Risky Woohoo

12 | Boys Keep Swinging

1957, July
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We stood in the field long before anything happened, or actually were supposed to happen. "Paul, don't you think we're a tad bit early?" His gaze wandered around the nearly empty lot, scattered with tents and whatnot, but he shrugged at last, making the guitar on his back sway a little. "Maybe a little, but being early never hurt a man, did it?" he proclaimed. "At some point it probably did." I butted in. Paul rolled his eyes, making me laugh. "Yeah, alright. What you wanna do then?"

I thought about it for a little while. "Well, the procession doesn't even start for another hour." I reminded. "Why don't we just look around the place?" Paul answered with a short grin. "Alright, but remember we're meeting Ivy." I nodded and we began strolling further into the field.

The sun shun warmly down on the city, and the wind was at its shyest. Several times I marvelled at Paul's choice of attire and teased him about it. He wore this light dress and darker trousers. He always had to be so formal, didn't he? But I thought he looked fine, really fine. I wore a white summer dress, very feathery and nice. Alright, I was pretty formal myself, but that was the dress' fault, not mine.

Soon we had found ourselves in a tree-shadowed area, with a tiny little stream running by. We looked around for a bit, Paul muttering: "Not that much to look at, is there." I agreed. It was really just a plain field, I didn't know what I expected. "Should we just sit down then?" I suggested. Paul nodded, but as I began leaning down he exclaimed: "Wait!" I quickly stood up straight again and looked at him confused. He slung his guitar off and carefully laid it down, then he shrugged his jacket off and laid that flat down on the ground as well. "Wouldn't want to get you dirty now." He said as he gestured for me to sit down. I gave him a sarcastic curtesy, which he replied to by tipping an imaginary top hat, and sat down.

"What a gentleman." "Always, my love." Paul spoke in an impossibly posh accent. I began laughing immediately, but couldn't help myself from blushing at his choice of words.
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We sat there chatting until we heard the faint sound of motors. We sprung up from our places, Paul taking a firm hold of his guitar, and me folding his jacket over my arm.

Together we ran towards the sound. A mass of people had appeared on the roads, two lorries were slowly making their ways through the streets.

On top of one of them sat the Rose Queen, surrounded by heaps of girls all dressed in pink and white. I could picture myself being up there one day, if only I lived in Woolton. But what seemed to catch Paul's attention was the other lorry, housing a feeble looking band. Of course I knew they were The Quarrymen. Not only had Paul been rambling on about them for the past week, but it said so on the posters hung around the area.

We strolled out onto the street and watched the lorries go by. They were going at snail's speed, so we stood there for some time. When the sound of skiffle faded away, we walked right back to the field. "I see your point now." Paul admitted. "They won't be coming 'ere for another hour." I looked at him and saw he had a hint of nervousness on his face. "What's wrong, Paulie?" We stopped. He looked at me for a second, then turned his gaze to his feet. "Dunno. Let's find Ivy, yeah?"
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"'Ello, Paulie. This yer bird?" We found Ivan at the front of the church with a few other boys. He sat lazily in the stairs, a cig hanging on his lip.

We both stiffened a bit when he said that. A tint of red found its way on my cheeks, and I could sense it did on Paul as well.   "Hello, Ivy." Paul nodded.

Ivan raised an eyebrow. "So?" Paul shook his head. "Alright then." Paul's classmate pushed himself off the stairs and sauntered towards me, raising his hand. I took at and he shook it softly, maybe holding onto it for longer than expected. "Ivan Vaughan." He muttered. "Ann." I simply said. The boy shrugged and made his way back to the stairs.

We followed. Paul sat himself beside his mate, and I directly behind Paul. The boys were chatting away, and I wasn't paying attention, I hadn't a clue what they were on about. I rested my chin in my hand and looked around. I thought Woolton was a fine little place, perhaps a bit posh, but nothing to complain about.

I thought about Paul again. I thought about him all the time. And I was with him all the time. We were on summer break now, so we were always together to pass the time. Of course he was often with his mates, which left me quite alone then. To be truthful, Paul was my only friend. I had William, but he's William, and William is my brother. When Paul was away, I missed him, even if for just a few hours, and not even a mile away.

Even though we hadn't even known each other for a year, I think we were sort of each other's rescues. We both missed our mothers dearly. And I thought that I must've had it easy, having comfort right then and there, when Paul hid it all away and refused to show it, or so he had told me. We had grown so incredibly close over the past 2-3 months, it was actually sort of weird.

"It's three o'clock." "You go lot, I'll be here." My thoughts were interrupted by Paul grasping my arm and dragging me down the few flights of steps there were. We jogged towards the crowd that had amassed around the lorry with the feeble looking band on. The group was already rocking on and getting the younger bit of the crowd going.

"That's him, I think." Paul pointed over the mass, his gaze seeming to land on the boy at the microphone. "Yeah, must be him." He confirmed. The boy wore a red flannel, unlike the rest of the group who seemed to be pretty plain. Of course it wasn't only the colour of his shirt which made him stand out. He had this energy to him, like he was the only one actually playing. Paul caught on that energy and was seemingly attracted to it, I could tell by the way he was suddenly dragging me through the crowd, emitting annoyed slurs from people we passed.

Then we were first row. Paul didn't really turn his gaze away until the red flannel told the audience it was over. When the band were off the stage, we immediately went back to find Ivan. He was where we left him. "Alright, Paul. They're in here." So we followed Ivan into the church, which didn't look much like a church at all. It had a stage.

As Ivan lead Paul into the room, I crept into a corner. The group were in the middle of the room drinking beer and cheering over their performance.

"Hey, John. John?" Ivan spoke. The red flannel turned. "Paul, a mate of mine from school." He gestured towards Paul who was slowly approaching the so-called John. "Paul plays too."

"What, with himself?" John said. The group laughed. Paul snickered, rolling his eyes. "I do, all the time. It's good for the wrist muscles." John demonstrated by twisting his fist around.

"I'm John." He took out his hand. "Paul." Hands were shaken.

"So, did you watch us play?" John asked. "Yeah, yeah." Paul answered. "And?"

"Yeah, you're alright." He admitted. John looked almost offended. "We're alright?" He waited a bit. "You're alright. Ivan likes you and he's alright." He laughed.

"How alright are you on one of those?" He pointed to the guitar strapped on Paul's back. "I'm alright." Paul shrugged, swinging the instrument to his chest.

"You got that back to front, haven't you, mate?" John snickered. The group laughed. "Any requests?" Paul calmly said.

John lightly shook his head, and so Paul went to work, playing Twenty Flight Rock.

"How old are you?" John asked when he finished. "15."

"When?" "Last month." A little pause. "I can do Little Richard as well." Paul pointed out.

"Sorry. Tick-tock." John scoffed. "Nice to meet you, but we've got to rehearse."

Paul gently swung his guitar back around again. "Well, I've got to get off anyway..."

"Ta-ta, then." John turned around and went back to his band.

Paul let out a shaky breath as he walked back to me. "Alright?" I asked when we went together out the door. "I've had enough of that word, alright."

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I almost directly copied the last dialog of the Nowhere Boy script as you could probably tell. And I don't think I had to put it in much detail, I think everyone remembers that scene in vivid detail.

Also... Aaron Taylor-Johnson... ............... 🤤

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