#I’m at like abbey road age now. don’t like that

[asunsetgrace16]

✧ …𝗛𝗘𝗬 𝗗𝗔𝗗, 𝗙𝗔𝗡𝗖𝗬 𝗦𝗘𝗘𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗛𝗘𝗥𝗘⎥𝗖𝗕98

Pairing: Connor Bedard x fem!Crosby!reader

Warnings: swearing

Summary: Connor and Y/N Crosby, Sidney's daughter, are in a secret relationship and are outed when she goes to the All Stars with her dad

Notes: The italics section is the flashback to how Connor and Y/N met. This is my new longest fic, and man I got carried away writing how Y/N and Connor met. Not really proofread, so hope for the best. Requested by anonymous.

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Word Count: 2.3k

It’s not exactly unexpected, for Connor Bedard and Y/N Crosby to be dating. His childhood idol, her father. Their lives are interconnected by a web of hockey players, former teammates, and friendships a mile deep. But, the caveat is, no one actually knows they are together. 

Y/N knew her dad would lose his mind when he found out who exactly her boyfriend is. From the time she was old enough to date, the rule was no hockey players, absolutely no teammates, and especially no rookies. Will he find out? Eventually, but not any time soon if Y/N has anything to say about it.

-

“I have tickets to most of the Canadian games, and I want to watch them win gold, in person. I was planning on going to the condo. No Dad, I'm fine. No, you don’t need to have Auntie Taylor come with me. I’m absolutely taking advantage of the fact that we have a place right where the World Juniors are happening. I’m seventeen for God’s sake, and I’ve been fairly independent for years. I’ll be fine.” Y/N says, on the phone with her dad. 

“I know, but you’re still my little girl. I’ll always want to protect you, no matter how old you get.” her dad, Sidney, says.

“I know dad, but this will be good practice for when I’m away at university.” She tells him teasingly.

“Uhhhg, don’t remind me.” he groans, “I trust you not to burn the place down, and try not to go overboard, with anything. The credit card for food and stuff is in the safe, and you have your own for anything else. Call me, if you need anything.”

“Thanks dad, I will.”

“Love you honey.”

Love you too, dad. Bye.”

There, that’s settled, Y/N thinks to herself. She is already in Cole Harbour, staying with her grandparents for Christmas. They already know her plans, and she convinced –not that she needed any convincing– her aunt Taylor to come with her for a girls trip. She flips her laptop open, hits play on Downton Abbey, and finishes her packing. 

“Tay, are you ready yet?” Y/N calls a few hours later. She hefts her suitcase down the stairs, shouldering a backpack.

“Yeah bug, just put my bags in the car. Bring yours out here too.” Taylor replies, “We can be on the road in twenty if we hurry.”

“Make it fifteen.” Y/N challenges with a grin.

The preliminary round of the tournament passes fast. After the shocking Game 1 loss, Canada bounces back and plows through every game afterwards. An exciting quarterfinals win against Slovakia has Canada set to play USA in the semifinals. A match up that always promises an electric game.

After the quarterfinal game, Y/N and Taylor head back to the dressing rooms and player’s entrance for a shortcut to the parking lot. They both have access, thanks to Sid. They talk excitedly about Bedard’s OT winner, a wicked 3-on-1 goal. 

“That was incredible.” Y/N exclaims. She’s no stranger to good hockey, but seeing a player that young, one her own age, to have such amazing talent is unreal to see. 

“Yes it was-” Taylor starts, but is cut off by a man in a suit stalking towards them.

“Hey! You two aren’t allowed back here. Players and staff only. Who do you think you are? Waltzing around here like you own the place? No respect anymore.” He rants before someone grabs him, pulling him away from Y/N and Taylor.

“I am so sorry about Randy. I’m Jim, by the way.” Jim apologizes, “I’m assuming that since you’re back here, you have permission. Is there something I can do to make it up to you? Wait, you’re Crosby’s daughter, aren't you? This makes a lot more sense now.”

“Yes I am, and we have permission. I can’t think of anything, it’s not necessary.” Y/N says. But Jim is determined, knowing who she is now. He offers to introduce the women to the team. They agree, and after Jim explains the situation to Randy, they all head back towards Canada’s dressing room. Talking the whole way, Jim explains that the team has a place rented for the tournament where the boys can hang out and relax. 

“If you’d like to join us, you are more than welcome. I won’t tell them who you are, I’ll let that happen naturally.” Jim says with a wink. “I want to see the look on their faces. It’s too bad your dad couldn't make it. That would really blow their socks off.” The group laughs and waits for Randy to make sure all the guys are decent, and beacons them in with a sheepish look, apologizing once again. The introduction is basic, no announcement or anything. Taylor and Y/N meet the rest of the staff first, quickly becoming engrossed in conversation. 

“So,” the head coach says, “Crosby’s daughter. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“And you.” Y/N replies.

“Coach, did you just say Crosby's daughter? She's here? Holy shit!” one of the players exclaims, joining their little group. “I’m Brandt, nice to meet you. Is your dad here, by chance?” He says, very quickly. The energy rolls right off of him.

“No, he’s not, unfortunately. West Coast road trip.” Y/N says, failing to hide a giggle. 

“Wanna mess with the guys with me?” Brandt asks, a scheming look on his face.

“Always.”

“Ok, I’m going to introduce you around, but not mention your last name. I want to see how long it takes the guys to figure out who you are.”

“Oh I like that.” They grin at each other, and make their way around the room. Before long, the whole team is standing or sitting close together, chatting with Y/N. The adrenaline can still be felt in the dressing room. 

“So how long are you in town for?” Dylan asks, “Hopefully long enough to watch us win gold.”

Y/N and Brandt exchange a look, “I’m planning on it. I don’t have to be back in Pittsburgh until the tenth.”

“Pittsburgh? You came all the way up here, to watch a Canadian team win? That makes no sense.” Logan wonders, looking confused.

“Oh I’m Canadian, I just live in Pittsburg with my dad. I was up visiting my grandparents for Christmas.” Y/N says. It is getting awfully difficult to keep a straight face. 

“Where do your grandparents live?” That comes from Olen.

“Cole Harbour.”

“Does that mean you've met Sidney Crosby?” Ethan asks. 

“Yup, see him all the time.” She bites back a smile. Brandt has to turn around and take a deep, shuddering breath so he doesn’t give them away. Connor sees him out of the corner of his eye. 

“Wait, you’re Y/N Crosby!” Connor says, standing up just as Y/N and Brandt burst out laughing. The rest of the boys look shocked as the two struggle to stop laughing. Connor grins, chuckling as Y/N wipes honest-to-goodness tears from her eyes. The staff and Taylor laugh amongst themselves, watching the young folks. 

“Guilty as charged.” She says breathlessly, silently wondering if Brandt is going to die of oxygen deprivation at this point. His face is pretty red. Now the questions are really flowing by the time Brandt finally regains some composure. The excited chatter doesn’t stop at the restaurant, either. Y/N and Taylor are invited to stay. As the evening winds down, Y/N finds herself with Connor, conversation flowing easily. 

“Nice goal, by the way. Dad was impressed.” Y/N says, nudging his shoulder with hers.

“Really?” Connor flushes. Cute.

“Yeah, he sees a lot in you.”

“That is…I have no words.” He admits. “Do you, um, do you think you’d want to sit with my family for the rest of the games? I want to talk to you more, and um…I’m just going to stop talking before I make a fool out of myself.”

“I’d love to.”

Connor and Y/N spend a lot of time together in the following days. She sits with his family during the final, and celebrates with them after they win gold.

“We did it!” Connor shouts, picking Y/N up and spinning her around. There is a moment when he sets her down where her arms are still on his shoulders and his hands are on her waist. The noise fades away, just the two of them in a little bubble. “Can I have your number? I’d like to keep talking to you, and take you out sometime.”

“Yeah, I’d like that.” She replies.

-

Now, over a year and 10 months into dating later, Connor and Y/N are both in Toronto for the All Stars. 

“Hey baby.” Connor says, putting his phone away when Y/N slips into the empty visitors dressing room.

“Hey Con.” She goes to him easily, settling comfortably into his open arms. He puts his chin on her head and tightens his hold on her. “I miss you.”

“I miss you too. I’m glad you decided to come.”

