Chapter Seventeen

"So… is anything else going on for the rest of the day?" I asked upon our arrival upstairs. By that point it was just after three o'clock in the afternoon. We still had a whole day and night full of free time in front of us.

Brian shook his head, rubbing his eyes tiredly. Wow; lately he'd looked like he was in really bad shape from the stress-even the Beatles didn't look that worn out, and they were the ones that did all the running around and sweating about ten pounds off every night on stage. "I'm going to lie down," he said quietly, reaching into his pocket for a bottle of prescription pills that he always lugged around with him.

"Hey, Nell," George said to Neil as we walked down the hall to the suite, "how about getting us some birds to entertain us for the evening?"

I glanced over at Paul, who kind of wished that George hadn't made such a request; obviously he didn't want a repetition of what had happened last week!

"All right," Neil said, turning around and heading back to the elevator. "They shouldn't be hard to find here in New York…"

I frowned a little as we entered the room; I didn't want to hang around and watch another orgy going on! Plus this time there really wasn't any way to escape it; they'd have their little party in the common room in the suite, so there was no getting away from it.

Paul reached over and took hold of my hand. He must have noticed that I looked a little glum all of a sudden. "What's wrong?" he whispered.

I shrugged, then stood on my tiptoes and whispered back, "Paul, I really don't want to be around if they're going to… you know… last time it just caused problems…"

He nodded as the others crashed into the soft couch that I'd been sitting on earlier. "Okay…I was just thinking the same thing, luv," he replied in a normal voice. "Let's just get out of here, then."

"And go where?" I asked, crossing my arms. "We can't get out of the hotel, can we?"

"I don't know…we'll see about that. Hell, I'll go rent another room for the night if that's the only place to go," he replied, unbuttoning his suit coat that he'd worn for the conference.

"Hey, Paul, want a smoke?" John said, lighting up a cigarette and offering one to Paul, who refused it.

"Nah," he replied, trying to think of some place he and I could go for a while. "I think me and Laurie are going out."

Ringo turned around and gave him a funny look. "Out? You'll get attacked, you know."

"Well, I'm not going to sit in here all night," Paul said, retrieving his room key from the coffee table. "Come on, Laurie."

"Aye, well, don't come running and crying if you get in trouble," John said, getting up from the couch and slowly walking over to Paul.

"Hey, if you blokes want to go out, you can, too," Paul said as I followed him to the door. "There's no reason to stay cooped up in here all night."

Just then, Ringo stood up. "Hey, I'm gamed to go out, too," he said, reaching for the suit coat he'd discarded upon entering the room earlier. He looked like he wanted to get out and explore the city like he did in A Hard Day's Night…though that might have proved to be just a bit impossible, since I was sure that most of those teenyboppers that had been at the press conference were still hanging around the hotel, either hiding somewhere inside the building or screaming their lungs out on the front steps.

"Well, I'm not going anywhere," George said, casually browsing through a copy of a newspaper that Neil had been reading earlier that day. "I don't like leaving the building…I'm so sorry if I fear for me own life after that little firecracker incident in Memphis, thank you very much…"

"Well, Laurie," Paul asked, "what should we do?"

"You're asking me?" I said. "I've never been to New York before. I was going to spend the evening washing my clothes-I really need to do laundry, you know."

Paul rolled his eyes, tossing the key up in the air and catching it. "Okay, okay; do what you want, but I've got to get out of here. I'm really starting to go stir-crazy just sitting in these damn hotels."

"Well, if you're so anxious to get out, why don't you take a walk with me and see if we can't find a laundromat around here?" I asked. "I'm serious; I can't go another day without doing my washing. I'm completely out of clothes."

"Fine, fine; anything…let's just go," Paul said, pacing back and forth. God; what was he so antsy about all of a sudden?

"Okay, okay," I said, going into the bedroom we shared and taking my laundry bag out of my biggest suitcase. "I just hope you've got some change on you."

