THE PROJECT
Title: Two of Us
Chapter: Prologue, Part One: “Johnny Come Down to Hilo”
Author: Mwah
Fandom: The Beatles
Pairing: Eventually John/Paul
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don’t own them or claim to have any knowledge of the intimate details of the events of their lives. Basically: don’t sue. All you’d get from me is my shitty computer and the debt of many-a college loan.
Warning: Probably horrible historical incorrectness and blatant stealing of song/movie titles.
A/N: Here’s the beginning of… THE PROJECT! DUN DUN DUUUUUN! So yeah. This story is going to be a continuing saga of the boys’ lives… the primary focus will be on John and Paul but of course there’ll be a lot of cameos/focus on the people in their lives. This is going to take forever and will most likely be very, VERY long but I think it’s a project I’ll enjoy doing. Oh right, the prologue is in present tense but the rest will be in past. Why do I need to share that with you? Because… I… like to share. Whatever. On another note, I kind of hate the title and will perhaps change it at some point but we’ll all just have to live with it for now.
Also: a special shout out to the johnheartpaul community because they kick some serious patootie, lildevilgirl06 for telling me whether or not my facts were absolute crap (and yes, I did change the entire beginning and didn’t tell you… bwahaha), Bob Spitz, the Anthology people, and (to a lesser degree) Peter Brown for doing the actual research, and to everyone else who gave me super-awesome databases of interviews and transcripts and whatnot or just plain offered their services. On a similar note: an anti-shout out to the Project Runway Season Two DVD’s and The Daily Show for taking up so much of my time and distracting me. Eviiiil.
Length: 1608
Feedback: Always welcome with open arms and loads of metaphorical cookies.
Summary:
“We were four guys… that’s uh… I met Paul, I said ‘do you want to join me band?’ you known and then… And then George joined… and then Ringo joined. We were just a band! Who made it very, very big. That’s all.”
There are places I remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places had their moments
With lovers and friends
I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life
I've loved them all...
TWO OF US
PROLOGUE, PART THE FIRST:
"JOHNNY COME DOWN TO HILO"
*~*~*
“Oh, God…”
A teacup slips from between the white, trembling fingers of the young woman as she falls to her knees, clinging to the windowsill and trying not to slip in the liquid pooling below her.
“Someone… help…”
Rapid footsteps clack on the linoleum outside in the hall, the white trusses of the nurses’ uniform making a rustling sound as the elderly woman hurries to the room.
“Mrs. Lennon… Oh, dear-Doctor!”
The footsteps depart again before reappearing, accompanied by the squeak and creak of leather shoes behind them.
“Go and get Nancy, we need to move her…”
Tears blurring her vision, the young woman has the sense of more people entering the room-whirling around her in a sea of white. As she looks out the window the sky suddenly lights up in the distance and a low rumble follows soon after. The nurse hauling the girl onto the gurney winces and begins to hurry.
“Christ, an air strike is starting!”
“Watch your language, Nancy… the sirens’ll start if there’s anything to really worry about.”
“But…”
A groan from the gurney silences the two and the hollow squealing is the only sound as the wheels roll over the polished floor and out the door.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Julia’s almost certain she’s dying. There wouldn’t be so many tubes in her if she wasn’t. And where is Freddie? No, no, Freddie is gone, elsewhere, far and away…
Her parents? She isn’t at home, that’s for sure. She is also elsewhere but where? Where?
The white walls rushing past her trigger a word: “hospital.” Hospital? But why? Was she in an accident? No… no. Not an accident.
Baby.
She is having the baby.
She feels more needles go into her and straps suddenly constrict her arms like villainous snakes. She tries to squirm, tries to say something, anything, but no. She is trapped.
Then more pain suddenly rips through her, her abdomen expanding. Her eyes roll back in her head and there’s someone yelling and screaming and the nurses are holding her down. She needs to help whoever is screaming! Don’t they understand that?
But no, no, it’s not someone else… it’s her, she’s the one yelling her head off. She tries to stop it, tries to shut her mouth, but just like everyone else her body refuses to respond.
So she stops trying.
But then, there’s the voice. The voice hovering near her ear, whispering: “Julia… push. You have to push!”
It almost sounds like Mimi but that couldn’t be. She would have called her Judy anyways. She tries to look but can’t.
“Push!”
Unable to do anything else, she obeys.
“Good, there you go, push…”
A thin wail is driven from her mouth.
“Push!”
*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*
Freddie Lennon sways a bit on the galley, a bottle in one hand, cup in the other. He swings the door to the mess open, met by cheers and jeers of his fellow compatriots. Pirates or navy (or perhaps a little of both), the men are more than alright. And they sail with fine company.