“Me too.” She tips her head up, meeting Connor in the middle for a sweet kiss. They go back to their hug, Y/N tucked against his chest, feeling warm again in the cold arena. They simply stand like that, swaying gently and soaking up the moment. They get so wrapped up in each other that they fail to hear voices outside the door. Connor goes to kiss Y/N again, but is interrupted by the door slamming open. Their heads snap to the door, wide eyed and scared.

“Y/N ANNA CROSBY. WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?” Sidney yells furiously, steam practically shooting from his ears like a cartoon character. Nate is standing close behind him, and Cale, Mathew Barzal, and Brady Tkachuk stand in the doorway. Connor and Y/N take a step back from each other, but keep their hands tightly clasped.

“How dare you not tell me about this. You know the rules, I expect you to follow them.”

“I-” She begins.

“And you,” Sid says, pointing at Connor, “I expected better from you. You’re a good kid, but I have rules for a reason.” Y/N grips Connor’s hand, squeezing three times. 

“You can’t control me like this, Dad. I’ve never had a real relationship because of you. So much of my life is wrapped up in hockey that it was easy to find my person there, and if it wasn’t a hockey-playing boyfriend, it was a hockey fan boyfriend which is worse. All they ever wanted to talk about was you, they never wanted me for who I am. Or you just plain scared them off because ‘no one is good enough for my daughter so why should she even bother’.” Y/N says back to him. Her chest is heaving and she is fighting off tears. 

“I can’t believe that you didn’t tell me this. How long have you two been together anyways?” Sid asks, still pissed off.

“Ten months.” Connor replies, voice strong and true despite the situation. He is nervous, of course, but he loves Y/N too much to let his childhood idol have much of an impact.

“TEN MONTHS!” Sid exclaims, incredulous that his daughter kept this secret, “Bloody hell. What possessed you to keep this from me?”

“This exact reaction that I knew would happen. I knew that if I told you when Connor first asked me out, you would flat-out forbid me to see him, and that wouldn’t have ended the way you wanted anyway. At least this way the two of us can act as a united front and you can see that this isn’t bad. We are both 18, legal adults. You can’t tell me what to do anymore.”

Sid stays silent. He is still angry, but the figurative steam has gone away. Nate and the others hover around the door.

Y/N continues, “I get it, Dad. You just want to protect me, and I love you for it. But I’m not a little kid anymore, I can’t be sheltered forever. And Connor’s good to me. You know he would be.” She takes a deep breath, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but I knew that if I did, you would react exactly the way you are. I wanted to be able to figure out my relationship without my dad looking over my shoulder the whole time.”

Sid’s face falls at her monologue. He can finally understand what Y/N was trying to say for years. “I’m sorry sweetheart. I had no intention for it to go that far. It is hard to watch you grow up, but I need to grow up some too and understand that you are an adult now. In my attempts to protect you, I drove you straight into what I always knew would happen. Thankfully, you picked a good one.” Sid pulls his daughter into a hug, tears threatening to fall. “I’m sorry. Please forgive me, it wasn’t fair of me.”

“Thanks dad, for apologizing. I know you meant well, but I don’t think this wasn’t the best way to get you to see my side of it” Y/N quips, a wry smile on her face. 

“I’m still pissed that you didn’t tell me, but I’d rather it was you than a lot of other guys” Sid states, reaching out to shake Connor’s hand, “but if you hurt her, I have a lot of power in this game.”

“I know,” Connor says, eyes focused on Y/N. A look so full of love even Sidney can’t deny it, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Awwww.” The trio looks up to see the other four guys with their hands clasped over their hearts, cute pouts on their lips. 

“The babies are in love.” Cale says with a grin.

[longing4yesterday]

Hello! ^^ Obligatory cat picture:

(Jackie sleeps with her eyes open and she always looks terribly panicked)

Ok now emotional support ringo panty shot:

Ok now some things that I'd actually been meaning to send into your inbox but keep forgetting to:

-taking off shipping vision and putting on the tinfoil hat, how real do you in your heart believe mclennon or any other ship of your choice were real? Doesn't need to go with evidence- just your most trutherlike attitude

-beatles album ranking?

Omg also I saw you were getting into the monkees... how are they treating youu I've been meaning to get into them for ages but somehow have not taken a single step towards it.

Ok thatis alll... hope it's not too much and hope you feel better !!! Muchmuchlove

hiii leo!!! first of all, thank you for the cat picture!! jackie looks adorable ; ; lovely little baby. and also thank you for the emotional support ringo panty shot. beautiful, 10/10 <3

secondly, to answer your questions;

in terms of if mclennon really happened, i can see it but not to the extent that we envision in fics. there was certainly a mutual attraction to one another, that much we can establish. but there’s no real way they could’ve made it work. at least, not how they were going about it. i don’t believe in the “they fucked in india and fell apart after that” theory, it feels shallow and one note. most likely, if anything happened, it came in spurts over the years. we have evidence of paul saving a letter that aunt mimi left for john saying she was heading into town for an hour or so, which is interesting. why save it? unless…either way, the love was there, but the love wasn’t enough to keep their bond completely together. maybe if john lived things would’ve been different but idk.

for albums, i will leave off yellow submarine and let it be cause i haven’t listened to either. but my official rankings goes as such; magical mystery tour, the white album, abbey road, a hard days night, sgt. peppers, revolver, rubber soul, beatles for sale, with the beatles, help! and please, please me. i need to relisten to quite a few of these but that’s my list for now <3 the first three are on heavy rotation all the time on my way to work.

and finally, the monkees! i love these silly guys so far!!! tbh i’m more interested in the lore than the music, but it’s growing on me too. i often have papa gene’s blues stuck in my head cause i am a sucker for southern inspired music. i need to get back to the show cause i was having so much fun. micky’s a stick out for me, but so is mike. i’m also a bit sold on them as a ship cause oh man, the things i’ve seen so far. either way i’m enjoying stay! glad i watched head forever ago and got sucked in the spiral <3

thank you for the ask leo, i always appreciate your presence <333

[zephyruswrites536]

I’m going to make a statement about Mammalian Sighing Reflex because I used to be a strong SBI-DSMP fan, still SBI fan. So if you dislike DSMP in any capacity and just want to hate move away, I don’t like Dream, I was never a true fan of him, as I said SBI.

Now, any Lovejoy fans who also know Wilbur Soot or the ones like me who went through Wilbur’s music and then was there for Lovejoy’s first EP.

Mammalian Sighing Reflex is such a good album. Someone on Reddit described it in its literal sense(I believe) that Mammalian Sighing Reflex is the Reflex that makes a Mammal stop itself from drowning because it needs to stay alive. A human however can stop this from self-control. It’s our primal instinct to save ourselves and that’s what it’s about, the primal instinct to not drown yourself. I probably summarized it slightly wrong- who knows.

As I am American I did not get this first and I believe we were last… anyways

Every song matches up to the next, it’s like Abbey Road’s side B but more depressing. Honestly the whole second half of the Album just hits closer to home than the rest and it just sounds good to me anyways.

I was saying, I can like almost anything Wilbur specifically makes because I have know and heard and loved his music for years now, almost two and a half.

Also, I forgot to mention- the reflex is a panic attack in the animal to survive, it knows it’s dying and is terrified/panicked. Well, any long term(I know I’m not an OG but i have been a fan for two and a half years) Wilbur fans know he has anxiety- I forget if it’s Social or just generalized- but he has talked about having Panic attacks from a young age.

That clues in the album name as well as a decent portion of the songs’ content.

Don’t fully listen to what I’m saying because the music is flowing through my ears and I’m picking up little bits so.

I don’t know which exactly but one of the first four songs there are lyrics about being on tour or heavily suggest a band kind of perspective.

He talked about having a panic attack on stage because he’d forgotten how to play “La Jolla” and I think that’s connects again to the album name.

What I was going to say though is again, before Lovejoy was a thing so SBI DSMP or Wilbur fans are thé ones I’m speaking to now, we all know the beginning of 2021 sucked for Wilbur. In “I don’t think it will end”(very good, makes me feel seen and that’s what this album is for) he describes how he hides away, and a very popular Crimebois quote is when he had talked about how he was sleeping in till the afternoon then would just scroll aimlessly on his phone but Tommy would text him saying “come talk to me” so he’d get up and get ready. The cycle he talks about fits in with that very well to me.

