Chapter Text
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Now that he’s older, John will own up that it was a series of accidents that became less so.
The first time it happened, neither John nor Paul really understood what had happened.
They were drinking at a bar in Liverpool. The cheapness of the spot meant anyone’s shilling was good enough, including John and Paul’s, and in the end John wasn’t far off from being of age. He looked it now, at least as much as the rest of the Quarrymen did— excluding Paul. The curve of Paul’s face was still sweet, untempered by the quiff he’d teased into his hair.
They let Paul in anyroad. He was never the problem.
John was the problem. At the start of the night, he’d be smooth, charming, and easy. He’d chat up the owner and they’d near forget what had happened when the drink had gotten to him last time. Later, they’d remember when John riled, snapping and aching for a fight. He’d whet his knuckles against any tender flesh; a flash of vulnerability, and the clever crafty words that made him a riot at the beginning of the night would sharpen into lancing malignancy.
The Quarrymen had been turned away from a couple places already tonight, and Colin had muttered about running out of clubs to drink at, let alone play.
But fuck them. Fuck it all. Julia, his daft whore of a mum, had. She’d fucked it all up, and then down too, because Nigel’d seen the accident, had said she’d flown through the air before hitting the ground. The image chased John whenever he shut his eyes. Over and over— THUD the car THUD the ground THUD his hands bruised, and rinse. Inside him there was an unmetered ocean that boiled and blurred beach sand into mixed, shattered glass. It clattered busily through his ears with the rising pump of his blood and he couldn’t stop it, couldn’t even see the boiling point. He tried to set it off himself these days; that way, it at least felt like control. Something to hold onto in all this waste.
Tonight, he was in rare form, tearing into some bloke reading Greats at the college. John would be damned if he let this prissy swine leave without bloodying his pressed collar.
The lads were around him. The first time, months ago, they’d cheered and joined in, but now most of them looked away or kept their eyes to their dates and just let John finish. John wasn’t ever finished. Something was building, growing, and he didn’t know what until he felt hands pull against his jacket and he reeled off balance. He swung back, expecting the bloke’s mates, but his bleary eyes fell upon Paul and the red flush suffusing his pale face.
“You’ve had enough,” Paul said, and there was a snap to his voice: different and too brave. John’s lips twisted.
“No, I really haven’t.” Blood eased down his face, warm and wet from his split lip; he licked it, grinning at the uneasy way Paul tracked the movement. All the lads were watching now, but not a one spoke. “Have something to say about it?”
“He didn’t mean it, did he?” Paul said.
As if John ever knew what set the oceans boiling or was capable of forgiving someone for it. Getting his fingers around Paul’s jacket and hauling him forward felt good. Hands were reaching for him then, Paul’s and Colin’s.
“If you’re scrapping with mates you're done here, John Lennon!” the owner called, eyes heavy on them. “The two of you are out for the night.”
The bouncer arrived then, a thick meaty lad, and John wasn’t about to throw himself into a wall, not when he had someone so much softer to aim at.
His teeth flashed. “Jealous I was giving all my hard loving to someone else, Paulie? Need some attention, do ye?” The rest of the Quarrymen laughed, and John made a show of waving them off. “Enjoy the evening, lads. I’ll see if we can’t get me biggest fan an autograph.”
Beneath the owner’s attention, Paul could do little more than flush further and tremble in anger as they were escorted out onto the street. A new thrill shot through John as he eyed Paul through the dim lighting. He’d had it out with all the lads before in their years of knowing each other, but he hadn’t gotten Paul yet, Paul who was smooth stone where John ran coarse, restrained where John lashed out. They’d never traded pain before, and John was suddenly hungry for it.
“You’re such a bloody bastard, John!” Paul cursed. “Sometimes I—”
“You’re not half that, even still.”
Paul edged near him, and the wild something in John’s heart must be catching, because he saw the same bleary ire churning in Paul’s eyes. Just a bit more. John said, “You’re going to have to give me some space so I can pull out me pen.”
He grinned as Paul shoved him. Accepting the invitation, he swung his fist up into soft stomach. Paul reeled back, eyes dim and furious. Never could stand being talked down to, could Paul. Still brimming with mad glee at finally getting a swing in, John wasn’t ready for Paul’s fierce plow into him, and was reminded of the height Paul had garnered lately as they stumbled into the alley. From there it was scraping, scrambling hands, elbows and knocking their heads and faces into the brick and each other.
