You've Got To Hide Your Love Away - A Beatles Fanfic

Chapter 34 - IN SPITE OF ALL THE DANGER

••••
In spite of all the danger,
In spite of all that may be,
I'll do anything for you,
Anything you want me to,
If you'll be true to me.
••••

John sat in a small dressing room, legs crossed, bouncing his foot up and down. There were many places that he would like to be, and a stuffy dressing room in Germany was not one of them.

It was the end of June, and a month had passed since the night he and Ruby first admitted their true feelings to each other. They, well mainly Ruby, had decided that it would be best to wait a few months before making any changes to their current situation.

"There's far too many things currently going on in both of our lives to start making any massive changes straight away," Ruby said.

"There's no better time than now, Rube," John countered. "If we don't get the ball rolling soon then we might as well sit 'round with our thumbs up our asses for another two years."

Ruby laughed and then gave John a warm smile. "You have a tour coming up. Brian would murder not only you, but me as well if this came out right before you left. You also have a wife and child. A marriage isn't something you leave haphazardly." She broke eye contact with John and looked around the bedroom. "And besides, now that I'm feeling better, my manager has booked me a handful of performances around England and Sweden in the coming months. So we both have busy schedules coming up."



John hadn't been too keen on putting their plans on hold, but when it came down to it Ruby was right. As usual. Germany was only the first stop on a summer full of concerts and traveling. And with Ruby venturing back out into the performance scene, neither one of them were in any state to deal with the repercussions of a new public relationship.

"Well if it was up to yer we'd all be on our arses!" George's loud voice brought John out of his thoughts.

"Fuck off," Paul brushed George off with a wave of his hand.

"No, you 'fuck off,' Paul." George didn't seem willing to let this particular argument go. "After that performance it's a wonder we can show our faces out there again. We all sound for shit, and you can't even get through a bloody song without mucking up all the words."

"He's right, ye know," John piped up from his seat. "We play like garbage and sound worse. How many verses did you get right in "I'm Down," hmm? None."

"Ah, piss off!" Paul retorted and walked to the far corner of the room with his bass.

The four band members had gone onstage earlier at 5:15 PM and were currently biding their time in the dressing rooms before their second performance at 9:00 PM. The first show had gone off with numerous flubs. The group's recent absence from performing live had been more than apparent. George had introduced "Yesterday" as being from Beatles For Sale, and "I'm Down" had been delayed by an on-stage conference between the three guitarists about lyrics in the opening verse. In spite of this, Paul had still managed to get each verse wrong.

"It'll get better. We just need to get back onstage and back in the swing of things." Ringo had been silently watching the conversation from a well-worn couch. "They can't hear us anyway from all the screaming."

"So why are we even playing?" George asked. "This whole touring thing is getting old, and you're right - they don't even listen to us."

John let out a small sigh. George was right. The fans had never really been able to hear their concerts. Hell, the band could barely even hear themselves. In the early days the screaming from the fans had been exciting. Then it started to become annoying. Now it was just plain ridiculous. Add to that the fact that the new music the band was creating was all but impossible to play live, and you end up with a group that sounds awful and feels frustrated.