Growing Up Beside You [John Lennon/Beatles Fanfiction]

31. I wouldn't expect an apology (2)

John walked down the corridor fingering the silver chain in his trouser pocket. He'd had it in there a while now, two hours to be exact. The pendant had become clammy where John had been mindlessly rubbing at it. He glanced around making sure she wasn't around before pulling it out of his pocket again. The chain dangled inbetween John's fingers, the pendant facing upright in his palm. He could probably draw it from memory by now. There wasn't anything fascinating about it and it didn't mean anything to John, yet, something about this locket attracted him to it.

Unlike those crappy little heart lockets that needed a bloody microscope to see inside of it, this oval pendant was quite large and intricately detailed. It looked antique. Victorian perhaps. The front was decorated with an engraving of a bird and throughout John's French lesson, he'd been thinking of all the small birds he knew the name of. Swallow, sparrow, blue tit, wren, robin, blackbird, canary. It was bound to be one of those. Birdwatching wasn't exactly his area of expertise. Unless, of course, you count the kind of birds with tits, lips and hips, then yeah, birdwatching was a skill of his that he took quite a bit of pleasure in.

The silver bird was perched on a branch covered with foliage and its little beak pointed to the sky like it was in mid-song. A lace-type filigree edged around the centrepiece of the locket whilst another vine-like swirl boarded the outside. On first inspection whilst using the bog, John noticed six circles, in between the border's weaving. Three on each side which were a little smaller than the head of a matchstick. John rubbed the tip of his thumb across them to feel them caving inwards. It appeared that something had once filled these hollow holes. Jewels, possibly. Rubies, diamonds or emeralds—treasures worth a fortune. Did she know about the gemstones? Did she have them stored somewhere or was the necklace given to her dejewelled?

Anyway, it didn't matter because John owned it now. He'd noticed the chain sticking out from the mud, back at the foxhole. At first, he'd called after her, but being the stubborn bitch that she was, she continued to strop away from him without so much as a glance backwards. 'Fuck her then', he'd said, shoving the muddy locket into his coat pocket. He wasn't shouting her stupid name again. He'd keep the sodding thing. It looked valuable and antique crap was always worth something. He knew of an old fella living on the corner of Penny Lane that collected relics. Or was it that he auctioned them off? He used to be a mate of John's late Uncle George and he vaguely remembered tagging along for a visit or two when he was a young boy. Even to this day John still grimaced at the strong smell of Vinegar and Varnish that overwhelmed the place. Anyway, John would take it there, see how much he could get for it. Perhaps, he could get a quite a bit despite the lack of jewels. It was too bad if she went looking for it. It was clearly a keepsake worth sentimental value, but if that's the case, than she shouldn't've been so careless with it. Finders keepers, losers weepers. Ha, last time he'd chanted that he'd been wearing shorts to school and smoking on candy cigarettes.

John hadn't seen Celia drop the locket, but he knew it belonged to her. He'd noticed something of the similar sort hanging off her chest last week, while she was fast asleep in his bed, drunk and smelling of vomit. He hadn't really paid attention to it then, though. Girls were always wearing necklaces these days and plus, he'd been too busy watching the steady rise and fall of her cleavage. It must've unhooked when she decided to go all Sugar Ray Robinson on him.

John pushed the locket open with his thumbnail. The right side was empty, but to the left, a sepia-toned portrait of a pretty woman smiled up at him, once again. The woman looked about thirty when the photograph was shot but still, she had the exuberance of youth. Her dark hair was piled on top of her head into one of those big, swirled pompadours and she wore a dark, round Edwardian hat that made her head look like a pea in comparison. The photo was cut at the chest but she seemed to be wearing some smart, button-up suit dress thing, with big, black lapels below the collar. Her bright eyes were sparkling with merriment as she held the massive bow on her hat, laughing into the camera lens with her pointy chin tilted upwards. There was a confidence about her, a light-hearted, jaunty temperament, with a beauty to match it. Whoever she was, dead or alive, she seemed like the kind of woman who'd got heads turning. Above all, though, she had a bright, wide smile, and round plum-like cheeks, exactly like Celia, and that's what John couldn't take his eyes of.