November 1969
Alice

I'd been staring at the uneven chunks of butter for so long that it felt like I was in a trance. Was I was meant to press them into the flour with my fingers or with a fork? Or was it two knives? Paul's stepmother had given me the definitive answer ages ago, but it was like that happened in another life.

In fact, it felt like most of my life -- specifically, anything that had happened prior to September -- had happened to someone else in a parallel universe. There was the groovy Alice who had bagged the unbaggable Beatle. And then there was the decidedly un-groovy Alice who lived in the middle of bloody nowhere and had nothing better to do than make scones.

Martha trudged over and leaned against my leg, her nose nearly at the edge of the counter. She made snuffling noises and looked up at me, her eyes begging for a spot of butter. Her fur was getting matted, which was my fault because I was meant to be brushing it every other day but somehow days went by without me realizing.

Time-blindness, John Lennon had once called it, back when he was friend and not foe.

"You'll ruin the scones." I gave her a look. "That's my job, to ruin the scones."

The telephone rang, which I answered but there was only static, likely because of the wind. I'd all but given up on having a functioning phone and, with it, the ability to maintain contact with the outside world. Paul seemed comforted by the fact that we'd dropped off the map, but I found it stifling. And I'd basically given up on trying to run Zarby from here, because only so much could get done with telegrams. I received regular updates from Suzie and my accountants, but everything in London seemed so far away that it couldn't possibly be real.

The house was quiet except for the sounds of wind howling outside and a Simon & Garfunkel record playing in the bedroom. Paul had purchased the Mrs. Robinson LP at a record shop in Campbeltown during the one outing we'd taken since we arrived. For the past week, he'd played the song on repeat for hours at a time as he lay on the floor and stared at the ceiling. Every so often, he would pick up his guitar and play a few chords unrelated to the song before abandoning the instrument like it had somehow failed him.

The song ended and the farmhouse was quiet, the quietest it had been in ages. After a moment, I heard him shuffling over to the other side of the bedroom and, after a brief pause, the buzz of the telly being turned on.

"This morning when I woke up and the sky was all dark and cloudy."

Morticia Addams' voice floated through the farmhouse, the timbre sounding a bit tinny because of the awful speakers on the television.

"I knew right then and there that this was going to be a lovely day!"

Paul said the punchline out loud, seeming to delight in the fact that he'd seen the episode so many times that he'd memorized the dialogue.

I winced slightly as saccharine giggles from the laugh track seeped through the bedroom door. Years ago, Paul had met the creator of the laugh track machine and was very taken with the technique. Apparently it could produce 320 different types of laughs on 32 tape loops. Of course, Paul being Paul, he immediately thought of the mellotron, and we all know how much he bloody loved the mellotron, so it was a match made in heaven.

Another quip by Gomez Addams and more artificial laughter. There was a cartoonish boing! that made Paul laugh -- real laughter, but dimmed as though someone had turned down the intensity of his ability to feel joy. I paused, leaning my forearms on the counter and staring out the back window. Winter was quickly descending and I missed the lush green meadows, which had been one of the only saving graces of this place.

"You gotta see this, Liss," he called out. I heard him play the same few notes as earlier, this time on his guitar. I couldn't tell if it was something new, or stray notes from a long-forgotten Beatles song.

The piano from Apple had shown up five days after Derek had dropped by unannounced. It was all wrong though, a Bosendorfer baby grand that looked more suited for a concert hall. It must have cost Apple a fortune and yet there it was, taking up half the available space in the living room. Paul hated it and refused to play it, saying that the piano represented all that was wrong with Apple and Derek's head should be put on a pike.

And then, two days later, the awful television, the high-end VCR, and the Addams Family cassettes had arrived. Who had sent it? How had they known it was just the thing to pull him away from the edge of the proverbial cliff? My bets were on John, though I'd never say as much to Paul. Regardless, it was that day that he'd finally picked up his guitar, which he hadn't touched since we'd arrived.

So, yes, he'd been playing the same few chords for ages but at least he was playing something.

"Liss?"