“Well, hi there Freddie!” Victoria giggles, landing in his lap. “Sing us a song?”
Freddie grins, and nods. “Of course dear, anything for you pet.” He cracks his knuckles and sends her a leering grin. “’Johnny Come Down to Hilo’ alright?” The girl nods and slides her arms around him, grinning and landing a series of light kisses down his neck.
Freddie clears his throat.
“We’re running away ‘round the cape
Some for debt and some for rape
Johnny come down to Hilo, poor old man
Wake her, shake her
Wake that gal with the blue dress on
Johnny come down to Hilo, poor old man
Now I once had a gal, her hair was red
‘Twas curly all over ‘cept on her head
Her eyes was blue, her dress the same
But she always fell asleep a’fore I came
Now a dollar goes from hand to hand
My gal goes from man to man
I tied my gal in a gunny sack
She’ll be true to me ‘til I get back
I threw that sack out in the rough
By God she weren’t true enough!
She’s a downeast gal with a downeast style
For a dollar a time it’s all worthwhile
Them Hilo gals all dress so fine
They ain’t got Jesus on their minds
Wake her, shake her
Wake that gal with the blue dress on
Johnny come down to Hilo, poor old man!”
The men cheer at his conclusion, those who had joined him in song half-way through being the most raucous in their applause.
“To Freddie!” Victoria yells. “Finest man to ever sail the seas!”
“To Freddie!” comes the reply.
Their laughter drowns out the cry of a baby in a hospital in the middle of a port town of Britain, an ocean and a lifetime away.
~**~**~**~**~**~
“What?” Silence. “Ah, I see then. Well, I’m coming. Yes, I’m quite aware of the state of things outside. And I’m still coming.” There is a click as the phone is briskly put back in the receiver.
“Who was that, dear?” George calls from his recliner where he is currently glued to the radio sitting in his lap.
“Hospital. Judy’s had the baby.” Mimi appears in the doorway, coat in hand and hat already on her head.
“She has, has she? Oh well, good. Is it a boy or a girl?” The woman’s husband glances up and finally notices the state she’s in. “Oh, love, no. You are not going out. I forbid it. Really.”
Slipping her coat on, she checks herself in the mirror. “I appreciate your concern dear, but I fear I really must.”
“Oh, but Mimi… why?”
She’s already at the door.
“Well, he is my nephew, isn’t he?”
And she’s gone.
“Well,” George remarks in defeat to no one in particular. “I guess that means it’s a boy.”
*~**~~**~~**~~**~*
Really, the German’s could choose a better time for an air strike. Honestly, it’s just rude of them. Mimi picks her way across the street, ducking more times than she would like to admit and dodging shrapnel that later turns out was really just a bird. Gunfire (or perhaps a car backfiring… who can really tell these things when there’s a war going on?) sounds in the distance and she shudders involuntarily, feeling a dread that she would never usually tolerate swelling within her at the sounds of bombs bursting somewhere nearby.
“Ma’am?” She ignores the rapid footsteps that approach her as she makes her steady march. “Ma’am? Excuse me! Madam!”
She sighs and stops abruptly, nearly causing the young man pursuing her to crash into her back. Upon seeing the woman he was chasing, the officer feels lucky that he had the fortune of stopping quickly enough. “Er… Madam…” he stutters, caught off-guard by her stern stare.
“Yes, well, spit it out, I’m in a bit of a hurry,” she urges.
Flabbergasted, he continues. “Yes, well… you do know it’s past curfew and there’s an air strike on, don’t you?”
“No,” she replies severely, “I’ve been struck both deaf and dumb and am quite senile. Of course I know there’s an air raid, hence me being in a hurry! And don’t give me this rubbish about curfew, I’m not a child after all. In fact, I do believe I’m at least a few years your senior.” The young man merely gapes at her, clearly out of his depth. “Now if you don’t mind too horribly, my sister has just given birth and I’d like very much to go and see my nephew. May I?” It’s not really a question, but the officer nods anyways.
“Yes, of course, just, uh… be careful.”
“Of course I will,” she retorts as she begins on her way again. “Not all of us are complete imbeciles!”
The man stands there for a few moments afterwards, contemplating how, during a war of all things, the most terrifying thing he could encounter would be a contemptuous woman on one chilly October evening.
~~~***~~**~*~**~~***~~~
“So,” Mimi remarks gravely, standing in the doorway, “you really have done it.”