"Sorry; all I got is hundreds," Paul laughed, spinning the keyring around his thumb so fast that I thought the thing was going to fly off his hand and whack someone right in the head. "No… I've got change… You coming with, Ring?"

"Of course; I haven't changed me mind," Ringo said, retrieving their baseball caps from the coffee table where they'd left them and tossing one to Paul. "We'd just better be careful, going out in broad daylight and all…"

Paul rolled his eyes. "Yeah; we vampires could melt, you know," he said, taking the laundry bag from me without even asking. "Come 'ead, Laurie… see you later, George, John…"

Once we got into the hallway, I said, "Okay, now how in God's name are we going to pull this one off, Paul?"

As Ringo pressed the down button on the elevator, Paul said, "We'll go out a side entrance and come back in the same way. I've got my I.D. pass with me, so it shouldn't be as big a problem as you caused last time you went out of the hotel in Memphis."

"Hey!" I giggled. "That was not my fault and you know it!"

"Yeah, yeah; we all know you wanted to go out and stir up trouble with those old ladies in the market," he replied, winking at me.

Once we reached the lobby, we walked right through the staff-only doors that led to a service entrance at the back of the hotel. I was hoping that those baseball caps were going to be enough of a disguise for Paul and Ringo; those kids from the press conference would surely recognize the funky threads they were wearing: Paul and his flowery-looking shirt, and Ringo and his polka-dotted shirt.

The heavy metal service door slammed loudly behind us, locking from the inside, leaving us with no place to run if someone recognized the two Beatles on either side of me as we walked down the alley to the street one block south of the hotel. When we reached the sidewalk, I was sure we'd be recognized; after all, this is the same town that had absolutely no crime for ten minutes straight when the Beatles had made their appearance on the Sullivan show in '64, so everyone was bound to recognize them.

Luckily I spotted a laundromat sign about a block and a half away from us as we looked around from the spot where the alley met the street. "Over there," I said, already leading the way. I glanced over my shoulder to make sure that I had two Beatles following behind me. Neither of them wanted to say a word while on the street for fear that their accents just might give them away.

Ringo nodded, following me along with Paul as we crossed the street. The laundromat was pretty empty; there were only five women in there doing their wash, all of whom looked like they were servants for some ritzy folks that lived in Manhattan. I found an empty washing machine at the back of the laundromat, then took the bag back from Paul and dumped the contents onto the floor.

As I started sorting out my clothes, Ringo and Paul sat down on the chairs right across from the machine. Paul reached into his pocket and pulled out five dimes for me to use, setting them on the seat of the chair next to him.

"Boy, some help you two are," I muttered. "Make a lady do all this by herself…"

"Hey, it's a woman's job," Paul said, making a face and leaning back comfortably in his chair.

I gave him a look and pitched one of my socks at him, missing him by just inches, then walked over to him to retrieve it from the countertop that it had gone sliding across. "Hey! There'll be none of that now!" I said, leaning over and staring him right in the face. "Otherwise I'll just….I'll just-"

"You'll just what?" Paul said, sticking his tongue out at me like a bratty two-year-old.

"Or I'll just raise my voice LIKE THIS," I shouted, "and scream 'OH MY GOD, IT'S THE BE-"

Paul clapped his hand over my mouth before anyone in the laundromat could turn around. "All right, all right, I'm sorry, Miss Pine Lake," he apologized. "Whatever can I do to make it up to you?"

I grinned treacherously at him. "You can buy me a very nice dinner when we get to California."

"A nice dinner… as in?"

I looked up at the ceiling, biting my lip for a moment pensively, then said, "Oh, something along the lines of lobster-tail and filet mignon…nothing much…"

"You little-" he began, pulling his arm back to throw a punch, but then dropped it, leaning forward and kissing the tip of my nose instead. "You've got it, luv."

