Paul tried to fall back to sleep after his nightmare, but he only got halfway there. He was stuck in that weird and terrible realm between consciousness and sleep, and he hated every moment of it. He could hear John's snores, but he could also see bits of his life - the first one - flitting by in front of his eyes. He heard words, all jumbled together, mumbled and screamed at the same time.

      "Found dead in his flat - "

     " - frankly, I miss Paris - "

     " - Paul, Mike...your mother is dead - "

     " - the lung cancer took him - "

     " - Martha's gone, she's really gone, after all the years she's - "

     " - sometimes I think you're the only one that I can really talk to, Macca - "

     " - the cancer has spread too far, there's nothing we can do to save her - "

     " - she's dead! She's not coming back and I can't - "

     " - shot seven times, pronounced dead upon arrival at - "

     " - how do you sleep at night, you cunt - "

     " - it's a girl - "

     " - I now pronounce you husband and wife - "

     " - I'm John Lennon - "

     " - Uncle Paul, guess what I did today - "

     " - the dream is over, McCartney - "

     " - look at me, Daddy - "

     " - maybe it's good John's not around right now. He lost enough people in his lifetime. He'd be heartbroken over Mimi - "

     " - I don't believe in Beatles - "

     " - can you believe what George fucking did - "

     "Think of me now and then, old friend."

     Paul woke up, sweating, his breathing labored, to find John sitting on the other bed a few feet away. Light was pouring in through window, indicating it was a new day. "John," he breathed.

     "I'm right here," John said and hurried over to him. "You're fine." He wrapped his arms tightly around Paul. "It's okay..."

     "John," Paul said shakily. "I don't know what to do..."

     John pressed the back of his hand to Paul's forehead. "You're still burning up, Macca. You're sick, okay? You just need some sleep and you'll be back to normal in no time at all."

     "Nothing is normal," Paul shook his head but John gently pushed him down so that he was laying down again. "Nothing has been normal in a long, long, long time, John."

      "Okay," John said. "Close your eyes and get some rest. I'm going to make you some tea and get you a bite to eat. I'll be back in a little while, all right?"

      Paul slowly closed his eyes but he didn't answer John. He began muttering to himself.

    John left the room and walked into the kitchen. George and Ringo were sitting at the kitchen table drinking tea and chatting in hushed voices. There was a surprisingly untouched bowl of cereal sitting in front of George. Ringo saw John walking into the room and quickly shushed George. "Morning, Johnny," Ringo said. "How is he?"

     John shook his head as he began making tea. "I don't know.. I mean, he's not very good, that's for sure. He's got a pretty high fever, still, and he just keeps saying these weird nonsense things like..like he keeps insisting that I died and that nothing has been normal for a long time. It's really weird."

    "It'll probably stop once his fever breaks," George said.

     "Yeah, he's probably just having hallucinations," Ringo nodded. "I mean..what else could it be?"

     John shook his head again and put some bread in the toaster. "Nothing else, I suppose. You're right, it's just that I'm worried about him. I don't like seeing him like this."

     "Neither do we, John," George said. "But he's just sick. He'll get better."

     John nodded. "Yeah, I know." He sighed, putting a tea bag in a teacup and pouring the water he'd just boiled. The bread popped out of the toaster, now crispy on the outside and golden brown. John put the toast on a plate and picked up the teacup. "Well, I'm going to look after him."

     "Okay," George nodded.

    "Let us know if there's any change," Ringo said.

     "I will," John promised, then left the kitchen and headed back to the bedroom he shared with Paul. The moment he was out of earshot, George and Ringo dipped their heads low once more, leaning in toward each other, and co inured their whispered conversation.

~~~

     Paul nibbled at the toast and and took a couple sips of tea before he buried himself beneath the covers, trying to block out the world. He wanted everything to go away. The F.H.O. and the shadows, his memories, his thoughts, and even, at the moment, John. He didn't want to see or hear anything, he didn't want to feel anything, he didn't want anything. He wanted to wrap himself up in his blanket and sink further and further into his bed until he was gone, until he faded into non-existence.

     But he couldn't do that, as proven by the feeling of dread that was rising up in his stomach, making his heart beat faster and jump into his throat, and his thoughts that were slowly suffocating him. And he could hear John. John shuffled around the room, and his mere presence sounded worried somehow.

     Paul knew that he should feel bad for worrying John so much, but he couldn't. Not at the very moment. In that moment, the only thing that Paul had the ability to do was dread the future and pray that it would never come.

      "Paul," John said after a while. Maybe it was minutes after Paul buried himself in the covers, or maybe it was hours. Paul wasn't sure. "Paulie?" John said when Paul didn't answer, and then, "Macca?" when there was no answer for a third time, John finally gave up and left the room.

    "I can't lose him," Paul whispered to himself, squeezing his eyes shut. "I can't lose him. I can't lose him. I can't lose him."

~~~

     John woke in the dead of the night and yawned. He didn't open his eyes, he just reached out to pull Paul close to him, but his fingers found a cold, empty spot of the bed.

     In an instant, his eyes were open and he was sitting straight up. "Paul?" He said, squinting into the blackness that surrounded him until his eyes adjusted. He scanned the room for any sign of Paul, but found none.