Julia sighs and turns her gaze back at the baby. “It’s kind of you to come Mimi, but it’s really much too dangerous outside. What were you thinking?”
Her older sister doesn’t answer but instead moves to Julia’s bedside. “Let’s have a look then.”
Julia glances at the nurse by her side in annoyance but the old woman busies herself with the sheets at the foot of the bed, ignoring her gaze. Sighing again, only this time in defeat, Julia lifts up the baby and sets it into her sister’s arms.
“It’s a boy,” she offers gently.
“Yes, they told me on the phone,” comes the quiet reply.
Mimi stares at the baby whose soft brown eyes gaze back up at her. If she’s not mistaken (and she rarely is) he has a bit of that wickedness of his mother’s in them.
“His name’s John.”
Mimi looks up at her sister before letting her eyes drop back down to the child before her. Mimi is fairly certain that she has never seen a more perfect baby… it even brings out that “perfect Lennon profile” that Julia used to go on about. It was evidently wasted on that vagrant because on this child, it’s just beautiful.
Mimi is transfixed; she soon finds herself thinking, “We’re going to be close, you and I.”
Out loud, she says, “Well, he’s got Lennon’s nose. No doubt he’s his. I guess you’re stuck with him then.”
Ignoring the quiet sobs of her sister, she hands the baby to the nurse before heading back out the door. As she slips her hat on and passes the hospital staff that is looking at her with barely-concealed wonder, she smiles.
“I do believe I’ll rather like you, John Lennon.”
Onward...
*ENDNOTE: Yeah, I know, I know. Do I really need to talk any more? Basically, the sea shanty Freddie sings was taken from here and was a bitch and a half to find. Especially when I couldn’t remember the term “sea shanty” and took a whole day looking up dirty songs that sailors may or may not have sung at one point or another. Also, the birthing sequence was based on some very shoddy research I did on the subject… basically, women were put into that “twilight” state of conciousness with the anesthetics and strapped down when giving birth during the 40’s. This was because pregnancy was seen as a disease. Yeah, ew right? And it’s contested as to whether or not there was actually an air strike on October 9th, 1940, but I thought it was a bit of a fun dramatic flare. The quote at the beginning was transcribed (by me and most likely badly) from the first Anthology CD and the song lyrics are from “In My Life” by the Beatles.
Shew. That was a lot. Thanks for reading!
Chapter: Prologue, Part One: “Johnny Come Down to Hilo”
Author: Mwah
Fandom: The Beatles
Pairing: Eventually John/Paul
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don’t own them or claim to have any knowledge of the intimate details of the events of their lives. Basically: don’t sue. All you’d get from me is my shitty computer and the debt of many-a college loan.
Warning: Probably horrible historical incorrectness and blatant stealing of song/movie titles.
A/N: Here’s the beginning of… THE PROJECT! DUN DUN DUUUUUN! So yeah. This story is going to be a continuing saga of the boys’ lives… the primary focus will be on John and Paul but of course there’ll be a lot of cameos/focus on the people in their lives. This is going to take forever and will most likely be very, VERY long but I think it’s a project I’ll enjoy doing. Oh right, the prologue is in present tense but the rest will be in past. Why do I need to share that with you? Because… I… like to share. Whatever. On another note, I kind of hate the title and will perhaps change it at some point but we’ll all just have to live with it for now.
Also: a special shout out to the johnheartpaul community because they kick some serious patootie, lildevilgirl06 for telling me whether or not my facts were absolute crap (and yes, I did change the entire beginning and didn’t tell you… bwahaha), Bob Spitz, the Anthology people, and (to a lesser degree) Peter Brown for doing the actual research, and to everyone else who gave me super-awesome databases of interviews and transcripts and whatnot or just plain offered their services. On a similar note: an anti-shout out to the Project Runway Season Two DVD’s and The Daily Show for taking up so much of my time and distracting me. Eviiiil.
Length: 1608
Feedback: Always welcome with open arms and loads of metaphorical cookies.
Summary:
“We were four guys… that’s uh… I met Paul, I said ‘do you want to join me band?’ you known and then… And then George joined… and then Ringo joined. We were just a band! Who made it very, very big. That’s all.”
There are places I remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places had their moments
With lovers and friends
I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life
I've loved them all...
TWO OF US
PROLOGUE, PART THE FIRST:
"JOHNNY COME DOWN TO HILO"
*~*~*
“Oh, God…”
A teacup slips from between the white, trembling fingers of the young woman as she falls to her knees, clinging to the windowsill and trying not to slip in the liquid pooling below her.
