I was not the only one having problems.

That same night that I’d secluded myself into my room, I was enticed to open the bedroom door ajar when, at about seven o’ clock, Nathan showed up at the flat and he and Cindy launched into a heated row.

“Well I’m sorry, Cindy, but I’ve had enough! For four years I’ve given you my everything and I’m just tired— bloody tired of you not even trying to meet me halfway. I’m tired of feeling like the fella you have on the backburner until something better comes along.”

I was peering out through the door just enough to see the both of them in the reception: Cindy with her arms crossed, and Nathan pacing around her.  By then, however, his voice was calmer than it had been when he’d first arrived and Cindy had accused him being a ‘heartless arsehole’ for going to Paul’s house the previous night instead of staying with her.

“And it’s not just Paul,” he said with noted composure. “I feel as though any fella could just come right along and then, that’s it: four years down the drain.”

I was straining now to hear his voice because the two of them were no longer shouting but speaking to each other like civilized adults.

“I don’t want to be the one left holding the short end of the stick. I want out now, before that happens… and Cindy… you know as well as I that things haven’t been right with us for… quite some time…”

After that, I couldn’t hear a damn word. They spoke for a very long time… it was close to midnight when the muffled murmurings outside my door ended completely and Nathan finally left. 

I lay awake on my bed, staring up into the infinite blackness covering me. It had been hard to listen to the two of them break up… harder than I’d thought it would be… still, I couldn’t manage to dwell on it.  I couldn’t dwell much on anything… except for Paul. And the look on his face when I kissed him… and… God Almighty, I wanted nothing more than to die.

***

“Charley? Margo is here— we’re going to go get something to eat. You really ought to come, you know.”

Cindy had been almost as quiet as me in the past few days. But even she had made numerous attempts to lure me out of my room. But I’d firmly resolved that I would leave only to go to work and to go to class, and nothing else. Including spending time with the girls.  Dinner was eaten only out of necessity and consisted of whatever I could snag out of the refrigerator and take to my room to eat in peace.

Three days had passed since that fateful morning, and I’d been considerably successful in cutting myself off from the rest of the world.

“I’m not feeling up to it,” I told Cindy, who still stood in my doorway as I turned over on my side so that my back faced her. “You understand.”

“Not hardly,” she said before closing the door behind her. “Oh,” the door swung back open. “And Paul called earlier while you were asleep and wanted me to tell you that it’s terribly important and would you please call him back.”

“Thanks,” I said. 

“Maybe… maybe you should actually call him back this time.”

“I will,” I said with equal curtness, and Cindy took the cue to leave me be.

He’d left a message of similar urgency at least twice a day for the past three days. 

But I was entirely too afraid to call him back. To face what was waiting me… to face him.  I was nothing more than a shivering coward hiding away in my room, not strong enough to face the music.

I went in to work that next morning, just as I had the previous few days: late from oversleeping.  My boss was starting to get rather miffed over it, and my apologies were becoming less heartfelt. That particular morning I listened to his lecture, without a word, and then started right in on my shift.

The fact was that I didn’t have an interest in anything at the moment, not school and certainly not work. Every minute that ticked by was meaningless and empty… it was surely better to sleep all day than having to be conscious to deal with the void.

The shop door jingled as it was pushed open by an incoming customer, so I casually looked up…

And my stomach plunged to the floor.

He had walked in: tall and slender and very smart indeed in a crisp black pinstripe suit with a bright red polo underneath. I considered making a dash for the break room, but I hadn’t the time.  He’d spotted me, and we stood twenty feet away from each other, silence speaking everything.

“Good morning, sir!” My boss was quick to Paul’s side, gesticulating eloquently as he spoke. “Might I welcome you to Hatchard’s, this is a pleasure indeed! May I be of any particular assistance today?”

Paul’s eyes were squarely on me. “Yes, I’m rather interested in some books on art. Proto-Surrealism, preferably.”

“Ah!” My boss’ eyes widened and he turned to me. “Miss Gooding here happens to be an authority on art books. Miss Gooding, won’t you please assist Mr. McCartney?”

What was I going to say, no?

I cleared my throat. “Yes… of course, right this way, sir.”

He was close at my heels, and I led him to the furthest row of bookshelves, tucked away from the prying eyes of management.

“So you’ve taken to not returning phone calls?”

No use in making excuses, Charley.

“I’m sorry, Paul. I shouldn’t have run away like that anymore than I should have… said those things I said.”

“What, you’re apologizing for being honest?”

“I made a right fool of myself.”

“I am personally convinced there is not a foolish bone in your body.”

“But… you don’t feel the same way I do… right?”

Paul sighed. “Charley darling, I want you to listen to me and… try to understand. I’m… I’m not going to say that I’m not attracted to you because the fact is that I am.”

