Into My Life

Chapter 15

The apartment seemed so empty that evening without John. Sandy informed me that she couldn't blame me a bit for getting involved with a married man. I opened my mouth to protest, but, as usual, Sandy was off and running with the idea. "John is gorgeous! And he is so funny and smart, and when he looks at you, it's like that line in "Gone with the Wind" He knows what you look like without your clothes!"

"But he's not the one, is he Terry?" Brenda said, less question than comment.

"No. He's my friend." I hesitated, then went on. "You guys have been so great, taking care of me, keeping me going. You even managed to keep John's visit a secret. I feel bad about not telling you what went on while I was in England, but . . . I made promises." I had only promised Paul I wouldn't write about him, but as far as I could see, writing about him and talking about him would end up the same. If anything leaked out, there would be reporters snooping around and questions asked that I couldn't answer honestly without putting Paul in a bad light. Even refusing to discuss him would make him look bad.

"It's OK, Terry," Sandy said. "I'd give my eye teeth to hear the whole story, but you made a promise."

"Besides, we have narrowed it down to two," Brenda laughed.

"I haven't ruled out John!" Sandy objected.

"Come on, he'd never have shown up here if he was the one!"

"Aha!" Sandy crowed, "Maybe he never knew how Terry felt about him!! Maybe she just kept all the love inside until she couldn't hold it any more and had to leave before she confessed her love for him. Or maybe he knew and felt the same but they agreed that it was wrong because he was married and they knew they couldn't go on seeing each other day after day without consummating their love so she came home but he found he missed her so much and just couldn't stay with Cyn and came after Terry to beg her to come back to him!"

Brenda and I were in hysterics at Sandy's flood of romance novel mentality.

"Or maybe it was George after all," Brenda teased. "But Terry knew that Pattie was mentally unstable and would go berserk and end up in Bedlam if he left her and she just couldn't do that to a sweet girl like Pattie."

I couldn't resist contributing to the nonsense. "Or maybe I fell in love with Ringo but Paul fell in love with me and said if I chose Ringo over him, he would leave the group and fans all over the world would blame me for the breakup of the Beatles."

Sandy countered with a scenario that had me in love with Paul but finding out that he was my long lost first cousin, illegitimate son of my Uncle Mortimer, the family ne'er do well.

Brenda then proposed a situation in which it was really Prince Charles I loved but the Queen forbad the union to someone who was not only a commoner, but a colonist.

I was reassured by their sense of humor about my deep dark secret, and life returned to normal for us. Near normal at least. Sandy began stepping up her campaign to get me to go out with someone. For the first time in two years I could afford not to work every weekend and I had no excuse for sitting at home, she pointed out. The only way to get over one guy was to move on to the next. "If you get bucked off, you get right back on," she insisted. I was certain the mental image that brought to my mind was not the one in hers.

"You have to start dating someone," she badgered me daily for a week but I really had no interest. In fact, I resisted because it seemed that if I did start to date, I would lose my memories of Paul. I didn't want to. I wanted to remember his voice, his touch. I remembered the way I felt when I had started to massage John's sore muscles, the flush of heat that signaled the beginning of wanting. I wasn't ready for that -- I didn't want to want anyone else. I found myself going to the box in the back of my closet where I had hidden away all my mementos. I got out the pictures of Paul that had been too painful to look at and found with some odd sense of relief that it still was too painful to look at his face. That wasn't healthy and I knew it.

I sat on the floor of my closet, staring into that box for a long, long time. When I put the lid back on it, I told myself I was closing the door to a part of my heart. Maybe the hurt would always be there, but I didn't have to open the door and look in. Didn't have to see the glow of the firelight, the bay window, the feather comforter on the bed of that cottage in Scotland. Board the door and window shut. Let the fire grow cold. Let gray dust cover the white sheets and dull the red roses in the rug. Let cobwebs anchor the suitcase to the chair. Miss Havisham had her room with the wedding feast molding away. I would have a cottage with a room that held a premature honeymoon that never should have happened. But unlike Dickens' crazy old woman, I would not visit this room again.

I got up off the floor, pushed the box up on the shelf, and went to find Sandy. "Get me a date," I said.