“Someone… help…”
Rapid footsteps clack on the linoleum outside in the hall, the white trusses of the nurses’ uniform making a rustling sound as the elderly woman hurries to the room.
“Mrs. Lennon… Oh, dear-Doctor!”
The footsteps depart again before reappearing, accompanied by the squeak and creak of leather shoes behind them.
“Go and get Nancy, we need to move her…”
Tears blurring her vision, the young woman has the sense of more people entering the room-whirling around her in a sea of white. As she looks out the window the sky suddenly lights up in the distance and a low rumble follows soon after. The nurse hauling the girl onto the gurney winces and begins to hurry.
“Christ, an air strike is starting!”
“Watch your language, Nancy… the sirens’ll start if there’s anything to really worry about.”
“But…”
A groan from the gurney silences the two and the hollow squealing is the only sound as the wheels roll over the polished floor and out the door.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Julia’s almost certain she’s dying. There wouldn’t be so many tubes in her if she wasn’t. And where is Freddie? No, no, Freddie is gone, elsewhere, far and away…
Her parents? She isn’t at home, that’s for sure. She is also elsewhere but where? Where?
The white walls rushing past her trigger a word: “hospital.” Hospital? But why? Was she in an accident? No… no. Not an accident.
Baby.
She is having the baby.
She feels more needles go into her and straps suddenly constrict her arms like villainous snakes. She tries to squirm, tries to say something, anything, but no. She is trapped.
Then more pain suddenly rips through her, her abdomen expanding. Her eyes roll back in her head and there’s someone yelling and screaming and the nurses are holding her down. She needs to help whoever is screaming! Don’t they understand that?
But no, no, it’s not someone else… it’s her, she’s the one yelling her head off. She tries to stop it, tries to shut her mouth, but just like everyone else her body refuses to respond.
So she stops trying.
But then, there’s the voice. The voice hovering near her ear, whispering: “Julia… push. You have to push!”
It almost sounds like Mimi but that couldn’t be. She would have called her Judy anyways. She tries to look but can’t.
“Push!”
Unable to do anything else, she obeys.
“Good, there you go, push…”
A thin wail is driven from her mouth.
“Push!”
*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*
Freddie Lennon sways a bit on the galley, a bottle in one hand, cup in the other. He swings the door to the mess open, met by cheers and jeers of his fellow compatriots. Pirates or navy (or perhaps a little of both), the men are more than alright. And they sail with fine company.
“Well, hi there Freddie!” Victoria giggles, landing in his lap. “Sing us a song?”
Freddie grins, and nods. “Of course dear, anything for you pet.” He cracks his knuckles and sends her a leering grin. “’Johnny Come Down to Hilo’ alright?” The girl nods and slides her arms around him, grinning and landing a series of light kisses down his neck.
Freddie clears his throat.
“We’re running away ‘round the cape
Some for debt and some for rape
Johnny come down to Hilo, poor old man
Wake her, shake her
Wake that gal with the blue dress on
Johnny come down to Hilo, poor old man
Now I once had a gal, her hair was red
‘Twas curly all over ‘cept on her head
Her eyes was blue, her dress the same
But she always fell asleep a’fore I came
Now a dollar goes from hand to hand
My gal goes from man to man
I tied my gal in a gunny sack
She’ll be true to me ‘til I get back
I threw that sack out in the rough
By God she weren’t true enough!
She’s a downeast gal with a downeast style
For a dollar a time it’s all worthwhile
Them Hilo gals all dress so fine
They ain’t got Jesus on their minds
Wake her, shake her
Wake that gal with the blue dress on
Johnny come down to Hilo, poor old man!”
The men cheer at his conclusion, those who had joined him in song half-way through being the most raucous in their applause.
“To Freddie!” Victoria yells. “Finest man to ever sail the seas!”
“To Freddie!” comes the reply.
Their laughter drowns out the cry of a baby in a hospital in the middle of a port town of Britain, an ocean and a lifetime away.
~**~**~**~**~**~
“What?” Silence. “Ah, I see then. Well, I’m coming. Yes, I’m quite aware of the state of things outside. And I’m still coming.” There is a click as the phone is briskly put back in the receiver.
“Who was that, dear?” George calls from his recliner where he is currently glued to the radio sitting in his lap.
“Hospital. Judy’s had the baby.” Mimi appears in the doorway, coat in hand and hat already on her head.
“She has, has she? Oh well, good. Is it a boy or a girl?” The woman’s husband glances up and finally notices the state she’s in. “Oh, love, no. You are not going out. I forbid it. Really.”
