The World Spinning Round (Beatles/Paul McCartney)

20. New York (pt 2)

December 1968
Paul

It took less than 24 hours for word to spread that I was in town.

The scene outside Alice's hotel was mental, a swirling frenzy of excitement and chaos. There were the wide-eyed teenagers with their homemade signs and giddy enthusiasm. And then there were the veteran autograph hounds who had been through this before and seemed a bit blase about it. To be honest, it was an excellent reminder of why we'd quit touring.

It took three days for the hotel to tactfully suggest that Alice and I bugger off somewhere else. She returned from an awkward chat with the manager and gave me a look like she'd been living a peaceful life until I showed up. Couldn't blame her entirely, but what was I supposed to do? It wasn't like I could put the Genie back in the bottle, so I just had to get on with things.

Neil found us a friend of a friend's brownstone on the Upper West Side. It was a quiet residential neighborhood where the aging population could care less that I was a Beatle, though they didn't seem too keen on my long hair and Alice's short skirts. So Mal helped us pack up, moved all our luggage to the new flat, and then flew back to London.

Once we were safely relocated, I focused my attention on Alice. She felt like absolute shite and was clearly overwhelmed by life, both of which she refused to admit. According to her, acute symptoms in the first trimester were supposed to signify a healthy pregnancy. Sounded like a load of bollocks to me. So I gave Yoko a ring to get the name of the herbalist she once mentioned. He gave Alice a foul-smelling, terrible-tasting tisane to drink every 2 hours, which, surprisingly, worked wonders.

Since Alice refused to let me near anything related to Zarby, I was left to my own devices. The first few days, I woke up restless, like my brain was screaming for some sort of input. So I smoked a lot of pot to take the edge off and rang Apple regularly to check in. Had the Hells Angels left? Why not, and what was the plan to get rid of them? Had we finalized Mary's album cover? Why the fuck not and what was the plan?

Around the fifth day, I woke up feeling different. It was like a switch inside me had been flicked off. The usual restlessness that plagued me vanished into thin air. I didn't feel the compulsion to call Apple to check in. I didn't worry that everything would crumble to pieces without me. Nor did I have the urge to frantically scribble down the melodies that danced around in my mind.

So, I decided to explore the city I'd never been able to properly visit. With a pair of mismatched trainers purchased from a nearby charity shop, I wandered aimlessly through all the neighborhoods I'd heard about but never experienced first-hand. Turns out, my new beard provided a certain level of anonymity -- paired with the fact that no one was expecting me to casually pop into their record shop or art gallery. It was fucking glorious being able to come and go with no one the wiser.

For once, I didn't feel that distinct yearning to be constantly on the move, to never let anything slip past me. I was oddly content to... just be.

"Where's Paul McCartney, and what have you done with him?" Alice asked one night.

She'd just come home from a dinner with a designer called Halston, and her sheer black stockings were in disarray as she tiredly unrolled them. She then walked bare-legged over to where I sat in an oversized chaise lounge to press a kiss on my temple.

I wrapped an arm around her waist as she made a big show of inspecting the top of my head. She poked around in my hair with an exaggerated expression of confusion.

"What're you doing?" I asked bemusedly.

"Looking for your antenna.... I think it's fallen off."

"Fuck off," I laughed, pushing her away.