#imagine working with John and Paul...

[georgeharrisonsmiling]

[harrisonsbabygirl]

[papasmistakeria]

Hamish Linklater suddenly seeing a bunch of people drawing his character interact with an 8-bit pixelated blue stickman holding a cross from a video game he’s never even heard of:

[iteh3xael]

Wasn’t expecting to reblog Beatles fan fiction (?) ever but uh… sure

How they act when they're in love, but haven't confessed yet

(here is the second request fill for the previous anon !! sorry to keep you waiting ✨️ I hope this is what you had in mind!)

John

John is openly affectionate and flirtatious with you and will do anything he can to get your attention

he's also the embodiment of the "if he pulls your hair, that means he likes you" trope

he'll engage in playful teasing and banter with you, trying his best to get under your skin

in conversation, he'll make subtle references to shared interests or inside jokes, showing that he pays close attention to your preferences

John often slips you silly handwritten notes or doodles to make you giggle and blush

he invites you to rehearsals and recording sessions in an attempt to impress you with his songwriting prowess and musical talent

he'll send you handwritten letters or postcards when on he's tour to let you know he's thinking of you, showing a bit of his softer side

Paul

Paul is more traditional in his approach, doing things like writing anonymous love letters and complimenting your style of dress

he initiates subtle gentlemanly displays, like holding the door open for you or offering to share his umbrella on a rainy day

when you're near he'll find reasons to touch you casually, brushing against your arm or offering a reassuring pat on the back

even from across the room, he's always gazing longingly at you or shooting winks in your direction

Paul makes an effort to remember small details about your life like your coffee order or the names of your pets

he'll even dedicate songs to you during live performances, using the stage as a platform to subtly declare his affection

George

George prefers a subtler approach rather than grand gestures and is somewhat shy about showing his affection

however, this doesn't mean he's any less in love with you

he'll share meaningful glances and smiles with you from across the room, conveying his affection and admiration in a subtle yet powerful way

when he's feeling bold he'll find excuses to be near you, positioning himself strategically to create more opportunities for chatting

George always shares new books and music with you when he discovers something he thinks you might like

he'll ask about your interests to find common ground and reasons to spark up a conversation

he plays you demos or rough cuts of new songs he's working on, showing you that he values your opinions and seeking your approval in a display of trust and vulnerability

Ringo

Ringo is a bit more shy than the other lads when it comes to his crush

he'll joke around and be playful with you, willing to do anything to make you smile

he'll try his best to act naturally and be himself, wanting you to feel comfortable around him

he always finds reasons to spend time with you (like inviting you to see shows with him), seeking out opportunities for one-on-one interaction

Ringo often gifts you small tokens of appreciation like snacks or trinkets as a subtle way of expressing his feelings

he favors physical displays of love, afraid he will trip over his words or become tongue-tied if he tries to express his feelings through language

he'll mirror your body language and gestures, subconsciously displaying his affinity for and connection with you

he always notices subtle changes in your mood or behavior, demonstrating his devotion and offering support and comfort when you need it most

[starzzmissthesun]

NO BUT IMAGINE!!! You're Paul McCartney in November of 1980 and John Lennon puts out double fantasy, you listen to it and hear just like starting over. You realize and understand it's directed towards you and maybe you kind of reminisce about the past and your relationship and what not. Maybe you even are planning to reconcile,to call again, or even go and visit. Whatever. And then BOOM. He gets SHOT AND KILLED. Just TWO WEEKS! after you hear it. You had no time to act with any thought you wanted. You thought you could've had it worked out, maybe it wouldn't even taken 10 years at this point. But NO!! HE DIED

[m1ssunderstanding]

So I know we're all over eyes of the storm by this point but I turned this YouTube video on for background noise and ended up squawking.

After doing the 'it's only me under the glasses' story, Paul says about John, "he was a great guy and I'm so . . . Proud. And happy to have Known him, to have Worked with him, and to have done All That Stuff with him. So that's a huge thing in my life. ( . . . ) For me, the main feeling is just remembering the joy. I suppose, you know, in life, people . . . come and go. (. . .) But you remember the great times you had together, and that's what these pictures do for me." And you can tell they've cut out where he's going on and on about him. And the footage of Paul talking about John looks like this.

Then it cuts to what seems like the only George-related sound bite they had. Paul says, "these days, you'd go the other way, you'd retouch out his pimples. This way we're bringing them Up! Sorry George. You're still gorgeous . . . My little mate! Met on the school bus. Imagine that." And the footage of him talking about George looks like this.

[valend]

imagine how fucked it was that after the whole Paul marrying Linda and John deciding to marry Yoko 2 days later situation they all just had to clock into work together basically the next day

[bambi-kinos]

What’s up with paul obsession with sex?? Im seeing many posts about paul being asked different things and he doing a 180• and answering about sex?

Some people are just naturally more horny than others. Paul is just kind of like that and always would be no matter where his life went.

Paul was initiated into a world of no-limits sex when he was 18 years old and he was made a man through the introduction to truly wild sexual expression in Hamburg. He was introduced to sexual ideas and scenes that he never imagined existed and would probably shock even us internet people.

Once he knew that kind of horny could be on tap, there's no way he was going back to an ordinary life of a wife who put out once every 2 weeks. He is telling the truth when he said he wanted to be a rockstar so he could have sex with a lot of girls. The Hamburg residency was not just musical, it was also sexual and Paul put a lot of effort into studying music and sex. And yes if you want to be good at it then you have to make it a discipline and a study and you have to practice. A lot of Paul's sexual interests were first practiced on brothel girls who were up for anything and he clearly learned a lot.

His best mate was John Lennon, a guy notoriously against restrictions. John encouraged Paul's sexual expression as he did for thousands if not millions of women all over the globe. There are lots of people with stories about spending the night with John and coming out as different people on the other side.

Paul is terrified of being alone but not willing to commit to true intimacy. Sex is an easy way to have someone's physical company for a few hours but he can jettison a sex worker the moment she becomes too much trouble. Some people have emotional support dogs, Paul has emotional support hookers.

Paul demands artificial closeness where he is benefitting materially from his time and mental investment but he still controls the field and sets the terms. This defines most if not all of the non-Beatle relationships in his life. See: Nancy Shevell, Jane Asher, Robert Fraser, Jane Asher's mother. All of these relationships while supposedly "deep" and "close" all end up mirroring Paul's patronage of prostitutes. They are for his emotional and/or material benefit and he will end them the moment they become inconvenient no matter how personally fond of them he may be. See: Heather Mills, Jane Asher's family when she broke up with him.

Sex is an emotional and material benefit for Paul that doesn't require a lot of work or investing from him because he has something they want. For sex workers this is his money and his company; for regular people it's his money and his company and the illusion that they have a special relationship with him. Paul even gets an additional bit of chuff from selling this illusion and he enjoys their emotional back and forth while knowing he has the power to end it at any moment. Very reassuring for a lonely control freak. All of it is a form of prostitution.

Coping with his own PTSD from Beatlemania and a traumatic upbringing. Paul, like the other Beatles, was sexually assaulted, chased, yanked, punched, spat on, forcibly kissed, and stalked by deranged fans. This is on top of his childhood with abusive parents that couldn't decide what they actually wanted to teach their kids.