My heart stopped and I hung upon his words as though he was breathing for me.

“And when you kissed me the other night it was…” he sighed heavily. “Well, let’s just say it was very much something I wanted every bit as much as you did, that much I’m certain of.”

Am I hearing this? Is this real?

“The truth is…” Paul took a breath, which shook with nervous apprehension. “The truth is that… I’ve just come out of a four-year relationship and… at the moment…” He was visibly choosing his words with great care. “At the moment, I’m attracted to a lot of girls.” His eyes dropped to the floor and he sighed. “And… I happen to know that what you need is something that… I’m not capable of giving to you.”

I shook my head adamantly. “No, that’s not true—“

His fingers were at once gently covering my lips. “I asked you to try and understand.  I’m telling you this because your eyes are so bright and they won’t let me tell you anything but truth. And the truth is that the things I know you need from a bloke: the loyalty and the trust and the complete devotion… those are things that I… I  just… I can’t promise you.  I don’t trust me own self at the moment, let alone having someone else trust me.”

I closed my eyes, ashamed of the tears streaming down my cheeks.

Paul put his arms around me, and I let go of my emotion: burying my head into his chest. I could not help it: I still wanted him… I still needed him…

Only the sound of a throat clearing got my attention.

We both looked up: my boss was standing about ten feet away— gobsmacked.

Paul didn’t release me. “It’s the Marc Chagall,” he said gravely. “She really likes it.”

My boss sighed. “I shall never understand the artistic temperament.”

I laughed after he’d gone, as did Paul, who wiped my tears away with his thumb.

“What time do you take lunch?”

“Er… at half eleven.”

Paul looked at his watch and smiled. “Perfect, that’s in exactly twenty minutes. Meet me at the Punch and Judy in the Covent Garden— you know where that is, right?”

I nodded.

“It’s nice and dark in there so we can… talk.”

He squeezed my shoulders before turning to walk away. “Oh, damn,” he said, turning back around. “Er… pick out some book and charge it for me, will yer? Don’t want your boss gettin’ suspicious.”

I did so— a new collection of Proto-Realist prints by deChirico and Max Ernst— and at 11:28, rushed out the door and walked ever so briskly across the Charing Cross Road towards Covent Garden.

***

The Punch and Judy pub resided on the first floor of the market in the Covent Garden.  I could see why Paul chose it: yes it was crowded, but visibility was nearly nonexistent.  Indeed, only the brightness of Paul’s red shirt stuck out from the hanging dark smoke.

A pint of Guinness stout was sitting in front of the empty chair across from him, and I smiled.  “The most beautiful thing in the world, that is.”

He raised his own pint of lager to me in cheers.

“I swear I’ll write a book about it some day,” I said taking my seat. “Guinness can cure anything.”

Paul nodded. “Or at least… make things seem better than they are for a  little while anyway.”  There was a strange lopsided smile to his lips. “Bleedin’ ‘eck… Some master plan of mine, eh? Instead of getting Nathan to fall in love with you…” he set his glass down. “Do you meant to say that you’re not in love with him at all? Not even in the slightest?”

My feelings for Nathan? “I… I honestly can’t remember the last time I thought about him.” I shrugged. “I’d say ‘out of sight, out of mind’, only I see him nearly every day at school.

Paul’s chin was resting on the palm of his hand and he was idly playing with the table napkins. “But you know, Charley… sometimes we just get confused. All mixed up. And the next thing we know, well, the person we think we’re in love with is a bloody stranger… and then we’ve no idea who we are, to boot.”

He was trying to talk about me, but he was full of Jane. I could hear it and see it.

I took a hesitant breath. “You loved Jane very much.”

“I did.”

“But not enough to marry her.”

“That… is exceedingly complicated.” He leaned forward across the table so that he could speak cadidly. “I would have loved to marry Jane… if we’d been in love with each other. That’s what I’m talking about Charley: it’s a bloody confusing thing, love is, and a terribly powerful word.”

I smiled. “Isn’t is curious how it loses it’s power, that word? In English we love chips, we love our dogs and we love our mates.  In, say, French, we “adorez” our pets, but we “aimez” our mates— rather helps to keep the power of the word in perspective.” I sighed. “And I understand how powerful that word is.”

“You told me that night outside your flat that you’d never used that word with a bloke until you met Nathan.”

“It’s true… but…” I could not look at him. “Until the other morning, I never used that word and knew how incredible it is to truly mean it…” I sat back, somewhat embarrassed of what I was about to say. “Maybe I should just let you know: the night you kissed me outside the flat was my first.”

“Your first…”

Yeah. This is definitely embarrassing. “My first kiss.”

Paul was silent and I was wishing I could strangle myself for being so open with him.

“You’re shitting me.”