     John threw the covers off of himself and leapt out of bed. He hit the floor running and hurried from the room, into the hallway. He thought for a split second that perhaps Paul was just in the bathroom, but upon inspection he found that the door was standing ajar and the bathroom was dark and empty.

     He caught a glimpse of the time in the kitchen in passing. The clock that hung above the refrigerator told him that it was two in the morning.

     He stopped dead in his tracks when he glanced into the living room and saw Paul, looking particularly sickly pale and weak, seated in the sofa with an acoustic guitar... And he was singing.

      John could listen to Paul sing for hours on end. Paul's voice was probably the most beautiful thing about him, in John's opinion anyway. It was smoother than satin, gentler than a mother's touch, sweeter than honey. The way he could hit notes sent shivers down John's spine.

     At the moment, Paul's voice sounded nothing like that. It was soft - no, soft wasn't the word John was looking for... It was weak. It was gravelly, and even a bit hoarse. It wasn't the voice that John had come to associate with Paul and all his beauty and glory. It was still something to behold, though.

     "Paul, what're you doing?" John sighed. "You're sick. You need rest, you need sleep."

     Paul sniffled and John saw the tears that were beginning to well up in his eyes. "It could have been so much more," Paul spoke barely above a whisper. "It could have been so beautiful.. It turned out as such a throwaway song."

     "What are you talking about, Macca?" John frowned, sinking down beside him.

     Paul shook his head. "Never mind," he said.

     John sighed. He leaned in and pressed his lips to Paul's forehead, then pulled away and put a hand on the back of Paul's neck. "Your fever's gone down," he said and tugged the corners of his mouth into a small smile. "I told you everything would be back to normal again soon."

     "Hm," Paul nodded. Nothing is normal. Nothing. Nothing! He thought, but he didn't say it this time. His fever was going down now, he was beginning to think clearly again. He couldn't be saying things like that. He looked down at the strings of his guitar and began to strum absentmindedly.

     "What're you working on, love?" John asked in a gentle voice.

      Paul drew a shaky breath, then breathed it out. "It's called Hold Me Tight," he said slowly.

      "Can I hear it?" John asked.

     Paul nodded. He began to strum and okay intricate chords, glancing at John through his long, dark lashes every few seconds as if yo check and make sure he was still there.

     John just kept smiling at his boyfriend, waiting patiently.

     "It feels so right now, hold me tight
Tell me I'm the only one
And then I might
Never be the lonely one
So hold me tight, tonight, tonight,
It's you, you you you oooo oooo,"

     It was a little strange for Paul to hear his own voice singing the song so differently. It was even weirder to think that John didn't notice the difference at all because he'd never heard the song before.

     Paul sang it slower than when it had originally been written. It was gentler, sweeter, and he hit different notes in different places. It was different, it was weird..and Paul loved every single bit of it.

     "Hold me tight
Let me go on loving you
Tonight tonight
Making love to only you
So hold me tight, tonight, tonight
It's you, you you you oooo oooo,"

     Paul blinked back tears. Never had the line "Let me go on loving you" meant so much to him..not until now. Now Paul appreciated its true significance. There was a lot of shit surrounding Paul, but he was fighting. He really was fighting tooth and nail, with every fiber of his being, to keep John around.

     "Don't know what it means to hold you tight
Being here alone tonight with you
It feels so right now, feels so right now

Hold me tight
Tell me I'm the only one
And then I might
Never be the only one
So hold me tight, tonight, tonight
It's you, you you you oooo oooo,"

      John watched him, never taking his eyes off of him for a second. Paul still couldn't stop marveling at the way John always looked at him, as if James Paul McCartney was the greatest thing to him. As if his very existence was better than music, or food, or sex, or oxygen. 

     He was beginning to think that that was actually how John saw him.

    "Don't know what it means to hold you tight
Being here alone tonight with you
It feels so right now, feels so right now,"

      Paul was trembling, but he powered through the rest of the song.

     "Hold me tight
Let me go on loving you
Tonight, tonight
Making love to only you
So hold me tight, tonight, tonight
It's you, you you you oooo oooo
You oooo."

     "I love it, Paul," John whispered.

     Paul set his guitar aside and looked at John, tears sliding down his cheeks.

     "Hey, love, don't cry," John pulled him into a tight hug. "Don't cry. I really do love it." He kissed the top of Paul's head, the bassist's dark hair tickling his nose. They stayed their, cuddled up against one another on the sofa, for a long time before John spoke again. "Let's get you back to bed, yeah?"

      Paul sniffed and nodded slowly. "Yeah, that sounds good." He croaked.

     John half-led, half-carried Paul to their room and helped him into bed before cuddling up beside him, wrapping the warm covers around them and wrapping his arms around Paul.

     "Johnny?" Paul said, his voice shaky.

     "Yeah, Macca?" John breathed against the back of Paul's neck.

     "I love you,"

      John smiled and kissed the skin below Paul's ear. "Love you, too, babe."

     Paul grasped one of the strong arms that was was wrapped comfortingly around him. Tomorrow I'll stop talking like this, I'll start making sense to him again, Paul promised himself, but for right now I need to say this.. "Don't let go, okay? Never let go."

     John frowned, but then he just shrugged and blamed Paul's nonsense talk on the slowly fading fever. "I'll never let go, Paulie," John said sincerely, closing his eyes and letting the world of sleep drag him down into the darkness, but nit before he added, "and that's a promise."