Yes It Is Stories: A Day in the Life
Yes It Is Stories
Title: A Day in the Life
Authors: pennylane_fic, jenny_wren28 & lovely_rita_mm
Starring: The Beatles and Maggie Sue
Rating: R for language, sex, & implied drug use.
Disclaimer: We don’t own any of the Beatles, this obviously never happened, and much to the real Maggie’s disappointment, is a complete work of fiction.
READERS (if we have any left because we wait so painfully long between updates... I know, we suck... forgive us?)
ANYWAYS here is a new Maggie Sue adventure for you! And all 4 Beatles are in this one. And some romance... and and and... well, we just hope the REAL Maggie Sue likes what we've done here. ;)
So, dearest readers, turn off your mind, relax and join Maggie Sue on another one of her Beatle adventures.....
Previous updates located HERE!
A Day in the Life
January 19, 1967, 11:55pm
A guitar strummed, an organ sounded long tones, a piano tinkled a few experimental notes.
“Sugarplum fairy, sugarplum fairy…” John counted in and then started singing as he strummed softly. Paul gently shook maracas in the background, giving extra rhythm to what John was playing on his guitar.
“I read the news today, oh boy. About a lucky man who made the grade…” John sang, remembering not long ago when he had found the news article that had inspired the song. He’d read it aloud at breakfast, only to watch his fiancé turn pale and sit down heavily. He’d thought it was a slight overreaction on Maggie’s part as she hadn’t known Tara Brown. Did she feel guilty for not saving the lives of all the Beatles’ acquaintances too?
It wasn’t until a few days later, when she’d had the same dramatic reaction to a much less tragic newspaper blurb he’d read her from the Daily Mail about 4000 pot holes being discovered in Blackburn, Lancashire, that John realized what was going on.
“And though the news was rather sad…”
It had become a kind of game now, figuring out exactly what she was reacting to, how serious it was, and how whatever it was would be woven into the tapestry of the Beatles legend. He’d sometimes badger her to tell him what was coming, but often she’d just shake her head, refusing to give it away.
John was a bit torn - he wanted to know about the future, but the more he knew, the more the legacy of the Beatles pressed, suffocating him. To him, the Beatles were just a band, but having seen a bit of the future, John now knew for a fact that the Beatles were going to be more than that. And that meant pressure to create something that would stand up to the iconic status the band incredibly still had 40 years on. Frankly, John didn’t always want to be bothered with this responsibility.
While the Beatles’ success was something he had worked long and hard to achieve, at the end of the day, John had to admit he was lazy. Writing songs was something that was easy to him, a kind of lark. Something he and Paul had done together so many years, simply because they could. They were just a band, he kept telling himself. Sometimes, if he repeated it enough, he could almost believe it. Then Maggie would have one of her odd spells and he would be reminded that they had met for the first time only because of this future legacy. Sometimes, when it was too much, he simply figured that whatever he had come up with musically must have been good enough or Maggie never would have come back to him in the first place. The thought that the second time she came back had been purely for him, and had nothing whatsoever to do with music thrilled him deep down. She may be a bit mad for the music of the Beatles like so many other fans, but there was no doubt she was different. And she was all his. He felt warmth run through his body. He wanted her. Right now!
He tried to focus.
“...well I just had to laugh…I saw the photograph…”
It’d been a photograph of him that brought Maggie back in time - it still hung in one of the labyrinthine hallways of EMI. He looked at it every now and again, just to reassure himself that it was still there. An odd sense of responsibility came with that picture. It needed to still be there, waiting for Maggie to walk past it in 2006. If it wasn’t, would he somehow lose her? The rules of time travel and possible futures still confused him.
“I saw a film today, oh boy…The English army had just won the war…”
He liked this reference to the film project he’d just recently finished. It was while on location that he picked up his latest pair of glasses, surprising himself that he’d finally found a pair he didn’t feel ridiculous in. He felt a bit foolish that they were much like the glasses he'd refused to wear as a child. Maggie had taken a funny turn the second she’d seen them too. Very strange it was, seeing these flashes of the future in her eyes.
“1...2...3...4…”
John’s mind wandered as Mal counted. Where was she? Maggie was supposed to have been here an hour ago.
“…13...14…15…”
She’d been putting in long hours, he knew - and he was proud of the work she was doing. Apple needed her. The Beatles need her. Hell, HE needed her. And that was just it. HE needed her - and where was she? Off shuffling papers. Not for the first time, John felt himself scowl.
“…21…22…23…24…”
At the sound of an alarm, John looked up, catching sight of Mal clutching a ringing clock. Mal smiled sheepishly at him as he shut it off. John shook his head. They’d never be able to get that off the tape. What was once a good mood was quickly becoming soured.
The placeholder bars to Paul’s middle eight were counted off, and then John sang the last verse - the bit about the holes he’d read about in the paper filling the Albert Hall. John loved this verse, but even its nonsensicality wasn’t enough to cheer him. Where was she?!
Once George Martin had given the signal that he had stopped recording, John put his guitar down, a little harder than he had intended to, and stalked over towards Paul who had just slid onto the piano bench. Mal had seen that John was in a mood and had already scooted out the door figuring he’d hide out at the pub until the current Lennon temper tantrum had blown over. He knew from experience that by the time he returned, John would have forgotten about whatever had driven Mal away in the first place.
John slammed his fist down on top of the piano. “Well, that was complete shite, Macca. And what in the hell got into Mal with setting off that clock?”
“What? I thought the song was coming together nicely.” Paul’s mental alarms were going off - he could see John was in one of his moods. Glancing at John out of the corner of his eye, Paul quickly picked up the glass he’d been drinking from and moved it out of John’s range.
Now that that threat wasn’t present, Paul turned back to the piano, neatly ran his fingers over the keys of the piano, and started singing, “Woke up, got out of bed…dragged a comb across my head…” in his best Vaudeville voice. He knew John hated when he did that, but he thought that maybe his best bet was provoke John to just explode and get it out of his system, otherwise he’d be stuck listening to him simmer and snipe for the rest of the night. They had planned to work until 2:30 am, and he didn’t want to waste the studio time. And, truth be told, deep down, Paul really just enjoyed provoking John.
“The alarm clock works quite nicely with what I’d written, doesn’t it?” Paul said mildly, keeping his eyes focused on the piano keys in order to avoid John’s gaze. “I think I quite like it there.”
John watched as that typical, smug expression cross Paul’s face and he knew Paul was pleased with himself. It infuriated him - that and Paul’s insistence on hamming up half his songs. He knew Paul was angling to have “When I’m 64” included on the album. He hated that song too. John opened his mouth to let Paul have it.
George watched in dismay from across the room as he saw the stormy expression move across John’s face, and knew what John was about to unleash on a seemingly unsuspecting Paul. John had been in a perfectly good mood all night - this sulk had come on rather suddenly. Actually, George could pinpoint it to somewhere around the end of verse two, when John had looked up to check the time.
Maggie was late again.
He’d better go call her to see what was keeping her and to warn her about John. George ducked out of the studio to go find a phone. After years of experiencing Lennon and McCartney brawls, George knew that he had plenty of time to kill.
“Where are you going, mate?” Ringo was right behind him. “You’re not leaving me in here with that, are you?" Ringo followed George out the door and into the hallway. "What’s got John this time?”
“Maggie’s late.” George said briefly. “I’m sure she just lost track of time again - but if she doesn’t get her arse here soon…”
“Maybe John will be done in by the time she gets here.”