I loaded up the machine with my whites, poured myself a cup of bleach from a bottle that someone had left behind nearby, dumped it in, and started the machine after putting two dimes into the machine. "Well, that's that, for now," I said, sitting next to Paul and stretching my feet out in front of me.

"I'll be damned…these laundromats are huge," Paul remarked, surveying the endless line of washers and dryers lining the walls of the shop. "We had to wash all our clothes in the kitchen sink; we didn't even have a separate wash basin back home in Liverpool."

"My mother used to have one of those really old washing machines until about five years ago," I said. "The thing went crazy one day when she put too much soap in it and it started spewing bubbles all over the basement floor. She tried to turn it off, but the knob came loose and fell right into her hand. By the time she dried her hands and reached over to unplug the damn thing, the entire laundry area was covered in bubbles. Needless to say, she and my dad went out to buy a new one from Sears the very next day."

I tossed my colored clothes into another washing machine right next to the first one, dumping in some soap from a box that one of the other ladies in the shop let me borrow for a moment. It would make things much easier if I did both loads at once and got that over with. Then we could go back to the hotel right away, not wasting away half of the day, since I could tell that this was about the very last thing that Paul and Ringo wanted to be doing right now.

Paul stood up after about ten minutes of watching the clothes go around and around in a dizzying circle through the window on the machine. "I'm going to call the hotel and see if we can rent another room for the evening, since you don't want to be around for the little get-together," he said, heading for the pay phone near the doorway.

"'Get-together' is quite literal!" I commented, continuing to watch my socks spin around and around in a tidal wave of soapy water.

A few minutes later he returned. "Got it," he commented, sitting back down.

"Got what? A brain?" I joked.

"Hey, enough with the insults…I meant that I got another hotel room so we don't have to sit in the other one all night if you don't want to."

"Well, that's cool," I said.

"It's a very basic one, just a sleeping area and a very small sitting area with a television," he described. "Nell got it all taken care of for us; all we have to do is pick up the key from him and go down to the ninth floor."

It took about another forty-five minutes until the dryer drying my whites finally shut off and I retrieved everything from it. I tossed my underwear and socks into the laundry bag right away-those things really didn't need to be folded-and began neatly folding up my white blouses so that they wouldn't be too terribly wrinkled from not ironing.

The colored clothes finished in the other dryer just as I was finishing those blouses, and Paul stood up to get those clothes out for me. He helped me fold the shirts I'd washed, and I packed everything up in the bag again, ready to head back to the hotel.

When we got back, I took all the laundry out of the bag and set it into piles on my bed, not wanting anything to get all mashed up if I'd just tossed the bag aside and left it there all night. I went back into the common room, and Ringo said he was going to go down to the coffee shop for a cup of tea, so he was gone a few moments later. Neil was just on his way to find those girls he'd promised George, but Paul stopped him before he walked out the door.

"Nell? Key?" he requested, holding his hand out.

Neil surveyed the room, then pointed to the coffee table. "It's on the table," he said. "And if anyone asks, it's under Laurie's name."

"My name? Why?" I questioned, wide-eyed.

"Just because everyone else's name might get recognized too easily," Neil explained. "There've already been half a dozen phone calls for me while you were gone; the birds on the phone thought that maybe they could get a hold of one of the Beatles if they got connected to this room."

"Oh; okay," I replied.

"You two have a nice evening," he said, heading into the hallway.

"Thanks," I said, watching as Paul rummaged through the instrument cases in the corner of the room until he found his acoustic guitar in a rather beat-up looking black case.

"I'll bring this with," Paul said, checking inside the case to make sure that he hadn't lost the pick or the capo he kept in the little hollow beneath the neck of the guitar.

I grinned. Wow! At last he was going to sing for me! I couldn't get rid of the grin, even as we took the elevator down to the ninth floor and found our room. Paul was right; the room was nice and all… but very basic, probably overnight-business accomodations. There was a double bed in one section of the L-shaped room, and a couch, a coffee table, a television, and a small dining table near the window in the other section of the room. The bathroom entrance was just to the right of the door to the room.