His name was Todd. He was tall, nice looking, and really quite nice. Very intelligent, a pre-med student, but no egg head. He had a good sense of humor. I had met him before at a party and, at the time, thought he was interesting, but he was dating someone then. So at least it wasn't a blind date. We doubled with Sandy and her date because I feared that if left on my own with him, I would be home by nine. We went bowling and I managed to have a fairly good time, but it was still the longest evening of my life. I couldn't seem to concentrate on what he said. I just kept smiling and nodding like a demented fool. Then we went back to the apartment. When it was time to say goodnight, he was enthusiastic and I let him kiss me. Nothing. No spark, no heat, but at least I didn't throw up. I let him keep on, encouraged him, hoping my faked enthusiasm would turn into something real. It didn't, not even when he started groping me. I stopped him and sent him home. That night I dreamt of Paul, more vividly than I had in weeks and woke up crying so hard I woke Brenda and Sandy.

But I was determined. I wasn't looking for Mr. Right. All I wanted was someone who could make me forget Paul, if only for a few hours. I carefully analyzed the situation trying to figure out why none of the boys I knew interested me in the least. Boys . . . Maybe that was the problem. Maybe I looking should be looking for a man, not a boy. Todd was twenty two, and Paul only twenty four, but in experience, sexual and otherwise, Todd was a babe in the woods. I couldn't help but laugh. In order to find a guy around here who could compare with Paul in experience, I might have to start in a nursing home!

So my next date was with a twenty five year old friend of Sandy's brother. He wasn't terribly good looking, but he was experienced. Our date went well. I was on the right track with the idea of looking for a man, not a boy. I managed to pay attention, look interested, smile at his stories and laugh at his jokes. He managed to get me to let him come upstairs when we got back to the apartment. That was all he managed. Smooth moves, all the right words, nice kisses, but still nothing that felt good much less tempting. I sent him on his way shortly. Then I went to bed and dreamt about sex.

This did not seem to be working. I wasn't feeling anything when I was with them. No interest in them emotionally or physically, but I was dreaming about sex a lot!

Meanwhile, John and I talked on the phone every week. He wasn't at all thrilled with the movie business. He was regretting agreeing to do the movie thing and wishing he could go home. But, in spite of the movie being a drag, he was glad he'd come in one way. He was proving to himself that he could survive away from the isolated world of being a Beatle. Besides, partying in Hollywood was a different scene. He was having some good times. Too good, I feared. The weekends sounded like non-stop drug marathons. But he was keeping things together thanks to Hans whom he was now convinced was Mal in disguise. "He keeps me out of real trouble. He has been getting instructions from the home office. I am not to be allowed to do anything to tarnish what is left of my lovable mop top image. The Jesus thing, leaving Cyn -- all quite enough for one year!"

John sounded more amused than resentful and I was just plain relieved that Brian was keeping an eye on him if only by long distance.

John said he was working on some songs. He hadn't done that at all while I was in England and I took it as a good sign that the self pitying slump he had been in was over. He also reported that Cyn had hired a solicitor. Good news since it meant she took him seriously about the divorce. Bad news since she had been told not to talk to him about it. When he called she refused to discuss plans, but at least she let him talk to Julian. Julian was fine. He was used to Daddy being gone.

I told him about my dates, making a big joke of it. He laughed. "We make a pair. I want out and you want in."

He was renting costumes for Halloween for both of us, a vampire and his victim complete with makeup and tips from Hollywood's finest makeup artists. On this visit he wasn't planning to bring along his security people. He hadn't needed them at all the last time he was here and just wanted to visit like an ordinary person. I was horrified at the idea. We argued over that for three weeks of phone calls. He was totally pigheaded about it and it was clear he was thumbing his nose at the controls other people still put on his life. As a bid for freedom, the movie thing was a failure in his eyes. "I'm less on my own than ever! I am living at the estate of the director, for Christ's sake!" I figured he would give in after putting on a show of rebellion but the weeks went by and he didn't. We finally compromised; he would travel in a disguise and would allow Mark and whoever Sandy was dating to act as bodyguards for the weekend. I agreed to that, knowing that in spite of his off-the-wall personality, Mark would take the job seriously. The Halloween party we were going to was at another nursing student's parents' home. That would be a smaller crowd and a lot quieter group that any of the Halloween get-togethers at local bars or dance halls. Even so, I told Sandy she had to go to the party with the biggest, brawniest guy she knew.

