"He kind of looks like a walrus, doe'n't 'e?" was said by a man with a strong cockney accent, lighting a cigar in the pouring rain and chuckling to himself. This angered John, turning his pale face red- visible even in the dark of the early morning- and making his brown eyes squint.
"No!" John shouted, letting his temper get a hold of him, grabbing the man by his coat and shouting in his face. "I am the walrus! I am the walrus!"
Meanwhile, just feet away John's friends sit on the ground near the head of their friend as they would be sitting at his deathbed. George and Richie held back the tears for their friend whom they cared about, whom they achieved fame with.
They all felt confused because this was the last thing they had ever expected to happen: especially to Paul who seemed to have so much life ahead of him. "For God's sake, he was only twenty-five! He couldn't be dead! Not now!" John shouted again, sobbing and plopping on the ground next to Richie, in front of Paul's head which had been severely deformed because of the accident. George and Richie remained quiet, unlike John who couldn't control himself. And as many things ran through their mind, John had a memory: he remembered his last conversation with Paul, in the recording studio, which made him storm off in anger and drive in the hard pouring November rain.
"Hell, Paul, get it right this time!" John scolded, glaring at Paul for missing yet another note on the bass. Previously, though serious, John had said it in more of a teasing way, but his time he let his anger get a hold of him.
"I'm trying…" Paul muttered back, then spoke louder. "I'm trying. Maybe I could hear what I'm doing better if you didn't play your guitar so loud."
"You know why it's up so loud? It's up so loud to cover up your awful playing. Get it right."
Paul, George, and Richie's mouths all dropped open. George quickly defended, "That's not true. Don't listen to him, Paul; you're a great bass player."
Paul listened but he was still upset and hurt about what John had said to him because John was his best friend. John honestly didn't mean what he said: he said it out of anger and frustration; he thought Paul was a great bass player, but he had let his anger get out of hand.
"Maybe I should just leave." Paul snapped at John, taking off his bass and unplugging it, "I bet you'd like that."
"Fine!" John snapped back, "I'd love that!"
Paul left the recording room, putting his bass back in its case. John followed him to be sure he won the argument, but George and Richie followed to beg him not to leave.
"You know, John, if you didn't like my bass playing, you could've just said so in the first place instead of keeping it some bloody secret until now!"
"Oh, don't be such a woman, Paul!"
"I'm leaving now." Paul snapped again, grabbing his coat and slipping it on before picking up the case for his bass again.
"No, wait, Paul!" George and Richie said, hoping he might change his mind since John was the only one being rude to him. "Please stay," Richie pleaded. Paul looked over at John, who still looked angry at him.
"I don't think I can be in the band anymore if this is how it's gonna be." Paul muttered to Richie. "I'll see you guys soon." He said louder to both George and Richie. He then turned towards the door, then looked at John, "As for you, John," John looked at him, suspecting what the he may say. He was right. "Fuck you, John Lennon," Paul retorted, storming out the door into the rain and into his pearl-colored Volkswagen Beetle.
"Hell, what do we do now?" George looked at John for an answer, angry at him for causing Paul to leave, "Who's gonna play the bass now? We don't even have a bass."
"We can just do vocals tonight." He insisted, inside feeling a little guilty for what he had done, but he had no idea what would happen.
John's flashback caused him to sob: he was so vicious to Paul over just his own anger; he wasn't angry at Paul anymore because he was angry at himself and in front of him were the remains of Paul are on the ground. Was it a suicide? Or was it just an accident? John noted in his mind that it could've been the rain. For an official answer, he asked the man with the cigar. "What happened?" He asked, "To Paul, what happened?"
And the man explained what happened.
Upon leaving the recording studio in his car, Paul continued to drive back home. The drive was a blurry one as rain poured on his windshield; the windshield wipers only seemed to help a little bit to see through the rain. And after a left turn, he suddenly saw in the rain something bright blue in the middle of the road: the windshield wipers swiped across the windshield again revealing that there was a girl there, looking for shelter and standing alone in the rain. He had to help her, so he rolled down the window next to where she stood and shouted over the rain, "Oi, can I give you a ride?!"
