Only Love Remains - Paul McCartney Fanfiction

Chapter 24 - New Toy

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The day seemed quite normal until Paul decided to go out and grab some 'equipment'. That's exactly what he said, but I wasn't anticipating what he would actually be bringing home.

It was 2 in the afternoon and I was just dusting the house a little. Things needed a little bit of care after our absence, I couldn't stop sneezing the past few days so I hunted the duster down so I could clean this place up again. I had always been a bit of a neat freak, I couldn't stand things being out of order.

The front door opened and I heard Paul grunt, sounding like he was lifting something. I took a peak around the corner so I could get a look at him and saw him with a big cardboard box. It made me raise an eyebrow and wonder what it could possibly be, he didn't really give me much description after all.

I let him be and decided I'd wait until he wanted to show me. He looked like a kid who just got a new toy, so I thought it'd be good to let him play around with whatever it was. It didn't mean I wasn't dying of curiosity though.

For the next hour or so, I could hear him playing music and singing. He seemed to be playing around with different song parts, because he would hop on and off different instruments to play through the song. Whatever he had going on in there, I'm sure it was good.

It wasn't long before he came out from the room and rushed over to me with this big grin on his face. I was in the middle of having a tea when he came to grab my hand and pull me out of my seat.

"Oh Ramona, you're gonna love this. C'mon, I wanna show you something," he said, sounding out of breath form the excitement of it all.

I let him drag me to see whatever he was doing, and ended up a little confused when I saw what it was. There was a microphone and some weird thing that was shaped like a big rectangle box with these reel things on top of it.

It took me a few seconds to realise exactly what I was looking at, but when I did, I had this huge grin on my face as I looked at Paul, who just couldn't contain his own excitement. He was doing exactly what I wanted him to do: find something that makes him motivated again.

"Have you been in here making music?" I asked.

He nodded. "Yeah, sorry I kind of dumped it in our living room."

"Oh no, that's fine! Paulie, I'm just so glad because you seem to be really happy right now. I don't mind if you take up the whole damn house, it's just good to see you doing this. Do you have something you can play me?" I asked.

Paul passed me the headphones and fiddled with the machine and then pressed play on it. Through the headphones came the sound of the guitar, and it was exactly what he was playing earlier. His voice came in and I looked at him in excitement and surprise, amazed with it. There was a bit of drumming in the background with some interesting percussion choices that I really liked.

The song was super simple, probably just being used as a test for everything. Either way, this was amazing and I couldn't believe he had managed to do this in our living room. The quality was pretty good too.

I didn't realise I was holding his hand the whole time until I felt him bring it to his lips to kiss. Throughout the whole song, I couldn't stop smiling.

Paul watched me closely until it was finished, and when I took off the headphones and met his eyes again, I couldn't help but giggle from excitement and pull him into a hug. Something about this made me so emotional and I almost began crying like a baby, but I stopped myself before any tears could leave my eyes. Paul still noticed it when he pulled away though, and he just laughed and swiped his thumb across the edge of my eyes.

"Look at my little crybaby," Paul teased with a terrible attempt at my accent. I think 'Loowk ayt mah litol crah baybeh' was more how he said it. He loved to exaggerate the way it sounded. Surely that's not how I spoke.

I rolled my eyes. "Oh shut up, Paul," I chuckled. "Gosh, I'm so glad to see this happening, you're back on your feet and you're doing something you clearly love. It's like a Christmas toy."

"Well, I wanna share my new toy with you," Paul said, before looking away in confusion as he mumbled those words to himself again. "Sorry, it sounded cuter in my head. What I mean to say is that I want you on these songs too."

"You do?" I asked.

He nodded, before pulling out his notebook full of lyrics and notes on all these songs he's written. After quickly flipping through it, he grabbed his guitar that had been leaning against the couch and he took a seat on one of our sofa chairs.

"This is a song I wrote a while ago but I'm thinking of recording it. I want backing vocals on it but I haven't figured it out yet. I'll play it to you and you see what you can come up with, yeah?" Paul asked.

I nodded and listened as he played it, finding the cute how he had to go through some parts again because of how he had forgotten it a bit. He played this to me ages ago but it never became anything. I'm not sure why, I guess it just didn't fit on the albums.

As he sang, I noticed how he had that sparkle back in his eye. The one that made him look like he was smiling even when he wasn't. It was apart of his charm and I had noticed it the moment I met him.

Seeing him lose it was terrifying. I knew that if it was gone, something was terribly wrong and it meant he was feeling empty and hopeless. There were times when I thought I would never see it ever again, and in those times it was the hardest to hold on.

I suddenly started bawling my eyes out just thinking about everything, unable to hold it back anymore, but it was all out of pure happiness and proudness of him. He looked a bit startled as he was in the middle of a song, but he kept playing as he seemed to know that everything was truly alright. There wasn't much left to go anyway.

He put down his guitar as soon as he finished and chuckled as he pulled me onto his lap and when his arms around me. "Aw, just because I called you a crybaby didn't mean you had to fulfil it," he giggled.

I just shook my head with a smile and snuggled my head into the crook of his neck, feeling the little prickles of his growing stubble itch me.

"Goddamn Paul, you hold on tight, don't you?" I commented, though his tight hold made me feel so safe and warm.

He nodded. "If I could, I would never let go of you. Just let us stay like this for as long as we can, yeah? I spend too much time wanting you in my arms for me to only give a quick hug."

I wasn't gonna argue with that.

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