Frankly I think that Paul's sex obsession is a response to the parentification he experienced when Mary died and responsibility for the entire household dropped on him all at once. See the "but what will we do without her money" quote which was the exact moment that Paul realized he was now head of the household no matter what Jim said or did. Sex becomes a comfort/distraction/break/escape as a result. Remember, Paul was partially driven into John's arms because Jim was beating Paul at home.

John was very horny and Paul mirrored his actions and desires. John and Paul were not just mirroring each other musically or emotionally, they mirrored each other sexually as well. The timing of Linda's first pregnancy implies to me that Paul wanted to try for a baby because Yoko was pregnant. The end result was Mary.

John mentored him sexually and eased him into uncomfortable but still safe situations like the group wanks to further mold Paul's desires in a direction John liked. He encouraged Paul's revealed preference for enjoying feminization by putting him in the position of being John's girlfriend/wife, something John likely picked up on when Paul fed him toast as a teenager. Many of Paul's sexual habits and needs were shaped and fostered by John into something that complimented his own. That is why John took Paul to Paris to play the part of "Mrs. Lennon on honeymoon" and not Cynthia. Remember that Paul affirmed John's masculinity in their relationship by putting John's package at the center of this photograph of them coming out of the Louvre:

John is obsessed with sex and has a high sex drive, Paul drove his higher to compete and match this, they were fucking like bunnies, the end. Now John is gone and part of the wreckage left by his passing is that Paul has an unbearable sex drive and no one he can trust to exhaust him properly. They learned how to fuck girls together and then how to fuck each other, together. The most formative relationship of Paul's life was centered around sex.

None of this is a shitpost btw I am being completely sincere with all of this.

[myheadphonesareneverloudenough]

Thinking about how Matt Lang mentioned rerunning TGWDLM.

Obviously, there'd have to be changes. Not just in the casting, but in every aspect of the show just due to the nature of how Hatchetfield has expanded and how TGWDLM has aged.

Now that we know for sure that the events in TGWDLM happened because of Pokey, I think they'd design the show even more around the colour blue instead of green like in the original promotional material. This also gives Matt Dahan so much more to work with when it comes to underscoring, think of all the motifs he has to sneak into the scenes now.

Hidgens would have to be recasted, and while there's plenty of options, I think after Workin' Boys he has to be played by Jeff Blim. I don't know if anyone can ever top what Jeff did in WB. Of course, that would mean that Jeff's original TGWDLM characters would need to be recasted as well. Mr. Davidson has not been seen in HF since TGWDLM (save for the small BF cameo), so it wouldn't be hard to find someone new for that role. Sam Sweetly is more difficult because of his appearances in Nightmare Time and the pre-recorded NPMD cameo, but it's impossible to have Jeff play both Hidgens and Sam in the same scene so he would still most likely be recasted.

The only Jeff character that would need to stay the same is General John Macnamara, that's another permanently Jeff character, in my opinion. The show would require some rearranging so that the Macnamara and Hidgens scenes weren't back to back this way. Between TGWDLM and BF, Macnamara went through a lot of character development and Jeff really discovered who he was by the second show, so it would be super interesting to see him interacting with Paul again now that we've learned so much more about the guy.

Now that Hatchetfield has expanded so much, I think it would be really fun to bring in new characters that we've met since TGWDLM happened. They should include Curt Mega as Officer Bailey in Show Me Your Hands, since we know he canonically works alongside Sweetly. Bring in James Tolbert during the PEIP scene as Xander Lee. Even just the people on the streets in La Dee Dah Dah Day, imagine the amount of cameos that could come into play there. Kim Whalen dances in as Becky Barnes, Angela Giarratana is Grace Chasity, all these well-known characters that we never saw during TGWDLM before making small appearances as they were already infected by the hive mind.

Speaking of the La Dee Dah Dah Day number, it would be fucking awesome to get Joey Richter back in the Pete Spankoffski costume for the coffee shop scene to do the hot chocolate boy bit.

I also just think a new perspective on the show will change so much of the context. Like Emma discussing Jane, we now know Jane's family with Tom and Tim. We're now very familiar with Ted's little brother, a character we had no idea existed during TGWDLM (think about Ted's little freak out over Alice being dead at Hatchetfield High...). We had no idea that this apocalypse was brought on by one of the Lords in Black.

Anyways. I agree with Matt, they should definitely bring The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals back for another run of the show.

[muzaktomyears]

The secret messages Lennon and McCartney hid in the Beatles’ songs

As Ian Leslie’s superb book John & Paul explains, the greatest songwriting partnership in pop history was a volatile and tortured one

★★★★★ 5/5

John Lennon and Paul McCartney in November 1963

John Lennon and Paul McCartney may have been only half of the Fab Four, but don’t expect Ian Leslie to write a “George and Ringo” book. The Beatles’ beating heart was always Lennon and McCartney. In John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs, Leslie, whose previous books have focused on applied philosophy, examines their relationship through the lens of individual tracks. We’re taken from Come Go With Me, the doo-wop number that Lennon sang at a Woolton church fete in 1957 when the pair met, to Here Today, McCartney’s 1981 tribute to his murdered friend.

The Lennon-McCartney songwriting powerhouse, which would produce around 180 songs, began in earnest in 1962 after the two men made the decision to sideline George Harrison. (Ironically, the latter’s Here Comes the Sun, from 1969, is today the most streamed Beatles song on Spotify.) Their partnership became a private dialogue, even as millions fell in love with the music. Few knew, for example, that Lennon’s I Don’t Want to Spoil the Party, a 1964 Beatles song, was raking over McCartney’s real-life 21st birthday celebrations a year earlier, during which Lennon had savagely beat up Cavern compère Bob Wooler for joking that the singer’s holiday with gay Beatles manager Brian Epstein had been a “honeymoon”. 

Wracked by self-doubt even as the Beatles conquered the world, Lennon developed what Leslie describes as a “charisma of vulnerability”, evident in the lyrics of Strawberry Fields Forever, a track “finely poised between dream and nightmare”. It inspired McCartney to write the single’s flipside, Penny Lane. Both lyrics swathe in surreality various Liverpool locations that were significant to their writers. Leslie imagines the songs “facing each other, deep in conversation. Radically different, but umbilically connected.”

Early Lennon-McCartney songs were written “eyeball-to-eyeball”, quite literally: Leslie notes the “intensity” of the duo’s eye-contact in Peter Jackson’s 2021 documentary The Beatles: Get Back. “When John wasn’t being looked at by Paul,” Leslie writes, “he didn’t know who he was supposed to be.” (Or, as Lennon tells McCartney in Get Back, as they work on Two of Us: “It’s like you and me are lovers.”) In the Beatles’ final public performance, on their Savile Row rooftop in January 1969, Leslie suggests that “Paul can see that John is happy, and because John is happy, Paul is euphoric.” In recent live concerts, McCartney has used the footage in a virtual “duet” with Lennon.