Paul's head popped his head out the bedroom door. His beard was long past the point of sexy and his hair stuck out a bit on the side from where he'd slept. In the background, Lurch said "you rang?" in his gravelly, deep voice.

I wiped my flour-covered fingers on a nearby tea towel and began to cover the cubes of butter. Paul watched me silently for a moment before walking over. I paused when he put his arms around my waist, pulling me back toward him.

"Earth to Liss," he said. I wanted to relax in his arms, but couldn't because he smelled of whisky. Which on its own wouldn't give me pause, because he always smelled of whisky those days. But we'd had a conversation the evening prior about how he was perpetually half-pissed and I was feeling rather melancholy about it all. He'd managed to pull it together somewhat when Derek had showed up, but the effort had depleted him so he'd immediately gone back to his hopelessly unmotivated ways.

"This is a good one," he said earnestly. "Best of the lot. You know, the one where--"

I disentangled myself from his arms and walked towards the fridge, placing the butter inside before turning to face him. He tilted his head and his brows knit together, his eyes searching mine as if wondering what could possibly be amiss.

Except he knew. I knew he knew--and he knew that I knew that he knew--but it wasn't something we could discuss without the entire facade coming tumbling down.

The Simon & Garfunkel song, American telly, and the fucking ewes had been holding him together this past month. I suppose perhaps I'd also been part of the equation, but I wasn't sure how much longer I could sustain the effort. I could hear my mum in my head, regally telling me that one must carry on, but, honestly, all this carrying on was a bit of a drag.

"It's not my favorite programme," I replied. "It's too... American? Let's put on Mister Ed if you fancy watching American telly."

His eyes brightened, but only temporarily. "Oh, but we don't have the cassettes here."

I shrugged, keeping my tone light. "Let's have Mal send them? They're just sitting at home, begging to be posted to Scotland."

His eyes dimmed a bit, either at the thought of Cavendish or Mal.

There was another sound effect of a gong and the laugh track. Paul glanced hopefully toward the bedroom and then back at me again.

"Liss--" he started to say and then stopped as if he was either collecting his thoughts or hadn't worked out what he wanted to say in the first place. I waited for him to continue, but we were interrupted by the tell-tale squeaks that Louise was waking from her nap.

"Fucking hell," he muttered, less about the fact that Louise was awake and more about the fact that we rarely got to finish a conversation these days.

I placed the tea towel on the counter, making a mental note that I needed to do laundry and brush Martha and tonight was Lou's bath night, which always ended up being a nightmare because, while she loved having a bath, she hated getting out. My neighbor had also given me some sourdough starter, though I wasn't quite sure what to do with it.

"Don't forget that we have to record the footage," I said as I passed him, walking towards the makeshift nursery we'd set up in the tiny second bedroom. "For George's song."

Paul leaned against the counter and ran a hand through his hair, staring at the floor which was covered in crumbs because I wasn't a bloody maid. He squinted slightly like he was hard-pressed to remember that we were meant to record some footage -- any footage, really -- of the two of us for the promo for 'Something'. Neil had had the idea of editing together all the Beatles and their wives in lieu of asking any of them to be in the same room together given the current state of affairs in Beatledom.

"That was a fucking good bassline I gave him," he muttered. "Really fucking good. I could've phoned it in, y'know. Just done whatever, but I stayed at the studio til 4 in the morning getting it just right."

He paused. "Fuck of a lot of good that did me."

I sighed and I could feel my facial expression soften. "Well, Neil rang this morning to say that everyone else has finished their bit... I think if we don't send it soon, they'll all show up on our doorstep."

He looked up. "Are you cross, Liss?"

"About the recording?"

I was cross about the recording because I didn't want my likeness to help sell records for the band that had broken my husband.

He sighed. "No-- I know you don't want to do that. But what's it going to look like if it's all the others and not us? It's like giving the public proof that I'm dead. And George'll think I'm being bitchy. I don't want to leave her now--" he began to sing 'Something'. "But I want Paul to go, oh wow."

I offered a lopsided smile. "See? Told you you could still write songs. Rhymes and everything."