Wilbur splices recordings of himself into it, I know because almost all of us who were his fans in 2020 and 2021 know about the “field video” where he talks about how he could be easily killed by a sniper and not be found for days. From that I can recognize his younger voice and I think it’s in at least two videos, Amazon Standing Lamp and Glass Chalet- I believe-.

That’s all the investigation I’m doing from subconsciously picking up lyrics, so here’s this. This is obviously not my normal content so Good Omens and Our flag means death and The Magnus Archives enjoyers I’m sorry, but the creator means a decent amount to me and now does this album.

[monsterintheballroom]

It´s more of a questionnaire than interview and it´s under the cut :-)

Penelope Wilton: ‘I was dyslexic. People thought I was stupid’

The actress on flower power, the Beatles and her star turn in Downton Abbey

First film I saw at the cinema

My mother used the cinema as her nanny. She had an arrangement with the usherette where she would go shopping and leave my sister and me at the cinema. When she had finished shopping she would come down the aisle and wave a white hanky — that was our sign to leave. Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot was the first film I remember seeing. Jacques Tati was such a great clown.

First time I cried at the cinema

I don’t tend to cry over films. Usually I cry in front of paintings or at concerts. I did, however, sob through the film Brief Encounter. It’s so terribly touching. I still get a lump in my throat every time I watch it.

First time I performed on a stage

My first job was at 20, as Tammy the tightrope walker in a Christmas show at the Nottingham Playhouse. Theatre is always anxious-making and it gets worse when you’re older. There have been some funny things happening while I’ve been on stage, though. One audience member heckled Ralph Richardson and me over bad language during the play West of Suez when we performed in Brighton. Another acclaimed actor, who will remain nameless, was embarrassingly drunk on the stage once, forcing me to say his lines and mine. It was madness.

First TV show I watched

We didn’t have a television for a long time while I was a child. I think we had one for the coronation but then it seemed to go. It wasn’t until I was a bit older that I became aware of television, and even now I don’t seem to have much time to watch things, mainly because I’m busy acting in plays and TV shows like Downton Abbey, which was a wonderful experience. It was a surprise to us all, including the writer Julian Fellowes, that it was so successful here and everywhere. It was particularly lovely to work with Maggie Smith because she was one of the actors I had always admired. I would be very keen to come back to the show if it were to return. I can hardly leave it now.

First book I loved

I was dyslexic as a child, at a time when dyslexia wasn’t diagnosed. You didn’t get much help — people just thought you were stupid. My dyslexia seems to have got better with age, but when I was younger I was read to by my mother and my older sister rather than reading myself. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame was a favourite.

First album I bought

Please Please Me by the Beatles. Growing up I listened to romantic music like Dionne Warwick on the radiogram in our sitting room. Nowadays I listen to more classical music, but I still have a soft spot for the Beatles. Sadly I lost that LP when we moved houses.

First concert I attended

The 1812 Overture by Tchaikovsky at the Royal Albert Hall when I was about ten. They had real cannons that went off. I only started going to concerts when I was older. My late husband, the [Roads to Freedom] actor Daniel Massey, was a great classical music fan. He taught me a lot about music, in particular jazz and Erroll Garner.

First pop-inspired fashion trends I adopted

Hotpants and thigh-length boots in bright pink suede. Once you went to drama school, you didn’t have any money and could do what you wanted looks-wise. It was all flower power then, so we would walk around with no shoes on, throwing flowers at each other. It was alternative but lovely.

First actor I admired

Michael Redgrave. I saw him give the most tremendous performance in Uncle Vanya at Chichester in 1963 when I was 17. Laurence Olivier was the Doctor. Together they were funny and heartbreaking. Redgrave was a wonderful actor and, more importantly, a wonderful man.

First moment I realised I wanted to be an actress

I went to a pantomime once and there was a whoosh and the curtain went up. There was this bright light and warm air came out. I thought, “I don’t know why I’m sitting in the dark here. I’d like to be up there.”

First famous person I met

Jonathan Miller when he came to Nottingham Playhouse to direct King Lear. I was a bit starstruck then, but meeting the royal family is the only time I get truly anxious.

First moment I realised I’d made it

Even at my age I don’t think I have. If you started, you wouldn’t be very good. So I will continue to try.

[maureenforever]

Ringo Starr and Maureen’s Glamorous Honeymoon in Hove in 1965

Rob BakerJuly 7, 2019

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Post Views: 7,354

"How does it feel to be married to a very famous man?" MAUREEN: "Very nice."

Honeymoon Photo Call – Ringo Starr and Maureen Cox – Hove, Sussex

Ringo Starr and Maureen Cox were married on February 11th 1965 at Caxton Hall in Westminster. They had known each other since the Beatles’ Cavern days where at the age of fifteen, Maureen, known to her friends as “Mo”, had become a regular at the club. She once recalled:

On the marriage certificate Starr wrote that his profession was “musician”, while Maureen, who was now eighteen, left her profession blank. She had given up her job as a trainee manicurist/hairdresser at Ashley du Pre in Liverpool after continued threats from jealous Beatles’ fans.

Maureen had found herself pregnant at the end of January 1965 and within a few days Ringo proposed to her while they were at the Ad Lib club a few days later. Because of the pregnancy Brian Epstein arranged a quick wedding and hoped that it could remain a private affair. John Lennon told Maureen that there should be no tears or she “wouldn’t be one of the gang.” Ringo was due in the recording studio at Abbey Road on the 15th February before he then had to fly out to the Bahamas for the filming of Help! a week later, so a quick three-day honeymoon was organised by Epstein at the house of a friend of his in the glamorous location of Hove. The friend – the showbiz lawyer David Jacobs – like Epstein, was Jewish and gay although more flamboyantly so – he often attracted the ire of judges by openly wearing powder and makeup in court.

2 Prince’s Square Hove

Other than Epstein and the Beatles, Jacobs’s clients included Marlene Dietrich, Diana Dors (both on the cover of the Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band LP incidentally), Judy Garland, Zsa Zsa Gabor, the Rolling Stones and even Liberace. It was David Jacobs who planned the American pianist’s libel case with the Daily Mirror’s columnist Cassandra in 1959. The jury were persuaded that Liberace was of unimpeachable moral character and not at all, “a deadly, winking, sniggering, snuggling, chromium-plated, scent-impregnated, luminous, quivering, giggling, fruit-flavoured, mincing, ice-covered heap of mother love”. Liberace was able to walk out of the court £26,000 richer and famously said that he was “crying all the way to the bank”.

Time to go, love

News that Ringo and Maureen had married soon leaked to the press and the next day the couple awoke to find film crews, photographers and the press camped outside Jacobs’s house at 2 Prince’s Square a stone’s throw from the sea in Hove. Although disappointed with the lack of even a short period of privacy, Ringo and Maureen agreed to a lunchtime interview in the back garden of where they were staying:

Q: “How long have you known each other?”

RINGO: “About two and a half years now.”

Q: “So this means, Maureen, that you knew Ringo before he was right at the top of the tree.”

MAUREEN: “Yes.”

Q: “How does it feel to be married to a very famous man?” MAUREEN: “Very nice.”

Q: “Well, I’m sure you wanted a rather different honeymoon from this. What do you think about all this?”

RINGO: “Well, you know– We took a chance. We tried to keep it quiet and we tried to arrive here quiet, but we must’ve been spotted and that’s the end of it, you know. So from now on, it’s not really a honeymoon, it’s just– we’re just stayin’ here.”

Q: “How do you think the other Beatles reacted?”

RINGO: “Well, John and George were great, you know. They were happy and congratulated us and everything. And they, in fact, went to the wedding.” Q: “When are the rest of you going to get married?”

RINGO: “When are the rest of them? I don’t know. I’ve no idea. As I said before, I don’t think ‘cuz I’m married, next week they’ll all pop up and say, ‘We’re gettin’ married ‘cuz Ringo is,’ you know.”

Q: “What sort of an effect, really, do you think the marriage is going to have on the Beatles’ future?”

RINGO: “On the Beatles as a whole, I don’t think any great effect– as much as that everyone will sort of say, ‘Well, we can’t sorta like them anymore ‘cuz Ringo’s married,’ you know. I don’t think I’ve got that image. I don’t think it’ll bother them too much. It may help, in fact, you know. We don’t know yet. It’s too early to say.”