Leslie’s analysis, empathetic and carefully sourced, reaches its apogee with his account of the rift that emerged in India in 1968. The Beatles had gone to Rishikesh for meditation and enlightenment under the tutelage of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Lennon and McCartney wrote scores of songs there, including most of the “White Album”. 

But in this spiritual and creative idyll, Lennon suffered a breakdown. He had long harboured feelings of betrayal and loss: abandoned by his parents, he was brought up by an aunt; when in his teens he got to know his mother, she was killed in a road accident. His close friend and original Beatle Stuart Sutcliffe had died; so, more recently, had Epstein. The Maharishi hadn’t brought an end to the trauma as Lennon had hoped: worse, to Lennon McCartney seemed indifferent to his pain, and left Rishikesh early without him. Back in London, in a drug-fuelled madness, Lennon announced to the rest of the Beatles that he was Jesus, and howled with pain on the song Yer Blues. 

Lennon in 1975, post-Beatles break-up, with Yoko Ono (l) at a London protest 

After the Beatles stopped touring in 1966, the two men had spent less time together. Lennon sank into depression. His musical dialogue with McCartney continued, even after the Beatles split in 1970, but it took a darker form: listen to How Do You Sleep?, a 1971 anti-McCartney diatribe that contains the line “The only thing you did was yesterday.” Yesterday, the first Beatles recording to have featured just one member of the group (McCartney), remained as much a source of bitterness for Lennon as of wonder. He asked a friend whether Imagine was “as good as Yesterday”. Conversely, in his 1973 song I Know (I Know), by which time post-split tempers had cooled, Lennon would sing: “I love you more than yesterday.” 

John & Paul is an elegantly written and original telling of the Beatles’ story, which is as enthralling and astonishing as their music. There are fresh insights for the most seasoned Fab Four fan. Decades after their split, listening to the Beatles can still yield new rewards, and Leslie is an expert listener. As he puts it, describing Hey Jude: “What started so modestly, one human addressing another, culminates in this massed glory.”

(source)

[menlove]

one thing that adds to credibility of Paul being closeted imo, is that often he is thought of as having this internalised homophobia, if not homophobia itself, because he always mentions how un-gay he is whenever some gay subject comes up in interviews

but like, there are so many things that disprove him being homophobic, it's not even funny. going to Paris alone with gay men? Paul did that two times (three if we count John lol) and that Peter Brown story is incrediblyy suspect. what homophobic man, scared of gay, sits on the bed of his male employee and his male fling that casually late at night in his hotel room and chats them up?

most likely reason, combined with his incredibly suspect lyrics, is that he is so defensive about his sexuality because he has something to hide

THATS WHAT IIIIIM SAYING!!!! like he is so comfortable w gay people and gay culture which on its own isn't suspect but it Is when people insist he's homophobic as a Reason He's Repressed Not Closeted. and once again I must remind everyone that john nearly beat a man to death for calling him gay and was still undeniably queer.

it's just like. imagine for a moment. with me. everyone hold my hand. not claiming this is true but walk w me along this path to get to current paul that isn't "he's just repressed and stupid and doesn't even know he's bi" but is instead MY speculative timeline (somehow this turned into a mini fic or something god help me but I'M SO SERIOUS IM SO SERIOUS THIS WOULD MAKE THE MOST SENSE TO ME WALK WITH ME HOLD MY HAND)

you are born in the 1940s. you are raised by a strict man who was physically abusive & in a culture that hates gay people. you grow up watching people get killed for being queer and being bullied over your feminine features that people think make you queer. you hit puberty and Shit Gets Harder because you start finding other men hot. elvis, for one! when you're 15 you start seeing a boy around that you think is hot and it turns out he's in a band and you fall in love with his looks and his voice and then him. and he's just as insane about you. you start doing increasingly sexual things together. eventually, you're having a full blown sexual affair. while writing love songs together and growing up together. and then he gets his girlfriend pregnant. and marries her. and you lose him, a little bit. he goes off and has an affair with your gay manager & when he gets home he ruins your birthday party by nearly beating a man to death for bringing it up. you wonder what he'd do if anyone found out about the two of you too.

and then the insane happens and you end up The Most Famous Band In The World. the ENTIRE world is watching your every move. the entire world loves you. they wouldn't love you if they knew. you get a girlfriend and it's convenient because she's always gone and you're always alone. but you still have him. and other girls. through everything, you have each other. even when he says something stupid and the world wants all of your heads on a platter and he starts to fall into a depression, you still have each other. even if now you Know how bad it could be if they ever found out. and then your manager, your father figure, an openly gay man, dies. and it's not a suicide, but a lot of people think it is, and sometimes you wonder, and fuck it's terrifying, isn't it? the reality of your life, the reality of loving Him, the reality of being queer. what if that winds up being You? you start to lose Him a little bit more as you throw yourself into your work and push everyone way too hard. you propose to your girlfriend. and then you do lose Him. to a woman. which was sort of unthinkable because he was already married and never cared about her, just you. never cared about any women, just you. but he cares about Her. and you fucking lose your mind. lose yourself in drugs. blow up your engagement. propose to another girl and many more "jokingly". your one girlfriend says you had to try again or you would have gone "raving queer" and killed yourself. the whole time you're losing Him more and more. suddenly he's looking at Her like he used to look at you. you're no longer his world and what the fuck do you have? a bunch of girls you don't care about and a drug problem? and then you meet a woman who, according to you, is more woman than anyone else. she's a mother already, a family ready made when you've always wanted one. she's smart and she's funny and she's quick and you let yourself cling to her because you don't have Him and he has Her so you've got to have someone, don't you? and she winds up pregnant and that's great, that's wonderful, you're no longer in danger of dying alone and queer and sad. you've lost Him by now completely, even though you have about a month where things feel a little less awful again and you perform together one last time. you marry her and you ASK people, flat out, if they expected you to be a 26 year old unmarried queer. you fight the night before you're married for some unknown reason, so badly she almost leaves you. and then He marries Her, and everything is fine. and then it all falls apart completely. you at least had Him as your friend, your writing partner, the other half of you legally. and then he asks for a divorce. and the world ends. you don't have the band, you don't have Him, you don't have anything. you stay in bed all day, drinking, miserable. like a breakup, not just of the band.

eventually, your wife pulls you out of it. you survive. you start writing again. you write to him. you put two beetles fucking on the cover of your second album and he thinks a song you wrote about your wife's ex is about him (and maybe it is, a little) and he shoots right back. and you keep that up for a decade. writing to each other. seeing each other only in the news and in snatched moments together where nothing is the same as it was. you plead with him through your music: why do you hurt me so bad? call me, pretty baby. I'm waking up screaming over you. I can't tell you how I feel. you try and make things like they were, even a little, showing up to his house with your guitar like you're 15 again, but he sends you away. in all that time, he's basically gone to conversion therapy. he's with someone who makes disparaging remarks about his sexuality. for you, you've let yourself embrace being a bit campy, but you still can't bring yourself to be open about any of it. not with anyone but your wife.