George nodded. “I think that might have been Paul’s plan. Sometimes it’s best if John gets it all out and then we can get on with things. Paul hates wasting his precious studio time.”
“I dunno, I’ve wasted plenty of it playing chess.” Ringo shrugged, knowing that as he wasn’t one the band’s song writers, he was often waiting around for other people to tell him what to do. He didn’t know why John was so insistent that Maggie race over here, just to have to sit and watch, when she had a company to run. Ringo always felt a little bit in awe of Maggie’s mental quickness - it was all he could do to keep up with her in conversation - between her interest in science and her knowledge of life in the future, he hardly knew what she was saying half the time. She had brought in a chessboard once though, and they’d starting playing regularly during breaks from recording, while John and Paul were busy arranging and composing. Chess he understood - he’d been a sickly child and had played lots of sedentary games. He’d always liked chess - and the fact that he was better than her at it helped level the playing field a bit.
George and Ringo wandered around trying office doors, until they found an open one with an available phone. Quickly, George rang Maggie’s office.
“Maggie Sue.” The voice on the other end sounded impatient, as if it didn’t welcome the interruption.
George held the receiver between himself and Ringo. Grinning, George made his voice higher to disguise it, comically unable to keep the Liverpool scouse out of it.
“Please, can we talk to Miss Margaret Susan of Apple Corps, L.T.D?” George spelled out the full name of their fledgling company.
“We’re ever such big Beatle fans,” Ringo squeaked into the phone. “Can we meet the Beatles, please?”
“We’d do anything,” George giggled. “And I mean anything!”
“Ringo’s me favorite!” Ringo managed to exclaim before he broke up laughing.
There was silence on the other end of the phone.
“Who is this??” Maggie Sue said in a mock serious tone, trying to keep the laughter out of her own voice.
But she couldn’t keep the laughter in any more than they could.
George finally caught his breath. “Miss Maggie Sue, it is midnight - and you were due here an hour ago,” he scolded.
“Oh no! It isn’t really midnight already, is it?”
“It most certainly is!” George’s voice lowered. “Seriously, Mags, you’d better get over here. John’s in a mood.”
George could hear Maggie digging around the papers stacked on her desk trying to unbury her clock. “Shit!” he heard her groan under her breath.
It was midnight and she’d told John she would make an effort to get to the studio at 11pm that night. She’d really wanted to be there too - John had told her they were recording his new one, “In the Life of…” tonight. Quickly, she’d figured out he’d meant “A Day in the Life”, but hadn’t corrected him at the time, wanting to see how he’d come up with the familiar title on his own. John amused her by being very particular about his titles. She badly wanted to be there to see the song recorded, but there was always so much work to be done at Apple Corps. She was in charge now and she owed it to the Beatles legacy to give them her best.
Tonight she’d spent the last few hours tapping numbers into an adding machine and wishing for the millionth time for a copy of Excel. Or a computer. Everything took so much TIME to do in the 1960's. The lack of the right technology for this job, added to the late hour had made her frustrated and tired. And now the ringing phone had interrupted her train of thought and she had lost the string of numbers she’d been adding. Her bad mood had dissipated though, when George and Ringo had called her. She’d been living amongst the Beatles for nearly a year now and she still found them entertaining. She didn’t know how they were able to turn the charm on like that. And off, as she’d sometimes found.
Like now, with John.
“Oh no!” She’d finally found her clock and verified the time.
“Oh, yes. He’s yelling at Paul as we speak. He’ll have gotten it out of his system by the time you get here, but I think you’ll owe Paul one for that.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can! Hopefully Paul will keep John distracted.”
It wasn’t just Mal that knew that anything John was upset about would blow over as soon as something else caught his attention. The last time John had started to make noise about Maggie being late, George had pointed out that it was looking like Paul was going to have more songs on the new album than he would. John had started mumbling something about circus posters and wandered off, Maggie’s lateness forgotten. He had been so involved in his new song idea that he hadn’t even noticed when Maggie had slipped in.
“Paul did his Vaudeville voice.” George said flatly. “He knows John hates that.”
Maggie laughed. “Well, John will be yelling for a while then. Just make sure you keep the glassware out of reach.”
“Good thought. I’d better go check on that.”
“Thanks for calling, George. I owe you one too!”
“You owe me more than one, luv! Looks like you’ll be joining us on our next trip to India, then?” George laughed and hung up.
India had been a bit of a bone of contention between them. Pattie and George had fallen in love with the country on their visit - all Maggie could envision was the poor and the indigent, the beggars and the starving children. She’d had friends visit India and come home shaken by the experience. Still, she knew the band’s future was tied up in it and there probably was no good way to get out of going.
Maggie grabbed her coat, locked up her office, and headed downstairs towards the main door of the Apple office building.
“Good evening, Miss,” Henry, the night guard said as she walked up to his counter. “Working late again?”
“Hello, Henry. Yep - busy as always. Would you mind calling a car for me?”
John had insisted that Maggie use a driver to transport her back and forth from the Apple office to EMI. They’d fought over it, as Maggie had deemed it an unnecessary expense. She could just take a cab, couldn’t she? No need to keep drivers sitting around waiting for a call. But since Maggie worked off hours and was often driving to the studio late at night, John had refused to back down on this issue.
“We have lots of money, luv,” he’d laughed. “Don’t worry about it!”
But that was just the problem. The Beatles had lots of money. But they also spent lots of it - and often generously. And she even admitted that some of it had to be done for tax purposes. She accepted that. But she wanted them to invest it wisely, not just throw it away.
The few fights Maggie and John had had so far were over money.
Maggie didn’t think a casual attitude towards money was a good way to live life. Not having had much of it as a grad student, she’d always kept track of her own spending, dutifully recording her expenditures in a computer program. She knew to the penny what she had. The Beatles didn’t seem to have any clue, other than that they had a lot.
She’d read about the Apple years and had been horrified how mismanaged this company had been. The Beatles were like children in so many ways, not having any idea how money worked or what value it had. They needed her, whether they knew it or not. She had a feeling they wouldn’t like some of the changes she planned on imposing at Apple, but it was too bad. It was for their own good. Like…being made to eat your vegetables.
As head of Apple Corps, she was swiftly finding that this was a job that could be all-consuming. John had understood her need to take this job at first. He knew Apple Corps needed someone they could trust to guard their interests and their money, but he also knew that she needed a purpose, something she could sink her teeth (and her brain) into. Maggie liked drawing a salary by working for it - she hadn’t the idea of being a kept woman. At home in her own time, she’d been a scientist and she’d supported herself fully. She wasn’t used to asking a man for spending money, something she’d had to do here, having no money of her own. John was only too glad to throw fistfuls at her, or to tell her to bill anything she wanted to Apple and the Beatles’ accountants. Beatles just didn’t deal with money. But that was going to change. And soon.
Maggie knew that she could catch the company before it started bleeding money, which she knew it would. It would positively hemorrhage. Her first week on the job, she’d dug into the expense reports to see exactly what was being charged to Apple. There was actually a fairly good record of these, because a good many people had been essentially living off the company since the day it had started. Which wasn’t even that long ago.
As a giant tax shelter, too many people looked at Apple as if it were an ATM. (Not that any of them knew what that was yet!) They’d simply submit an invoice, and whatever it was would be paid with no questions asked. There was simply no oversight and no one to care. Everybody wins with the Beatles footing the bill. While the band was just as bad, they worked damn hard for that money and she wasn’t going to let other people waste it. So, no more. All invoices were to go through her. If it wasn’t truly related to Apple and Beatle business, she wasn’t going to approve it. Approved ones would go to the accountants, the rest would be returned unpaid.
