Got To Be Good-looking ('cause he's so hard to see)

~25~

John

I sat tinkering on the upright piano for ages waiting for Macca, was ok though, I had a few ideas and was busy writing them down when he first walked through the door, saw me, walked back out, and then, seconds later, walked back again shaking the sight of me, sitting at his piano, from his head.

"John?"

"Yes Paul?"

Paul was flustered. Looking at me, then the ground, then me again, waiting for the penny to drop and me to be hit by lightning. He looked almost the same as in the later years, no mo or beard but his head wore a mullet at the back and slightly spiky from the wind at the front. He looked good, healthy, the fresh air must work wonders.

"John? Arrr, why are you here?"

"Oh, wanted to borrow a cup of sugar, you know I'm not one for shopping" I glanced down and hit a few notes of Hey Jude, his eyebrows rose "Linda invited me"

Paul's eyebrows then rose comically higher, I had to chuckle "Ha! Your face, mate. Classic. Maybe I requested- she assented" I stood and walked toward him, this is it.. Kick me out, thump me one, or hug. Which is it to be McCartney?

"And she never mentioned it to me?!" Paul took a step then stopped it was like a romantic climax of a movie "She's not here then?"

"Doctors, in town"

"Well glad she tells you. Tea?" Paul turned on his heel and I thought that was it.

Ignore John- make tea.

Then, before I could step off the red stripy rug that lay on the floor in his home studio, he turned around and rushed me, hugging tight.

Mates, kin..., brothers, family.

"Come on, you still drink tea? Do you expat?!"

"Yea white with three" I ambled behind him watching the step, the happy beat in his stride, the one that reminds me of better, easier, innocent days before stress and mess occurred.

It'll be ok.

This is alright.

The girls ran through the house screaming, flashing by out through the old wooden door. We followed, finding a spot on the fence climbing up, letting the sun seep in and began to talk, a cigarette thrown from me to him, then one thrown back a half hour later.

"I tried giving up, ya know" Paul waved the cigarette about. Smiling as Mary handed him a bunch of daisies. "Not easy"

"Yea I went a day and felt like I'd been hit by a truck, then a bus then another truck. Terrible" I recalled a date not so very long ago, when I was trying to cold turkey everything.

"Yea missed the boat me thinks, Linda's not pleased, would rather I stuck to pot, doesn't stain the ceiling apparently" Paul laughed and hopped off the fence "Girls I'm going in the studio, want to stay with the dogs or come"

"Stay with Pete please daddy" Mary stated as she sat beside the big dog that dwarfed the small girl easily.

"Come on Lennon, let's see if you still got it"

"Really, I thought Linda said you hadn't got -"

"Poppycock, Linda wouldn't say anything crap, John. Spade a spade an all that"

"Yea she doesn't mince words that one"

"That she doesn't it" Paul pushed the door and moved across the floor, grabbed his guitar then sat cross legged in the centre, on the same rug I was hugged on..

I sat dead opposite with my guitar.

Mirrors, like the old, old days, he lifted his chin in remembrance and we spent an hour or so tinkering, laughing and talking about George, Rich and their families.

Somewhere in the wash Linda walked in. Standing back, watching as we chatted, a soft smile pulling at her thin lips, happy neither of us were black and blue.

She went into the next room and returned minutes later, reefer in hand. Lighting it, she passed it to me.

"Lennon"

"Linda"

"So........... how's the accommodation I arranged?"