and then you start talking again. you make up. things seem hopeful. it seems like he might still love you and he writes you a song about starting over with you. and then he's murdered. and it's senseless. it's so so senseless. and it's unfair. you lock yourself away for days listening to that song he wrote you. the media tears you apart for grieving wrong. they wish you died instead. they think you're cold. you never loved him, not like he loved you. you write a song, with tear marks on the page, telling him how much you DID love him. all the things you'd say to him if he were there with you. you write more songs about that, all centered around that theme. some of them you say are about him. others you don't. once, you say if anyone catches on you can just deny it. but he wrote you love songs too, apparently, for you, and you eventually record them with your old band

and the thing is, You are one of his widows. his name follows yours every time it leaves someone's mouth. he's all anyone ever talks about with you. he's all you want to talk about too. his legacy is your legacy. he's no longer here to tell people about his sexuality, he's no longer here to consent to everything that you were being told. he's not here. and how can you even begin to mention Your Own sexuality without bringing him up? you owe him more than outing him in death. you owe Her more than that too, because you were already cruel to her and so was the world. she's grieving just like you, you can't do that. your wife dies, and now you're her legacy too and you being queer would seem like a betrayal to her. your best friend dies, and now he's your legacy too. you aren't just you- you're Him, you're 1/2 of the living members of the most famous band to ever exist, you're Her, you're your dead wife

so when someone asks you about him. when someone asks you about being gay or calls him the love of your life. What Exactly Are You Supposed To Say?

I wouldn't say shit either

[crownics]

The curious “love triangle” between Paul, John and Brian (A long sequence.)

“This was the state of play in the music business and wider world on the day the Beatles had their arranged second meeting with Brian Epstein to discuss management — the day they said yes. [...] John, George and Pete arrived, Paul didn’t. Five minutes passed. Ten. Fifteen. Brian became edgy. [...] Beyond this, Paul’s non-arrival made things awkward — Brian wouldn’t want to say everything twice, so they waited for him to show… and waited. 

Brian’s irritation couldn’t be suppressed. [...] ‘I was a bit put out’, Brian said two years later, more coolly collected. ‘I thought, ‘This is the first meeting, they want to do something about management…’. He had every right to wonder what was going on. Paul was patently ambitious, liked to impress, and the Beatles needed a manager, so why was he doing this to the one person trying to help him, probably the only man in Liverpool who stood any chance of getting him everything he wanted?

After three-quarters of an hour, Brian suggested George phone Forthlin Road to establish when Paul had left for the bus. He returned saying Paul had only just got out of bed, was now having a bath, and would be along when he was done. Brian blew… but ended up being charmed and laughing, the usual Beatle mix.”

“It’s unlikely Paul arrived much before six, when Brian finally got to explain in detail the London meetings he’d had on their behalf. [...] Brian was, in several ways, the ideal manager for Paul. [...] However, John remembered Paul’s attitude to Brian being very different. John was always emphatic that Paul didn’t want Brian as the Beatles’ manager and presented obstacles to destabilise him, to make his job difficult, like turning up late for meetings.

‘Three of us chose Epstein. Paul used to sulk and God knows what. [Paul] wasn’t that keen [on Brian] – he’s more conservative, the way he approaches things. He even says that: it’s nothing he denies.’

Paul’s stance may in part have been a reaction to John’s, who always made snap judgements and leapt right in. It was a major and constant difference between them. As Paul says:

‘John said to me once, ‘Look, imagine you’re like on a cliff-top and you’re thinking about diving off. Dive! Try it!’ I said, ‘Like bloody hell I’m gonna dive. You dive and give us a shout and tell me how it is, and then if it’s great I’ll dive.’ John always had a strong instinct to do that, but it’s not my personality.’

Paul has confirmed that he asked Brian most of the questions about the contract: there had to be a signed agreement between them, but there wasn’t one yet because Brian was still looking into it. Paul says they didn’t know the going rate for a manager’s commission — ‘We had a little discussion about percentage, whether it was going to be 20 or 15 or maybe 10 perhaps, you know, because isn’t that what they charge? We were pretty naive then’ — but, having mixed with other artists for the best part of eighteen months, they surely had some idea.”

“The decision, of course, was John’s. This democracy had a leader and only he approved the moves. It was time for another of his big decisions. His first was to bring in Paul and his second was to allow Paul to bring in George. This was the third. Should he admit Brian Epstein into their partnership, or not? [...] Brian was a man who might achieve it for him. Of all the characters he knew in Liverpool, no one better suggested the possibility. It was plain that Brian had a fragile personality, but he was also intelligent, cultured, a fellow reader and thinker, generous, smart, civilised, cool, edgy, arrogant and, most vitally, a risk-taker. There was enough here for John to decide, and to disregard Paul’s games. In time, he’d subject Brian to a few tests of character, to find out how he really worked — but, for now, John had seen and heard enough.”

— “The Beatles – All These Years – Extended Special Edition (Tune In: Vol. 2)” by Mark Lewisohn (2013)

“[Brian] was to love them in a platonic, almost paternal way, calling them ‘the Boys’ until well after they became men, and dedicating himself to their welfare and protection.

But he was in love with just one. Not with Paul, the most obviously attractive, but with John, whose tough-guy exterior hid a middle-class upbringing not unlike Brian’s own, and who’d needed an all-protecting father figure since the age of six. So, yet again, a back seat for Paul — one which this time he took with some relief.”

“On the Beatles’ side, there was never any doubt that being managed by such a prominent local businessman, for whatever reasons, would be a major step forward. But, as lords of the Mathew Street underworld, they had developed a super-sized attitude from which even their most career-conscious and punctilious member was not immune. When an exploratory meeting with Brian was arranged at the NEMS store after hours, Paul failed to turn up. George telephoned 20 Forthlin Road to ask what had happened to him and learned he was taking a leisurely bath. [...] At further meetings which didn’t clash with Paul’s bath-time, Brian set out what he’d do for the Beatles if they put themselves in his hands. [...] Paul was the one who questioned Brian most closely, asking if the plan involved changing the music they played or the way they played it.”

“Living on the fringe of Liverpool’s underworld as they did, the Beatles knew all about Brian’s secret gay life and quickly guessed his fixation on John. (Strangely, none of their families ever seemed aware of any of it.) [...] John wasn’t the only Beatle to arouse Brian’s ardour: Pete Best has since claimed to have been propositioned by him on a car journey to Blackpool while John and Cynthia were sitting in the back. But never once would he show the tiniest flicker of attraction to Paul.

‘I think Brian felt a bit guilty because he ought to have fancied Paul, but didn’t’, a former NEMS employee recalls. ‘That always seemed to make him a bit uneasy around Paul and try extra hard if he ever had to do anything for him.’”

— “Paul McCartney: The Life” by Philip Norman (2016)

“The Beatles spoke directly to the conflicts in Brian’s soul. Here were oddballs who exuded a shameless candor; here were rough-looking young men with the blithe arrogance of a charmed circle. It was as if Brian’s nocturnal life and daylight fantasies had met and fused on the Cavern stage. Epstein’s enthusiasm for the Beatles has been glibly explained by his sexual attraction to them, and to Lennon in particular. This rather begs the question of who, in that club, regardless of gender or sexuality, didn’t fancy the Beatles — they were polymorphously captivating. It is true that Epstein was sexually magnetized by Lennon, but it’s also true that he fell in love with the Beatles as a group, and it was this that led him to offer them a style of management unprecedented in the pop industry: one based on devotion rather than profit-seeking.