The first day of her second week, she’d drafted a memo and circulated it before she’d thrown down the hammer - she’d wanted to give fair warning, though she knew that her memo would make her unpopular regardless.
Derek Taylor, the Beatles’ press agent, had actually marched into her office and slammed it down on her desk, wanting to know what in hell she meant by it and who in the hell she thought she was. She’d explained it as simply as she could - from now on, business was business. She had the authority to act, and she intended to use it. Derek could like it or leave. However, it would be a shame for him to leave when he was due for a pay increase. That had caught his attention and he’d left her office slightly mollified.
In addition to looking at the invoices, she’d taken an inventory of the Beatles’ employees and their salaries. The Beatles may have lived it up, but Mal and Neil still only made 38 pounds a week. They were employees, but they were also underpaid for the value they had to the Beatles - and for what the Beatles often put them through. They were practically on duty twenty-four hours a day. She didn’t want them to feel owed later and try to take advantage of Apple, so she’d put through substantial pay raises for them. She’d also adjusted the salaries of many of the other employees, like Derek and others. The Beatles never thought of these things because they simply never had to think about money anymore. There were many trusted people here and they should be rewarded as long as they kept that trust. And maybe if people made more, they wouldn’t try to charge every little thing to the Beatles. Well, they might still try, but at least they could afford some of it on their own.
She’d also made note of which employees she considered deadweight and put them mentally on notice. She’d cut them if she had to. Maybe interview some new people.
Tonight she’d been making all sorts of notes. She wanted to audit the accounting department and explain her new policies on paying the invoices. She wanted to make sure all the numbers added up in the books. She also wanted to recruit one or two people to give the Beatles an overview of the company’s numbers, the Beatles’ worth, where their assets were, and what each Beatle’s expenditures were. They needed to be hip though. If they were boring, the Beatles attention would wander. She wondered if circus clowns might help. Or midgets. John liked midgets. Little people, she mentally corrected herself.
There was also the matter of Dick James publishing to be dealt with, and the fact the NEMS was taking 25% of what they made. And that terrible merchandising deal. And what EMI took. She should meet with Apple and the Beatles’ lawyers to get the figures from them and to explore their options. She remembered that Linda’s brother Lee had had some very sound advice on the Beatles’ investments, and that they hadn’t wanted to listen to it. She’d give him a call, and sound him out. She knew they could use his advice. She’d warn him to wear jeans and leave the preppy clothes at home. John hadn’t liked the look of him the first time out, which led to Bad Things. Like Allen Klein.
There was so much to do - so much that it was overwhelming. She knew she couldn’t do it alone, but she really wanted to get a feel for every aspect of the Beatles business and then try to assemble a team of people she could trust, and try to get things to the point where she just needed to have the team report to her. It was a big investment of time up front, but it would be worth it. She knew it wouldn’t be long before the Beatles would come to her wanting a clothing boutique or a record studio of their own. She’d give it to them if it was what they wanted, but they would do it the smart way. And she’d be damned before they handed out money to every freak who walked up and asked for it. They’d scout talent the right way. After all, one of the early Apple Corps talents had been James Taylor. Not all the ideas the Beatles had had been totally crazy - they just needed some guidance with the execution.
Juggling all this plus John, who could be very needy, had been difficult. But she’d actually tried to involve him as much as she could for the very reason that she didn’t want business to drive a wedge between them. She knew it could if she let it. But she also knew John respected her brain, and was even turned on by it. John was smart himself, even if he was easily manipulated, so she filled his head with her worries about the company and tried to make them his worries too. She wanted him (and the others) to care. It was their money, their company, their legacy; they should care what happened to it.
John was patient, but she knew his patience had a limit. The neediness again. Everything was fine until John needed her or wanted her and then he had to come first. Sometimes that was easy, other times, not so much. She knew most of the other Beatles wives and girlfriends put their men before themselves. While Ringo was in the studio, she knew Maureen would be at home preparing her man a feast that would be ready and waiting for his 3 AM return from the studio. And when Beatle women weren’t there for their men, like Jane, with her demanding schedule, it caused Problems. With a capital P.
Now it was her turn to cause problems. She’d promised to be at the studio early tonight, and she was an hour late. She cursed again, because she really had wanted to be there early. Missing out on A Day in the Life would be tragic. Fortunately, they’d still be working on it tomorrow. And they wouldn’t be recording the orchestra until early February. The final touch would come a bit later, when they added the final pianos. She wouldn’t miss that for the world. She wanted to be playing one of them. What good was being engaged to a Beatle if you couldn’t play a small part in the making of Sgt Pepper?
Though she frequently worked evenings, usually John didn’t mind terribly. He was busy with Paul in the studio most nights. Maggie and John had worked out a schedule where she’d be at Apple until around 10 PM, at which point, she’d head to the studio to play chess with Ringo, watch John and Paul be brilliant (she really didn’t want to miss that!), grab some sleep at home with John, and arrive back at Apple in time for a quick lunch, which she ate while her secretary, Jenny, updated her. Truthfully, she’d never been a morning person anyway - and as a grad student she’d kept an odd schedule, coming in late and working all night. The Beatles’ unusual hours were actually a natural fit.
Maggie had sworn she wouldn’t compromise her 21st century work ethic to be a 60's wife. She wouldn’t be at John’s beck and call. But she knew it was important to be there for him and not to put the company before her relationship. There was no point if she transformed Apple but lost John in the process.
Besides, in the end he was far more important to her then any business. She hoped he knew that.
----
Maggie raced down the hall to Studio 2, and peeked in. George, who had been keeping an eye out for her, saw her and motioned at the corner, where John was twanging away on his guitar. Paul was in the middle of the room pounding on the piano. Ringo was in another corner, which had been set up with a table for meals and tea, hands on his ears, stubbornly reading the book in front of him.
Maggie walked across the room and past Paul, who ignored her. She was really going to owe him one for this, she thought. She approached John, who was sitting facing away from her. Lightly placing her hands on his shoulder, Maggie leaned down and kissed his cheek. She didn’t linger long, deciding it was probably best to pull back, not yet knowing what she was to expect from John.
John turned and peered up at her through his granny glasses. He looked back down, nearly expressionlessly, put the guitar neatly on its stand and stood up. She looked up at him curiously, as he bent over her so they were eyeball to eyeball. John grabbed the briefcase from her hand, tossed it aside, and then picked her up and swung her around.
Kissing her full on the lips he growled at her, “You’re late!”
“Sorry,” she replied twining her fingers in his hair and pulling him down for more kisses. So it was to be passion of a good kind. That she could handle. She loved John when he was like this. Maggie very quickly derailed her train of thought when John set her roughly down and pressed her up against a wall and continued to kiss her hard and fast. She was gasping, he was panting, and his hands were everywhere at once. She was about to pull him down on the floor and finish it right there when suddenly a drumstick rebounded off the wall by their entwined bodies, very quickly reminding Maggie that they were NOT alone and had quite the audience.
“Get a room!” Paul bellowed. “The rest of us are here to work.”
“I’m not, mate,” Ringo quipped, “and I was quite enjoying the show.” He finished by waggling his eyebrows meaningfully at Maggie and John. Maggie blushed beet red, mortified.
“Disgusting!” George added. “You two are worse than animals.” But Maggie could see from his lopsided grin that he was just teasing.
