Blackbird, Fly (A Paul McCartney Story)

Chapter Six

Even after the chaos the night before, my parents said that we had to carry on, but with caution.  My dad walked me to the bus stop, and made sure I got on.  Other people from the neighborhood watched me carefully, as if I had the plague and they didn't want me near them.  

My family was in trouble, but I wasn't sure what to do about it.  We couldn't run away the way my aunt did.  Aunt Johanna was threatened for going down to the voting station a few years before, and things got bad quickly.  She went to live up in New York.  I'd love to go visit her, but unless I was going to live with her, it was way too impractical.  

When I went to clean John and Paul's room, I was inside for about fifteen minutes before he returned.  Locking the door, Paul said, "You're alright!  I knew that if I didn't leave before morning I would be caught.  I was so worried..." he said, taking me in his arms.  I didn't know which place was more dangerous, my house or this hotel, but either way it felt safer with him.  He kissed me once he had a hold on me, but I wasn't afraid of him anymore.  

Then there was a knock on the door.  I grabbed the linens I had brought with me to change the sheets.  Paul answered the door as if he wasn't kissing the maid a moment earlier.  Two men walked in, and I recognized neither of them.  "Paul, this is Mr. Ender.  He wanted to talk to the both of us."  

"Should I get John and the others?" 

"No," Mr. Ender immediately said.  "That wouldn't be necessary.  This conversation would only seem to involve you, and your manager."

I stopped folding for a small second, but hurried to keep working.  I feared what the man would say, but I soon realized that my fear was accurate.  

They sat down in the living room part of the suite, meanwhile I stayed in the bedroom.  I heard Mr. Ender say, "Now, I'm aware that you boys have some...counterculture ideas about the...colored situation.  But there have been rumors flying around about a boy who looks a lot like you wandering about in a Negro neighborhood."  I had to walk out into the kitchenette near the living room in order to clean off the counters and the table.  Mr.  Ender seemed to glance at me.  

"I assure you that these are just rumors.  However, it is true.  We support integration."  Paul said, lighting a cigarette.  I had never seen him smoke before; it never occured to me that he did, with his singing voice being so good.  

Mr. Ender did not seem convinced.  "It is your belief that makes me wonder."  He leaned forward in chair, reading to interrogate Paul.  "There are so many impressionable children and teenagers who follow you very closely.  I'm afraid that you'll put unsettling ideas in their heads.  We've already got," he said that awful word again, "marching in Washington, and causing trouble all around."  

"Excuse me," the other man, who I assumed was their manager, interjected, "but you ought to use better language.  There is a lady present." he nodded towards me.  I looked up for a moment but continued to wipe down the counters.  

Mr. Ender snorted.  Paul glared at him, and snuffed his cigarette in the ashtray.  "Sir, what do you find funny?"

The man popped his knuckles.  Paul was getting irritated.  "You see, Mr. McCartney, your attitude is starting to displease me, and the other shareholders at the stadium.  We don't want Negro sympathizers playing a concert and spreading a message of social equality to our youth."

"What is so bad about equality?" The Beatle demanded.  

"You might believe that being equal will solve everything.  It won't.  They're different than us.  They're dirty and uncivilized."

Paul was livid.  "How can you say such a thing in front of her!" he shouted, making me drop my washcloth.  As I bent down to get it and clean it off, I hoped that Paul would calm down.  If he said anymore, he might as well have walked over and kissed me.