He rolled his eyes as Louise's cries escalated, going from Level 2 to Level 10 with no warning. It was her modus operandi -- she was perfectly alright until she wasn't. My mum had told me I was very similar as a child, though I questioned if she had been around on a day-to-day basis to really make that determination.

"I'll get her," I said, walking past him. Just before I got to the door of the nursery, I turned around to look at him. But he was already back in our bedroom, chuckling to whatever Wednesday Addams was saying. I heard the three notes on his bass over and over and over. Then Mrs. Robinson started to play on the hi-fi and I wondered if I really was going crackers, really crackers, I'm talking cream crackers, Ritz crackers, all the crackers.

**

It was a few weeks later when I decided that I was done carrying on like this. Living with Paul like this was like living on the edge of a volcano, never sure when the bitterness and rage would fully take over. My nervous system couldn't take it anymore.

"Let's go back to London," I said from the bedroom doorway. It was nearly noon and I'd been up with Louise since six.

Paul's nose twitched and he shifted his arm so it rested on his face. He'd started to shave two days prior but had gotten distracted mid-way through so his facial hair situation left much to be desired. It was almost reminiscent of the days with the mustache, only worse.

"Paul," I said, more loudly this time. "Wake up."

"I'm a bloody superstar," he mumbled, pulling a pillow over his face to block the light -- and me -- out.

Unseen, I rolled my eyes. "Be that as it may, it's time to get up. We're going back to London."

That got his attention.

"London?"

There was a brief pause before he uncovered his face and looked at me with bleary eyes. His hair was a fright and the bags under his eyes were pronounced, as if he'd gotten so much sleep in the past two months that his body wasn't sure what to do.

"We've a lot to do," I continued. "Starting with who is going to take care of the sheep. I thought we could go by the Abercrombie's farm tomorrow to see if they're up to it "

He didn't reply, just looked at me like I'd suggested we travel to Mars.

"London," I said after a moment. And then: "Home."

Paul sat up, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hands as I pulled open the curtains. He raised a hand to shield his eyes from the mid-morning sunlight, looking a bit like a prisoner about to be interrogated.

"Next week?" he asked. "We can't possibly go next week."

I sighed and went to sit on the side of the bed. "I'm going to London with Louise next week. I'd like for you to come with us."

He processed this for a moment. "You'd leave without me?"

I sighed. "Well, I'd rather you come with us, hence this conversation. I can't do it anymore, Paul. It's freezing outside... and inside as well... the insulation here is dreadful. We said we'd go home when it got too cold, and it's too cold, so it's time to go home."

"Mike said he'd come help me--

I put out a hand to interrupt him. "No, no, the McCartney brothers are not going to die while trying to do an ill-advised construction project that neither of them is suited--"

"I fixed the hole!" he exclaimed, looking minorly offended. "In the roof! I can handle some insulation."

I reached over and took his hand. "I'm going back to London, love. It's cold and dismal here. The sun sets at 2 in the afternoon. We never see anyone. I can't handle the cooking anymore, or looking after Lou all day--"

"Where is Lou?" he asked.

"She's at the Stewart's."

Our neighbor's daughter came to visit most weekends from uni and, when she was here, she earned extra pocket money by watching Louise for a few hours.

"So you're saying that you want to go back to London because you miss your staff?" he asked in a tone that could have been joking or could have been serious.

I paused. "I miss our life."

I wanted to say, I miss you. I miss us. But he seemed too fragile for that and, besides, Paul and Alice from August 1969 seemed like a lifetime ago. Perhaps this was who we were, but surely we could be this sad version of ourselves somewhere more convenient.

His eyes searched mine for a moment before he pulled his hand from mine and flopped back on the bed. He stared at the ceiling for a few minutes before he finally spoke.

"I keep thinking about what Mr. Epstein would say," he said. "About all of this, I mean." He waved a hand in the air as he adopted an upper-crust accent. "'C'mon, lads, back to the studio you go. No more of this nonsense.'"

We sat in silence for a moment and I could tell his mind was racing as he envisioned this conversation with Brian.