John, who was laughing at this point, pulled Maggie up from the floor, and kissed her soundly one last time before heading back towards Paul. He kept Maggie’s hand firmly in his, though. “I need to work, luv, before Paul’s knickers stay permanently in a twist,” John whispered to Maggie conspiratorially.
“They are not in a twist!” Paul began before he realized what he’d just said. “Wait, that isn’t to say that I have knickers. What I meant was -“
“Not wearing any knickers?!!!” John yelled with glee, dropping Maggie’s hand and pouncing on Paul while making a grab for his trousers. “Let us see, you wanton hussy you!”
“John, get off,” Paul bellowed from underneath him frantically trying to keep his trousers safely UP.
Well, Maggie thought with a smirk, John seems to have gotten over his bad mood if he’s trying to get into Paul’s pants.
While John and Paul were wrestling, Ringo sidled up to Maggie and asked quietly, “So did you get a chance to look at the idea for the clothing boutique yet?
Ah yes, The Boutique. The sinkhole, the money pit, the bad move for Apple. Maggie had hoped they would forget about it, but from the cessation of noise on the floor, either John had succeeded in checking to see if Paul really had knickers on or not, or they were waiting for an answer.
Looking around the room, Maggie’s fears were confirmed, and she suddenly felt exhausted. John, Paul, George, & Ringo, The Beatles, she thought with a shiver, were staring at her with a mixture of expectation and anticipation.
They didn’t expect her to say no. After all, who said no to a Beatle?
The truth was, she didn’t want to say no to them, she just wanted to put some checks and balances into the store so that they wouldn’t be outright robbed!
Knowing she had their full attention, which was a rare thing these days, she began slowly, picking her words carefully. “It’s an interesting idea, Ringo. Though I’m not sure how profitable it would be -“
“Who cares about profits?” John asked bitingly, all trace of playfulness gone from his countenance.
Exhausted from the long days and longs hours spent at Apple, with apparently no comprehension from anyone about just how much work it truly was, Maggie snapped. “Well, for starters you should, John Lennon. Money doesn’t grow on trees. We can’t drop everything to pursue a hair-brained project, every time one of you has a whim. Just because you’re The Beatles, it doesn’t mean everything you touch is gold.” Ok, perhaps she’d gone a bit too far. Feeling instantly guilty she opened her mouth to soften her words, but John beat her to it.
“We do this because we like it, not for the money,” John began angrily. “That’s all you care about these days, Maggie. Money, money, money. Where’s it going? Who’s spending it? How’s it being spent? How can we earn more? Christ, you’d think you cared more for five quid than the music, Maggie. Than you care for me. You’re always going on about money, girl and it’s becoming a bit of a drag.”
Maggie could feel the tears pricking the corners of her eyes. Tears of anger and shame. She couldn’t believe that John actually felt this way, after all her efforts to make him care about his own company, and more, that he would talk to her and embarrass her like this in front of the others, her friends. And she was just trying to help them. In fact, they always seemed to forget that she’d in fact given up everything for them. For John.
The other Beatles were pointedly looking anywhere but at Maggie and John. Ringo was pretending to read an upside down book, Paul was plunking away at a discordant tune on the piano, and George had simply melted into a corner and was pretending to be asleep.
Wiping at the corners of her eyes, Maggie angrily responded back at John. “Well, if I’m such a drag, then I suppose I’m off!” and promptly turned on her heel and marched out the door.
As soon as she was clear of the room she let the tears fall freely.
~~~~~~~
John found her sitting in their hallway staring at his picture. The picture. The one that had brought her back and then nearly taken her away from him. Panicking, he raced to her side and wrapped steely fingers around her wrist in a vise grip.
“Just what do you think you are doing?!” he demanded as he stared into her red-rimmed eyes. She’d been crying. John felt like an even bigger jerk then before. He prided himself on his razor wit, and the skill with which he wielded it, but it was easy to forget that the end result was usually hurting someone he loved, and he never wanted to hurt Maggie.
Maggie weakly tried to pull her wrist from his grip, and when he didn’t relent, her shoulders slumped. “Nothing.”
“What?” he asked, more gently this time.
“Nothing. I wasn’t doing anything. I couldn’t leave you even if I tried at this point, John. This is where I want to be. Need to be. It doesn’t work on a whim,” she said resting her chin in her free hand, and looked at him out of the corner of her eyes. “Besides, I wasn’t trying to leave. I told you I wouldn’t do that again.”
Relaxing his grip on her wrist and breathing a sigh of relief, John settled down next to her. “Then why are you here?” he asked, truly confused.
In response Maggie just smiled sheepishly at him. “Honestly? I don’t know. I just like looking at that picture of John Lennon. I always did have a crush on him.”
Chuckling a little at that, John reached out and pulled her into his arms. “I also hear he’s your favorite Beatle.”
“Yes!” she quickly responded, snuggling deeper into his arms. “Even more then George, and that’s saying something!”
“I’d better be your favorite,” he growled playfully, and then buried his face into her hair inhaling deeply. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“I’m sor-“
“No, let me finish,” John interrupted. “I know that you are just trying to help us, and that you need something be “just yours” and that’s Apple. I guess, I don’t know, I just hoped that maybe me being “just yours” would be enough. And I miss you girl. You’re gone so much and work such long hours. It’s only money, luv. They print it every day. You shouldn’t worry so much about it, about everything. I know, I know…. I’m a selfish, moody beast, but I can’t help it. I just want to be with you.”
Any thoughts or counter-arguments that Maggie had faded away to the back of her mind. She knew that they still hadn’t resolved this issue, and probably never would completely resolve it, but right now she and John just needed to be together.
Smiling up at him, Maggie leaned in for a kiss. It was soft and gentle, and she fluttered light kisses to the corner of his mouth, up his jawline, and then pausing at his ear, she whispered, “Nothing is more important to me then you. Nothing.” And she meant it.
Pulling back slightly to look her full in the eyes, John stared for a moment, and seeing the truth of her words, simply said “Good!” before kissing her fully on the lips, suddenly reigniting their passion from earlier in the evening.
Before she even realized what was going on they were kissing frantically, tugging at clothes, and Maggie was pulling John down on the floor while he was pushing her down at the same time. They may have had a hard time agreeing on ideas today, but clearly their bodies were working in harmony.
John was tugging her skirt up roughly and Maggie was fumbling with the zipper on his trousers when suddenly cold water splashed on them.
Paul was looming over them, a wicked grin on his face. “Oy, get on home for that you two. This is a proper place here! George was right. You ARE animals!”
John scooped Maggie up and threw her over his shoulder without a word, and started to trot off towards the exit while Maggie called out to Paul, “We’re even now, buddy!” Paul came to attention and tossed off a smart salute at Maggie as she and John rounded the corner and were out of Paul’s sight.
John found an unlocked office, set her down inside, locked the door firmly behind him, and then, leering at her like a lecherous old man asked, “Now where were we, dearie?”
“Right where we’re supposed to be.” She laughed and held out her arms out to him.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Authors' Note: So.... Geez john, moody much? And sounds to us like you got a bit of a crush on Paulie... I mean SRSLY what's up with the obsession with his underwear?
ANYWAYS, I think perhaps this is the last short story before, you know, we actually get to writing that sequel with THE EVIL YOKO that we've been promising you for the last little while...
Love you guys & all your wonderful comments!
Continue to the first chapter of the Sequel to "Yes It Is", "Tomorrow Never Knows"!