The Beatles agreed to a meeting with Epstein at his Whitechapel store, on Wednesday, November 29, after a lunchtime session. They regarded him as a serious player, a successful businessman with music industry connections — an ‘expert’, as Lennon put it. They knew Epstein was ‘queer’ too, which didn’t bother them much, although McCartney was alert to what it might mean for the balance of power within the group.”

“Epstein fixed a follow-up meeting with the Beatles for Sunday, at 4:30 p.m. This one was nearly disastrous. John, George, and Pete arrived on time; Paul did not. Half an hour went by. The small talk ran out. Finally, Brian suggested George call Paul at his home. George returned with news from Jim McCartney that Paul had just got out of bed and was in the bath. Brian was angry now and only somewhat mollified by the others’ good humor. (‘He may be late’, said George, ‘but he’s very clean.’) Eventually Paul turned up. [...] Brian was already thinking of America as well as Britain. ‘You’re going to be bigger than Elvis’, he said, a prophecy they found outrageous and thrilling. They agreed to be represented by him. Lennon later claimed to have made the decision himself, over Paul’s objections: ‘I make a lot of mistakes, character-wise, but now and then I make a good one… and Brian was one.’

We should be wary of John’s retrospective tendency to present himself as the driving force of the band, but Paul’s lateness to the Epstein meeting is well attested. Why did he throw a spanner in the works? He seems to have been uneasy about what Brian’s appointment would mean for him. Paul, who like John was a close reader of people, could see that Epstein was besotted by Lennon. He understood what that felt like. As he put it later, ‘I’m sure Brian was in love with John. We were all in love with John, but Brian was gay, so that added an edge.’ What worried him was John’s power over Epstein, and therefore his power over the group if Epstein became their manager. His concerns were not groundless. In his first months as manager, Epstein treated John as the most important Beatle, running any proposed changes by him before talking to the others. Lennon reveled in this role. He later said, ‘I was pretty close to Brian because if someone’s going to manage me I want to know them inside out.’”

“As for McCartney, he had given over school and the prospect of becoming middle-class for a career in music, against the advice of his father. He would have felt responsible for his family’s economic security. He was ambitious. Given how much was at stake, the idea he might become a backing musician for John Lennon was not worth contemplating. In the contract that the Beatles signed with Epstein there is a clause that says the manager may split up ‘the Artistes… so that they shall perform as separate individual performers’. Epstein’s assistant Alistair Taylor claimed that this was inserted at Paul’s request. Taylor recalls Paul saying, in an early meeting, that if the group didn’t work out he would pursue a solo career.

Despite his initial hostility, and one occasion when he sorely tested Epstein by skipping a show, Paul’s problem with Brian — or John and Brian — largely resolved itself. Brian learned to consult Paul, and his efforts on behalf of the group began to pay off.”

— “John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs” by Ian Leslie (2025)

“They knew [Brian] was homosexual, but that was all. John was the only one I discussed it with, as he was quite interested, but Paul I think was upset by it. Brian realized this and was always especially concerned about pleasing Paul, giving him the biggest presents. Brian’s staff told me that he worried most about keeping in with Paul and always answered his calls first.”

— Hunter Davies, “The Beatles: The Authorized Biography”, 1968 (Revised Edition)

“I heard there was an English guy drunk in the next-door bar, who I first thought must be a musician. But when I go in there, I find Brian Epstein sitting up at the bar, passed out cold with his head on the counter. So I go back into the Star-Club and tell John to come and help me get him out of there. When John comes into the place, he just picks up a half-empty glass of beer from the counter, pulls back Brian’s collar and pours the beer down his neck. I asked him if that was any way to be treating the Beatles’ new manager. ‘It’s OK’, John said to me. ‘I already gave him one up the ass.’”

— Horst Fascher about when The Beatles went to Hamburg for open the Star-Club on April 1962. (“John Lennon: The Life” by Philip Norman, 2008)

“Toward the end of April 1963, Lennon went on an eleven-day holiday with Brian Epstein to Barcelona — the one he informed Cynthia about at the hospital. It’s not clear why he chose to go with Brian rather than staying with Cynthia and Julian (‘what a bastard I was’, said John in 1970, recalling this), or why, if he was determined to go away with friends, he didn’t go with Paul, George, and Ringo, who all went to Tenerife. His decision may have been about consolidating his status as the Beatle who was closest to the manager. That was Paul’s theory: ‘John was a smart cookie. Brian was gay, and John saw his opportunity to impress upon Mr. Epstein who was the boss of the group.’

John was curious about Epstein’s sexuality and perhaps his own.”

— “John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs” by Ian Leslie (2025)

“LENNON: I was on holiday with Brian Epstein in Spain, where the rumours went around that he and I were having a love affair. Well, it was almost a love affair, but not quite. It was never consummated. But it was a pretty intense relationship.

It was my first experience with a homosexual that I was conscious was homosexual. He had admitted it to me. We had this holiday together because Cyn was pregnant, and I went to Spain and there were lots of funny stories. We used to sit in a cafe in Torremolinos looking at all the boys and I’d say, ‘Do you like that one, do you like this one?’ I was rather enjoying the experience, thinking like a writer all the time: I am experiencing this, you know.”

— “All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono” by David Sheff (2000)

“Although Paul was the friendly one, within the setting of the band he was always slightly apart from the others, on his own. It was triggered by the fact that Brian Epstein was in love with John, so Paul felt isolated. Even after Brian had gone, it was something he always felt.

I remember after they had a Number One hit with ‘She Loves You’ in 1963, they came out to stay with me in my father’s house in Tenerife. Paul, George and Ringo. But no John: he’d gone on holiday with Brian. While George was busy trying to befriend the girl in the shop down the road, showing her the cover of the single, and Ringo drifted through the days, Paul resented John going off. It showed.”

— Klaus Voormann, “Who Killed John Lennon?: The lives, loves and deaths of the greatest rock star” by Lesley-Ann Jones (2020)

“‘Actually Pete’, he said softly, ‘Something did happen with him one night.’

Now that wiped the grin right off my face. Had I even dreamed there might be any truth whatsoever to the rumors, I would never have made light of the subject in the first place. Still — as John surely knew — I would have stood by him, and let the rest of the world handle the business of passing moral judgement, even if he had just told me he’d committed murder. And John would surely have done the same for me.

Which, after all, is what true friendship is all about.

‘What happened’, John explained, ‘is that Eppy just kept on and on at me. Until one night I finally just pulled me trousers down and said to him: ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, Brian, just stick it up me fucking arse then.’ And he said to me, ‘Actually, John, I don’t do that kind of thing. That’s not what I like to do.’ ‘Well’, I said, ‘what is it you like to do, then?’ And he said, ‘I’d really just like to touch you, John.’ And so I let him toss me off.’ 

And that was that. End of story.

‘That’s all, John’, I said. ‘Well, so what? What’s the big fucking deal, then?’

‘Yeah, so fucking what! The poor bastard. He’s having a fucking hard enough time anyway.’ 