I was worried that John would find my friends and our parties very dull after London and Hollywood and asked him if he was sure he wanted to go. "I like your friends," he said. "Brenda has half a brain and Sandy has great tits!"

I gasped and was spluttering about for a suitable retort, but he was laughing. "No, really, Tess. It will be a good time 'cause it's me going out to meet people. Not them after me, wantin' a bit of the big time. And your friends aren't phony, aren't pretending to be arty college puddin's, and they aren't smarmy, upper crust university elite. Like Brenda's boyfriend Mark -- he's just a workin' class guy getting ahead while he avoids being sent off to Vietnam."

"Well, just so you are forewarned. This won't be an all night drug happening or sex orgy like you are used to! We are strictly a beer and make-out 'til she slaps your face crowd."

He chuckled. "That's where I come from. Liverpool. And Hamburg was just more of the same but with girls who didn't get ‘round to the slap!"

Halloween weekend finally arrived. This time Brenda and I were able to leave class in time to meet John at the airport. Mark went along even though I didn't expect trouble at the airport. I almost didn't recognize John when he got off the plane. The sunglasses and beard and mustache were really effective, and having been done by a Hollywood costume/make-up artist, they were very real looking. I did a classic airport run into his arms and kissed him, laughing at the scratchy facial hair. We hustled him down to the baggage claim, grabbed his suitcases and were out of the airport in no time. He gloated over having made his point -- he could travel alone.

Back at the apartment, we set about making popcorn balls to take to the party. It was a messy, sticky project and when Sandy got home John made a sticky mess of her too when he greeted her with a smacking big kiss and lecherous hands all over her, but she didn't seem to mind. We cleaned up, grabbed a bit to eat and while Mark went to get his costume, we started getting dressed. The costume John brought for me was a Transylvania peasant girl dress with a full, colorful skirt, white peasant blouse with a big open neckline that could be pulled out to the sides and off the shoulders, and black lace-up bodice. I slipped the blouse on and found to my dismay that it could not be worn with a bra, but realized that was the purpose of the bodice. Once I had it on, I went back out into the living room. John looked at me and grinned. He tugged the loose neckline of the blouse further down over my shoulders. I tugged it back up and he tugged it back down. I had tied the bodice laces loosely. He untied them, pulled them tight and retied it. I looked down and found that the tight bodice did just what it did for the tavern girls of Merry Old England. It pushed my boobs up made them rounded mounds threatening to spill out of the blouse.

"I can't wear it like this!" I said, feeling my face turn red and untying as fast as I could. Sandy and Brenda were laughing wildly.

"That's how it is supposed to be!" John protested.

"Just don't bob for apples," Brenda advised. "You'll confuse everyone!"

"I can't breathe!"

"Neither can I," said John.

"And that's how it's supposed to be!" Sandy giggled.

I got it undone, and headed for the privacy of the bathroom to re-do it to the level of voluptuousness of my own choosing. Sandy and Brenda headed to their room to get dressed. John went to my room to change -- after Brenda slammed her door in his face.

I adjusted and readjusted the laces, unsure just how daring I wanted to be. I was laughing a little at myself as I realized that only a couple of months ago I would have considered the blouse itself to be quite revealing enough and not even considered tightening the bodice. Now I was mentally going over a list of who might be at the party that I might want to impress. Somewhere in recent months I had crossed a couple of lines. One about how to dress. That was easy to understand. I was a lot more comfortable with how I looked and with the whole sex thing now. The other line was a little stranger. Since when was I really interested in looking for someone? The dates I had been on were like a dose of bad tasting medicine. I took it because I knew I needed to. But tonight felt different. I wanted to be with someone. I wanted someone to want me. Of course there was no escaping the thought that maybe the reason for the sudden change was simply that John was here. His airport hug and kiss were fresh in my mind. I did not like that thought at all. I could not possibly be so shallow, conceited, so star struck that only a celebrity would do! Tonight I would disprove that. I would have a great time and dance with every guy I could and, dammit, I would enjoy it.