"Perhaps he would say" -- I adopted a lower pitch --"'sod 'em, Macca, you don't need 'em'," I suggested.

"No, he'd never say that," Paul said, his eyes still on the ceiling.

There was another pause as I walked around the bed and lay down next to him.

"Would you go?" I asked finally. "If the boys rang today and said they wanted to go back to the studio, would you?"

Paul shrugged, his eyes still on the ceiling. "Dunno, really."

I sighed and rolled to my side so I was facing him.

"What if you don't need them?" I asked.

His expression was blank as he processed the words. I knew that I should have made the sentence more declarative, but who knew? What if the magic in the four lads from Liverpool really lay with all four of them? I didn't think that was the case, but I wouldn't have bet my life on it. The music, the friendships, the Beatles legend... it was all too tightly wound up in the four personalities that it was impossible to untangle them.

"What if I do?" he asked finally.

I shot him a look. "What if you don't?"

"Maybe," he replied after a long pause, running a weary hand through his overgrown hair. "I dunno."

And then I said the words that I'd thought so many times ever since he'd come home from the meeting at Apple, distraught over what John had said. Words I'd nearly said every day that John didn't call, that George didn't call, that bloody Ringo didn't call. Not a letter, not a telegram, only coded missives sent through Mal, Derek, and NME interviews.

"You're bloody Paul McCartney," I said, reaching out to put a hand on his face. "You write songs in your sleep. It's annoying, if we're being honest. You're too good at it all, you know. You don't need anyone."

He shook his head. "I need you and Lou."

"Yes, well," I said, offering a half-smile. "You mostly just need me to remind you not to name the sheep. But Paul-- you're not some guy who insulated farmhouses and raises sheep. You're more than that."

"Sort of raises sheep," he corrected with a raised eyebrow. "Can't believe Lucky and Pluto died."

I gave him another look. "Which is why we don't name the sheep."

He rolled into his side to face me. "Which is why I keep you around."

I reached out to run a hand over his tired eyes, his uneven beard until it rested just above his heart.

"Years ago one of my uncles was sick.... Really sick, y'know... cancer, I think it was," he said, apropos of nothing. "Anyway, he'd always loved trad jazz-- the stuff they played between the wars. Spike Hughes, Reginald Foresythe, those sorts of musicians. So when I found out he was bed-bound with cancer, I had Eppy send loads of records for them to play. He couldn't really communicate at that point, just sort of lay there... and my dad played these records for him all day."

"That must've been soothing for him," I said, entirely unsure where this was headed.

"That's the thing," Paul replied, his eyes on mine. "I keep wondering-- did he like it? Or did it drive him batty? Suppose his last thoughts were, 'stop playing that blasted Spike Hughes!'"

I pondered this for a moment while he continued.

"Suppose it's like me going into a coma tomorrow and you playing nothing but Procol Harum for days while I wither away and die?" he mused.

I gave him a pointed look. "Or a bit like listening to the same Simon & Garfunkel song over and over."

A whisper of a smile appeared on Paul's face. "Touché."

We went back and forth for a while about what he liked about the song. I wondered if John had pinched the "coo-coo-ca-choo" for I Am The Walrus, to which Paul indignantly replied that John had sung "goo-goo-g'joob" before admitting that yeah, he might've pinched it.

Five minutes before Louise was due to arrive back, I reached over to hold both his hands. He stopped mid-sentence and looked at me.

"We've got to go back to London," I said. "It's time."

He squeezed my hands before releasing them and turning to stare at the ceiling. "I dunno, Liss. It seems so far away, doesn't it?"

"It's time," I repeated.

"Suppose the sheep... there's still the mystery of the clover, y'know. We need to sort--"

"No," I shook my head. "Love, I know you don't feel like yourself. And I know you're in the middle of something.... Something I can't even understand. But it's time to get on with it."

He turned his head to look at me for a long moment. "What, keep calm and carry on? That sort of thing? Are we being bombed?"

I nodded. "That sort of thing, yeah. It's time to get on with it. For both of us."