But he of course knew that I wasn’t.

“That was your first kiss?”

“Paul, even if I was capable of lying to you, do you think I would?”

“Aye, I know Charley, but… bleedin’ hell… how old are you again?”

“I’ll be nineteen next month.”

“And you honestly have never been with a fella before?”

“I told you I hadn’t, remember? When you first brought up the whole plan of yours?”

“Aye, but I didn’t… I thought you were just exaggerating!” Paul’s gaze drifted upwards. “Jesus… can I even remember my first kiss?”

I smiled. “I’m sure you can.”

“Er… Layla, I think her name was.” There was a wicked twinkle in his shadowy eyes. “Used to help her baby-sit.”

“As long as you didn’t pay to help her with the baby-sitting. Because then, you know, that would be illegal, wouldn’t it.”

“Why you little cheeky monkey!” He feigned disgust, but only until his giggling broke through. He was smiling at me and shook his head. “Charley, Charley, Charley. What am I going to do with you?”

My own smile faded, and I focused on my now quarter full pint of Guinness. My voice was hardly more than a whisper. “I dunno…”

Paul sighed and took a long draw on his cigarette. “I’m off to the studio tonight… we’re working on a new single, you know. But tomorrow night… what do you say to dinner? Perhaps a movie?”

I laughed, “Oh no, not a movie again! I may end up actually getting arrested this time!”

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first.”

I raised my glass and said ‘Touché’ before downing the rest. “Dinner sounds… nice. And… you honestly don’t mind being around me… even though I acted the way I did?”

“As long as you promise not to suddenly make violent love to me right there in the restaurant, yeah of course.”

I laughed again.

And when I got home from work that day, I didn’t even think about my stuffy old bedroom.

***

Paul McCartney? You, son, are a fuckhead.

What were you thinking? Dinner and a movie? That’s a bleedin’ date, and you promised yourself you wouldn’t do it! You wouldn’t get involved! She’s off limits!

Says who?

Says YOU! Get your brains off your balls, Paul!

But… what if that whole plan with her and Nathan was actually my subconscious at work? So that I could really be with her?

You’ll be a right jerk if you step in between her and what’s meant to be.

But what if Charley and I are—

You’re NOT! And if you don’t shape up—

A blaring siren ripped Paul out of his anguish, and a blow to the stomach was delivered when he realized that a blinking police car was close on his tail.

Perfect, just perfect. The stupid bloody police have nothing better to do…

He pulled on his sunglasses and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel nervously while the policeman climbed out of his patrol car. He poked his head in Paul’s window, smelling of… god, of cheese and bacon.

“Oy! Wot you doin’ goin’ fifty on a High Street—“ The policeman paused and snapped his finger. “Hang on! Ain’t you… ain’t you one of them?”

Paul stifled a groan and removed his sunglasses. “All right there, officer?”

The officer’s surprise was short lived and the smirk returned. “Yeah, well, wot you tryin’ to do: run away from yer back tires?”

“I… just had my mind on other things.”

“Guess you reckon that ownin’ one of these toys means you don’t ‘ave to go by the rules like the rest of us little people, eh?”

Paul blinked. “No… I just had my mind on other things.”

“Aye, well, you go right on a head and keep thinking ‘bout your other things while I write you up a ticket.”

Bloody wanker.

Paul forced a smile to the officer before he disappeared back into his patrol car to write out the ticket.

This is just the icing on the cake, isn’t it.  You’re in the middle of a personal crisis, and this arsehole decides to cop an attitude just coz he’s a bitter old—

“Here’s your copy. Oh and sign this fer us too, will yer? For me little girl.”

Paul found himself taking hold of a fountain pen and a pad of paper from the officer’s sausage fingers. The officer must have seen sensed the confusion on Paul’s face because he felt the need to explain.

“Been waitin’ fer her to outgrow you lot.  Hopin’ she’ll meet some other fella to take her mind of yer.”

Paul scribbled his name and then paused. “What did you say?”

“I… I said I’ve been waitin’ fer some other fella to come along— you know, sweep ‘er off ‘er feet.”

THAT’S IT!

Paul could not help the very real smile that took over his face. “Right! Thanks sir!”

He drove precisely the speed limit until he turned off the Abbey Road and onto Cavendish: from then on he floored the Aston-Martin to his driveway.

“MARGO!”

She was just nearing his gate when he pulled the car up the drive to park. He burst out of his car and grabbed Margo’s shoulders, only vaguely aware of the fact that he’d just scared her quite out of her senses.

“Oh, thank God you’re here!”

She laughed. “Don’t flatter yourself— I’m actually just passing. I’m meeting a fella in Montague Square so I figured I’d just pass by—“

“I need to talk to you,” he said. “Now!”