"Hmm…did you guys suddenly go penny-pinching?" I asked, surveying the surroundings.

"Well, it's just so we have somewhere to sit and get some peace and quiet," Paul said, opening the guitar case and took out the acoustic guitar he carried around with him almost constantly in case either he or John got the songwriting bug all of a sudden. Wow; so many great songs had been written with the help of that rather shabby-looking guitar…maybe even the first Beatles songs!

"How long have you had this one?" I asked, tapping the body of the guitar as Paul sat down cross-legged on the floor with his back against the coffee table. "Since you were a kid?"

"Not a chance," he said, checking the strings to be sure that they were perfectly in-tune.

"Ooh; do I finally get my own private concert?" I asked, grinning.

"Ah, oui, madame," he said, swinging into French mode momentarily. "And how wooold zee dear Laurie like to hear 'Michelle'?"

"Of course."

Paul began to pluck out the high notes of "Michelle" and I smiled. Then he began to sing with that velvety voice of his.

"Mi-chelle, ma belle, these are words that go to-geth-er well, my Mi-chelle…Mi-chelle, ma belle, sont les mots qui vont tres bien en-semble, tres bien ensemble-"

"Now, what does that mean?" I interrupted.

Paul's hand dropped away from the strings. "W-what?"

"That sun-lay mon-kee part-what is that?"

"Oh!" he laughed. "It's French, luv, for 'these are words that go together well.'"

"No kidding? Hmm…"

He nodded.

"Claire thought it was something about 'some the monkeys want play piano song' the first time she heard the song."

"Cor; what'd she think that for?"

"Don't know… I think 'Norwegian Wood' confused her at the beginning of that album and she never quite recovered."

Paul raised an eyebrow, but then went on singing. "Laur-ie, ma belle, these are words that go to-geth-er well," he sang in a rough French accent.

"Oh, knock it off; you're murdering the song!" I laughed, giving his shoulder a shove with my socked foot. "Okay, no more French lessons-something else… how about 'Here, There and Everywhere'?"

He made a funny face all of a sudden. "I'd rather not."

"Why not? I love that song-it's beautiful."

"Yeah, but…well, it…it…it wasn't written for… you…it was, ah, for, um-"

"Oh…for Jane?" I asked. "Oh…"

I felt a little upset. So that was for Jane, was it? Damn… of all the Beatles' songs, I thought that maybe, just maybe that one was "mine," that maybe Paul had written something about me after last January. As I sat there dead silent for more than an hour as he sang to me, I kept giving this some thought. Maybe he had written one for me and I just hadn't picked up on it. Well, there was only one way to figure out the answer to that one!

"Paul? Did you ever think of writing a song for me?" I blurted out.

"What is this, Twenty Questions?" he said, strumming straight blues chords on the guitar.

"No. I was just wondering… I mean, if music-writing is anything like the creative writing I've had to do for school, you use your experiences…I just maybe thought…"

"I'll be honest, luv: it has crossed my mind a million times to write a song for you… I just don't have the slightest clue where to begin."

"Well, it's okay…just, someday, do you think you'll try?"

H looked at the ceiling for a moment, then said, "Yes; someday."

He began picking out a song which I easily recognized as "I've Just Seen a Face." This was so nice, just listening to Paul play guitar and sing. He had that wonderful voice that just sent chills through my body every time he spoke… and when he sang… oh, wow… it was just too much! He played and sang for quite a while, stopping only for about fifteen minutes when he ordered something to drink from room service around ten o'clock that evening.

"God, Paul, I wish I could play the guitar as well as you do," I sighed dreamily, allowing myself a split second of true teenage gushing.

"It's not hard. I'd show you, but this is a left-handed guitar."

"Does it matter?"

He nodded. "You could hold it like me, but you'd have trouble strumming with your left hand instead of your right one."

"Oh."

