Paul flicked the radio on as he sat behind the wheel at a stop sign, and George who was in the passenger side turned the dial trying to find anything good. I was in the backseat of course, in between Ringo and John. I was still a little starstruck, nonetheless it was so was so easy to be myself around these guys. It was like I have known them my whole life, well in fact that was not entirely false. I had grown up with them figuratively I suppose. The conversation was flowing a lot smoother than I had even hoped, and I was having a lot of fun, I almost forgot that I had no clue how to get home or if I wanted to at this point for that matter. I could have a whole new incredible journey ahead of me that I wanted to see unfold. I looked out the window on John's side and watched the sun follow us over the London skyline. John took this as me trying to stare at him I suppose because put a hand up to my face and started to twirl one of my midnight brown curls through his fingers. I sighed with huff.
"John do you mind!" I turned my head facing straight ahead hoping it was a bold enough movement to make a point. Unfortunately the books were not lying when the said John Lennon was increasingly stubborn. Therefore he kept doing so, and my little out burst caught the attention of all the other boys. Paul was laughing like mad, while George was too, but not as loud. Ringo decided to join in on the "fun" and started playing with the other side of my curly brown locks. I sighed over dramatically. Every time I tried to pull away from one of them, the other would pull my hair in there direction. John and Ringo started laughing uncontrollably at my prevalent pain, well that may be an exaggeration. George at this point was still spinning through radio stations when he stopped at one playing a Maggie's Farm by Bob Dylan. I was a huge Dylan fan myself, so naturally I knew a fair amount of the words I began to sing along. John had noticed and let go of my hair. Thank goodness Ringo followed suit.
"You know Dylan?" John asked surprisingly.
"Yeah, of course! I am American, and it's a classic,"
"How can it be a classic already?" Paul jumped in. Right, of course I need be more cautious of these things before I tell them I am from the future. Not knowing how to answer, I just deflected it by pretending not the hear him and began singing louder to the Dylan hit, and sporadically moved my arms to the music. John and Ringo did so as well and we started to practically shake the entire car! George was turned around to face us from the passenger side also bobbing his head and singing to the lyrics. We all attempted at our own "Dylan "voice, John's was for sure the best impression. Ringo told me mine sounded more like Popeye the Sailor Man then anything else, Paul then laughed in his best Popeye impression, which was quite good by the way, and the rest of us collapsed into laughter. Now all of us were singing as loud as we could,
"I ain't gonna work for Maggie's pa no more, No, I ain't gonna work for Maggie's pa no more!"
As we continued through the streets of London singing along to radio hits like Elvis Presley's "Crying In the Chapel,"
"Have you guys met Elvis yet?" I quizzed the boys.
"Nope," John answered,
"We have been trying to for the longest time, but his people just keep sending us fucking merchandise, which is just bull shit,"
"But I do love the Elvis mug," Ringo added.
"Yeah, that ones great, I used mine this morning!" Paul joined in. We all laughed.
"Well, you guys will meet him by the end of the summer I promise," I reassured them, because they would, on August 27th to be exact. God, I was such a nerd.
"You promise us eh, Abbey?" John put his hand on the top of my head and ruffled my hair like you would a dog.
"Yes, John! Now stop your fucking up my fringe," referring to my thick blunt brown bangs that hung just below my eyebrows, not much different from the boys mop tops.
"Looks like we found a bird with a dirty little mouth!," John exclaimed. The other lads made "oooo" noises to get me going.
"Oh shut it Lennon, now then, you have to promise me that when you go to meet Elvis you have to take me along" I began to scruff up his hair the way he did to mine.
"You raise a good bargain, I will have to consider and run it past some of my people," he said in a very upper class British accent.
We were all laughing as we pulled up into a hidey-doo area of London and Paul drove the car into a garage attached to a smallish but beautiful little townhouse. We all got out of the Aston Martin, except for Paul who still remained in the drivers seat.
"I think I'm going to head back to the studio," he said as he threw George an a key, which I assumed was to get into his house.