“Now? But… he’s waiting—“

“Please!”

Understand that it was not Paul’s fault he was born with puppy-dog brown eyes that could act like a tonic upon women. But, in his twenty-five and a half years, he’d certainly learned the value of making use of them when the situation called for it.

Such as right then. “Please,” he said again, fixing his gaze firmly upon Margo’s. “I’m not above begging, you know.”

Margo’s complexion was no longer pallid, but held a hint of pink at the cheeks despite the frown on her face.

“It’s about Charley, isn’t it.”

“I’m in a right fix and I need your help.”

She folded her arms. “Which one is it: has she fallen in love with you or have you with her?”

“She thinks she’s in love with me.”

“Can’t very well blame the girl, can you? What about you, is the feeling mutual?”

Paul bit his lip, face twisted in agony. “That’s just the trouble: before I go and do something really stupid— I think I’ve got a plan.”

“A very famous plan?”

Paul grimaced.

“Right, that was pretty daft.” She held out her arm. “Well! Since you’re making me miss my date, you may escort me inside, fix me a cuppa and we’ll see what we can do.”

***

“Well you certainly are looking much better tonight!”

Cindy and Margo both held their gazes firmly on me. Margo had come for dinner, and I was still smiling after having seen Paul at the pub. In fact, I’d even had something of an appetite, as I was just starting on my second serving of spaghetti.

“Yeah... I haven’t been much help around here, have I.  And Cindy… I was terribly selfish not to tell you this earlier, but I am sorry for what happened with Nathan.”

She waved her hand. “Water under the bridge, Charley, water under the bridge.  The both of us knew it was coming, it was just a matter of when.  We held it together for a hell of a lot longer than I would have thought possible…”

I was being very cautious. “So… are the two of you still…”

“Are we still friends?” She laughed softly. “Do you know… I think that’s all we have been for a very long time.” And then she gave me a pointed stare. “Sometimes we think we’re in love with someone.”

Déjà vu…

“Speaking of relationships,” said Margo. “Does this sudden change in disposition have anything to do with the fact that you saw Paul today?”

“How did you know I saw Paul?”

“Because I saw him this afternoon outside Cavendish. He mentioned having just come from lunch with you.”

“Oh.”

“What happened the other day anyway,” said Cindy. “I mean, you looked worse that even I did that day.”

Fair question. How to answer…

“I… I don’t even know what happened that day.”

“Well, are the two of you still together?”

“I… I don’t really know what’s happening. We’re having dinner tomorrow night, that’s about all I know for certain.”

“Well,” said Cindy brightly, “I’m sure that a quiet dinner will be the perfect thing… for the both of you.”

I took a sip of the wine from my glass and stared at Cindy.  In the span of only three days she’d broken up with her boyfriend of four years, and was now sounding nothing but chipper about my supposed ‘relationship’ with Paul.  I looked to Margo to see if she was similarly impressed with such a change in disposition, but Margo was keenly interested only in twirling her spaghetti on her fork.

“Yes,” I said slowly. “Well… we’ll see.”

Margo didn’t bring up Paul or Nathan at all for the rest of the evening. I was certain she would have done, since Cindy and Nathan had split and she hadn’t any idea of what things had happened between Paul and myself.  Telling her that I had actually fallen in love with Paul and hadn’t a care in the world for Nathan… well… I was dreading it, to say the least. 

So I was quite pleased that she seemed more than content with merely watching the telly, staying on for the news, and then gave both Cindy and myself a hug goodnight before leaving.

Life was beginning to feel normal again… although dinner alone with Paul had me considerably nervous.  Sure we’d had lunch together, but this was different… we’d be alone… to talk… 

I’d promised to behave myself, and obviously I would. I knew perfectly well that he wasn’t looking for a relationship… but somehow it was all right… just being near him was enough. And to know that he was actually attracted to me… I could well have been bouncing off the walls!

Cindy had been lounging on the sofa, talking on the phone the whole of the late afternoon to God knows who, and was still on the phone even after I’d dressed. (And dressing had taken a very long time, given the importance of the occasion!) I was hopping down the front steps of the apartment when I almost ran smack into none other than Nathan Sloane.

“Nathan! Hello…” I stopped myself from saying ‘what are you doing here’.  “All right?”

“Yeah. You?”

“All right.”

“You… you look terrific.”

I smiled. “Only because I’m on my way to dinner.”

“Oh I know,” said Nathan. “That’s why I’m here.”

“You wot?”

Nathan shifted his weight uneasily, and smiled with visible embarrassment. “Yeah… I guess Paul had to go into the studio, very last minute, and he told me to take care of you tonight. He had tickets to a West End show for you two and said he didn’t want them to go to waste.”

I was nodding, slowly. “Oh… I wonder why he didn’t ring me up.”

