Get It Straight, Or Say Good Night

America- Aftermath

Struggling to stand, struggling to move, the night became a long drawn out process of crying girls and an overall feeling of being bereft.

Now the once heavenly smiles, gushing wanting tears and happy screams were silent in sadness.
Now so upset, now so devastated, that they may never see the band again .. May never have a chance to say I Love You to each man.

And the smell. She hadn't smelt it before, hadn't noticed. 

Looking about she realised the floor was wet puddles in places, damp in others was that.... piss?........... It certainly smelt that way now her nostrils were working. Now, she couldn't not smell it, her nose wrinkled up. Sure she was dying for him but letting go... like that...

Was it want and abandon or can't leave my seat or I'll miss the show.

Lou wasn't sure but she would not waste her time dallying on the thought either, she inched closer to the main aisle and hopefully the exit as a few girls squeezed into the mass of bodies ahead, climbing the too narrow stairs.

Louise hadn't factored in the departure, the standstill traffic of people, the cars bumper to bumper, gridlocked and horns now honking and being held down to blare. She should have left earlier, perhaps well before the last notes rang out, all well and good if she could have actually heard them.

And she walked, feet so sore, throat needing water.... an ocean of water. It was like she was in some urban desert. Lou tried talking to see what it sounded like and the croak that emitted had her laughing and crying all in one moment. She wanted him, now, the urges that had flooded through her as she clung to the chair, squeezing her heart, baring her soul in unbridled screams, still coursed and burned within.

She wanted to mark him too, remind him that even though all those thousands wanted their claws in him that she was the only one that owned him.

But before she could strip him down naked, she had to get back. Get back to where she belonged.

Where she should have stayed waiting for him, like a princess in a tower that was blind ..... Not knowing the truth, the truth that he had actually created a type of foreplay on the stage. Lou struggled to push through the crowd, that had paused in their journey in the middle of the sidewalk. 

She had money, her media pass, her key, her wedding ring, a letter from Brian, his business card, the phone number of the house, the phone number of the Superintendent of police ~ assigned specifically for the Beatles security. Code words to utter to guards at the gate .... Even the name and address of one of the reporters that lived locally and was trusted by the band....

But panic still settled around her. 

Ever step taken felt like she was going backward.

Evie was sound asleep with the nanny assigned. The house that never slept was probably filled brim full.

Of photographers, newspaper men, record executives all shoving and pushing to get a one on one moment with the boys. Louise let her fellow walkers push and prod her as she stood breathing deeply, not wanting to panic, wanting to be home now, and safe in his arms.

A taxi appeared on the shore of the sidewalk and before anyone else could, Lou dashed into the backseat and instructed the driver of her destination.

"Roads blocked miss" The drivers American drawl, still foreign to her, woke her from the blank stare out of  the car window.

He had been doing so well too .... missing main roads, taking short cuts, avoiding the red traffic lights but as the climb into the posher suburbs began, the police presence rose and now at each roadblock the cabbie repeated he had a lone passenger on her way home... and it worked.