"You should have heard the racket I used to make on me old Zenith before I got it re-strung-bloody awful," he said, smiling at the memory. "But I got it re-strung, and I carried the thing everywhere: the bus, to school, even in the bath."

I giggled. "Why?"

"Hey, it's not that odd… you sing in the shower, right?"

I nodded. "Yeah? So?"

"Well, the acoustics in the bathroom on Forthlin Row were excellent. I think we should have recorded the entire Please Please Me LP in there," he said with a wink. "Actually… well, you probably won't believe this… but when John came up with 'Do You Want to Know a Secret', he recorded the demo while he was in the loo."

"No! Get out!" I giggled.

"No! Honest! God strike me dead on the spot if I'm making this up," he said. "Really; he did… toilet-flush at the end of the demo and everything. Maybe we should have left it on; that would have been interesting!"

Just then there was a knock on the door. We looked at each other, and Paul stopped in mid-strum of the strings.

"Hey, it's Ringo, you two," I heard Ringo's familiar voice say.

"Yeah? And?" Paul said, reaching for his cigarette resting in the ashtray.

"Well, open the door! I know you're not shagging in there… unless you're doing some highly kinky thing with that guitar."

I turned crimson as Paul shook his head and got up to answer the door. As Ringo stepped in, he looked at me with my bright-red cheeks and said, "Was I wrong?"

"No!" I shouted, getting to my feet. "For god's sake…"

"I was telling Laurie about 'Do You Want to Know a Secret?' Isn't it true that John did the demo--"

"In the bathroom?" Ringo finished the thought. "Yeh…Hey, I'm not disturbing you, am I?"

"Nah," Paul and I said at the same time, then Paul concluded with, "Yeah, the wild sex orgy ended about ten minutes ago… we're done for the night."

"Hey, you're making poor Laurie blush," Ringo said, giving Paul a kick with the tip of his shoe. "So… we're chatting about songs, eh? Too bad you don't have a piano in there; you could show Laurie that song you've been slaving over."

"Which one?"

"The one about Liverpool."

"Well, it's not done yet," Paul said.

"A song about Liverpool?" I asked. "Cool."

Paul messed with the strings on the guitar, tuning the high E string. "Well, I can't play it as well without a piano… but I'll give it a go."

He cleared his throat. "Pen-ny La-a-ane is in my e-e-ears and in my ey-y-yes… the-e-ere beneath the blu-u-ue sub-ur-ban sky-y-y-" strum-strum strum strum "a-a-ah…In Penny Lane the bar-ber shaves another cus-to-mer… we see the bank-er sitting wait-ing for a trim… then the fireman rush-es in…from the pour-ing rain…a-a-ah…" strum-strum strum.

"So, what do you think?" he asked, eager for my approval.

"Well…it's different, I'll give you that much."

"Yeah; I don't like the a-a-ahs, but I don't know quite what to do with them yet."

Ringo was laughing.

"What's so funny?" I asked.

"He's not singing the dirty version," he laughed, and Paul rolled his eyes.

"What dirty version?"

"God…" Paul sighed, exasperated. "You're gonna make me do it… Pen-ny La-a-ane is in my e-e-ears and in my ey-y-yes…four of fish and fin-ger pies…a-a-ah."

Ringo burst out laughing, but I was totally puzzled. "Huh?"

"I knew she wouldn't know what it means," Paul said to Ringo. "She's not a Scouser-she wouldn't have a clue."

"That's why the others and I think you should leave it in the song, really-no one else is going to know what it is."

"What is it?" I repeated, feeling ignored in the middle of this sudden songwriting session.

"Eh, it's more of just a joke…" Paul said, starting to play "Yesterday." "Remember Scram-bled e-e-eggs…oh my ba-by how I love your le-e-egs…It's just not quite going to work."

"Yeah, but you and John left 'prick teaser' in 'Day Tripper,'" Ringo countered.