“He said he tried, but the line was busy.”

Cindy.  She was on that phone all evening!

“I know I’m something of a disappointment next to Paul McCartney,” said Nathan, “but we might still manage to have fun, eh?”  He offered his arm graciously.

I accepted it. “Yeah, it’ll be a gas.”

“Paul had reservations at a posh French spot in Chelsea… but I’ve had the most insatiable craving for Japanese! Do you mind terribly?”

“Not at all! I’ve never had Japanese before!”

Nathan knew of an unassuming hole in the wall near Bermondsey. We came up out of the steamy underground to find the Tower Bridge looming practically right in front of us, glowing bright white and baby blue and ever so proud of the fact that it was, arguably, the prettiest sight in the city.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Nathan’s steps had slowed considerably as we walked along the street. “I love bridges— and that one, cor, I always forget how pretty it is.”

He was right of course. “Why do you love bridges so?”

He looked up into the sky, pensively. “I don’t really know…” and then he laughed. “Perhaps that’s why I love them. Ah, here we are!”

The restaurant was hardly bigger than my flat and filled with comfortable orange and red light.  Japanese lanterns were strewn across the low ceilings and gentle, quiet Asian music mingled along with the gentle, quiet conversation of the patrons.

We had to sit on our knees at a low table, and Nathan laughed as I nearly fell over in the process.

“Sorry I’m being ungraceful— I’ve never been to a place like this!”

Nathan seemed very genuinely appalled.  “Never? But that’s a crime! Now I have to give you the royal treatment!  We’ll begin with some Miso soup, some enemame beans and… you’ve had tempura before?”

“It’s all Greek to me,” I said with a laugh, studying the strange menu. “But I trust you.” I looked up. “And by the way… I’m sorry about…”

“About what?”

“Well, being Cindy’s flatmate one can’t help but… overhear certain things.”

He smiled. “Oh. That. It may as well have been on the BBC— everyone knows about it already.  And you’ve nothing to be sorry about.  It was the best thing for the both of us.”

“Good… I’m glad.”

Nathan ordered and cleared his throat. “So! You and Paul! Pretty wild, huh? I mean… I still can’t quite believe it.”

I took a sip of green tea from the cup. “Yeah…”

“Wish he hadn’t turned out to be such a damn nice bloke— you understand that I had every intention of hating him.”

“Nathan!”

“Well! He’s got a rather infuriating habit of stealing the hearts of the girls I care about.”

“Ah. Meaning Cindy.”

“Meaning Cindy… and more importantly, you.”

I looked up. “Me?”

Nathan’s blue eyes burned more brightly than I’d ever seen them. “Yes.”

He obviously can’t mean…

“That’s awfully good of you, Nathan. Nice to hear you’re looking out for me.” 

A strange shadow befell his face and it made me uneasy, so I decided to change the subject.

“I… I picked up a copy of the Poetry Society magazine today! It was terrific, seeing your name in print!”

He smiled. “Surreal, actually: ‘The Ebb by Nathan Sloane.’ Who would’ve thought?  Ah, the tempura! Dig in, you’ll love it.”

I did.  And I loved everything else about dinner.  The spicy sushi and the warm conversation… and how soft it all was.  The softness in Nathan’s voice… his eyes… and the softness of his hand in mine when he helped me up from the floor to leave.

Indeed, we’d both spent such a long time at dinner that it was well after eight by the time we were back out on the streets.

“Damn, I’m sorry,” he said. “There’s no way we can make it to the theater now.”

“Oh, I’m not bothered.  We can do something else— anything you please.”

“Glad to see you’re so obliging!  Cindy would’ve thrown a tantrum and gone home.  Er… I dunno… how about a walk through St. Katherine’s Docks?”

“I say, capital idea,” I said with purposeful stuffy superiority. “Jolly good notion, old boy, yes let’s do take a look at those old rowboats.”

Those old rowboats, by the way, were only the most impressive yachts east of New York!  The water below the docks was black, lit only by the foggy street lamps, and Nathan and I perused the impressive array of white beauties with feigned supremacy.

“Oh yes,” said Nathan, “ours at home are much nicer than this.”

“Indeed,” I said, “my but how the neighborhood has really come down.”

Nathan paused. “You know, I bet Paul owns one of these things.”

I paused. “Huh? Oh… I dunno… I suppose…”

“Cor, look at that!” Nathan was pointing to a yacht with fancy blue letters dubbing it “The Panacea”, probably about seventy feet long, lit up with lights and music and slightly tipsy laughter.

“Wow, some party.”

“Tell you what I’ve always wanted to do,” said Nathan. “Crash one of those high society soirees.”

I was just about to tell him he was crazy, when I stopped. Not a bad idea…

“I’m ready if you are.”