— Pete Shotton, “John Lennon: In My Life” (1983)

“John told me he had a one-night stand with Brian, on a holiday with him in Spain, when Brian had invited him out, a few days after the birth of Julian in 1963, leaving Cyn alone. I had alleged this brief holiday in the book, but not what John had alleged had taken place. Partly, I didn’t really believe it, though John was daft enough to try almost anything once.”

— Hunter Davies, “The Beatles: The Authorized Biography”, 1968 (Revised Edition)

“John admitted to [Hunter] Davies that he had slept with Brian ‘to see what fucking with a guy was like’.”

— Peter Brown, “The Love You Make: An Insider’s Story of the Beatles” (1983)

“Lennon’s sexuality has long been a subject of fascination for Beatles acolytes. [...] ‘It’s kind of well-known that Brian and John had some sort of fling, the extent to which we will never know’, Leslie says. ‘But it happened — probably. John was such a mess in so many ways; I think it’s been underestimated just how much of a mess he was. The others in the band continually had to manage him in order to keep him in the band.’”

— “Beatles biographer Ian Leslie on John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s ‘erotic’ bromance” by Nick Duerden (AOL, April 2, 2025)

“I changed the subject and told [Brian Epstein] that the few times I’d seen the Beatles, I’d found them so powerfully emotive that I almost felt I could have screamed along with all the crazy 14-year-olds.

‘Me too’, he agreed. ‘In fact, once I actually did. One night I pushed my way into the middle of ten thousand screaming kids, right in the middle of the chaos, and let myself go in a falsetto voice. I went absolutely berserk and it was the most erotic thing I ever did in my life. Like the first time I got to kiss John after I’d been crazy about him for ages. But afterwards I was incredibly ashamed of myself. I felt really guilty, as if someone might find out.”

“He obviously fancied me, and I made use of it to ask dozens of questions about his business and personal relationship with The Beatles.

‘There’s real love between all five of us’, he told me.

‘Despite the giggling guru?’ I asked, remembering that at that very moment all four Beatles were in North Wales with the Maharishi.

Brian looked hurt. ‘I never minded other people being around. I’m not jealous. Not of girlfriends, wives, even other boyfriends, but the Maharishi seems to want to kill their affection, not for anyone specific, but affection in general. He wants them to feel uninvolved with anyone or anything, but of course that’s a fallacy because they’re all completely involved with him, especially John. At the moment I feel I’ve completely lost him.’

It was obvious that it was losing John that hurt the most.”

— Simon Napier-Bell, “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me” (2005)

“Lonnie Trimble: He sat me down once after he’d gotten rid of Diz. It was the first time I ever went into his bedroom when he was actually in bed, and he said, ‘Sit down. I want to talk to you. I want to tell you about this and that.’ I said, ‘Wait a minute, now. Do you really want my opinion of what you’re gonna tell me?’. He said he did and I made sure to ask him three times if he really wanted my opinion. So eventually I laid it on the line.

I said, ‘Diz is in California now. Leave him there out of harm’s way’. Then Epstein said, ‘Oh, I’m gonna make him a star. He wouldn’t harm me’. It was during the same discussion that he told me that he and John Lennon had been lovers. Now that’s too much for me to take on. We’d never talked about his personal life before, so I left the room.”

— “In My Life: The Brian Epstein Story” by Debbie Geller (2002)

“Former Beatles manager Brian Epstein engaged in homosexual acts with one member of the legendary band — the gay pop mogul’s ex-aide claims in a sensational new book.

Joanne Petersen is working on ‘There’s A Beatle In My Closet’, which will expose ‘revelations of intimacy’ with at least one of the Fab Four, but she refuses to reveal which member.

Epstein, found dead by his devoted assistant after an overdose in 1967, was tormented by inner demons and had a hopeless crush on John Lennon, leading many to conclude the mystery lover was the Imagine star.”

— Irish Examiner: “Book to reveal Epstein’s ‘homosexual acts’ with former Beatle” (20 April, 2005)

“Paul McCartney loved John Lennon, who loved Brian Epstein, who loved Paul McCartney. All the whole London music scene knows this, and there, the famous suspicion about Paul’s ‘death’, which originated with an American DJ, didn’t catch on.

The ‘death’ theory is well-constructed, but the true story (the one about their faggotry) makes much more sense. And it’s much spicier. I prove what I said:

Everything was going great in the John-Paul-Epstein triangle. Everyone loved each other, they adored jelly beans, everything was rosy, smoke and mirrors, etc. Ringo and George Harrison were always on a different page. The duo was Lennon and McCartney — they sang together, composed together, did everything together. Together with Brian Epstein, of course, who was openly queer and quite relaxed about it.”

— “It’s queer!” by Nelson Motta (O Pasquim, 1970)

“Q: Have you ever fucked a guy?

A: Not yet, I thought I’d save it till I was 40, life begins at forty you know, though I never noticed it.

Q: It is trendy to be bisexual and you’re usually ‘keeping up with the Jones’, haven’t you ever… there was talk about you and PAUL…

A: Oh, I thought it was about me and Brian Epstein… anyway I’m saving all the juice for my own version of THE REAL FAB FOUR BEATLES STORY etc… etc…”

— “INTERVIEW/INTERVIEW WITH BY/ON JOHN LENNON AND/OR DR. WINSTON O’BOOGIE” by John Lennon (Interview Magazine, November 1974)

“Paul, with all his charm, knew how to bend people to his will. Tony Barrow, who saw Brian interact with all the Beatles in the London offices, recalls how John’s attempts to bully Brian never found an erotic charge in John’s bully-boy personality, but it was Paul, Barrow said, who knew how to seduce him. Platonically, but still. ‘Paul used the fact that Brian was gay to get his own way. He’d come in and put on his bedroom eyes. He’d use his own sex appeal to manipulate Brian into doing what he wanted the band to do.’”

— “Paul McCartney: A Life” by Peter Ames Carlin (2009)

“I found a love letter from Brian Epstein in Paul McCartney’s Aston Martin DB6… It was a love letter from Brian to Paul. It was begging… I don’t need to say anymore than that…”

— Francie Schwartz, BBC documentary “The Beatles’ Biggest Secrets” (2004)

“PLAYBOY: Pop historians spend a lot of time analyzing ‘the Beatles phenomenon’ and the dynamics of the band — your personalities, Brian Epstein’s secret love of Paul...

LENNON: It’s irrelevant. He wasn’t in love with Paul. He was in love with me. It’s irrelevant, you know.”