I pulled myself together and let Brenda into the bathroom. She was in bell bottoms and fur vest and tugging a long black wig into place. She needed the mirror to put on the tons of eye makeup to finish turning her into Cher. John came in to watch, wearing black trousers and a ruffled white shirt with an old fashioned black cravat. Sandy was dressed as Tinker Bell. Short, gauzy dress, sparkly wings, wand and all.

When Brenda was done in the bathroom, we all crowded in to watch John transform himself with the makeup he had brought. We watched as he put his contact lenses in and started with the disguise. Pale vampire skin, dark shadows around the eyes, pointed fangs that were big enough to be shocking when he smiled, but small enough to leave in comfortably, and a little trickle of fake blood at the corner of the mouth. He combed his hair back. He was going to just slick it back like Bella Lugosi, but somehow it came out more of a D.A. from the fifties.

"A blood sucking Teddy Boy," he proclaimed. The transformation was remarkable. No one would recognize him unless he spoke to them, and then it would take a few minutes for even a fan to realize who he was.

Then it was my turn. We decided on pale skin, but not the translucent whiteness of a vampire. Just the anemic look of his newest victim. Lots of eye makeup, red lipstick, and then the final touch. A little glue and a patch on my neck. Makeup to blend it in. Blood in the puncture marks and trickling down my neck.

"Just right!" Brenda exclaimed.

By then, the doorbell was ringing with trick or treaters and we went down to help Sandy who was giving out candy. Mark arrived wearing a fur vest and smirky Sonny Bono smile under a scroungy looking moustache.

"Think short." John advised him.

Sandy's date arrived. She had done exactly as I had asked. Chuck was huge. His Peter Pan made Sandy look like a tiny fairy.

"He is perfect, Sandy!" I said.

"All State Varsity Tackle of the Year his Junior and Senior years," she grinned. Of course poor Chuck didn't have a clue to what I was laughing about and I had to explain that we needed a bodyguard for John.

"A bodyguard? Why?" asked Chuck who had yet to be introduced to Count Dracula and didn't recognize him.

"Say something, John," Mark prompted. "See if he can figure it out."

"Fab," said John. "Gear."

Chuck looked bewildered.

"She looks more like him than I do?"

No response.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah!"

Light dawned. Chuck yelled "Holy shit! Holy shit, man! I can't believe this! Oh geez!"

Once Chuck stopped pumping John's arm in a painfully enthusiastic handshake, I went over what we needed him to do. "You have to stay sober and you have to keep an eye on the crowd and don't let anybody touch him--"

"Here now," John objected. "Let's not rule out all physical contact!"

"OK," I laughed, "But be ready to get him out of there if they recognize him and --"

Chuck took it from there. "Know where your man is at all times and know where the offense is. Work as a team and always, always have a plan."

Chuck was going to work just fine.

"And if we run into trouble, there is always Sandy's pixie dust," John laughed.

Sandy wanted photos of all of us and ran upstairs for her camera. John followed her up and came back wearing a black cape with a Count Dracula stand up collar and red satin lining. He looked fantastic. We posed for pictures on the front steps and John grabbed me, tipped me back over his arm and bared his fangs at my neck. I laughed and struggled as I was supposed to, but that laughing, theatrical, and posed embrace convinced me. I needed to find a boyfriend. I wanted, no, craved someone to bite my neck!

We started off the evening by testing John's disguise at a couple of bars. No problems with the disguise, but Mark's rendition of "I Got You Babe" nearly got us thrown out of the first place. (Hard to believe I know, but his singing was worse than Sonny's) John informed the bartender at the second that American beer was a tasteless imitation of the real thing. This said while the Hamm's Beer bear cavorted on the TV screen over his head. Pure heresy. The bartender told John to drink it or leave. Mark put an arm around John's shoulders and lead him back to the table. "When in Rome, John. When in Rome."

We left there, drove to a couple of liquor stores looking for a beer a little more to John's taste than the usual American brew, and finally found some German import he said would at least be an improvement. Then we set off to the Halloween party that Sue, one of our classmates, was having. As we drove down the streets of the housing development where Sue lived, John looked around at the tract homes around him, all ranch styles, all in pastel paint, every third house the same.

