to myself. How could you even compare the two? John would never.
"John," I said, compromising with my thoughts. "Listen, right now I'd really like a warm bath with you. My clothes stay on, though, all right?"
"Anything for you." He had learned by now that he couldn't push me, but when would he tire of me? I thought as I dropped the towel and he reluctantly zipped my dress back up and stepped into his pair of boxers, whispering, "I wish you'd see exactly what you mean to me." I slipped off my shoes and stockings, feeling the cold, concrete floor on my bare feet. We entered the tub, him first and me second, feeling the warm water rise around my body like a furnace, like a pair of warm, form fitting gloves. I wanted to laugh. Here we were in the bath, me wearing a full on outfit, him in barely anything. What a paradox against the times.
I brought my lips to his ear. "Why'd you take me on a walk, love?"
His hand on my shoulder. "Well, crazy bird, you're always going off about communication. I thought I'd give it a go."
I smiled, a wide, toothy smile, a short spark of laughter bubbling in my throat, something hopeful rising in me. Communication. John Lennon. Who would have thought.
I leaned against him in the tub and closed my eyes, the smile lingering on my lips.