"Oh, yes, that would be great!" Said the girl, opening the door of the car and hopping in the passenger seat; her auburn hair was drenched, as well as her dress which looked like it had been new and never worn when she got caught in the rain. "Thank you so much." She glanced at him, getting a good look at him for the first time.
"It's not a problem, Ma'am." He said, starting to drive again.
"Wait…" She paused, staring at him, hoping who she had identified him as was really true. "Are you… are you Paul McCartney of the Beatles?"
"I sure am. " He nodded, watching the road, unable to look away from it because of all of the blurry rain.
The girl let out a squeal so loud that Paul almost ran off the road. She scooted across the bench seat of the car, having not put her seatbelt on, and tightly hugging him, "I'm Rita and I'm your biggest fan! I can't believe it's really you! Oh my God! It's really you! It's really Paul McCartney!"
"Whoa, Rita," He said, "I appreciate your affection, but I need t' watch the road. I've already almost ran off of it once."
"Oh…" Rita slowly loosened her arms and pulled them away, staring out the windshield. "So, the band… you've seen them recently?"
"I just left the studio."
"You're recording another album?" She grinned in excitement, now gripping onto his left arm.
"They are." He said, "We got in an argument… I kind of left the band."
Rita threw her arms around him again, causing him to run off the road, "You can't leave the band, Paul!" Just then, the car hit a tree, causing the engine to catch fire in front of them and the dashboard to bend to Paul's lap.
Paul tried to get out of the car with no success, being trapped by the dashboard and steering wheel being crushed onto his lap. He looked over at Rita with the most scared look on his face he'd ever had in his life, "Please, help me, help me out." The two of them tried to pull him out with all of their own strength, "It's not working!" He cried, "We need more help. Get more help."
Rita nodded, getting out of the car and shouting for help. "Somebody help! Please!"
"Help!" Paul shouted. All of a sudden, the car exploded, causing parts to fall into the grassy parts of the woods next to the road and Paul's head to fall right in front of Rita's feet, forcing a loud, blood curdling scream out of her mouth.
She ran, yelling for help, almost in tears from what she saw, when she ran into a man in a suit, stepping out of a black car with an almost finished cigar, "It's Paul! Paul McCartney, he's dead! He just died! There was an accident!"
"Whoa, whoa, calm down there." He said in his strong Cockney accent. "It's alright. It'll be alright."
But it didn't seem alright, not to John, George and Richie. Paul was their friend. They'd known him for so long and they'd been through so much with him. John still wasn't convinced that the death had nothing to do with him; he still felt angry at himself for causing Paul to leave into the heavy rain.
The man said that Rita disappeared when he turned around, and he had not seen her since. He had no idea who she was or where she had come from, but he said he got a good look at her and would be able to identify her if he had seen her again.
"What about Paul?" Richie asked, "What are we gonna do now?"
"Just come with me." He said, motioning to his black car, "Everything will turn out okay." He insisted.
The next morning, George woke up with an ill feeling in his stomach at the remembrance of what had happened the night before. He looked around the unfamiliar room to see John in the couch on the other side of the coffee table and Richie in a recliner near the door. The doorknob on the door rattled until the person on the other side finally got it unlocked, opened the door and walked inside, "Good morning." The man had returned. "Mr. Lennon, Mr. Starkey, Mr. Harrison," He paused, "I should probably introduce myself." John was awake and cranky as he was most mornings and Ringo was still asleep until the man walked over and patted his arm repeatedly until he woke up more.
"Yes, mum, I want pancakes."
"Richie,"
"Oh," He awoke more, frowning. "Oh… I thought it was a dream."
"I wish it were." George muttered.