Q: “Have you decided where you’re going to live?”

RINGO: “Only in the flat I’ve already got in London, up to now. Then we have to move and get a house or something, but it’ll be a while yet.”

Q: “Maureen, what do you think of the flat and the furnishings? Are there any changes you’d like to make?” MAUREEN: “No, it’s great.” RINGO: (jokingly) “It’s a big flat, you know!” (laughs)

Q: “Ringo, where did you propose?”

RINGO: “In a club.”

Q: “Can you tell me which club?”

RINGO: “Yes, if you don’t mind a plug. The Ad Lib club.”

Q: “You mean, you made it up as you went along?”

RINGO: “Oh, ho!! Bad joke!! No, you know– I was sort of thinking about it, and I just sorta said, ‘Will you marry me?’ and she said, ‘Yes… Have another drink!’ (laughs) And we did, and that was it.”

Q: “Congratulations. Thank you both very much.”

RINGO: “Thank you. Alright? Goodbye! …hope not to see you out my window again!” After just three days in Hove, Ringo was driven to Abbey Road studios where the Beatles started to record songs for the new film Help! In six days they recorded five songs for the film, a b-side, two LP tracks and one song called ‘That Means a Lot’, rejected ultimately for Help! but became a minor hit for PJ Proby.

safari-reader://www.youtube.com/embed/lJMbEYuxeGw?feature=player_detailpage

In August 1968 Brian Epstein was found dead by his housekeeper after taking an overdose of Carbital, a popular sleeping pill of the time, at his London home in Belgravia. It was Jacobs who organised everything afterwards, the press, the reading of the will and had even identified the body for the police. Just over a year later David Jacobs also took his own life when he was found by his man-servant dangling from a length of satin from one of the beams of his garage in December 1968.

Recording a verdict of suicide while the balance of his mind was disturbed, the East Sussex Coroner, Dr Angus Sommerville said that there was no doubt that Mr Jacobs had financial problems. “But,” he added, “it is not my business to inquire further into these.” Dr Keith Elliott, pathologist, said that Mr Jacobs had stood on the stool, put his head in a loop of cord and then kicked the stool away. “But,” he continued, “it appeared that the attempted to loosen the loop but could not.”

Brian Epstein in 1966

It wasn’t particularly surprising that David Jacobs ended up in financial difficulty. This was the man that put together one of the worst deals in the history of popular music when, albeit with the permission of Epstein, he signed away the rights to all the Beatles merchandise for a pathetic 10% to a friend from the London party circuit named Nicky Byrne. It is said, however, that there may have been a more sinister reason for the death of Epstein’s friend and lawyer than debt. Shortly before he died, Jacobs had been visited by a cohort of Ronnie Kray. The Krays, at the time, were due to stand trial at the Old Bailey for the murders of George Cornell and Jack “the hat” McVitie and Jacobs was asked if he could legally represent the twins in court. Jacobs refused and immediately asked for police protection. It was refused…

[sodobabe]

Never Fall for the Guitarist pt. 1

A/N: Hey everyone! I'm not new to Tumblr but I am new to the Ghost fandom and am an avid writer. I thought I would share some of my works with you all. Once I get the hang of this, I will take requests. For now, enjoy!

Summary: (Y/N) has been chosen for their dream job. Will they put their job on the line for the love of their life?

Warnings: Sexual language. Minors DNI!! Angsty Swiss. Fluffy Dewdrop.

I had always longed to be a photographer for Ghost. I lived just outside of the Abbey and had been to so many concerts I lost count but each time, all I wanted to do was snap breathtaking photos of them. What I didn’t realize is that my dream would soon come true. I was fresh out of college. I had a degree in digital media with a minor in photography. It was my hobby. I took photos of everything and anything. I started applying to jobs and was feeling giddy enough to apply to be a photographer for Ghost. I cautiously filled out the application, being sure to be as detailed in my skills as possible. Submit. It was done. I submitted the application and sat back with my hot cup of tea to take in the possible life changing step I just took.

Three days passed. I had started to think that I would never hear back from any of the places I applied. That isn’t unusual in this day and age as employers are lackadaisical when it comes to reviewing applications. Ping. I grabbed my phone and saw an email notification. Before I could even read it, I threw my phone back on the couch. I was nervous. What if they don’t want me. What if they don’t think my photography is good enough. The thoughts were racing through my mind until I finally picked up my phone again and opened the email. 

“Dear (Y/N), we were thoroughly impressed by your exquisite photography portfolio and previous work experience that you have shown. We would like to extend an invitation to you for an interview on Wednesday, June 25. Please let us know if this time does not work for you and we can reschedule.  

Best regards, Ghost Management”

Holy shit! They want to meet with me. They want to interview me. What the hell am I doing on June 25 because those plans are canceled. I quickly hit the reply button and told their management that June 25 was a perfect date for an interview. Now I have to find the perfect professional outfit, so they don’t think I’m a slob before I even get the job. 

The week passed painfully slowly. I set my alarm for 7 a.m. to ensure I had time to get a shower, and make sure I was as presentable as I could be. After all, this is a dream opportunity, and I would hate to jeopardize it. After all was said and done, I picked up my phone and checked the time. 9 a.m. Perfect timing. I calmly walked out of my house and got into my car. Typically, I blast music even if I am just driving two minutes up the road to the gas station for a late night slushie run. Not today. Today I drove in complete silence as thoughts raced through my brain.

I pulled into the parking lot of the grey stone building and checked in the mirrors to make sure I still looked good, which I did, then I ever so calmly exited my car. I made my way into the building and asked the very kind sister where I needed to go for my interview. She so graciously led me down a hallway and into a room at the end. I was greeted by a tall, slim woman who was the epitome of beauty standards.

“Hi there! You must be (Y/N). My name is Sister Imperator, and I am the head of Ghost’s management,” she said enthusiastically.

“Hi! It is so nice to meet you,” I replied, trying to hide my nervousness. 

She motioned for me to take a seat and asked me all of the questions that one would expect in an interview. Why do you think you're right for this position? Do you have experience photographing moving objects? Etc. I gave her my best answers to those questions, and she abruptly stood up.

“Welcome to the team, (Y/N),” she said with a large smile plastered across her face. “Before we see what kind of talent you have, let’s introduce you to the band,” she continued. 

Holy shit. It’s happening. I am meeting my favorite band of all time and cannot fangirl because I have to appear professional. My thoughts were quickly interrupted when in walked 8 figures who towered over me. I knew who all of them were, but they were going to introduce themselves anyway because they didn't know that. 

They stood in a line and from left to right introduced themselves. Copia was first, followed by Dewdrop, Swiss, Mountain, Rain, Aether, Cirrus, and Cumulus. Seven of the members left the room to get back to practice but Dewdrop stuck around. He was the shortest and, in my opinion, the most handsome of the four. There he was standing at his height of 5'8" with his mask only showing his gorgeous blue eyes. He was slender with a little muscle tone to his arms and thighs from performing so much. Oh, how I could’ve melted into a puddle at that very given moment. 

He stepped closer to me and gently placed his hand on my waist to guide me out of the room and show me to the practice room. His hand was warm. I could feel his body heat radiating into my skin. I had a fuzzy feeling in the pit of my stomach. Little did he know that I dream about him from time to time. The only problem was that now I could never be with him so long as I held my job title. Rule number four in the contract was that employees were to have no relations with band members, or they would be immediately terminated. Was I willing to break that rule and pray I don’t get caught? Hell yes, I was but I seriously doubt Dew would go for it. 

I snapped out of my sexual thoughts as Dewdrop welcomed me into the practice room. It was larger and darker than what I had expected but if I’m being honest, I wasn’t even sure what I was expecting. Their instruments were all in their designated spaces. Everything was neat and tidy. The only light that was provided was the sun that shined in through the cracks in the blinds. 

As I stood there in awe, once again my thoughts were interrupted by a deep voice. It was Dew again. He seemed to be the most sociable.

 “Well are you going to just stand there or are you going to show us what you got?” he said with a smug look on his face, followed by a wink. 

If I hadn’t eaten that morning, I may have passed out from the lack of oxygen from holding my breath after the wink. 