"So this is the famous American suburbia?"

"In its glory," Mark said.

"Hate to be here in the off season," John said dryly.

We presented ourselves at the door of the home where the party was and were ushered inside. No one recognized John as I introduced him to our hostess Sue as "My friend, the Count." He smiled and nodded to the group in the kitchen, but didn't say anything. We handed over the contribution of chips and popcorn balls we brought, kept the beer, and were directed to join the crowd "down in the basement."

As we walked by the living room, John looked in, waved at Sue's parents sitting there and said, "Lovely suburban home you have. Do you always entertain in the cellar?" They looked confused, thrown off by the accent and uncertain of what they had heard. Chuck and I hustled John toward the basement steps. "You mean we really are going to the cellar?" he asked.

"Yes, to the rec room, " I said.

Mark explained. "Rec as in recreation or as in unwreckable. Home of the American Wild Party Domesticus."

Music was blaring and people were dancing. John headed for the stereo, flipping through the records. We were talking about a some of the records and artists he had never heard when the guy playing dee-jay put on a Beach Boys song filling the room with the beat of surfing music. Mark yelled "Surfs up!" and jumped up on the coffee table, doing a n unihibited lip-synch as he surfed his way through the song.

John laughed, opened a beer and took a long drink. I turned back to watch Mark and a half minute later, I was aware that John was moving past me through the crowd of dancers, toward Mark. Thumb over the top of the beer bottle, shaking it vigorously as he moved quickly up behind him. Before I could move, he stepped in front of Mark, hosed him down with beer and yelled "Wipe Out!"

The room exploded with cheers and Mark bellowed, "Christ, John, you could at least use real beer, not that brown crap!"

John laughed and said, "Come 'ead, I'll teach you to drink like a man, none of that yellow piss!"

The room went from party roar to near silence as they heard the accent, the voice that was somehow familiar. The excited, disbelieving whispers began. I braced myself and grabbed Chuck and Sandy. "Get ready. We might have to get him out of here fast."

Mark grabbed John's arm and brought him back to me. Around the room, there were whispers and gasps as they figured out who Dracula was. Chuck stood like a wall between John and the rest of the guests. I waited tensely as the sounds of "Satisfaction" poured out of the speakers, but John simply got a handful of napkins and handed them to Mark. Wide eyed girls were closing in, peeking around Chuck. John looked at the nearest one and said unconcernedly, "Hullo, luv."

"Hello John," she said. "Can I have your autograph?"

"No autographs tonight, please. I am off duty," he said, smiling. "What's your name, then?" And that was that. Others quietly crowded around, talking to him. No screams, no fainting. Mark, Brenda, Sandy and I looked at each other and shrugged.

The party rolled on. Beer flowed and the music got louder. More people arrived and the room was getting crowded, but there was no trouble. John, who didn't like to dance ("Unless it's a slow song and I can cop a feel!") was more interested in talking to people than dancing. The partygoers were behaving so rationally. They were surprised and awed to meet him, but aside from a few girls having vapors in the corner, no one was being silly about it. They asked what he was doing here, and he told them about being in California to work with a film director as a holiday and that he just came up to Minneapolis for a short visit with a friend. The girls from school were all giving me funny looks. When John was busy talking to some others, a bunch of them surrounded me.

"You are dating John Lennon?!?"

"No! He is just a friend."

"And married," one of them pointed out.

"He and his wife are separated! I read it just last week!" another girl offered.

That had them awestruck. Now, in their minds, I was not only dating him, but had broken up his marriage. I hadn't thought about how it would look, being here with him -- in matching costumes yet. I should have brought a date. I repeated that he was just a friend, but I could see the doubt in their eyes.

But John, without even knowing it, got me off the hook. He came on to half the girls there. If anyone was paying attention, which all my friend most certainly were, it became pretty obvious he wasn't "with" me. Some girl showed up dressed as a playboy bunny. Her date hovered in the background caught between excitement at meeting John Lennon and growing recognition that John was interested in his girl. I didn't know the couple, but I hoped this was not anyone who had been dating long because they were going to have one hell of a fight over her behavior with John. The girl was as fascinated with John as he was with her, or at least with her cleavage and cute little bunny tail. Within minutes she had draped herself around John and left her date standing there uncertain if he should be mad or flattered that John was stealing his date..

