Within You, Without You | George Harrison ✅

17

"I've, uh, told the press about tonight, by the way." George said as he drove us to the hotel where we had had our first date at. Tonight we were having the date, then.

"Oh," I replied, "do they know about the, uh..." I looked down to my non-existent stomach.

I didn't have to finish my sentence. George shook his head. "Not even John, Paul and Rings know about our baby, yet." He smiled at me, reaching over and putting a hand on my thigh as he continued to drive. "Why, did you want them to?"

"No." I told him. "I want it to be our's for a little while longer." Call me selfish, but I knew that once the secret was out, the baby - our child - would never be just our's ever again. It would belong to the media, to its godfathers; John, Paul and George, and then to its friends, significant others and its own children, eventually. But for a little while longer, at least, our baby was just our's.

We got in and were seated at the same table as we had been on our first date. We ordered - George had given up drinking since I had told him I was pregnant, so we both settled with iced water. The journalists wanted to know exactly what we were eating and drinking, so we asked the waiter to let them know.

It was so odd, being in the public eye. And there were lots of photographs being taken of us - presumably for the next day's front page.

"God," I said as I ate some of the salad which I had ordered, trying to stay healthy for the baby and keep the baby weight which was inevitable after the pregnancy as little as possible so it would be easier to lose it, "I feel like I'm in a zoo right now. How do you and the others deal with it?"

George shrugged, "after a while you get used to it." Jokingly, he waved to one of the journalists. He grinned and quickly scribbled something down in his notebook before glancing back up and catching my eye. George had, meanwhile, gone back to enjoying his pie. "And besides," he said, "we knew that they'd have to be around for the date."

"Yeah but I didn't think that they'd be so blatant about it." I sighed, pushing an uncooked cherry tomato around the plate. I hated tomatoes with a passion.

"Fuck 'em." George muttered as he stood up and came round to my side of the table. I was about to ask him what he was doing, but when he reached into his suit jacket and pulled out a small box, my heart skipped a beat... and skipped another when he got down on one knee.

But instead of speaking, George began to sing.

Something in the way she moves

Attracts me like no other lover

Something in the way she woos me

I don't want to leave her now

You know I believe and how

Somewhere in her smile she knows

That I don't need no other lover

Something in her style that shows me

Don't want to leave her now

You know I believe and how

You're asking me will my love grow

I don't know, I don't know

You stick around, now it may show

I don't know, I don't know

Something in the way she knows

And all I have to do is think of her

Something in the things she shows me

I don't want to leave her now

You know I believe and how

At the end, George asked, "Amoreena, I'm asking you to marry me. Will you marry me?"

With tears in my eyes, I nodded and threw myself into his arms, my salad now long forgotten.

"Mrs Harrison," he murmured into my ear as the journalists and photographers clamoured around us, their cameras flashing and pens scribbling.