I simply nodded toward him and picked up my camera. They got busy right away playing a few songs that I already knew. I snapped so many photos I thought I was going to break the camera. That’s how I capture the best photos. Take hundreds and choose ten. As I was so entranced by doing my job, I almost missed the fact that they were playing a new song. I continued capturing digital moments when a fight broke out between Dew and Swiss. 

“I don’t fucking understand why you can’t keep up with your stupid guitar,” Swiss spat at Dew. He was significantly taller than Dew, standing at 6'2" and he must have kept all his temper in his frame. 

“Well maybe if you and Papa weren't singing ahead of the instruments, you would realize how it’s supposed to sound but no, we have to do everything on your time." Dew snapped back.

I couldn’t help but interrupt and set my camera down. 

“Ghouls, I don’t mean to step out of line, but I cannot do my job if you all are fighting because I don’t think fans want to see you all spitting comebacks at each other,” I calmly said. 

“Mind your own business, new meat,” Swiss practically growled at me. 

Dew obviously did not like this as he lunged at him. 

“Don’t you dare talk to them like that. They are doing us a service and we should treat them with the utmost respect.” Dew sternly told Swiss.

“Oh, give me a break Dew. You’re just thinking with your dick once again because that’s all you ever do. That’s why we can’t keep any employees because you can’t help but stick your stupid penis in them and they aren’t smart enough to keep it a secret. I’m sure this one will be just as dumb as the rest of them,” Swiss spouted off as he raised his arm in my general direction, ending the argument but Dew was more concerned about the fact that I swiftly left the room. 

I didn’t want to run as I didn’t want to draw more attention to myself than I already had. I found my way into the restroom and locked myself in. I backed up against the wall and slid down with my hand on my chest trying to catch my breath. What they never tell you is how different your favorite band is to what you actually imagine. A minute or two passed when there was a gentle knock on the door. I thought I was hearing things, so I ignored it and continued to even my breathing. Knock knock. There it was again. 

“(Y/N)? It’s Dew. Are you okay?” he asked in a gentle, worried tone. 

I let out a sniff and replied with a quiet “no.” 

“Well, can you let me in so we can talk it out?” he asked politely.

I pulled myself up off the comforting cold ground and unlocked the door. Dew gently opened it, making sure not to be too harsh with his movements. I threw on a fake smile to try and mask my true emotions.

“You can pretend to smile all you want but I can tell how Swiss’ words impacted you,” Dew said as he took a small step toward me. 

“Can I be honest with you, Dew?” I said after a deep breath. 

He nodded.

“I love you all as a band. I am a big fan and have been to so many of your shows that I have lost count at this point. I thought it would be a dream come true to work for you but after that little episode, other than you, the band members were nothing that I had thought,” I said shakily while meeting Dew’s eyes. 

He gave me a warm smile and said, “That’s because our photographers do their job well. We fight everyday but our photographers know to keep the ugly stuff out of the media. Just like you said, our fans don’t want to see us fighting. As far as what Swiss said about us, I don’t plan on using you like that. You’re different, (Y/N). You have a deeper intelligent personality than most of the ditsy people that come in here and work for us. I have personally seen your work and I am in awe of your talents. I want to know you for who you are, and I know we aren’t allowed to have relationships with our employees, but I won’t tell if you won’t.” 

How the hell do I say no to that? All I did was smile, nod my head, and say, “I have secrets nobody knows about, I’m sure I could keep this under the table.” 

Dew nodded and pulled me into a tight hug, my face squishing against his chest. I couldn’t help but notice his smell. Slightly sweaty with a more noticeable sandalwood scent. 

“Here’s my phone number,” he said as he handed me a card. “Text me when you get home, and I will come over. We can discuss how we will go about this relationship.” he continued. 

I nodded and put the card into my pocket before going back to the practice room, waving goodbye to the other members, grabbing my bag, and starting my venture home. 

[new-sandrafilter]

Photograph by Ruven Afanador for TIME |  INTERVIEW BY SAM LANSKY

Timothée Chalamet and I are on the run, chasing down Sixth Avenue on a bright September day in search of a place to talk. The restaurant in Greenwich Village where we had planned to meet ended up getting swarmed by NYU students while I was waiting for him, chattering excitedly to one another—“Timothée Chalamet is here!” “Shut up!” “Yeah, he’s right outside!”—so, trying to avoid a deluge of selfie seekers, I bolt from the table, tapping Chalamet on the shoulder where he stands under the awning, on the phone, and we make our escape. Face covered with a mask and hoodie pulled up over his curly hair, he’s mostly incognito but still cuts a distinct enough figure that we’d better find a new location fast, and standing at a crosswalk with him, I feel briefly protective, like I should be prepared to body-block an onslaught of fans at any moment.

Luckily, we go undetected as we make our way to another diner a few blocks down—a true New York greasy spoon, less crowded and doggedly uncool—and slide into a back booth. He orders black coffee and matzo-ball soup, which he says he has been craving. It’s not an easy thing to come by in London, where he’s been in rehearsals for Wonka, an original movie musical that will serve as a prequel of sorts to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, following the titular chocolatier as a young man. He just spent a weekend recording music for the film at Abbey Road. “I felt out of my league,” he says of working in that legendary space. “Like I was desecrating history!” But working on this project has been good for him. “It’s not mining the darker emotions in life,” he says. “It’s a celebration of being off-center and of being O.K. with the weirder parts of you that don’t quite fit in.”

If Chalamet—whom most people call, affectionately, Timmy—sees himself as off-center, so far it’s working. He’s back in New York for the Met Gala, which he’s co-chairing alongside Billie Eilish, Naomi Osaka and Amanda Gorman. (He walked the red carpet in a Haider Ackermann satin tuxedo jacket and sweatpants.) On Oct. 22, he’ll appear in two films released on the same day. There’s Wes Anderson’s ensemble The French Dispatch, which earned raves out of Cannes, in which Chalamet appears opposite Frances McDormand as a revolutionary spearheading a student liberation movement. He also stars as royal Paul Atreides in Denis Villeneuve’s towering sci-fi epic Dune, an adaptation of Frank Herbert’s beloved 1965 novel, budgeted at a reported $165 million and slated for a massive worldwide release.

This makes it a big moment for Chalamet, who is not just an actor who works often, although he does, and not just a celebrity, although he is one, but a movie star in the old-fashioned sense of the word. (More on this later.) He’s now the rare performer who, at 25, studios are betting can help launch a blockbuster franchise and a festival hit on the same day, with a pandemic still rumbling out of view. With great power, of course, comes great responsibility—including a spotlight on everything from his personal life (he’s been linked to actor Lily-Rose Depp) to his activism (he’s outspoken on climate change) to what he wears, whether on a red carpet or dashing to the bodega. The latter runs the gamut from embroidered joggers to tie-dye overalls to space-age suiting—or, say, a Louis Vuitton hoodie spangled with 3,000 Swarovski crystals. (All this has led GQ to crown him one of the best-dressed men in the world.)

“I feel like I’m here to show that to wear your heart on your sleeve is O.K."

Chalamet belongs to a generation that’s known for oversharing, particularly on social media, but his Instagram is frequently enigmatic; he holds more back than many of his contemporaries. He cites as role models Michael B. Jordan, Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence—the latter two of whom he’ll appear opposite in Adam McKay’s star-studded Don’t Look Up on Netflix in December—actors who are more likely to talk about craft than to post selfies doing sponsored content. If fame is surreal to him, he also doesn’t make a show of resisting it. “I’m figuring it out,” Chalamet says. “On my worst days, I feel a tension in figuring it out. But on my best days, I feel like I’m growing right on time.”

As we sit and talk, a procession of fans stop by the table to ask for photos—mostly young women, but there’s one sheepish-looking guy, too, who looks to be in his 40s. Chalamet indulges them all gamely, making conversation. “Oh, you go to Columbia?” he says to one girl. “That’s cool! I did too.” He stops himself. “Well, I dropped out.”

If the challenge is staying level amid all this attention, he has a game plan. “One of my heroes—I can’t say who or he’d kick my ass—he put his arm around me the first night we met and gave me some advice,” he says. What was it, I ask?

“No hard drugs,” Chalamet says, “and no superhero movies.”