"Anyway, Beatles," The man paused straightening his suit out. "My name is Michael. That's all you need to know about my name. You will call me Michael or Sir. Anything other than that is unacceptable." Three other men entered the room behind Michael. "Oh, hello, gentleman," Michael greeted them. Each of them grabbed one of the Beatles, holding them by one of their shoulders.
"About what happened last night." Michael began, "You cannot tell anyone. Do you understand?"
John was too angry to speak, Richie was quiet out of sadness, but George spoke. "People should deserve to know." He insisted, "We can't keep it a secret. The Beatles have gotten huge. They're gonna notice if one of us is missing, especially Paul."
"Exactly," Michael says, "We have a plan. We're gonna pretend this never happened."
"And how are we gonna do that?" John finally asked, sounding more angry than intended.
"Just watch and see. It'll all make sense eventually." Michael insisted, "But you have to keep it a secret; you can't tell anyone."
He nodded to the men behind them who punched them all in the stomach.
"What was that for?!" John exclaimed.
"That was to show you just a tiny part of what will happen to you if even one of you tells anyone."
The first thought on Richie's mind upon seeing William Shears-Campbell was the fact that he could easily pass for being Paul from a distance, which is why he won the Paul look-a-like contest. But when Richie got closer to him, he didn't seem to look all that much like Paul. His eyes were shaped a little different and his nose was different. He also had a little scar on his chin that brought curiosity to Richie's mind to where it may have some from.
John kept a large distance from William- or as he had asked them to call him- Billy Shears Campbell because he felt that no one could replace Paul, no matter what Michael and his group of minions said. He treated Billy with pure coldness and refused to speak to him at all.
Billy also had a small bruise on his face, which George suspected was from Michael's guards to threaten him not to tell anyone that he wasn't Paul. George figured this because he still had a dark purple bruise from the hard punch on his slender stomach. He worried about the bruise, not that it would hurt him internally, but the fact that his wife Pattie might see it and ask him where it came from. He didn't know if he was allowed to tell her and didn't want to risk the lives of the band over it; he still didn't want to keep it a secret from Pattie, even though he had been keeping a secret from her.
Billy was kind to the rest of the band, especially Richie who seemed to give him the most attention and kindness, George being too sad to speak to Billy and John being too angry. Billy had expected the rest of the band to be welcoming to him, as he didn't know that Paul had actually died and only thought that he had left the band. He was now nervous about having to have surgery done to look like Paul, having to have contacts, and having to change his hair. He was worried that he might not be able to impersonate Paul correctly and afraid of what they might do to him if he didn't do it correctly.
The biggest problem with Billy- which John seemed to notice right away- was that he was right handed. The fact that he was American wasn't great, but curable, while the fact that he was right handed had to change everything. Paul didn't even hold his cigarette with his right hand. Any hint of him being right handed might give the whole thing away.
The room had gotten uncomfortably silent: John lying on the couch, staring at his feet, George sitting in the recliner in the corner of the room, staring at the ceiling, Ringo sitting in front of the coffee table, smelling the pens on the table, and Billy sitting in the recliner, staring at them all and worrying about everything he now has to be put through.
Billy misses his family already and he knows he probably won't see them again.
Michael enters the room again, "Have you all gotten acquainted? Good." He answers his own question before they even can, "You all may not call him William, ever, and you must always call him Paul. To you he is Paul, now because if anyone finds out about Paul, things could get bad for the world." John gave him a very confused look, thinking Michael was talking about world domination, but Michael explained, "There could be suicides, John, mass suicides. All these teenage Beatlemaniacs who chase you down the street and cry when they see pictures of you could kill themselves over one of you being dead. That's why we can't tell anyone."
"They're gonna find out sooner or later. Look at him, he doesn't look like Paul, he's right-handed!"
"We're working on that." Michael retorted sharply, "It will be okay. You don't have to worry about this. We're taking care of it."
"You keep saying that." George said as calmly as he possibly could, "But how do we know everything will just fall into place like you're insisting?"
"Just trust me." He said, "That's all I can say to you."