"Awwww, come on Paulie, why?" John said in an over the top whiny voice.
"I have had some inspiration to finish the lyrics to Aunty Gin`s song," he said in a kind of hushed tone.
"Well It's about fucking time, is it because of...," George took a swing and hit John in the stomach. In which he started to hunch over and laugh. I giggled at his dramatics.
"Alright Paul, we`ll see you in a bit then," George said, while the other three of us waved as he pulled out of the parking garage. George unlocked the side door to the house and we all piled through. I was standing in Paul McCartney`s private house. With three Beatles nonetheless! It was strange, as natural as I felt being around them, my brain still had difficulties in-taking all these very strange Beatle and time travel occurrences. The house inside was very nice, it definitely looked a lot bigger on the inside then it did from the front. Right as I entered
the house I was hit with a strong smell of pot, which I was expecting. The boys seemed to not take notice, which would make sense by what I have heard about there lifestyle around this time. I followed George to a room on the main floor that had a couple couches and instruments scattered about as well as pieces of paper with lyrics scratched on to them. The other boys had gone of to other places in the house, so George and I were alone for the first time. I took a seat on one of the dark velvet love-seats that was placed in front of an ebony coffee table. I really got a good look at the room, it looked like an antique furniture store, if a 23 year old man lived in it. George sat down beside me and smiled. I got those out of place butterflies yet again. He looked a little nervous, which made me blush, I couldn't even imagine some one like myself making a Beatle blush. I smiled back at him and scattered some thoughts to start a conversation with the guitarist.
"So what was Paul talking about just then," I asked him, even though I already had some kind of idea what he was talking about with my in depth Beatles knowledge.
"Paul's been a working on this song for a while now. We recorded the instrumentals today, but 'e 'as never really been fully 'appy with the lyrics".
"What is it called?" I asked him.
"Well, 'e 'asn't given it a real name, we've all just been calllin' Auntie Gins Theme, cause 'is aunt really liked it,"
"That's really sweet," I understood that this was the song that eventually became I've Just Seen A Face. George smiled at my comment. There was an acoustic guitar leaning on the side of the couch closest to me. I asked George if it as okay that I picked it up. He nodded. I reached over and picked up, what seemed to be a Epiphone Texan. It was strung left handed of course, which was great for me because I was left handed as well.
"You play Charlotte?" George asked sounding surprised.
"Yeah, a little, I mean nothing near as good as you,"
"Well go on, play me something," he said with with his little side smile. I contemplated literally playing him "Something" but I figured that may not play out so well, I settled on Raunchy, I felt like that one would be a clever choice under the circumstances. So I began to play the first couple bars of the song, and George's face immediately lit up. It was surreal, I couldn't believe I was playing guitar for George Harrison!
"Georgie, I 'av'nt 'eard you play that one in a while," I heard John shout before he walked in the room. When he noticed it was me playing he let out one of his giant bird laughs.
"Shit Abbey! You can play, and Paulie's guitar for that matter too. George you better watch it or I might replace you," John sat down between us on the two seat couch. I giggled.
"I wouldn't worry about it, I'm not even close to being as good as George," I stated.
"Yes maybe not," John replied, he snuck his arm along the back of the couch that I was sitting on, so his arm was practically around me.
"But I bet your better in other situations," he suggested provocatively. I practically jumped on to the arm of the couch, after slapping him lightly on the chest. George was chuckling to himself.
"You really have sense of boundaries do you?" I asked him.
"That's something I had to learn the hard way," Ringo said as he walked in the room holding a small tin box. We all laughed, except for John who flipped him the bird. Ringo took a seat on an dark green embellished chair and pulled out a joint and a match from the small box and lit it up. The hazy smoke filled the room as he took a puff. He offered it to me, and I passed it along to John, who took a drag and blew the skunk like smoke back in my face.
"Come'on Abbey, we Beatles 'ave the good stuff, that I will promise you," I looked over at George who nodded and I took the joint from John and took a puff.