Chalamet grew up in midtown Manhattan, where his mom was a Broadway performer and his father worked as an editor for UNICEF. He went to the arts high school La Guardia, where he performed onstage. Not long after graduating, he booked a role as Matthew McConaughey’s son in Christopher Nolan’s 2014 space drama Interstellar, which he, along with everyone he knew, expected would catalyze his career. “I remember seeing it and weeping,” he says, “60% because I was so moved by it, and 40% because I’d thought I was in the movie so much more than I am.”

He briefly attended Columbia, then NYU, but didn’t finish college, which he says seems “insane in retrospect.” He remembers the insecurity of those years, which he describes as “the soul-crushing anxiety of feeling like I had a lot to give without any platform.” But he waited for the kinds of jobs he wanted, trying to avoid getting locked into a commitment that might stifle his growth, like a years-long TV contract. “Not that those opportunities were coming at me plenty,” he says, “because they weren’t. But I had a marathon mentality, which is hard when everything is instant gratification.”

That paid off in 2017 with the release of Luca Guadagnino’s gay love story Call Me by Your Name, which earned him an Oscar nomination and catapulted him to fame. (He demurs when asked about co-star Armie Hammer, who has denied a widely publicized accusation of rape. “I totally get why you’re asking that,” he says, “but it’s a question worthy of a larger conversation, and I don’t want to give you a partial response.”) That same year, he featured in Greta Gerwig’s Oscar-nominated Lady Bird. He followed up with the addiction drama Beautiful Boy, then Gerwig’s adaptation of Little Women, both of which earned him still more critical praise.

If his filmography has made him an art-house darling, Dune feels like the perfect big movie for an actor like Chalamet: despite the booming score and dazzling visual effects, there’s a gravity to it—and an unusual prescience. “Dune was written 60 years ago, but its themes hold up today,” Chalamet says. “A warning against the exploitation of the environment, a warning against colonialism, a warning against technology.”

Dune is also the kind of cinematic event that demands to be seen in theaters, which spelled controversy when Warner Bros. announced that, due to the pandemic, all of their 2021 films would premiere on the streaming service HBO Max concurrent with their theatrical release dates. Chalamet shrugs about it. “It’s so above my pay grade,” he says. “Maybe I’m naive, but I trust the powers that be. I’m just grateful it’s coming out at all.”

A day later, we meet at a bar in Tribeca. As he arrives, he’s wrapping up a call. “Love you too, Grandma,” he says gently into the phone as he’s hanging up.

Male movie stars have long been defined by an old model of masculinity. Chalamet, who rose to fame playing a queer character and whose style is frequently described as androgynous, evinces a kind of masculinity that’s a little different: more sensitive, more emotional, in keeping with his generation’s permissive attitudes about self-expression. “Timothée is a thoughtful, poetic spirit,” says Villeneuve. “I am always impressed by his beautiful vulnerability.” Chalamet doesn’t always reveal much, but what he does is intentional. Ask him what he stands for, and he considers it seriously. “I feel like I’m here to show that to wear your heart on your sleeve is O.K.,” he says.

Yet Chalamet knows better than to obsess about how he’s perceived by the public. “To keep the ball rolling creatively takes a certain ignorance to the way you’re consumed,” he says. He calls it a “mirror vacuum”: the black hole you disappear into studying your own reflection. He wants to use his platform thoughtfully, to spread the right kinds of messages through the world—whether that’s about mental-health awareness, a subject which he wants to see become “less of an Instagram slide share and something more intrinsic,” or climate. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the same generation that inherits the overheated planet is the generation saying, ‘Hey, there’s a level of complacency here,’” he says.

All that said, Chalamet doesn’t take himself too seriously. The idea that he’s seen as a movie star—let alone his generation’s most promising—seems to make him squirrelly. “I don’t want to say some vapid, self-effacing thing,” he says. “It’s a combination of luck and getting good advice early in my career not to pigeonhole myself.” The term movie star, to him, is “like death.” All it does is make him think about ’90s-nostalgia Instagram feeds.

“You’re just an actor,” Chalamet says, like a mantra. “You’re just an actor!” Then he looks to me, as if checking to see if he’s convinced me it’s true.

[lazypeachsoul]

are you thanking me or your god? - u.r.

Pairing: Uhtred Ragnarsson x fem!reader.

Request: by @viktoria12 “Hey can you write a imagine with Uhtred? The content is up to you🙏”

Warnings: Nothing.

Word count: 1.601 words.

A/N: I have to admit this was a bit tricky because I've never read uhtred imagines. But it was fun, i really like uhtred as a character. i hope you like it and I'm sorry it has taken me some time to post it.

Masterlist.

To be added to my taglist use this forms or write me an ask!

Winchester was the busiest it had been in a long time. With the coming of spring, the merchants were returning to the city to trade and spending too much time around the alehouse. Spirits were high after the blessing given by the priest on Easter and the year was expected to be calm and fruitful. Except for the danes lurking in the surrounding areas. But nobody would dare talk about that when it’s the Lord’s day.

Good weather meant people would go outside more, and therefore more gossip. Every turn you took on your way to the market, you would hear a different rumour. Most were about the health of the king, some were about the threat of a battle. You even heard one about danes walking around the city freely.

But your head was too centered on the task at hand. Abbess Hild had asked you to go to the market for flour and other necessities, and you wouldn’t dare disappoint the Abbess. You weren’t even a nun and you still followed her orders like a soldier.

Your house was close to the convent and, ever since you walked past the gates and into their garden when you were young, they had treated you like their family. Sometimes too much when it came to the boys your age. But they were only trying to protect you.

Sister Hild, later Abbess, had always surprised you. Not only did she have a strong will and personality, she was also physically strong. More than what a woman of god should be. but still, with all her strength, she needed you to go buy the necessities that they couldn’t get from their garden.

Too distracted by your thoughts and the gossiping going around, you collided against someone making you almost tumble to the dirt floor. If it hadn’t been for a quick hand grabbing your dresses you would be covered in mud and other disgusting stuff.

Looking up you saw a scruffy looking man, but not in a bad way surprisingly. This man looked almost too different from what you were used to seeing around Winchester. Something about his reaction told you he was trained, and the scars in his hands and handsome face gave away he was probably a soldier. For who is what you were curious to know.

Realizing the compromising position you found yourself on, with a man holding your dress, you quickly tried to regain your balance. The man let go and you tried to stutter an apology, but your attempts were stopped by a sweet but authoritative voice behind you.

“Uhtred! I was looking for you, we need to discuss…” Her voice got interrupted when she recognized you in front of the man. “What are you doing here, darling? I thought you would be in the market by now.”

“I tried Abbes, I just had a little-” You tried to speak but were interrupted by a deep voice. In a normal situation you would be angry at such interruption, but when you heard the voice you couldn’t really care about it.

“We had a small incident, Hild. Don’t worry, nobody is hurt.”

The voice fit the man perfectly. With a deep voice he spoke calmly and yet you could pick up a joking tone towards the Abbess. Who is this uhtred man? Why is he joking with Hild? But wait, how does Hild even know a man like him?

Full of curiosity you realized you were still standing between them. Clearing your throat you nodded at Hild and turned around with a smile to your saviour.

“Thank you Lord for helping me. I’m in your debt.” Nodding your head you moved past them, not missing the small smile on the man's face.

“You owe nothing to him, young lady. He's heathen. He doesn’t deserve your compassion.”

A loud laugh was heard from the man along with what sounded like a smack, probably to the leather of his armour. The words of the Abbess circled your brain for the rest of the day. So he was a heathen, a friend of Hild and incredibly handsome. Great, what a mysterious man.

After your chores were done and you took some time to relax outside of your house, the world seemed to dissipate around you. The soft sound of quick steps and panting made you look up from your dress, breaking the peace of your surroundings.

Eanflæd was running towards you, people looking her way either worried or weirded out by your young friend’s race. She reached you just in time to ungracefully collapse on the bench you were sitting on.

“Is everything okay, Eanflæd? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you run that fast. Not even when the chickens escaped.”

She was trying to regain her breath, but took the time to pinch your arm for the reminder of the chicken run.

“You...you…” She panted before taking a big breath. “You weren’t going to tell me you have been seeing the Dane-slayer.”

“Who?” You couldn’t hide your surprise.

The only person you had seen outside your family was the man who sold you the produce for the abbey. And also that man…

“Are you talking about Uhtred?”

“You know him enough you don’t even talk about him like a lord?”

You tried to hide your laugh but a small snort came out.