Following through on my resolution to have a good time and find a boyfriend, I flirted. I felt silly the first time, going up to a guy I didn't know, introducing myself, smiling, touching his arm, looking into his eyes. But it worked. Maybe it was just that they knew I was "that girl who went to England with the Beatles." The mysterious "Tess" Martin that the reporters couldn't seem to find. Anyway, within an hour I had danced with a lot of guys and had four ask if they could call me sometime. I also had a few girls a little steamed at me. What I didn't have was any desire to dance with anyone any more, much less go out with these guys if they did call. Won the battle but still losing the war.

We had been there just over an hour when I noticed it was really getting crowded in the rec room. A lot of people I didn't know were there, but Sue was a local girl so she knew lots of people so I hadn't been concerned at first. Now however, new arrivals, few of them in costumes, were starting to push in on John, wanting autographs and pictures taken with him. The mood was changing. Mark had noticed the same thing and we realized what had happened. People were tipping off their friends that John Lennon was here, and people were crashing the party. It was time for us to leave.

Chuck was standing guard over John who was sitting on the sofa with a girl on his lap. She was in street clothes, not a costume and I figured she was one of the party crashers. The uninvited flirted shamelessly with the undead and I wondered what had happened to his Playboy bunny. We told John what was going on and he looked a little concerned but still more interested in the girl on his lap.

"We need to leave, John," I said.

"Ah, but can we?" he asked. Mark and I looked at each other, realizing John had a good point. We didn't know what was going on upstairs or outside.

"I'll go --" he started to say but we were interrupted by our hostess.

"Terry, you've got to talk to my Dad," Sue said. "We've got a little problem upstairs." Something in her tone and expression tipped me off. It was the way nurses communicate dire emergencies to one another when visitors were in earshot.

"Stay with John," I told Chuck. Mark and I followed Sue upstairs. The house was packed with people and Sue's father was demanding to know what was going on.

"What the hell is going on?" he asked. "Kids have been standing in line to use the phone and now all these people are showing up looking for one of the Beatles! I have a Beatle in my basement?"

I apologized, explaining that it wasn't Sue's fault, she hadn't known I was bringing John, and that I knew when we decided to come that people would recognize John at some point, but I hadn't thought about them calling their friends. "I'll get him out of here right away," I promised.

"The street is a parking lot," he said. "You'll never get your car out." He turned to his daughter. "The party is over Susie. Go around and tell everyone you don't know to leave so we can get this guy and everyone else out of here."

Sue started to protest, asking if her friends could stay, but he was firm.

"He is right, Sue," I said. "The word is out and people are going to keep showing up. As long as there is any sign of a party going on, they will try to get in. I am really sorry we ruined your party."

"Ruined it?" she laughed. "This is the best party I ever had, even if it has to be the shortest!"

"I'll go see what the situation is outside," Mark said, but the words were no sooner out of his mouth when the sound of sirens was heard.

Her dad said, "Oh great - the neighbors have called the police on us!"

I was momentarily relieved at the arrival of help, but it was short-lived. The sirens had stirred the party crashers up and they were milling around, searching for John knowing they were about to be removed from the premises and determined to see him before they left.

"Tell them they are going to have to help me get John out of here," I said to Sue's dad, and Mark and I headed back downstairs to John. We gathered around John to formulate a strategy. Chuck reported that there was a good sized window in the laundry room we could break and get John out through, but as much as he and Mark and John liked the idea of breaking a window, we realized that our car would be totally blocked in. We talked about moving John into the laundry room where we could barricade the door, but there didn't seem to be any real danger in the rec room as yet. All we needed to do was tell those who had already infiltrated to leave and keep more from coming downstairs.

Mark and Chuck stationed themselves at the top of the stairs to block the entrance while Brenda and Sandy began to identify probable party crashers and told them they had to leave. Most objected until told the police were upstairs, then they went quietly. When they told the girl who had been sitting on John's lap she had to leave, she turned to John. "Oh, John, tell them to let me stay!"