**

A week later, we departed the farm in the Land Rover I'd gotten Paul for Christmas ages ago. It was on its last leg and we agreed we'd drive it to London and have Mal sort out what would be done with it.

He'd shaved early that morning and asked me to trim his hair. We traded in our farm gear for the more fashionable outfits we'd arrived in several months prior. I looked at Paul's profile as he drove south, wondering if I'd made the right decision to force his hand. Perhaps he needed more time to mentally prepare to face the world, or perhaps isolation had been the only thing keeping him together.

Before I could get too stuck in my own thoughts, he turned toward me and gave me a dazzling smile. It reminded me so much of the carefree man that I'd married that I burst into tears, causing him to panic and pull over to the side of the road until he was sufficiently assured that I was alright.

We spent two nights in Liverpool with his cousins, which mostly consisted of listening to you-remember-when? stories and drinking copious amounts of whisky until I could barely see straight. Something about being in his hometown -- or maybe being around his family, who could care less that a Beatle was in residence -- seemed to revitalize something inside him. I was almost certain that the heaviness of London would come as an assault to us both, but was happy to see him like that even just for a few days.

The second day there, his cousin's wife drove me to a beauty parlor to get a proper haircut. I'd done a shit job with it in Scotland and it was horribly uneven, causing the hairdresser to visibly flinch. We decided the only option was to cut it short -- just above my chin -- and she styled my long fringe to one side, adding a little swoop.

"Holy fuck," Paul said as soon as I arrived back at his cousin's.

I lifted a hand to pat the top of my head. "Is it awful?"

He started laughing. "No, love -- every bird in London is going to have that cut within a month."

We left Liverpool early on a Tuesday morning for Heswall, where we spent three days with his dad, stepmother, and stepsister. They adored Lou and fussed over her like she'd never before been fussed over. Our last night, his dad took him on an extended walk around the property, both of them looking seriously and gesturing dramatically.

"What were you talking about?" I whispered the night before we were due to leave. Louise was asleep in a cot on the other side of the room, so we were huddled under the covers, terrified of waking her. "You and your dad, I mean."

"Oh, everything," he whispered. "He... well, I think you're right, Liss. It's time to get on with things. "

"I'm always right," I joked.

"It's annoying," he admitted. "Be wrong more often. Stop making the rest of us look bad."

His eyes softened and he reached for me, pulling me closer. He leaned forward and pressed a kiss on my lips and then on my shoulder. His hands moved down my torso until he found my waist and he groaned into my shoulder.

"Really wish my daughter wasn't in the same bloody room," he muttered.

It had been ages since we'd been together. When we first arrived in Scotland, we'd had loads of sex whenever we could, mostly to show that we might have run out of town but we were still standing. But then, quickly thereafter, we'd both run out of energy for much of anything other than survival.

"We could be quiet?" I suggested in a whisper.

He shook his head. "That's crackers, Liss, suppose she wakes up? We could traumatize her for life."

I eyed him. "But she doesn't even know what sex is."

"Yes, and I don't want her to until she's at least 25."

"I think she might find out before then."

"Sorry, what? Can't hear you? Is that English you're speaking?"

I giggled and there was a long pause before he leaned forward so his forehead was touching mine.

"Tell me we're okay."

I pulled back, searching his eyes but the room was too dark to see much.

"I know this all has... strained us," he said quietly. "You didn't sign up for this, Liss. I don't know what you signed up for, but not this bollocks. And I've been a useless twat most of the time. Don't think I'm not aware of it even if there wasn't much I could do about it."

I started to protest, even though the past two months had strained us -- so much so that there had been times when I wasn't sure if we could recover -- and even though he had been a useless twat most of the time.

"No, don't," he said, cutting me off. "I just..." he trailed off and I would've given anything to properly see his expression. "You kept me together, Liss."

He reached out and brushed away a tear on my face. "Don't cry, love. We're on the other side of it, I hope."

I nodded silently, because more than anything, I hoped that we were on the other side of things. He reached out and grasped one of my hands, holding it against his chest as he began to hum a song I'd never heard until I fell asleep curled up next to him, hoping that we would be alright but not particularly confident about it.