After a mischievous wink, he took hold of my hand and we climbed the steps with heads held high. We were quite relieved to find no bouncer at the door with a guest list, which made our uninvited entrance especially easy to pull off.

The music was terrific, the new Simon and Garfunkel song Scarborough Fair being played repetitively much to the satisfaction of the guests— including us uninvited ones.  We were doing a terrific job of mingling quietly until a voice joined our conversation.

“You two are new around here, aren’t you?”

Nathan and I fumbled for an answer to the exceptionally pretty brunette standing in front of us who bore more than just a passing resemblance to Emma Peel. “I’m Dinah, by the way. You friends of Keith or Leslie?”

“Both,” said Nathan smoothly.

“Groovy,” said Dinah, since this was apparently all it took for her to accept us.  “I must introduce you to the rest!” She took hold of our arms and pulled us towards a group of extremely beautiful people, three of which I was sure had to be fashion models, and one of which I was almost sure I recognized as one…

“May I present… sorry, what did you say your names were?”

“Fred,” said Nathan happily. “And Ginger.”

I pinched his arm, but his smile remained, and the crowd laughed breezily.

“You are putting us on,” said one of the men who had an even better moptop than Mr. McCartney himself.

“Of course we are,” said Nathan, “but it’s ever so much more impressive than Nathan and Charley.”

We shook hands and were given martini’s by the obliging Dinah, and the next thing Nathan and I knew, we were having a rather intense conversation about American politics and Vietnam and Pacifism with a group that happened to include names found only in the society pages. (Or so Nathan informed me anyway, since I did not make a habit of reading the society pages. Years of being with Cindy had educated him on such matters…)

The music switched gears dramatically from the Moody Blues, to a song that nearly caused my heart t stop in mid-beat.  It was as though a forgotten door was opened, letting in a memory long abandoned.

Never My Love had been the song that I’d heard on Boxing Day at the Price house. When Cindy had given Nathan the present I’d bought for him…

And now I was standing near a window overlooking the romantic honey glow of the lights upon the docks next to the same man who had, at one time, been the center of my entire being.

Who was this man really, now that place had been taken by Paul? And… why had I so readily and easily abandoned him?

Nathan’s eyes were so very bright beneath his black hair (hair that, by the way, frizzed in moist air just like mine, thank God!) and his eyes smiled into mine.

“We must dance to this song.”

I nearly pulled away.  But once his hand found its place along my waist, my hesitations disappeared.

Blame it on the vodka in the martini and the harmony in the music that made the touch of Nathan’s hands about my waist feel ever so much more real than Paul’s ever had. My senses were suddenly quite aware of everything about him… particularly the feel of his voice against my ear.

“So… why Paul? I mean, aside from the obvious?”

Paul… why Paul… why couldn’t I answer him…

“I… to be honest… I don’t really know.”

Nathan seemed to accept this very weak explanation.  “Ah,” he said, “sort of the way I don’t know why I love bridges?”

If you’d asked me a fortnight ago the reasons why I cared so much for you, I could have written volumes…

“You know, I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

His voice was lullaby and my head felt heavy, wishing it could rest along his. “About what?”

“The birthday present Cindy gave me.  You know, I didn’t believe for a second that she bought it for me.  She just would never have thought to do it.”

I waited, making him say it.

“And… if it was you who bought it and merely let Cindy take the credit for it, as I’m sure you did, then… thank you.”

“Well, since you and Cindy aren’t together anymore, I have no reason to cover her: you’re welcome.”

He laughed softly, and then a seriousness commanded his voice that made me listen to every syllable as though my life were dependent upon it.

“Honestly: I can’t think of a nicer gesture that anyone has made towards me in quite some time.”

Keep talking, just keep talking…

His lips were now against the side of my face and he was granting me my wish by talking… his fingers stroking my own as he did so.

“You know… hindsight is just our common sense showing our brain what our heart didn’t allow it to see. And my common sense was… well… it didn’t exist at all.  That can happen to even the best of us.  We don’t even realize we’re being blinded from what is real…” his hands squeezed mine, “and tangible, and right in front of us, waiting and pleading for us to notice, while we foolishly kid ourselves with something that’s… that’s not even real.  Like Nietzsche said, ‘an altogether different reality concealed.’”

And that’s when Nathan’s dancing stopped, and his hand clasped mine against his chest.

“And for that, Charley… I’ll never forgive myself. Because I’ve missed out on what, I’m sure, is the most beautiful thing to have ever come into my life.”

Jesus Christ.

My hands were sweating in his and I could have collapsed right there into the floor. His words had left me as helpless in his power as a little child.

I could not speak… for surely anything I had to say would only ruin the intense beauty of those words.