“I don’t know him. He merely saved me from an ugly fall this morning.” Shrugging you tried to dismiss the gossip. “But you do seem to know about him, so tell me…”

The next day didn’t allow for much thinking about ‘the Dane-slayer’. You had been working non stop in your father’s farm and everything hurt. But your mother has asked you to take some fresh eggs to her friend, and you couldn’t say no to your mother’s gentle face.

It was late enough for the ruckus of the market to have died down, but not enough for it to be dangerous or improper for a young woman to be walking around unaccompanied.

Too absorbed in your own thoughts you didn’t hear the neigh of the horse until it was too late for you to react. Looking at the animal getting closer you couldn’t help but try and pray that you would be saved, but no prayers came to your head at that moment.

Just when you were about to give up and close your eyes, something yanked you out of the way making you barely dodge the horse and the man on the cart who was yelling at you. Your heart was hammering in your chest, ears ringing and hands shaking. The eggs were no longer in your grasp but smashed against the floor, although in that moment you could make yourself care for them.

The same hand that had yanked you out of the way, spoon you around. Your saviour was none other than yesterday’s saviour. you really were in debt with this man now.

“Are you okay?” His voice was worried, a contrast to the day before’s joking tone.

Time seemed to slow while you assimilated what had happened. Probably too much time passed before you could answer but the man didn’t seem to care. When you could trust your voice to speak again, the words came out all at once.

“I was nearly trampled by someone’s horse in the street, but you stepped in just in time to get me out of the way even if it put you in danger as well.” He smiled at the jumbled words and after a deep breath you tried to regain your thoughts. “Thank you, lord.”

“Are you thanking me or your god?” Uhtred spoke and you knew he was trying to avoid your shock at the incident.

You thought about the answer and tried to smile, probably looking more like a grimace.

“Both? Yes, I think I’m thanking both.” Your voice lowered, probably to avoid other people hearing you talk that way about the Lord. “Both is good.”

He smiled and took a step back looking at you, probably checking for any injuries. The people of Winchester were used to accidents and didn’t normally care, but you could feel some stares on you. Probably because of Uhtred and his fame.

“You seem to be in one piece, can’t say the same for the eggs.” He pointed at the road.

“You have saved me twice now, lord. I might have to ignore the Abbess and ask you what I should do in return for you.”

“I wouldn’t ignore Hild. You don’t want to know what she can do with a sword.” He tried to dismiss the conversation but your curiosity only grew. “I only ask for one thing in return.”

You nodded, asking for him to continue and still trying to imagine Abbess hild wielding a sword. You knew he was a soldier, and a good one. But Hild? No, she was a woman of God.

“Stop distracting yourself when walking around. If you don’t you might end up like your eggs.”

“But if I stop getting distracted, what would you save me from, Dane-slayer?”

What possessed you in that moment to utter those words you couldn’t really say. You just knew it was not entirely proper and that if your mother heard your ear would hurt from the scolding. But the smirk on Uhtred’s face was worth it.

“So you know who I am. But I know nothing about you. Is that unfair?”

“I have my ways, Lord Uhtred. Maybe when you save me next time I could tell you something about myself.”

"Let's just hope it's not a dangerous situation then. Just to make sure you can tell me after."

taglist: @webreathfandoms

[carryonthroughtheages]

Hello everyone!

Another year of Carry On Through The Ages is over and done! We have emotions and exhaustion, but we're so happy that this year had the hype and excitement that it did.

Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, to all of the AMAZING creators who spent the last several months working away at their historical content!

Thank you also to the hard-working mods: @bazzybelle, @giishu, @palimpsessed, and @xivz . This fest would not have been as successful as it has been without you!

We encourage everyone to look under the page break for all the fics and art. They're all fantastic!

Here is the link to the AO3 Collection: Carry On Through The Ages 2021!

Thank you all, and until next year! 🧡🧡🧡

MONDAY:

1) sun on the sea (T) - @trenchcoat-moth : AO3 // Tumblr

Tensions run high in England, and Malcolm decides it's for the best he sends Baz to live with Fiona, where he'll be safer.

That is, until Baz's ship is attacked.

2) The Words I Long To Say (M) - @bazzybelle : AO3 // Tumblr

Simon Snow was dead.

Baz Pitch was sure of it. Simon had gone away seven years ago to fight a war in the jungle and he hadn't come home.

So, when Simon shows up in Baz's club, investigating a string of brutal murders, all Baz wants to do is hold him close and never let him go.

But these aren't the same boys from 1960 and Baz has a lot of processing to do before he's ready to believe in Simon again.

3) we are slaves to gods, whatever gods are (M) - @wellbelesbian : AO3 // Tumblr

I don’t fully understand what plagues him, but I know it’s bad, and I know it goes deeper than guilt. He didn’t want to kill his father, not really, but we were instructed to do so by Apollo. Cleanse the house of its sins, dispose of a murderer to set things right. It was only right that I join him; he was avenging my mother as much as his. Clearly, Apollo didn’t seem to consider that such an act would make Simon a murderer in his father’s place. It seems I got off fine, but as far as Simon is concerned, the vengeful spirits that once spun and danced on the roof of the palace now hunt him down, determined not to stop until he rids the world of himself.

4) World War II Era Art - @stardustasincocaine : Tumblr

TUESDAY:

1) the art of loving you (E) - @one-more-offbeat-anthem : AO3 // Tumblr

1955. London. Young love.

Forbidden love.

A year ago, starving artist Simon Snow met Baz Pitch, son of a wealthy art patron, at a party, and their days (and nights) together have been a wonderful secret.

But Simon is tired of being a secret and knows it's time for things to end.

(Baz has other ideas.)

2) Reliquary of an Arsonist (T) - @tea-brigade : AO3 // Tumblr

Simon Snow grew up a ward of Watford Abbey, but when his magic manifested in an explosive accident as a child, he became the Abbey’s anchorite—never to leave Watford’s walls, for his own protection. That is, until Abbot David sends him on an important errand…

Basilton Pitch paints portraits for his patron, Lord Grimm. But he’s never forgotten the magic he learned from his mother—nor the men who condemned her to death as a heretic. When Simon arrives and offers Baz a commission from Watford Abbey, he sees his chance to avenge his mother once and for all...and he’s willing to burn down everything in his path to that end.

But it was no coincidence that pulled these two unlikely souls together. Something more sinister is underway at Watford Abbey, and only Simon and Baz can uncover the truth before everything goes up in flames.

3) Westward Son (E) - @aristocratic-otter : AO3 // Tumblr

Simon and Baz have found each other again, but there's nowhere in Brooklyn or Virginia where they can safely be together. So now, they venture the hazards and struggles of the Oregon trail, to perhaps find a little homestead in Oregon of their own.

4) A Way Out (T) - @lying-on-the-sofa : AO3

I frown at him..“You don’t know me.”

He offers his hand. “Simon.”

Simon. I feel the name around in my mind and assign it to his face. Simon. I don’t shake his hand. They’ve still got my arms pinned. “Basilton.”

Simon nods at me. “Now we know each other. Let him go.�� Very casually, he takes his other hand from behind his back. A sword, flashing. He leans on it and smiles invitingly. “Let him go.”

This time, they listen.

--

Simon Snow has been trained for years to become a tribute—one of the fighters Athens sends every ninth year into the Minotaur’s labyrinth. He wants to know the way out, if only for Penny’s sake. Luckily for him, Prince Basilton of Crete also wants a way out—off the island, where no one will know he’s the half-brother of the Minotaur.

Unluckily for both of them, they don’t exactly form the most agreeable pair.

WEDNESDAY

1) long is the road the leads me home (G) - @wellbelesbian : AO3 (Version 1) (Version 2) // Tumblr

Baz has a rather unremarkable life, and he's fine with that. Running his late mother's beloved inn with his temperamental aunt, estranged from his father and step-siblings, he's successfully convinced himself that he's better off without attachments.

Then Simon barrels into his life, guns blazing and rapier drawn, and Baz is swept up in dramatic plot he never bargained for.

Worse still, he finds he quite likes the thrill.