"Sorry. luv," he said. "You've got a lovely ass, but you'll have to go."

As she was led away, he sighed. "Tragic. I was in love."

"Uh huh," I said.

"Well, for the moment," he said.

Meanwhile, people were still dancing and having fun, thinking this was one great blast of a party, unaware they too would be asked to leave soon.

John watched this, and feeling reassured he was in no danger, went after another beer and came back to sit next to me. "You've run off all my birds! Looks like I'll just have to make do with you."

He told me that the playboy bunny had falsies, and that her date had finally gotten fed up and told her he was leaving. She decided she better go with him. He pointed out a girl who had dragged him into the laundry room and french kissed him. "Either I swallowed it or she made off with one of me fangs," he said. I was amazed. I told her she was a fellow nursing student with a reputation for being very quiet and reserved. "I suspect she is a real moaner and scratcher," he said. I didn't know whether to believe any of this. He hadn't wasted any more of his beer and was feeling good.

"You are making that up! She didn't really."

"Did so. One dance with me and women turn into animals." As he said that, a slow song came on. He laughed fiendishly and led me out among the dancers. As he put his arms around me, I laughed. "I know you too well, John. I am impervious to your charms."

"Your loss," he teased and pulled me close.

So I let him dance with me. Let him pull me close and hold me. It felt so comfortable, so safe to be with someone I knew as well as I knew John. Someone I cared about and I knew cared about me. Safe and comfortable, and something else I didn't want to think about. Halfway through the song, I looked up to find John looking down at me, looking right into me with that look I knew so well. His eyes locked on mine and I knew that he knew exactly what little fantasy was going on in my head. I felt my face grow hot, and that wicked smile was on his face as he pulled me closer. I concentrated on not letting the lower halves of our bodies get any closer. That made him laugh out loud.

The police made their way down to the rec room just as the music stopped. A sergeant informed us that the premises had been cleared of uninvited guests and John could -- and should -- leave.

"Just how long do you plan to remain in Minneapolis?" he asked John.

John looked at the policeman long and hard before answering, "Just a couple of days." I thought John was about to be encouraged to cut his visit short, and I held my breath. John had had enough to drink that he wouldn't take any crap from anyone. I had visions of a trip to the police station, a panic stricken call from me to Brian, headlines in the morning paper, reporters swarming . . .

But the officer simply said that if John would keep the police department informed of any places he might go where this kind of thing could happen, they would see to it that officers were available. If he wanted full security, they could put him in contact with local security firms. Pleasantly surprised, John thanked him and said he didn't think that would be necessary. I wasn't sure. It was hard enough for them to go out in London, but here, where fans had only a once in a lifetime opportunity to see a Beatle, it might get more difficult. Mark and Chuck were fine for everyday security, but thinking that John's disguise was enough to let us into an open party was a mistake. We would have to be more careful.

Since everyone left at the party was standing around watching this interchange with the police, it was as good a time as any to tell them to leave him alone. As tactfully as I could I announced that anyone who intended to bring friends or family by the apartment to meet John could just forget it. We would not be answering the door and if they hung around outside I would call the police. Sue's dad might be upset with her about tonight, but our landlord would simply throw us out! Everyone laughed and I could only hope they would do as I asked.

The policemen escorted us upstairs. John looked around as we headed to the door and said, "Well, a bit of a mess, but no broken windows or smashed lamps!" Sue's parents were out on the lawn with a bunch of gawking neighbors. John waved to them and yelled "Great party but you're cellar's a rec!" We hustled him to the car.

The police had told the party crashers to leave, and they had, but as we left the subdivision, John said "We are being followed." Mark was full of great suggestions to elude the string of cars behind us. Sandy was driving since she was the one with the biggest car, and she cut through alleys, circled blocks, and made sudden turns. None of it was very successful since Sandy would not "Step on it" or run red lights, or make a sudden U-turn into traffic as Mark and John were suggesting. We still had a parade of a half dozen cars behind us. The last thing I wanted was for them to find out where we lived. Brenda finally saved us.