— “All We Are Saying: The Last Major Interview with John Lennon and Yoko Ono” by David Sheff (2000)

[hamyilton]

What's interesting about the "I Want to Hold Your Hand" anecdote vis a vis Jane Asher is that Paul does mention her as inspiration for other songs from around that time; he explicitly talks about writing "And I Love Her" as a love song to Jane. So, it's not that he doesn't attribute ANY songs to her bc he doesn't want to mention their relationship in that way (he also talks about "We Can Work This Out" as relating to fights he was having with Jane when they were dating) so mentioning that "other person" does strike me as noteworthy. Paul later says that "I Will" was also not about Jane at all, which again I might be overthinking this, but I can't help but think about what other people paul might have been in love with at the time to be a possible inspiration for the song. Paul has this constant habit in the Lyrics book of claiming a song is based on imagined characters, then retracting that and saying it was likely based on his own experiences, then saying he can't remember, then bringing up John as a seemingly non-sequitur and it's like hmm... I can't blame people for seeing a connection between all that

[harrisonarchive]

With The Chants (in all, comprised of Joe Ankrah, Eddie Ankrah, Edmund Amoo, Nat Smeda, and Alan Harding) and Little Richard, backstage at the Tower Ballroom in New Brighton on October 12, 1962. Photos by Les Chadwick.

“[Joe Ankrah noted] ‘It was bad enough that the modern moods [racism] never gave a black group a chance, but if not for Paul and his friends, we would have never stayed together… In fact, I think that meeting the Beatles changed the direction of my life.’ Ankrah also makes it clear that, in a sea of intolerance, Paul and the Beatles stood out, and stood up for him and his bandmates. ‘They were very cool guys, and meeting them gave us a look at real opportunity.’ […] [T]he Beatles, surrounded by postwar racial and religious bigotry, went against the grain and gave a black group a break, even was they were pursuing their own dream. […] ‘Could I have imagined a future like that? Who could? But, looking back, I knew they had something special, and a level of compassion that was truly unusual for a band on the move.’ - Joe Ankrah [of The Chants], Beatles friend whose band was pushed through racial barriers by the boys” - When They Were Boys by Larry Kane “They went ‘apeshit’ when we started to sing. I can still see George and John racing up to the stage with their mouths stuffed with hot dogs or whatever. The invitation to make our Cavern debut was given as soon as we finished ‘A Thousand Stars’ for them. They insisted we perform that very night. Everything happened completely spontaneously from that point. The Beatles themselves offered to back us when we told them we’d never worked with a band before. We then rehearsed four songs with them and then we ran home to tell all and sundry that we had ‘made it’!” When Brian Epstein arrived at the Cavern that night he refused to allow the Beatles to back us, but they collectively persuaded him to change his mind – and when he heard us he invited us to appear on many subsequent appearances with them.” - Eddie Amoo, Mersey Beat via TriumphPC “When the Beatles became big they were great about us. They went round telling everyone we were great, and when they were on Juke Box Jury, they played our record ‘I Could Write A Book’ and the Beatles raved about it and voted us a hit!” - Alan Harding, Record Mirror, June 25, 1966

[sugardollcurse]

Would it be wild of me to ask for a george x reader? Maybe like get back era? Like she gets to sit on the roof while they did their rooftop concert?

*Personally, I'm with George. I don't want to go on the roof.*

I'm mad scared of heights, but I feel like seeing the roof top performance would have been like changing.!*

𝒓𝒐𝒐𝒇𝒕𝒐𝒑

꒰ pairing ꒱ george harrison x fem!reader

꒰ contains ꒱ fear of heights

꒰ summary ꒱ you were scared of heights, and george knew it. still, somehow you ended up on the rooftop while history unfolded in the winter air.

꒰ note ꒱ omg... thank you for this request. truly. i’m already in love with this concept.

If you had a penny for every time you told the Beatles “no”, soft, stubborn, heart hammering, you might’ve bought your way off that bloody rooftop.

It started earlier that morning. You were curled on the battered sofa in the Apple lounge, pretending the cracked leather wasn’t cold through your pants, when George came striding in with his coat slung over his shoulder, cheeks pink from the January wind.

“Come up wi’ us,” he said, voice breezy like he wasn’t asking for the impossible.

You looked up from your paperback. “Where?”

He jerked his chin upwards. “Roof. We’re doin’ it. Now.”

The words hit you like a slap. The roof. The roof.

Your stomach flipped traitorously.

George must’ve seen it on your face, because his smile softened into something more careful. He dropped onto the sofa beside you, smelling like cold air and aftershave, his knee bumping yours.

“You don’t have to,” he said, quieter. “S’pose you could stay down here and mind the biscuits.”

You stared at him. At the way he was trying so hard not to push you.

But the thing was, you wanted to see it. More than anything.

You wanted to see them. To hear the sound pouring out into the open sky, wild and reckless. You didn’t want to miss it, even if your ribs squeezed painfully tight at the thought.

“I’ll come,” you said. Your voice sounded stronger than you felt.

George’s face broke into one of those rare, luminous smiles, the ones he saved for the stage, or for when you caught him humming to himself.

“Good on ya,” he said, and squeezed your hand, quick and clumsy.

━━

The staircase up to the roof was worse than you’d imagined.

Narrow. Drafty. The walls closing in the higher you climbed.

Mal sat behind you, lugging Ringo’s drum kit with muttered curses. John’s laughter echoed ahead like it didn’t cost him anything.

Halfway up, George paused. Turned back.

“You alright?” he asked, tipping his head.

You nodded, too quickly.

He didn’t call you out on it. Just offered you his hand.

You took it.

You always did.

The roof was…

Well, it was a roof.

Flat and grey and cold as sin. Wind whipping your hair into your mouth. Chimneys and skylights like jagged teeth.

You froze just outside the stairwell door, heart hammering in your ears.

The edge wasn’t even far, but Christ, it was far enough.

No rails. No safety. Nothing but air yawning open over Savile Row.

George didn’t let go of your hand.

He didn’t pull you forward either. Just stood steady beside you, your anchor.

“Come sit by me, yeah?” he said gently, like you were a skittish cat.

You managed a nod.

Together, you picked a spot near the stairwell structure, close enough to feel solid but still tucked out of the way. George fetched a crate someone had used to haul cables and set it down for you like a makeshift seat.

“Y’can jump down the stairwell if the wind picks up,” he joked, trying to make you smile. It worked, a little.

You sat, pulling your coat tighter around you. Your hands trembled, just barely.

George knelt beside you, rummaging in his guitar case.

Then, softly, so only you could hear:

“Don’t look over the edge, alright?”

You swallowed thickly. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

He smiled, that lopsided, slow thing that always made your knees weak, and pressed a quick kiss to your temple.

“Good.”

The others were already bustling around, Paul tuning his bass, Ringo tugging his coat tighter, John making some stupid comment about falling off and suing EMI.

You barely registered them.

You were too busy feeling everything. The cold, the fear, the height. And under all of it, beating louder: the thrill. This was history being stitched together in real time. This was your boys, your George, playing the roof off the world.

The first notes spilled out sharp and messy, carried off by the wind.

It didn’t matter. It worked.

The city paused. Heads turned on the pavement below.

Faces appeared at windows across the street.

And you forgot to be scared. Because George was glowing. Alive in a way you hadn’t seen in days. Maybe weeks.

Chords flying off his fingers. Hair whipping into his eyes. Grinning like a boy let loose from school.

You pulled your knees to your chest and listened.

By the time they started One After 909, your fear had retreated to some back room of your brain, muffled by the noise and the impossible joy of it.

You clapped along, your gloves thudding awkwardly against each other.

George gave you a look, mock scandalized, and then laughed outright.