Slipping her coat on, she checks herself in the mirror. “I appreciate your concern dear, but I fear I really must.”
“Oh, but Mimi… why?”
She’s already at the door.
“Well, he is my nephew, isn’t he?”
And she’s gone.
“Well,” George remarks in defeat to no one in particular. “I guess that means it’s a boy.”
*~**~~**~~**~~**~*
Really, the German’s could choose a better time for an air strike. Honestly, it’s just rude of them. Mimi picks her way across the street, ducking more times than she would like to admit and dodging shrapnel that later turns out was really just a bird. Gunfire (or perhaps a car backfiring… who can really tell these things when there’s a war going on?) sounds in the distance and she shudders involuntarily, feeling a dread that she would never usually tolerate swelling within her at the sounds of bombs bursting somewhere nearby.
“Ma’am?” She ignores the rapid footsteps that approach her as she makes her steady march. “Ma’am? Excuse me! Madam!”
She sighs and stops abruptly, nearly causing the young man pursuing her to crash into her back. Upon seeing the woman he was chasing, the officer feels lucky that he had the fortune of stopping quickly enough. “Er… Madam…” he stutters, caught off-guard by her stern stare.
“Yes, well, spit it out, I’m in a bit of a hurry,” she urges.
Flabbergasted, he continues. “Yes, well… you do know it’s past curfew and there’s an air strike on, don’t you?”
“No,” she replies severely, “I’ve been struck both deaf and dumb and am quite senile. Of course I know there’s an air raid, hence me being in a hurry! And don’t give me this rubbish about curfew, I’m not a child after all. In fact, I do believe I’m at least a few years your senior.” The young man merely gapes at her, clearly out of his depth. “Now if you don’t mind too horribly, my sister has just given birth and I’d like very much to go and see my nephew. May I?” It’s not really a question, but the officer nods anyways.
“Yes, of course, just, uh… be careful.”
“Of course I will,” she retorts as she begins on her way again. “Not all of us are complete imbeciles!”
The man stands there for a few moments afterwards, contemplating how, during a war of all things, the most terrifying thing he could encounter would be a contemptuous woman on one chilly October evening.
~~~***~~**~*~**~~***~~~
“So,” Mimi remarks gravely, standing in the doorway, “you really have done it.”
Julia sighs and turns her gaze back at the baby. “It’s kind of you to come Mimi, but it’s really much too dangerous outside. What were you thinking?”
Her older sister doesn’t answer but instead moves to Julia’s bedside. “Let’s have a look then.”
Julia glances at the nurse by her side in annoyance but the old woman busies herself with the sheets at the foot of the bed, ignoring her gaze. Sighing again, only this time in defeat, Julia lifts up the baby and sets it into her sister’s arms.
“It’s a boy,” she offers gently.
“Yes, they told me on the phone,” comes the quiet reply.
Mimi stares at the baby whose soft brown eyes gaze back up at her. If she’s not mistaken (and she rarely is) he has a bit of that wickedness of his mother’s in them.
“His name’s John.”
Mimi looks up at her sister before letting her eyes drop back down to the child before her. Mimi is fairly certain that she has never seen a more perfect baby… it even brings out that “perfect Lennon profile” that Julia used to go on about. It was evidently wasted on that vagrant because on this child, it’s just beautiful.
Mimi is transfixed; she soon finds herself thinking, “We’re going to be close, you and I.”
Out loud, she says, “Well, he’s got Lennon’s nose. No doubt he’s his. I guess you’re stuck with him then.”
Ignoring the quiet sobs of her sister, she hands the baby to the nurse before heading back out the door. As she slips her hat on and passes the hospital staff that is looking at her with barely-concealed wonder, she smiles.
“I do believe I’ll rather like you, John Lennon.”
Onward...
*ENDNOTE: Yeah, I know, I know. Do I really need to talk any more? Basically, the sea shanty Freddie sings was taken from here and was a bitch and a half to find. Especially when I couldn’t remember the term “sea shanty” and took a whole day looking up dirty songs that sailors may or may not have sung at one point or another. Also, the birthing sequence was based on some very shoddy research I did on the subject… basically, women were put into that “twilight” state of conciousness with the anesthetics and strapped down when giving birth during the 40’s. This was because pregnancy was seen as a disease. Yeah, ew right? And it’s contested as to whether or not there was actually an air strike on October 9th, 1940, but I thought it was a bit of a fun dramatic flare. The quote at the beginning was transcribed (by me and most likely badly) from the first Anthology CD and the song lyrics are from “In My Life” by the Beatles.
Shew. That was a lot. Thanks for reading!