"It's not 'prick teaser,'" Paul said, getting defensive. "It's 'big teaser.'"

"Oh, right; like there's much of a difference there. Laurie, what do you think it sounds like on the song?" Ringo asked.

My eyes were wide at this point. "You put 'prick teaser' on a record?" I squeaked. "What were you thinking? You-"

"Oh, come off it! It's not 'prick teaser'!" he shouted. "Damn… well, we'll just have to see how the rest of the song goes before I decide anything… John says he's been messing about with some other new song as well… something about Strawberry Fields."

"Gear. At this rate we could do an entire LP devoted to Liverpool."

Paul raised an eyebrow. "He-ey… you just might be onto something there," he said, standing up. "Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields…hmm…"

"Well, John did try writing Penny Lane into 'In My Life' anyways," Ringo said, swiping a smoke from Paul's pack of cigarettes on the floor next to the ashtray.

Paul reached for the phone and began dialing.

"Who are you calling at this hour?" I asked, checking my watch. "It's nearly midnight."

"I'm calling upstairs to see if George and John are done with their company yet," Paul said. "Shush… hello? Yeah, it's Paul… has everyone left up there yet?…They have? Gear; well, we're going to come back up there, then…I've got an idea for something…I'll tell you when I get up there… no, it doesn't involve any birds, for chrissake!…I'll tell you when…yeah, yeah, yeah, I know…"

He hung up the phone and laughed half-heartedly. "George said that everyone's cleared out for the evening; they've all gone home."

I ground out the remaining little stub of Paul's cigarette into the ashtray as he packed his guitar back into its case and Ringo waited by the door. We went back upstairs to the deluxe suite, where I could detect the very faint scent of pot again. John had dozed off on the couch with the television on-the station had gone off the air quite a while before, so all that was on was the light fizzing of the black-and-white static on the screen. George was tinkering around at the piano in the corner of the room, but stopped when he heard us come into the room and turned around.

"Interesting evening?" he asked, standing up and stretching. It was half past eleven, and everyone seemed a little more worn out than usual. It would probably be best if we all went to bed and got some extra rest for the hell of it, considering it would be useless for any of the Beatles to get sick right at the end of the tour.

Paul nodded. "Yep," he yawned, setting his guitar case down on the floor next to the door. Apparently no one was around to discuss whatever wonderful idea Paul had had in mind downstairs in the other room. "Well…I'd say we'd better get some sleep or we won't be getting up for that show tomorrow."

"Right," George replied, shutting off the small lamp on the top of the piano.

None of us woke up until around two-thirty the next afternoon and had to do some real hustling in order to get dressed and packed up before it was time to leave for the concert at Shea Stadium. We would be going straight to the airport after the end of the Beatles' set…and this time we'd be flying to California on a regular commercial flight-not our usual plane. The idea didn't sit very well with the lads, as I found out during the elevator ride downstairs to the lobby that afternoon.

"So, we're not taking the chartered one, eh?" John said, rolling his eyes when Neil reminded all of us of our traveling accomodations.

Neil shook his head. "Don't worry, John; we've got the entire first-class section to ourselves. We didn't book you blokes in coach seats like we had to do in Chicago last year after the snowstorm."

I laughed. "Oh, I remember that," I said.

"And it's just this once," Neil continued as the elevator doors opened. "Besides, you're going to have an entire day off before the Seattle show-you should be happy."

We made our way to the back of the hotel and boarded the limo that would take us to the point where we'd switch over to an armored car for the rest of the trip to the stadium. The ride wasn't very long; before I knew it, we were at the old World's Fair fairgrounds, and we made the switch, hopping into the armored car that was going to take us to the stadium. It was terribly hot and stuffy inside that back compartment during the drive; I was glad that I'd worn my sleeveless top instead of the blouse I'd planned to wear that morning.