He was the poet that could put into words his emotion.  I was an artist and therefore could communicate my emotion best through actions.  So I rested my temple against his jaw and could feel his hot breath on my neck.  The touch of his fingertips against my face was light and hesitant.  So were his lips, which shied away from mine several times before finally finding the will to take their place.  His kisses were slow and deliberate and I wasn’t able to get enough of them fast enough.

I was going on a furious instinct that I did not know I possessed and pressed my body against him which he responded to by letting his fingers run through my hair and he sighed, shakily, against my neck.

What was this?  It was frightening— and beautiful— and I wanted much more than just the wetness of his mouth upon my neck. I wanted Nathan.  Only it was a hundred times bigger than that.  I’d wanted Nathan for months… this was needing him and the difference between wanting and needing was becoming torturously evident.

I hadn’t felt anything close to this with Paul.

This was uncharted territory… and the fear of it only made it that much more exciting.

Nathan was the first to break away and I grabbed hold of his shirt with clinched fists. “No, don’t stop…”

He was out of breath and beaming. “Not here,” he said urgently, grabbing hold of my hand. His eyes scoured the crowded party and then he pulled me to the opposite end of the room.  He pushed open the first door in the corridor and we tumbled inside a closet.

Neither of us cared.  We were at once safe, delighted at how cramped the space was since it forced our bodies onto each other.

Nietzsche was right. An entire other reality had lay concealed.

***

Paul was fussing quite vocally with a bottle opener. “Bloody piece of rubbish— you’d think that Fortnum and Mason would have a decent bottle opener.”

I laughed and hopped up from his sofa joining him at the bar. “Go on, let it go before you break it. This calls for a woman’s touch.”

“Or a lush’s touch,” he said.

I answered by ever so easily twisting the cork out of the bottle of Burgundy with a loud pop.

The rest of the company clapped from their seats in the living room and I bowed graciously.

“Smart arse,” he said before pouring myself a glass of the deep smooth wine.

“Ah, you know I love you anyway.”

“As do I,” he said and held up his glass. “Now, everybody? I should like to propose a toast! To Charley Gooding, London’s brightest new artist according to… well… according to me, anyway…”

“Thanks a lot,” I said.

“And,” he pressed on, “to Nathan Sloane— London’s brightest new poet according to… the Daily Mail, was it?”

“The Evening Standard,” said Nathan, joining my side and accepting a glass from Paul. “Page nine, third column.”

“Right, well, here’s to the both of you in celebration of six months together… without killing each other!”

I laughed and Nathan pulled me close into a hug while classes clinked in agreement around the room.  Six months… was that all it had been? Surely not, we must have been together our whole lives.

Margo and Cindy were still seated on the sofa in Paul’s living room and shouted their applause from their comfortable positions: each in the lap of their respective fellas.  Margo’s, yet another beguiling new stranger, and Cindy’s— to the undying shock of everyone— the rarely sober Steve Harrington.

They fit, somehow.

It was more than wonderful, Paul’s sweet gesture for an ‘Anniversary’ party. Barry Miles and John Dunbar and a sizeable crowd of other Indica regulars were present, as was our old friend Dinah and her fella from the Yacht Party. They’d become quite close friends of Nathan and myself, and once we began inviting them along when Paul had parties, well, they began to hang around with us even more… imagine that.  Also present was someone I’d been aching to meet: a blond American girl named Linda Eastman that Paul had mentioned more than once… or twice…

Hers was an unusual sort of beauty that made me take a liking to her immediately since she seemed just like any other average girl, and was one of the most down to earth people I’d ever met. She was a photographer and made a light-hearted point of making it clear that “my last name may be Eastman, and I may be a photographer, but I have nothing to do with Kodak!”

Paul had of course been very keen to know what I thought of her. So I turned the tables onto him.

“What do you think of her,” I’d asked him.

“I’ve never bloody felt this way before in my life.”

“Then I love her,” I told him.  And he’d told me in reply that I was ‘just too good to him.’

That was impossible, of course, especially after everything that he’d done for me. He was the reason I was there at all holding Nathan’s hand, celebrating six months together.  Because of Paul going with his gut…

Oh it made for a marvelous story, and all of us had a ball telling the newcomers like Linda and Dinah and her beau the whole tale. 

“Now I’ve heard bits and pieces,” Linda was saying, “but I think I’ve missed a big part of it. Paul was playing mat0chmaker, wasn’t he? How exactly did that all start?”

Paul smiled devilishly, knowing full well the subject of his boxers had yet to come up in conversation.  I closed my eyes and gestured for him to go on and spill it.

“Well I came home early from a weekend trip one night to find about four patrol cars out front and me maid going on frantically about there having been a robbery. And when I went down to the police station, I saw the photograph of the suspect… a Miss Charlotte Gooding.”