Paul had drunk far less, and John realized it when he overextended and Paul pushed him forward. In a flash John felt a weight on his back, a hand pressing down on his neck, shoving his face in the brick. His legs scrabbled beneath him, but he was too drunk to maneuver for any leverage.
“Stay down, John!” Paul snapped, a growl lacing his voice.
He thrashed more, then tried for a witty line, but his voice was muffled against the floor and Paul’s grip remained steady.
“Stay down!”
John writhed and struggled but he felt disoriented and even weaker now. His vision was dark, hair matted around him to block off the dim light filtering from the street. Fingers dug into his neck and he felt hyperaware of the grip holding him down like a common dog. Thrill chased around the thought, horrible and altogether wonderful, like the first time riding the helter-skelter as a child, shrieking down the slope and uncertain of the end.
“Stay, John.” The words were growled, telling, not asking, and something in him… slackened. John let his muscles fail him as he panted.
“There’s a good lad,” Paul said. John half-lurched in defiance, but Paul’s grip held, and he subsided again into stillness. He breathed in the dark, feeling his own exhale against his cheek as Paul’s steady weight bore down on him.
It was quiet down here, on the ground. Little by little, the tension slipped out beneath the press of Paul’s body and the smothering darkness. John’s eyelids dragged and he forgot the club, his mother, and the whole world outside of this dark place as his sensations narrowed on Paul’s anchoring weight and the ridges of Paul’s fingers.
“That’s it, Johnny,” Paul said, and this time John didn’t fight. Paul kept muttering, his voice a soft rasp against the velvet darkness, vocalizing his approval and pleasure. John’s lips twitched but were without reply. It didn’t frighten him like he thought it might, the words not flowing. It felt reassuring… there wasn’t anything that needed saying when Paul had him so tightly in his grip. It was like he’d been pinwheeling through the air for months, but now suddenly was caught and held. He didn’t need to move or talk or be witty or sad. He was floating somewhere above all that.
Paul’s thumb began stroking the nape of his neck and pleasure unfurled in John’s over-light head. The only input he felt was the drag of thumb over him and the sound of Paul’s breathing. They’d synced up and there was only one breath, just the one of them in the dark. For the first time the ocean fell still, and the world shrank until it felt comprehensible and small.
A low sound escaped his throat and the thumb rubbing up the grain of his neck hair stilled. He let out another sound, a whine deep from his chest from loss as the breath above him shuddered and then diverged from his own.
“John?”
Suddenly the weight removed itself and John raised his head, blinking against the too-bright dimness of the alley. Paul was collapsed against the wall, eyes darting between John and his own trembling hands. Paul was young again, not the monolith that held John’s soul in his body.
“I’m-I’m sorry,” Paul stuttered. “I didn’t mean to… Sorry.”
John tried to lever himself up, feeling disjointed, tongue still heavy and marveling at the alien quietness of his mind. Whatever ire he felt before had vanished, and in his slowly resettling mind he started filtering through Paul’s words.
“You’re fine,” John managed at length, standing only to find it much higher up than he remembered. Paul blinked up at him, wet-eyed as John extended his hands. Paul took each in his own and stood up. They wavered there a moment, staring too closely. Though it was barely lit, he could make out Paul, and he gathered that neither of them understood what had happened. Part of John felt bewildered, but it was edged more with awe than fear and he leaned into it, sighing.
The smile, when John quirked it, felt soft with something forgotten. “Come ‘ead then, Macca.”
Paul’s jaw eased with relief and he smiled back.
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On the bus, John dozed off, head knocking against Paul’s shoulder. When he woke, disorientation spun his mind as he was struck with sudden unsettlement about what had happened. He remembered the way he’d given Paul so much power, let himself be exposed for Paul to grip and pet. What kind of bloke did that? His face itched and he sobered enough to feel the dirt on his chin with a building shame and nausea.
Paul noticed his waking peripherally and eyed him. He murmured, “It’s only me, Johnny.” His fingers, peeking from beneath his crossed arms, fluttered against John’s ribs. It was tickly, gentle; so much like Paul.
The hair rising on John’s arms dropped. Paul couldn’t hurt him, John thought. Only Paul had seen. Only Paul… John resettled and drifted off again. When he dreamt of his mother, she only ever went up.
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