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Title: A Day in the Life
Authors: pennylane_fic, jenny_wren28 & lovely_rita_mm
Starring: The Beatles and Maggie Sue
Rating: R for language, sex, & implied drug use.
Disclaimer: We don’t own any of the Beatles, this obviously never happened, and much to the real Maggie’s disappointment, is a complete work of fiction.
READERS (if we have any left because we wait so painfully long between updates... I know, we suck... forgive us?)
ANYWAYS here is a new Maggie Sue adventure for you! And all 4 Beatles are in this one. And some romance... and and and... well, we just hope the REAL Maggie Sue likes what we've done here. ;)
So, dearest readers, turn off your mind, relax and join Maggie Sue on another one of her Beatle adventures.....
Previous updates located HERE!
A Day in the Life
January 19, 1967, 11:55pm
A guitar strummed, an organ sounded long tones, a piano tinkled a few experimental notes.
“Sugarplum fairy, sugarplum fairy…” John counted in and then started singing as he strummed softly. Paul gently shook maracas in the background, giving extra rhythm to what John was playing on his guitar.
“I read the news today, oh boy. About a lucky man who made the grade…” John sang, remembering not long ago when he had found the news article that had inspired the song. He’d read it aloud at breakfast, only to watch his fiancé turn pale and sit down heavily. He’d thought it was a slight overreaction on Maggie’s part as she hadn’t known Tara Brown. Did she feel guilty for not saving the lives of all the Beatles’ acquaintances too?
It wasn’t until a few days later, when she’d had the same dramatic reaction to a much less tragic newspaper blurb he’d read her from the Daily Mail about 4000 pot holes being discovered in Blackburn, Lancashire, that John realized what was going on.
“And though the news was rather sad…”
It had become a kind of game now, figuring out exactly what she was reacting to, how serious it was, and how whatever it was would be woven into the tapestry of the Beatles legend. He’d sometimes badger her to tell him what was coming, but often she’d just shake her head, refusing to give it away.
John was a bit torn - he wanted to know about the future, but the more he knew, the more the legacy of the Beatles pressed, suffocating him. To him, the Beatles were just a band, but having seen a bit of the future, John now knew for a fact that the Beatles were going to be more than that. And that meant pressure to create something that would stand up to the iconic status the band incredibly still had 40 years on. Frankly, John didn’t always want to be bothered with this responsibility.
While the Beatles’ success was something he had worked long and hard to achieve, at the end of the day, John had to admit he was lazy. Writing songs was something that was easy to him, a kind of lark. Something he and Paul had done together so many years, simply because they could. They were just a band, he kept telling himself. Sometimes, if he repeated it enough, he could almost believe it. Then Maggie would have one of her odd spells and he would be reminded that they had met for the first time only because of this future legacy. Sometimes, when it was too much, he simply figured that whatever he had come up with musically must have been good enough or Maggie never would have come back to him in the first place. The thought that the second time she came back had been purely for him, and had nothing whatsoever to do with music thrilled him deep down. She may be a bit mad for the music of the Beatles like so many other fans, but there was no doubt she was different. And she was all his. He felt warmth run through his body. He wanted her. Right now!
He tried to focus.
“...well I just had to laugh…I saw the photograph…”
It’d been a photograph of him that brought Maggie back in time - it still hung in one of the labyrinthine hallways of EMI. He looked at it every now and again, just to reassure himself that it was still there. An odd sense of responsibility came with that picture. It needed to still be there, waiting for Maggie to walk past it in 2006. If it wasn’t, would he somehow lose her? The rules of time travel and possible futures still confused him.
“I saw a film today, oh boy…The English army had just won the war…”
He liked this reference to the film project he’d just recently finished. It was while on location that he picked up his latest pair of glasses, surprising himself that he’d finally found a pair he didn’t feel ridiculous in. He felt a bit foolish that they were much like the glasses he'd refused to wear as a child. Maggie had taken a funny turn the second she’d seen them too. Very strange it was, seeing these flashes of the future in her eyes.
“1...2...3...4…”
John’s mind wandered as Mal counted. Where was she? Maggie was supposed to have been here an hour ago.
“…13...14…15…”
She’d been putting in long hours, he knew - and he was proud of the work she was doing. Apple needed her. The Beatles need her. Hell, HE needed her. And that was just it. HE needed her - and where was she? Off shuffling papers. Not for the first time, John felt himself scowl.
“…21…22…23…24…”
At the sound of an alarm, John looked up, catching sight of Mal clutching a ringing clock. Mal smiled sheepishly at him as he shut it off. John shook his head. They’d never be able to get that off the tape. What was once a good mood was quickly becoming soured.
The placeholder bars to Paul’s middle eight were counted off, and then John sang the last verse - the bit about the holes he’d read about in the paper filling the Albert Hall. John loved this verse, but even its nonsensicality wasn’t enough to cheer him. Where was she?!
Once George Martin had given the signal that he had stopped recording, John put his guitar down, a little harder than he had intended to, and stalked over towards Paul who had just slid onto the piano bench. Mal had seen that John was in a mood and had already scooted out the door figuring he’d hide out at the pub until the current Lennon temper tantrum had blown over. He knew from experience that by the time he returned, John would have forgotten about whatever had driven Mal away in the first place.
John slammed his fist down on top of the piano. “Well, that was complete shite, Macca. And what in the hell got into Mal with setting off that clock?”
“What? I thought the song was coming together nicely.” Paul’s mental alarms were going off - he could see John was in one of his moods. Glancing at John out of the corner of his eye, Paul quickly picked up the glass he’d been drinking from and moved it out of John’s range.
Now that that threat wasn’t present, Paul turned back to the piano, neatly ran his fingers over the keys of the piano, and started singing, “Woke up, got out of bed…dragged a comb across my head…” in his best Vaudeville voice. He knew John hated when he did that, but he thought that maybe his best bet was provoke John to just explode and get it out of his system, otherwise he’d be stuck listening to him simmer and snipe for the rest of the night. They had planned to work until 2:30 am, and he didn’t want to waste the studio time. And, truth be told, deep down, Paul really just enjoyed provoking John.
“The alarm clock works quite nicely with what I’d written, doesn’t it?” Paul said mildly, keeping his eyes focused on the piano keys in order to avoid John’s gaze. “I think I quite like it there.”
John watched as that typical, smug expression cross Paul’s face and he knew Paul was pleased with himself. It infuriated him - that and Paul’s insistence on hamming up half his songs. He knew Paul was angling to have “When I’m 64” included on the album. He hated that song too. John opened his mouth to let Paul have it.
George watched in dismay from across the room as he saw the stormy expression move across John’s face, and knew what John was about to unleash on a seemingly unsuspecting Paul. John had been in a perfectly good mood all night - this sulk had come on rather suddenly. Actually, George could pinpoint it to somewhere around the end of verse two, when John had looked up to check the time.
Maggie was late again.
He’d better go call her to see what was keeping her and to warn her about John. George ducked out of the studio to go find a phone. After years of experiencing Lennon and McCartney brawls, George knew that he had plenty of time to kill.
“Where are you going, mate?” Ringo was right behind him. “You’re not leaving me in here with that, are you?" Ringo followed George out the door and into the hallway. "What’s got John this time?”
“Maggie’s late.” George said briefly. “I’m sure she just lost track of time again - but if she doesn’t get her arse here soon…”
“Maybe John will be done in by the time she gets here.”
