you really got a hold on me | john lennon

CHAPTER SIXTY SEVEN

July 9th, 1961

My legs rested on Paul's lap as we both took in the privacy of my new flat. Though it wasn't officially ours, at times it did feel like it. He stayed here more often than not because spending time together here was much easier than it ever had been at his house with Mike and his dad—and definitely better than having to do it at Mendips, where Mimi would rather have me do anything else than see him by my side; though it wasn't as if bringing him to Mendips with me was an option now that all the band was back from Hamburg, John included. If John saw us together, nothing good would come out of it for all of us.

Paul stopped reading the newspaper that had come to my doorstep earlier this morning and put it on the small coffee table in front of us. He then looked over at me with the most innocent look present in his eyes.

"How about I make you some breakfast?"

I tipped my head to the side and raised a brow. "Love, do you even know how to cook? I don't want you to set our only place to be alone into flames." Between the two of us, I had always been the one to make our meals. Not because I wanted to necessarily, but because I was the one who could do it without a mess and make it edible. But it was adorable for him to offer up doing it.

"Well, I can definitely try. Don't worry, I can promise you that I won't burn the flat down. Wouldn't risk it." Paul gently shifted my legs off of him and slid off the sofa. He made his way to the kitchen and started looking through my small stash of food to see what could possibly be made of it. My trust in him was very thin at the moment, but whatever Paul made I knew I would scarf down because he tried—which was all that mattered to me.

Seeing him toddle around the kitchen in confusion was adorable. This had been my life for the past few weeks, nothing but pure tranquility. The letters had stopped as soon as their Hamburg residency came to an end; I also had gotten to move out of Mendips after staying with Paul for a little while after John came back. There was nothing more for me to lose sleep over. Without having to wait for his letters every week or so, nothing could ever go wrong from this point forward. No more fear that something that seemed to be going smoothly in my life could be ruined by meaningless words of his smeared on a paper.

The box of letters and other belongings of John that I had once shared with him had been abandoned at Mendips. They were all his in the first place, making it only fitting that I left them there under the bed—hopefully to be forgotten for the rest of our lives. Serving forever as a reminder of one of the most awful parts of my life.

I snapped myself out of my pointless daze and saw Paul looking at one of the opened cabinets cluelessly. "I could go for some pancakes right now. Is that alright with you if I make that?" He asked, taking out just the flour...which was definitely not the only thing you needed for pancakes. I wasn't even sure I had all the ingredients for pancakes at the moment. But if Paul had no idea what the recipe for pancakes were, I wasn't surprised that it meant he didn't know we didn't have the things to make it in the first place.

"First thing, do we have the ingredients for pancakes? And—most importantly—do you know how to even make them?"

Paul checked the cabinets and the tiny refrigerator frantically one more time. "No...and no. But it can't be that hard if we did have the ingredients, right? All you do is mix it and put it on the pan and ta-da. Pancakes."

I chuckled at his enthusiasm about cooking—and pancakes, it seemed. "How about I just cook something up this time? I'll make sure I have plenty of ingredients the next time you stay over so that you can make those pancakes of yers." I started to get up to take his place in the kitchen until Paul extended his hands to prompt me to stay where I was. He always offered helping me around any way he could, it was awfully sweet to see. Paul was simply trying to fill the hole John had left inside of me...no matter how hard of a feat it was to do.