You wanted to memorize that laugh. Carve it into the inside of your ribs.

Later, when the police finally turned up, suits flapping, faces pinched, you felt the mood shift.

Paul and Ringo hammed it up, of course, smirking through the verses.

John threw in a bit of “I’d like to say thank you on behalf of the group and ourselves” nonsense.

George just played.

Quiet. Steady. Sure.

Like he knew, somehow, this was the last time it would ever be this. You wondered if it broke his heart a little. Maybe not... but you wondered if he’d even tell you if it did.

When the last song ended, the crowd down below clapped and whistled and scattered.

The city exhaled. And you were still sitting on the crate, hands stiff, heart so full it hurt.

George came over, sliding his guitar back into the case.

“Y’did it,” he said, bumping his knee against yours.

“You did it,” you said, voice wobbling.

He smiled, slow and private.

Then, before you could think, before you could lose your nerve, you reached out and grabbed his coat lapels, yanking him down.

You kissed him.

Right there on the frozen roof of Apple Corps.

His hands fumbled for a second, surprised, but then he kissed you back.

Long. Warm. Certain.

When you pulled away, George was grinning so wide it made his cheeks pink.

“You reckon that’s better than biscuits?” he teased.

You laughed, breathless. “Way better.”

You didn’t remember the climb down.

You only remembered his hand, tight in yours.

The roof wasn’t so scary after all.

━━

Back inside, the stairwell felt almost too warm. The walls sweated with everyone’s breath, the echo of laughter, the murmur of “bloody brilliant” and “I can’t feel my fingers” and “Ringo, you mad bastard, how’d you play like that without gloves?”

You trailed behind the others, your boots thudding quietly on the concrete steps, still half in a dream.

George’s hand never left yours. He held it like it was the only real thing keeping him grounded now, like the sky had lifted him a little too high and he wasn’t quite ready to come down.

You got to the second floor landing and he tugged you gently aside, out of the way of Paul’s bounding strides and John’s dramatic groan about needing tea “or heroin, whichever’s quicker.”

He ducked into one of the smaller offices, some little forgotten corner with a dusty window and old mixing notes scattered on the desk. He didn’t say anything at first, just shut the door behind you, shut out the world.

Then he exhaled like he’d been holding that breath all morning.

You stood in the middle of the room, coat unbuttoned, hair windswept, adrenaline still ticking beneath your skin like it hadn’t got the message yet.

George leaned against the wall, watching you. His lips were pink from the cold and your kiss. His lashes cast little shadows on his cheeks in the dusty light.

“That was…” you started, but the words melted on your tongue.

“I know.” He pushed his hair back from his face, still grinning. “Mad, wasn’t it?”

You nodded.

He stepped forward, slowly. Like he was afraid to break the quiet. “I was watching you, y’know.”

“While you were playing?”

“Mm.” He tucked a strand of your hair behind your ear. “Kept lookin’ over. Thought you might bolt.”

“I almost did.”

“Yeah?”

You nodded. “At the top of the stairs. I looked out, and… I couldn’t breathe.”

George pressed his palm to your cheek, gentle as a breeze. “But you stayed.”

“I wanted to see you!”

That lit something in him. Not just pride, something softer. Need. Maybe even a little awe.

“Christ,” he murmured, almost to himself. “You’re brave.”

“I was terrified.”

“Still counts.”

You laughed a little, but it turned into a sigh, and then, before either of you could think, you were in his arms again. He held you so tight you felt the beat of his heart through both your coats. A little fast. A little stunned.

Like he’d just jumped off a roof too.

taglist: @sharksausages, @wavvytin, @wimpyvamps, @finallyforgotten, @lennongirlieee

[therealsaintscully]

The fact that John talked like this about Paul in the last years of his life, “As the sky grew darker, another star appeared to shine even more brightly than Venus, and John speculated that it could be Mars. “Ah, Venus and Mars,” he laughed softly. “Sounds like an album title.” Like looking at the beauty of nature and thinking of someone you love is peak romance okayy. I do think that both seemed like they were on a course where fear was loosening it’s grasp in favor of the need to just love again, that it was inevitable they’d have intimately crossed paths again. Not saying at all that they would’ve left their families for the other ever but I think they were cursed/blessed to always hold the other close in their heart so long as they lived.

Yes, anon, exactly.

Personally, I don’t trust anything Mintz says—I’d take every story or quote from him with a Dead Sea-sized grain of salt (basically, I don’t believe a word). But lately, I've become pretty convinced that Paul—and John, right up until his death—weren't exactly telling the full story about where they stood or what they were up to from about '77 onwards.

If anything, I think Paul, to this day, is possibly keeping a chunk of the story for himself. Why do I say that? Because the 'official' narrative that Paul hasn't contradicted since is of the famous “last meeting” in '76. Everyone generally agrees their final get-together was in New York in 1976. But then we have James McCartney saying he 'knows' (read: was probably told by someone in the family) that John had held him as a baby. Also, he said he has vague memories of the Dakota apartments being sunny and bright. James was born September '77, so for him to remember anything about the Dakota, he’d need to have been around three or so. That puts the McCartneys in New York in the fall of 1980. I've also read somewhere that the McCartneys regularly visited the Eastmans around Thanksgiving or Christmas, so the timing fits.

Now, I'm not going to go down that particular rabbit hole of did-they-didn't-they and speculate too deeply about secret meetings. If they did meet, they obviously chose not to discuss it. I imagine he/they’d have their reasons at the time: avoiding media drama around a relationship that was already delicate, preventing interference from Yoko, or steering clear of gossip from friends, staff, and acquaintances who had fueled their conflicts for years.

But I'm becoming more and more convinced that something definitely shifted around 1976-1977, i.e. after the 'final meeting'. Interesting to note that the '76 meeting took place in April - Paul's father died March 18 and John's father died nine days later, on April 1. Wings were touring at the time, and I wonder if they met to bond over their shared grief. Also, Paul's let slip that John gave him some input about Mull of Kintyre ('77) over the phone (that one literally gave me whiplash), meaning, they were discussing song writing positively.

John began writing early (heart wrenching) versions of Real Life/Love circa 1977 ('Just got to let it go') and recorded the basics of what became Now and Then during that period, too ('I'm still in love with you'). Around the same time, Paul started laying the groundwork for what would become, after John's death, Tug of War (can we talk about Hear Me Lover and Seems Like Old Times?? hello!). If you're open to mclennon in some variation or another, all these works contain some very poignant lyrics representative of processing of something that was chipping away at them.

By 1979/1980, Paul was recording "One of These Days," ('It's there/It's round/It's to be found') and shortly after, John was working on "(Just Like) Starting Over," both very contemplative but expectant of a new decade, of examining something new.

It's almost like 1977/1978 was an actual rough patch, separately or mutually. However, by 1979/1980 they became vaguely and tentatively optimistic again.

I'm not saying everything suddenly became wonderful or easy, or that they were instantly ready to be best buddies again. But I wouldn't be at all surprised if, at some point, they both felt the urge to reconnect with the other, maybe even shared those feelings privately with each other, EVEN if Paul talks about a rather difficult, if subdued relationship till the very end.