There were half a dozen expletives of varying color and this revelation, and Nathan leaned forward with widening eyes. “Go on,” he said feverishly.

“So I know that me maid is rather… excitable and that a mistake has obviously been made and I tell the bailiff that Miss Gooding was a friend of mine. ‘Well,’ the officer says, ‘we did catch her with personal valuables in her bag.’ I ask to see what he meant and, lo and behold, he hands over to me a pair of plain white boxer shorts.”

“YOU STOLE A PAIR OF PAUL’S BOXERS?” Nathan was gasping between his great heaves of laughter. “Did you go COMPLETELY out of your head?”

“I’ll have you know, Nathan, it was your fault!”

“Mine?”

“If I hadn’t been so potty over you, I would never have stooped to stealing a trinket from Paul’s house to put Cindy in a better mood.”

Cindy sat up. “You were going to give them to me?”

“I was indeed, because I knew it would cheer you up, which would cheer Nathan up and, oh God, it sounds as crazy now as it was then.”

Cindy raised her brow and smiled at Paul. “Not any chance of gettin’ my hands on a pair of ‘em now, is there?”

“I think not,” he said, laughing. “So anyway, I let her out and she explains just what she was doin’ with me unmentionables in her handbag, and the two of us get to talking and…”

“The next thing we know he’s a regular Dolly Levy trying to pair myself with Nathan since he knew I was just head over heels.”

“Who was still going out with me at the time,” Cindy chimed in, and rightly so.

“So Paul says to me, ‘Charley— just show up with me as your boyfriend and that’ll make Nathan jealous.”

“Which it did,” said Nathan.

“Yeah,” said Paul, “and it also made Charley here go just a bit nutty.”

“Linda, look at me. Can you honestly blame me for falling for him?”

Linda smiled. “I can’t say that I can.”

“Thank you. So apparently, when Paul realized he needed to set me straight, he and Margo over there got together and decided to have a nice little chat with Nathan—“

“Who’d stopped seeing me by that time,” Cindy chimed in again.

“And was very aware of his feelings for Charley,” said Paul.

“So, they decided to throw Nathan and myself together, you know, set up a date with all the trimmings and a little magic and hope for the best.” I laughed. “Come to find our Paul had a very romantic booth reserved for us at a restaurant where he’d instructed the owners to cater to our every whim, and then he had two box seats at a West End show… but the two of us ended up just wandering… we worked our own magic.”

“Rather did something to me pride,” Paul said, snuggling next to Linda. “I mean, one day I’m the center of her universe and the next: out like yesterday’s nappies. Didn’t even bother being gentle about it, she just, bam, one day comes up and told me that she was well over me.”

I laughed. “In so many words… yes. Besides, it was good for you— you are not as irresistible as you may think.”

Linda winked at me. “I like to keep him thinking he is, though.”

Of course the whole lot was still trying to get over my temporary incarceration for underwear snatching, Nathan being particularly convinced that the episode should be written down for posterity’s sake. 

“It’d make a brilliant little story,” he told me softly, his mouth against my ear as he cradled me against his torso. “No one would believe it, of course. But that’s the misfortune of the masses: people love to believe stories, but dismiss truth as impossible.”

 “Ah, but like the man said: ‘everything you can imagine is real…’ which is our good fortune, you and I.”

My hand rested against his cheek and he held it tightly, eyes locked on mine, clear and steady and unwavering.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

His mouth enveloped mine, deliberately and with such force that my body fell backwards slightly. He stopped, abruptly, and let his mouth hover over mine and I sat waiting for him to continue… wondering why he’d stopped…

“I love you, Charley,” he said, with such passion that it felt like he was saying it for the first time.

Maybe he was.

Maybe we both were.

“Oy! Paul!” Margo, bless her, had broken the moment with a decisive holler and was pointing at a slightly alarmed looking Paul McCartney. “Didn’t you promise us you were going to play?”

The whole company of eyes focused on Paul who nodded. “Aye, that I did,” he said, hoisting himself up from the floor. “Though I was hoping you’d forget.”

“Sure you did,” I said, “sure. You know you’ve been waitin’ to show off.”

 He ignored me (or perhaps just didn’t hear me) and disappeared to fetch his guitar, an acoustic Spanish Gibson, and came back in pulling the black leather strap around his neck.

 “Right, now listen up, you lot. The LP doesn’t come out for another two months or so, so everything you hear in this room stays in this room!”

He resumed his spot on the floor next to Linda and crossed his legs, while the rest of us gathered around him in a close huddle.  He tapped a countdown and began to strum… his voice sweetening the strain of the guitar strings… and Nathan’s hold on my body tightened.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to be free.

Blackbird fly Blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life

You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

And do you know: it couldn’t have any more true.