"Go to the hospital," she ordered Sandy. None of the guys agreed with that, but I agreed with Brenda when I saw her pull her parking card out of her purse. We pulled up to the security booth at the entrance to the hospital parking lot, Sandy showed the parking permit to the attendant, and he raised the gate. We went on in, leaving our pursuers to try to convince the parking attendant to let them in. Fat chance of that, Brenda and I knew. We had both parked blocks away and hiked in on occasions when we forgot our cards. While they were learning the futility of trying to talk their way in, we cut across the parking lot, exited by another gate, and zipped home free and clear.

We ended the night with carry-out pizza and beer at the apartment. Chuck had to work the next day so he left first. Mark stayed to watch the late movie with us, not that he and Brenda seemed to be paying much attention to it. After the movie, Mark got up to go and Brenda went downstairs to say goodnight to him. I pulled the sofa bed out and made it up for John while he went into the bathroom. Some old Loretta Young movie came on. By the time John got back, Sandy and I were sitting on his bed, hooked on the movie. We scooted over and he joined us on the bed.

Loretta plays a woman who, after years of sacrificing her own life to care for her invalid mother, takes a sea cruise to Europe to escape the emptiness she faces when her mother dies. Of course she meets a guy on board. He is handsome, kind, but somewhat mysterious. She falls madly in love and so does he -- or so we think, but we are not sure.

By this point, Brenda was back, stretched out across the foot of the bed. Loretta dances with her man, takes a romantic moonlit walk on the deck, and -- ooh -- they kiss. But as she realizes she is madly in love with this man, he tells her they must part when the boat docks. He cannot tell her why, but she "must understand, it is better this way. I love you, I love you passionately and would give anything to be with you, but I cannot. Please don't ask me to explain." Loretta retreats to her lonely cabin for a good cry and resolves to stay away from him. Until the big storm at sea. He comes to make sure she is safe and, predictably, she falls into his arms. The moment ends in passionate kisses and, in old movie fashion, the rest is left to the viewers imagination as the scene moves to one of the ship tossed helplessly on the towering waves.

John started laughing as the scene faded. "No symbolism left unturned," he commented. "Wild sea, wild sex. I especially liked the pounding waves and throbbing of the ships engines. He nailed her good!"

Sandy walloped John with a pillow. "It isn't about sex. It is about love!"

"It looked like sex to me. She wanted it bad!"

"She was in love!"

"She was in heat!"

We all protested and he just laughed at us.

"How come you men have to make everything just a matter of sex?" Brenda demanded.

"Because it is," he said. "It is no more than a basic urge to guarantee survival of the species -- and hell of a lot of fun to boot!"

We never got back into the movie. We argued about sex instead. John insisted it was no more than another instinctive behavior that should not be blown out of proportion. We all eat when we are hungry, scratch when we itch, and we don't insist that someone be in love and have legal permission to do those things.

"But how can you do . . . that, with someone you aren't in love with?" Sandy asked.

"Spoken like a true virgin," John teased. "Once you've done it, you know it is physical, not emotional."

Sandy blushed, but Brenda protested. "Well, it can't possibly be as good with someone you don't love!"

"Sure it can. Better in fact. Pure physical pleasure with no demands, no promises you can't keep."

"Spoken like a man!" I answered. "It is more than that for a woman."

"Only in a culture that tells her it is more. There have been and are societies where sex is separate from love."

"For the man, sure. They have harems and mistresses and that is OK, but the woman cannot do that," Brenda said.

"But those days are over, " John said. "Women have had to trade sexual freedom for protection because they are the ones who get pregnant. Now women have the pill so there is no need for them to insist on a legal contract before they have sex. And when they realize that, society is going to change. It is changing already. "Free Love" is here. For the first time in history, fucking can be as much fun for women as it has been for man."

We just looked at each other and shook our heads. The feminist movement was several years away and we were focused on romance, not equality. We argued on, and even though John couldn't convince us that love and marriage would become obsolete, he did make us think about the fact that modern medicine would change society. The pill and penicillin. No reason not to "do it" except beliefs that were as outdated as mustard plasters and leeches.

I dreamt about having sex that night, and I'll bet Sandy and Brenda did too. And for once, I wasn't dreaming about Paul.

*********