George nodded. “I think that might have been Paul’s plan. Sometimes it’s best if John gets it all out and then we can get on with things. Paul hates wasting his precious studio time.”
“I dunno, I’ve wasted plenty of it playing chess.” Ringo shrugged, knowing that as he wasn’t one the band’s song writers, he was often waiting around for other people to tell him what to do. He didn’t know why John was so insistent that Maggie race over here, just to have to sit and watch, when she had a company to run. Ringo always felt a little bit in awe of Maggie’s mental quickness - it was all he could do to keep up with her in conversation - between her interest in science and her knowledge of life in the future, he hardly knew what she was saying half the time. She had brought in a chessboard once though, and they’d starting playing regularly during breaks from recording, while John and Paul were busy arranging and composing. Chess he understood - he’d been a sickly child and had played lots of sedentary games. He’d always liked chess - and the fact that he was better than her at it helped level the playing field a bit.
George and Ringo wandered around trying office doors, until they found an open one with an available phone. Quickly, George rang Maggie’s office.
“Maggie Sue.” The voice on the other end sounded impatient, as if it didn’t welcome the interruption.
George held the receiver between himself and Ringo. Grinning, George made his voice higher to disguise it, comically unable to keep the Liverpool scouse out of it.
“Please, can we talk to Miss Margaret Susan of Apple Corps, L.T.D?” George spelled out the full name of their fledgling company.
“We’re ever such big Beatle fans,” Ringo squeaked into the phone. “Can we meet the Beatles, please?”
“We’d do anything,” George giggled. “And I mean anything!”
“Ringo’s me favorite!” Ringo managed to exclaim before he broke up laughing.
There was silence on the other end of the phone.
“Who is this??” Maggie Sue said in a mock serious tone, trying to keep the laughter out of her own voice.
But she couldn’t keep the laughter in any more than they could.
George finally caught his breath. “Miss Maggie Sue, it is midnight - and you were due here an hour ago,” he scolded.
“Oh no! It isn’t really midnight already, is it?”
“It most certainly is!” George’s voice lowered. “Seriously, Mags, you’d better get over here. John’s in a mood.”
George could hear Maggie digging around the papers stacked on her desk trying to unbury her clock. “Shit!” he heard her groan under her breath.
It was midnight and she’d told John she would make an effort to get to the studio at 11pm that night. She’d really wanted to be there too - John had told her they were recording his new one, “In the Life of…” tonight. Quickly, she’d figured out he’d meant “A Day in the Life”, but hadn’t corrected him at the time, wanting to see how he’d come up with the familiar title on his own. John amused her by being very particular about his titles. She badly wanted to be there to see the song recorded, but there was always so much work to be done at Apple Corps. She was in charge now and she owed it to the Beatles legacy to give them her best.
Tonight she’d spent the last few hours tapping numbers into an adding machine and wishing for the millionth time for a copy of Excel. Or a computer. Everything took so much TIME to do in the 1960's. The lack of the right technology for this job, added to the late hour had made her frustrated and tired. And now the ringing phone had interrupted her train of thought and she had lost the string of numbers she’d been adding. Her bad mood had dissipated though, when George and Ringo had called her. She’d been living amongst the Beatles for nearly a year now and she still found them entertaining. She didn’t know how they were able to turn the charm on like that. And off, as she’d sometimes found.
Like now, with John.
“Oh no!” She’d finally found her clock and verified the time.
“Oh, yes. He’s yelling at Paul as we speak. He’ll have gotten it out of his system by the time you get here, but I think you’ll owe Paul one for that.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can! Hopefully Paul will keep John distracted.”
It wasn’t just Mal that knew that anything John was upset about would blow over as soon as something else caught his attention. The last time John had started to make noise about Maggie being late, George had pointed out that it was looking like Paul was going to have more songs on the new album than he would. John had started mumbling something about circus posters and wandered off, Maggie’s lateness forgotten. He had been so involved in his new song idea that he hadn’t even noticed when Maggie had slipped in.
“Paul did his Vaudeville voice.” George said flatly. “He knows John hates that.”
Maggie laughed. “Well, John will be yelling for a while then. Just make sure you keep the glassware out of reach.”
“Good thought. I’d better go check on that.”
“Thanks for calling, George. I owe you one too!”
“You owe me more than one, luv! Looks like you’ll be joining us on our next trip to India, then?” George laughed and hung up.
India had been a bit of a bone of contention between them. Pattie and George had fallen in love with the country on their visit - all Maggie could envision was the poor and the indigent, the beggars and the starving children. She’d had friends visit India and come home shaken by the experience. Still, she knew the band’s future was tied up in it and there probably was no good way to get out of going.
Maggie grabbed her coat, locked up her office, and headed downstairs towards the main door of the Apple office building.
“Good evening, Miss,” Henry, the night guard said as she walked up to his counter. “Working late again?”
“Hello, Henry. Yep - busy as always. Would you mind calling a car for me?”
John had insisted that Maggie use a driver to transport her back and forth from the Apple office to EMI. They’d fought over it, as Maggie had deemed it an unnecessary expense. She could just take a cab, couldn’t she? No need to keep drivers sitting around waiting for a call. But since Maggie worked off hours and was often driving to the studio late at night, John had refused to back down on this issue.
“We have lots of money, luv,” he’d laughed. “Don’t worry about it!”
But that was just the problem. The Beatles had lots of money. But they also spent lots of it - and often generously. And she even admitted that some of it had to be done for tax purposes. She accepted that. But she wanted them to invest it wisely, not just throw it away.
The few fights Maggie and John had had so far were over money.
Maggie didn’t think a casual attitude towards money was a good way to live life. Not having had much of it as a grad student, she’d always kept track of her own spending, dutifully recording her expenditures in a computer program. She knew to the penny what she had. The Beatles didn’t seem to have any clue, other than that they had a lot.
She’d read about the Apple years and had been horrified how mismanaged this company had been. The Beatles were like children in so many ways, not having any idea how money worked or what value it had. They needed her, whether they knew it or not. She had a feeling they wouldn’t like some of the changes she planned on imposing at Apple, but it was too bad. It was for their own good. Like…being made to eat your vegetables.
As head of Apple Corps, she was swiftly finding that this was a job that could be all-consuming. John had understood her need to take this job at first. He knew Apple Corps needed someone they could trust to guard their interests and their money, but he also knew that she needed a purpose, something she could sink her teeth (and her brain) into. Maggie liked drawing a salary by working for it - she hadn’t the idea of being a kept woman. At home in her own time, she’d been a scientist and she’d supported herself fully. She wasn’t used to asking a man for spending money, something she’d had to do here, having no money of her own. John was only too glad to throw fistfuls at her, or to tell her to bill anything she wanted to Apple and the Beatles’ accountants. Beatles just didn’t deal with money. But that was going to change. And soon.
Maggie knew that she could catch the company before it started bleeding money, which she knew it would. It would positively hemorrhage. Her first week on the job, she’d dug into the expense reports to see exactly what was being charged to Apple. There was actually a fairly good record of these, because a good many people had been essentially living off the company since the day it had started. Which wasn’t even that long ago.
As a giant tax shelter, too many people looked at Apple as if it were an ATM. (Not that any of them knew what that was yet!) They’d simply submit an invoice, and whatever it was would be paid with no questions asked. There was simply no oversight and no one to care. Everybody wins with the Beatles footing the bill. While the band was just as bad, they worked damn hard for that money and she wasn’t going to let other people waste it. So, no more. All invoices were to go through her. If it wasn’t truly related to Apple and Beatle business, she wasn’t going to approve it. Approved ones would go to the accountants, the rest would be returned unpaid.