The attire for the Beatles for their show that night included their pinstriped fawn-colored suits and some sort of wild-printed shirts-no ties, as usual-and black dress shoes. It was pretty darn hot that night, so all four of them were sweating like mad even before they stepped onto the stage. It didn't appear to be bothering them much, though; man, I actually saw all four of them actually smiling for a change that night.

As they made yet another walk down yet another long corridor in yet another baseball stadium, Paul mentioned to John, "Hey, have you called Cyn today?"

John shook his head confusedly, then suddenly got an "oh shit"-sort-of look on his face. "Crap," he muttered. "I can't believe I forgot…hell…"

"Well, it's already tomorrow at home," Paul said, shaking out his hands as we approached the exit to the field. "I, uh, don't think it's going to quite count if you call her tomorrow…"

"I should've rung her when I thought of it last night," John said, coming to a stop at the doorway while the deejays on stage started their introductions.

"Huh?" I asked George, not wanting to butt in on their conversation.

"It's John and Cyn's anniversary," he whispered back. "And he forgot to-"

"Uh-oh," I murmured, my voice drowned out by the sudden onslaught of shrieks from outside. Well, those fans were geared up and ready for the show by that point!

George nodded, and before I knew it, the Beatles dashed out the doorway and between the long lines of barricades that the cops had set up to keep adventurous fans from reaching the group as they made their way quickly to the stage.

As Neil and I watched them plug in their amps, Neil said, "Hey, Laurie, you want to get closer to the stage?"

"Really?" I asked. "I'd love to… but won't it cause problems?"

Neil shook his head. "We can go stand right over there by the corner of the stage with the press," he explained. "Just stick close to me so they don't think you're an intruder and you'll be fine."

"Cool!" I grinned, following him through the barricade pathway as he flashed his entourage pass at the security guards along the sides. Within the course of a minute, each of the four on stage happened to look over and spot me standing nearby; Paul gave me a big delightful smile and a quick wave just before he did the count-off for the "Rock and Roll Music."

Well, with being that close to the stage, I actually heard my first Beatles concert that night, since the amplifiers were somewhat close enough to me to drown out the jet-engine caliber shrieks of the hysterical fans in the stands. Paul really gave everyone a show by really letting loose on "She's a Woman" that night; I thought that the version they did that night almost overshadowed the recorded version of it. I was still amazed that they could hold those tight harmonies on "Baby's in Black" amidst all that screaming, even with a close listen like I had that evening.

I also had a chance to turn and pay attention to the more-than-usually hyper audience that night. Someone had painted a big banner that said "Happy 4th Anniversary John and Cynthia" and was waving it around, and John gave them a wave and a smile in acknowledgment about halfway through the show. There were lots of banners at the show that night, most of them in support of John-there was a big one hanging over the first balcony that said "Lennon Saves." Well…no need to worry about any snipers here, eh? I thought as their set continued, though there are a lot of cops here tonight.

The fans seemed to be loving every moment of the show. There were more than a few occasions when a few lucky fans broke away from the security barricades and ran for the stage-those New Yorkers sure loved the Beatles! I almost missed being able to sit with fellow Beatle freaks and scream and cry and tear my hair out at the mere sight of the Fab Four…but only for about a minute or so. After all, I was a lucky one, wasn't I? I was touring with them, with all the good and all the bad rolled into one…although there were only four more shows left on the tour schedule, two of which would be in Seattle. The remaining two were in Los Angeles and then San Francisco-the last stop on a very hectic tour. I was sure they'd be relieved that yet another tour was completed after that show in San Francisco; they could go back home, rest up, maybe do another album, and then probably hit the road again by Christmastime. Maybe they'd be coming back to the States during the winter for a tour, but surely again by the end of next summer. Either way, I knew I wouldn't be this lucky to tour with them again, so I'd damn well better start enjoying those concerts before they were all over with!

"Man, that crowd is completely soft in the head!" Ringo commented as he waited while the others changed into their street clothes. "I think it's worse than ever here."