The first day of her second week, she’d drafted a memo and circulated it before she’d thrown down the hammer - she’d wanted to give fair warning, though she knew that her memo would make her unpopular regardless.
Derek Taylor, the Beatles’ press agent, had actually marched into her office and slammed it down on her desk, wanting to know what in hell she meant by it and who in the hell she thought she was. She’d explained it as simply as she could - from now on, business was business. She had the authority to act, and she intended to use it. Derek could like it or leave. However, it would be a shame for him to leave when he was due for a pay increase. That had caught his attention and he’d left her office slightly mollified.
In addition to looking at the invoices, she’d taken an inventory of the Beatles’ employees and their salaries. The Beatles may have lived it up, but Mal and Neil still only made 38 pounds a week. They were employees, but they were also underpaid for the value they had to the Beatles - and for what the Beatles often put them through. They were practically on duty twenty-four hours a day. She didn’t want them to feel owed later and try to take advantage of Apple, so she’d put through substantial pay raises for them. She’d also adjusted the salaries of many of the other employees, like Derek and others. The Beatles never thought of these things because they simply never had to think about money anymore. There were many trusted people here and they should be rewarded as long as they kept that trust. And maybe if people made more, they wouldn’t try to charge every little thing to the Beatles. Well, they might still try, but at least they could afford some of it on their own.
She’d also made note of which employees she considered deadweight and put them mentally on notice. She’d cut them if she had to. Maybe interview some new people.
Tonight she’d been making all sorts of notes. She wanted to audit the accounting department and explain her new policies on paying the invoices. She wanted to make sure all the numbers added up in the books. She also wanted to recruit one or two people to give the Beatles an overview of the company’s numbers, the Beatles’ worth, where their assets were, and what each Beatle’s expenditures were. They needed to be hip though. If they were boring, the Beatles attention would wander. She wondered if circus clowns might help. Or midgets. John liked midgets. Little people, she mentally corrected herself.
There was also the matter of Dick James publishing to be dealt with, and the fact the NEMS was taking 25% of what they made. And that terrible merchandising deal. And what EMI took. She should meet with Apple and the Beatles’ lawyers to get the figures from them and to explore their options. She remembered that Linda’s brother Lee had had some very sound advice on the Beatles’ investments, and that they hadn’t wanted to listen to it. She’d give him a call, and sound him out. She knew they could use his advice. She’d warn him to wear jeans and leave the preppy clothes at home. John hadn’t liked the look of him the first time out, which led to Bad Things. Like Allen Klein.
There was so much to do - so much that it was overwhelming. She knew she couldn’t do it alone, but she really wanted to get a feel for every aspect of the Beatles business and then try to assemble a team of people she could trust, and try to get things to the point where she just needed to have the team report to her. It was a big investment of time up front, but it would be worth it. She knew it wouldn’t be long before the Beatles would come to her wanting a clothing boutique or a record studio of their own. She’d give it to them if it was what they wanted, but they would do it the smart way. And she’d be damned before they handed out money to every freak who walked up and asked for it. They’d scout talent the right way. After all, one of the early Apple Corps talents had been James Taylor. Not all the ideas the Beatles had had been totally crazy - they just needed some guidance with the execution.
Juggling all this plus John, who could be very needy, had been difficult. But she’d actually tried to involve him as much as she could for the very reason that she didn’t want business to drive a wedge between them. She knew it could if she let it. But she also knew John respected her brain, and was even turned on by it. John was smart himself, even if he was easily manipulated, so she filled his head with her worries about the company and tried to make them his worries too. She wanted him (and the others) to care. It was their money, their company, their legacy; they should care what happened to it.
John was patient, but she knew his patience had a limit. The neediness again. Everything was fine until John needed her or wanted her and then he had to come first. Sometimes that was easy, other times, not so much. She knew most of the other Beatles wives and girlfriends put their men before themselves. While Ringo was in the studio, she knew Maureen would be at home preparing her man a feast that would be ready and waiting for his 3 AM return from the studio. And when Beatle women weren’t there for their men, like Jane, with her demanding schedule, it caused Problems. With a capital P.
Now it was her turn to cause problems. She’d promised to be at the studio early tonight, and she was an hour late. She cursed again, because she really had wanted to be there early. Missing out on A Day in the Life would be tragic. Fortunately, they’d still be working on it tomorrow. And they wouldn’t be recording the orchestra until early February. The final touch would come a bit later, when they added the final pianos. She wouldn’t miss that for the world. She wanted to be playing one of them. What good was being engaged to a Beatle if you couldn’t play a small part in the making of Sgt Pepper?
Though she frequently worked evenings, usually John didn’t mind terribly. He was busy with Paul in the studio most nights. Maggie and John had worked out a schedule where she’d be at Apple until around 10 PM, at which point, she’d head to the studio to play chess with Ringo, watch John and Paul be brilliant (she really didn’t want to miss that!), grab some sleep at home with John, and arrive back at Apple in time for a quick lunch, which she ate while her secretary, Jenny, updated her. Truthfully, she’d never been a morning person anyway - and as a grad student she’d kept an odd schedule, coming in late and working all night. The Beatles’ unusual hours were actually a natural fit.
Maggie had sworn she wouldn’t compromise her 21st century work ethic to be a 60's wife. She wouldn’t be at John’s beck and call. But she knew it was important to be there for him and not to put the company before her relationship. There was no point if she transformed Apple but lost John in the process.
Besides, in the end he was far more important to her then any business. She hoped he knew that.
----
Maggie raced down the hall to Studio 2, and peeked in. George, who had been keeping an eye out for her, saw her and motioned at the corner, where John was twanging away on his guitar. Paul was in the middle of the room pounding on the piano. Ringo was in another corner, which had been set up with a table for meals and tea, hands on his ears, stubbornly reading the book in front of him.
Maggie walked across the room and past Paul, who ignored her. She was really going to owe him one for this, she thought. She approached John, who was sitting facing away from her. Lightly placing her hands on his shoulder, Maggie leaned down and kissed his cheek. She didn’t linger long, deciding it was probably best to pull back, not yet knowing what she was to expect from John.
John turned and peered up at her through his granny glasses. He looked back down, nearly expressionlessly, put the guitar neatly on its stand and stood up. She looked up at him curiously, as he bent over her so they were eyeball to eyeball. John grabbed the briefcase from her hand, tossed it aside, and then picked her up and swung her around.
Kissing her full on the lips he growled at her, “You’re late!”
“Sorry,” she replied twining her fingers in his hair and pulling him down for more kisses. So it was to be passion of a good kind. That she could handle. She loved John when he was like this. Maggie very quickly derailed her train of thought when John set her roughly down and pressed her up against a wall and continued to kiss her hard and fast. She was gasping, he was panting, and his hands were everywhere at once. She was about to pull him down on the floor and finish it right there when suddenly a drumstick rebounded off the wall by their entwined bodies, very quickly reminding Maggie that they were NOT alone and had quite the audience.
“Get a room!” Paul bellowed. “The rest of us are here to work.”
“I’m not, mate,” Ringo quipped, “and I was quite enjoying the show.” He finished by waggling his eyebrows meaningfully at Maggie and John. Maggie blushed beet red, mortified.
“Disgusting!” George added. “You two are worse than animals.” But Maggie could see from his lopsided grin that he was just teasing.
John, who was laughing at this point, pulled Maggie up from the floor, and kissed her soundly one last time before heading back towards Paul. He kept Maggie’s hand firmly in his, though. “I need to work, luv, before Paul’s knickers stay permanently in a twist,” John whispered to Maggie conspiratorially.
“They are not in a twist!” Paul began before he realized what he’d just said. “Wait, that isn’t to say that I have knickers. What I meant was -“
“Not wearing any knickers?!!!” John yelled with glee, dropping Maggie’s hand and pouncing on Paul while making a grab for his trousers. “Let us see, you wanton hussy you!”
“John, get off,” Paul bellowed from underneath him frantically trying to keep his trousers safely UP.
Well, Maggie thought with a smirk, John seems to have gotten over his bad mood if he’s trying to get into Paul’s pants.
While John and Paul were wrestling, Ringo sidled up to Maggie and asked quietly, “So did you get a chance to look at the idea for the clothing boutique yet?
Ah yes, The Boutique. The sinkhole, the money pit, the bad move for Apple. Maggie had hoped they would forget about it, but from the cessation of noise on the floor, either John had succeeded in checking to see if Paul really had knickers on or not, or they were waiting for an answer.
Looking around the room, Maggie’s fears were confirmed, and she suddenly felt exhausted. John, Paul, George, & Ringo, The Beatles, she thought with a shiver, were staring at her with a mixture of expectation and anticipation.
They didn’t expect her to say no. After all, who said no to a Beatle?
The truth was, she didn’t want to say no to them, she just wanted to put some checks and balances into the store so that they wouldn’t be outright robbed!
Knowing she had their full attention, which was a rare thing these days, she began slowly, picking her words carefully. “It’s an interesting idea, Ringo. Though I’m not sure how profitable it would be -“
“Who cares about profits?” John asked bitingly, all trace of playfulness gone from his countenance.
Exhausted from the long days and longs hours spent at Apple, with apparently no comprehension from anyone about just how much work it truly was, Maggie snapped. “Well, for starters you should, John Lennon. Money doesn’t grow on trees. We can’t drop everything to pursue a hair-brained project, every time one of you has a whim. Just because you’re The Beatles, it doesn’t mean everything you touch is gold.” Ok, perhaps she’d gone a bit too far. Feeling instantly guilty she opened her mouth to soften her words, but John beat her to it.
“We do this because we like it, not for the money,” John began angrily. “That’s all you care about these days, Maggie. Money, money, money. Where’s it going? Who’s spending it? How’s it being spent? How can we earn more? Christ, you’d think you cared more for five quid than the music, Maggie. Than you care for me. You’re always going on about money, girl and it’s becoming a bit of a drag.”
Maggie could feel the tears pricking the corners of her eyes. Tears of anger and shame. She couldn’t believe that John actually felt this way, after all her efforts to make him care about his own company, and more, that he would talk to her and embarrass her like this in front of the others, her friends. And she was just trying to help them. In fact, they always seemed to forget that she’d in fact given up everything for them. For John.
The other Beatles were pointedly looking anywhere but at Maggie and John. Ringo was pretending to read an upside down book, Paul was plunking away at a discordant tune on the piano, and George had simply melted into a corner and was pretending to be asleep.
Wiping at the corners of her eyes, Maggie angrily responded back at John. “Well, if I’m such a drag, then I suppose I’m off!” and promptly turned on her heel and marched out the door.
As soon as she was clear of the room she let the tears fall freely.
~~~~~~~
John found her sitting in their hallway staring at his picture. The picture. The one that had brought her back and then nearly taken her away from him. Panicking, he raced to her side and wrapped steely fingers around her wrist in a vise grip.
“Just what do you think you are doing?!” he demanded as he stared into her red-rimmed eyes. She’d been crying. John felt like an even bigger jerk then before. He prided himself on his razor wit, and the skill with which he wielded it, but it was easy to forget that the end result was usually hurting someone he loved, and he never wanted to hurt Maggie.
Maggie weakly tried to pull her wrist from his grip, and when he didn’t relent, her shoulders slumped. “Nothing.”
“What?” he asked, more gently this time.
“Nothing. I wasn’t doing anything. I couldn’t leave you even if I tried at this point, John. This is where I want to be. Need to be. It doesn’t work on a whim,” she said resting her chin in her free hand, and looked at him out of the corner of her eyes. “Besides, I wasn’t trying to leave. I told you I wouldn’t do that again.”
Relaxing his grip on her wrist and breathing a sigh of relief, John settled down next to her. “Then why are you here?” he asked, truly confused.
In response Maggie just smiled sheepishly at him. “Honestly? I don’t know. I just like looking at that picture of John Lennon. I always did have a crush on him.”
Chuckling a little at that, John reached out and pulled her into his arms. “I also hear he’s your favorite Beatle.”
“Yes!” she quickly responded, snuggling deeper into his arms. “Even more then George, and that’s saying something!”
“I’d better be your favorite,” he growled playfully, and then buried his face into her hair inhaling deeply. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“I’m sor-“
“No, let me finish,” John interrupted. “I know that you are just trying to help us, and that you need something be “just yours” and that’s Apple. I guess, I don’t know, I just hoped that maybe me being “just yours” would be enough. And I miss you girl. You’re gone so much and work such long hours. It’s only money, luv. They print it every day. You shouldn’t worry so much about it, about everything. I know, I know…. I’m a selfish, moody beast, but I can’t help it. I just want to be with you.”
Any thoughts or counter-arguments that Maggie had faded away to the back of her mind. She knew that they still hadn’t resolved this issue, and probably never would completely resolve it, but right now she and John just needed to be together.
Smiling up at him, Maggie leaned in for a kiss. It was soft and gentle, and she fluttered light kisses to the corner of his mouth, up his jawline, and then pausing at his ear, she whispered, “Nothing is more important to me then you. Nothing.” And she meant it.
Pulling back slightly to look her full in the eyes, John stared for a moment, and seeing the truth of her words, simply said “Good!” before kissing her fully on the lips, suddenly reigniting their passion from earlier in the evening.
Before she even realized what was going on they were kissing frantically, tugging at clothes, and Maggie was pulling John down on the floor while he was pushing her down at the same time. They may have had a hard time agreeing on ideas today, but clearly their bodies were working in harmony.
John was tugging her skirt up roughly and Maggie was fumbling with the zipper on his trousers when suddenly cold water splashed on them.
Paul was looming over them, a wicked grin on his face. “Oy, get on home for that you two. This is a proper place here! George was right. You ARE animals!”
John scooped Maggie up and threw her over his shoulder without a word, and started to trot off towards the exit while Maggie called out to Paul, “We’re even now, buddy!” Paul came to attention and tossed off a smart salute at Maggie as she and John rounded the corner and were out of Paul’s sight.
John found an unlocked office, set her down inside, locked the door firmly behind him, and then, leering at her like a lecherous old man asked, “Now where were we, dearie?”
“Right where we’re supposed to be.” She laughed and held out her arms out to him.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Authors' Note: So.... Geez john, moody much? And sounds to us like you got a bit of a crush on Paulie... I mean SRSLY what's up with the obsession with his underwear?
ANYWAYS, I think perhaps this is the last short story before, you know, we actually get to writing that sequel with THE EVIL YOKO that we've been promising you for the last little while...
Love you guys & all your wonderful comments!
Continue to the first chapter of the Sequel to "Yes It Is", "Tomorrow Never Knows"!
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