"It's safe to say that," Paul agreed. He ran his hands through his hair. "Cor; what I wouldn't give for a cool shower right about now."

"Go take one in the baseball players' showers, then," George suggested. "Brian said that he's having problems with one of the cars; we'll probably be here for a while."

"A lot of good that'll do when I have no soap or anything," Paul muttered, undoing the top button on his high-collared shirt.

"Use some soap from the dispenser by the sink, then," John said. "Hell, we did that every day in Germany."

Paul gave him a disgusted look. "Does this look like the Bambi Kino, John? I don't ever want to have to do that again."

"Hey; wait a second," I interrupted, opening my purse. "I just might have some shampoo with me."

"What? You carry it around in your purse?" Ringo asked.

I shook my head. "No; I have a really bad habit of taking all the freebies they leave for you in the bathrooms in hotels," I replied, finally finding a bottle of shampoo and a small packaged bar of soap near the bottom. "These are some leftover ones from Cincinnati that I just never remembered to take out and put in my vanity case."

I tossed them to Paul, who caught both of them and managed to keep a hold of his street clothes in his arms as well. As he pulled the paper off of the bar of soap, he said, "You're a life-saver, Laurie; thank you so much."

"Think nothing of it," I said as he grabbed a towel from the stack near the bathroom entrance and dashed around the corner for the showers. Within five minutes he re-emerged wearing his traveling clothes and was rubbing the water out of his hair.

"Aaah…that's a relief," he said, smiling. "Okay; I'm nice and relaxed now…time for a nap."

"A nap?" I repeated. "Yeah, right; sleep on the plane, you…"

"And you can sleep all day tomorrow if you want," Neil remarked, helping Mal organize the instrument cases outside the door in the hall. "Day off, you know…"

"Woo-hoo!" Paul said, doing a happy little version of the Twist for about five seconds, then regained his composure.

"Hmm…'twist and shout', eh?" I commented.

Paul rolled his eyes.

"Hey, it was worth a shot," I said, threatening to pull off my shoe and throw it at him. "I thought it was a valid observation…I'm just telling it as it is."

"Yeah, yeah…I know…"

Within a few minutes, Paul was ready to go-as were the rest of us-and we carefully snuck out a side entrance and got in our limousine. Neil had sent out two limousines in the past seven minutes as decoys, hoping that the fans would be kept at bay for a few minutes, giving us a window to slip out of the stadium through and go straight to the airport for our flight. We managed to luck it out; just as we were nearing the end of the block, hundreds of fans spotted our car and began to go all-out to reach us before we sped up and drove down the street, watching Shea Stadium disappear behind us through the back window.

It was about two minutes later that the limo driver turned his head for a moment and said, "Mr. Aspinall? We have a slight problem…this car is still overheating."

Neil turned around from our light conversation about how well the show had gone that night. "Eh?" he said, looking ahead of us as we caught up to the other two limousines about to pull off of the road.

"The engine is going to overheat," the driver repeated, slowing the car down and following the others. "We're going to have to stop."

We pulled right behind the other cars and came to a stop just as the engine started making a funny noise. "Uh-oh," I said as George unlocked his door and got out. "What are we going to do now?"

We all got out of the car and stood next to the other two limousines as Brian thought through the situation. "We'll just have to get in contact with the armored car that brought us here," he said wearily, taking his suit coat off before he overheated as badly as the car had done. "It'll just be another delay…"

Neil found a phone nearby, and within ten minutes, he returned. "The car is on its way," he said, smiling. "They'll be here in about ten minutes and we'll be on our way."

I sighed, pushing my sweat-soaked bangs off of my forehead; they stuck together in a messy fringe against my head. Thank god the sun had set ages before; if we were standing in the blazing heat of midday right next to an overheating car, I would've been too close to passing out! I just wanted to get on that damn airplane and get away from it all before the hordes of fans still around the stadium figured out where we were and attacked poor, defenseless us!

Continue to Chapter Eighteen...

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