2) New Romantics (T) - @ninemagicks : AO3 // Tumblr

Basilton Pitch, twenty-two years old and a famed poet of the Romantic era, has fled to the countryside. In Mummers House, the fabled haunt of literary greats, he sulks himself into oblivion and awaits a sad, disappointing end to his brief years of brilliance. The cause of his downfall? None other than Simon Snow, the so-called “bad boy of English poetry”, breaker of rules and eternal thorn in his side. Baz hopes that Mummers House might mean an escape from London, from Snow and his increasingly virulent popularity... but the rain that comes has other ideas.

3) thnétos (T) - @snowybank : AO3 // Tumblr

thnétos: subject to death, mortal

a retelling of Apollo and Hyacinthus

4) A Medieval AU art piece - @thewriterxj : Tumblr

THURSDAY

1) From Eden (E) - @orange-peony : AO3 // Tumblr

I wonder if his skin is warm or cold to the touch. I tell myself it’s simple curiosity, that I’m an artist and capturing things on paper or canvas is my way to make sense of the world. That drawing him feels so natural, so I should just follow my instincts. Ebb used to say it all the time. Follow your heart. It knows where you’re supposed to go.

I wish I could. I wish I had enough money and freedom to just draw what I want. To paint him in his unattainable beauty. To draw him the way I want to. Naked and vulnerable, raw. Without frills and expensive suits.

Just Baz on paper, my fingers tracing his delicate and beautiful lines with simple charcoal.

2) Slings and Eros (M) - @palimpsessed : AO3 // Tumblr

Young god of love Simonides is tasked by his father, the god of war, to bring about the ruin of a mortal prince to punish his blasphemy. However, once Simonides sees his intended victim, he begins to have misgivings. Prince Tyrannus might have offended the gods with his very existence, but all Simonides can see is how beautiful and lonely he is.

Or, a very loose interpretation of the Eros and Psyche myth.

3) I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire (M) - @knitbelove : AO3 // Tumblr

September 1940: Going back to Watford feels different this year, and not just because England is at the brink of war with Germany and Italy. Penelope seems unsettled by everything, and Agatha is distant, and Baz is … simply not here.

What if Carry On but during the Blitz?? Yeah.

4) A Fool's Oath (M) - @thewriterxj : AO3 // Tumblr

A simple soldier is invited to join the ranks of the royal guard. He and his appointed mage arrive at the royal city to find themselves at the mercy of an unmerciful court. As he struggles to find his place in this foreign environment, he also finds himself entranced by music that only he seems to hear that floats out about the city. He makes an oath to wed whoever makes such beautiful music.

Too bad that person is the crown prince.

FRIDAY

1) Stranger Tides (T) - @tea-brigade & @xivz : AO3 // Tumblr

“If some god shall wreck me in the wine-dark deep, even so I will endure…” Captain Simon Snow of the Chosen One is many things—cunning, handsome, ruthless. Greedy. It’s no surprise that Snow finds a way to piss off the God of the Sea, he always manages to get himself into some type of trouble. This time, however, he’s not the only one who will suffer the consequences. Poseidon promises to not stop his pursuit until Snow and all of his men are dead.

Enter Basilton Pitch—rich, beautiful, mysterious. Suspicious. He offers the crew of the Chosen One a hefty sum to take him back to Europe from the Caribbean. And who is Captain Snow to refuse so much coin? After all, Greek gods aren’t real.

Right?

2) The wayward heir [comic] (M) - @letraspal : AO3 // Tumblr

Like a folk song, our love will be passed on. Simon Snow wants to be an artist. He used to live in Fiesole where he worked in the wool shop of his good friend Ebeneza Petty. He has now chosen to return to his native Florence in order to participate in an art contest hosted by the Pitch family, the most important bankers in all the three continents and Simon’s last chance for an art patronage. No matter how much he hates them.

But being back in Florence also brings back the memories Simon wanted to leave behind : his days as an orphan, the mystery about his mother, and once more being under the inquisitive eyes of his godfather, the new archbishop Davy. The archbishop is very same man who would never forgive him for dropping out the priesthood and ruining his secret plans against the Pitches.

The last thing Simon needed was an unbearably handsome jerk getting him into trouble on his very first day in Florence. How can focus when this man is the most annoying person he has ever met and yet his major source of inspiration.

3) Prohibition Blues (T) - @heyyyandrea : AO3

Simon Snow is a baker and aspiring playwright in Prohibition Era New York City. When he meets a handsome man at Shepherd's speakeasy who is interested in his work, he can't help but think it feels too good to be true.

4) Earth Below & Sky Above (M) - @phoxphyre : AO3 // Tumblr

In the depth of the palace of King Minos of Crete lurks a creature known as the Minotaur.

Baz, prince of Athens and chosen of the god Poseidon, has heard the stories. And now he’s volunteered to come to Crete as one of the annual tributes—to dance with the king’s bulls and fulfill his destiny. He just wants to survive the bulls, protect his people, and go home.

But what if the Minotaur isn’t a monster—but just a boy? And what if instead of slaying him, Baz fell in love with him?

A Carry On retelling of the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur, set in Bronze Age Crete.

5) A 1980s AU Art piece by @stardustasincocaine : Tumblr // Instagram (Slightly NSFW)

[anonil88]

Abbey Lee for The Sunday Times (June 2021)

Can you tell she's modeled for Gucci?

Styling: Alicia Lombardini

Photography: Claire Rothstein

[Quick personal thoughts, I have realized I 1000 percent am vampire bait. Tick off the boxes of tall kinda scary Gemini and I'm like yea sure count me in. First of the long format fashion things I do that I'm posting here.]

“I can’t stand the constant sunshine... I’m a moody person and sometimes I just like the weather to reflect what’s going on on the inside.”

"That sulky intensity paired with an icy beauty has tended to dictate her acting roles. From the vicious (read: carnivorous) ageing model Sarah in the fashion horror The Neon Demon, to the vengeful clone in Elizabeth Harvest and the bigoted Christina Braithwaite in the HBO series Lovecraft Country, Lee often plays the high-class villain. Why does she get offered these parts? “I’ve worked as a model since I was 15, I’ve been through a lot. I’ve been to the edges of my darkness and I’m not afraid to access those parts of myself,” she says. “Or maybe I’m just a bitch and I don’t know it!”"

From what I've heard she really isn't so bad and she makes most putfits look very good. Even when they aren't to my personal liking, or anyone else's. Anyhow I really like the cover image for this shoot, she looks comfortable in a suit which not everyone does. Some people look like they are cosplaying as someone's father or guidance counselor. My favorite outfit/piece is the one with the Bottega coat. All of the Veneta coats are so nice and cost way too much for my wallet to ever agree on. Even on sale.

***************

It is actually a pretty short article so I'm going to share some quotes and summarize. Just in case anyone was interested but doesn't want to deal with the pay gap. There is a lot about needing a change of pace even before lockdown in the rainy London weather. She touches on being known as a pillar in an industry but being bored of said industry. Wanting more from a career started at the age of 15, needing a challenge. Her scouting was by chance, as she walked on a beach near her home in Australia. A tomboy looking for a chance to get out and see the world by stepping on a runway. Which she's done for ,as of several days ago, 19 years and she's walked or shot for almost everyone.

"At her busiest she starred in Gucci campaigns, appeared on the covers of numerous international editions of Vogue and took the coveted role of bride to close Chanel’s spring 2010 couture show. She hasn’t completely given up modelling — she fronted last year’s Bottega Veneta campaign, for instance — but she felt she had more to give."

In recent years she's taken up acting, one of her first roles was in Mad Max: Fury Road. And this year, she will be starring in The Forgiven "co-starring Ralph Fiennes and Jessica Chastain." And the horror comic turned movie "Old" directed by M. Knight Shyamalan.

"Lockdown in London — spent alone, recovering from a break-up — brought lots to the surface. She filled ten diaries with poetry, drawings, observations, and began writing a one-woman play — then burnt them all one morning in a pot on her windowsill. “It felt ritualistic,” she says, laughing. “It ended up being a positive experience [but] I was having to process some pretty deep shit.”

Part of her process has also been processing the questions other people ask in your 30s as a woman. Hell they ask it in your 20s too and then you start asking yourself the question too. "....well, everyone kind of is having babies. I do really want kids. It’s really difficult being a woman. My sister made a decision, family was more important to her, and for me it was always work first. But we have a biological clock and as that clock starts ticking, you know…"

For now though she has got a puppy, well does a giant Cane Corso count as a puppy ?

**********************************

[bitletsanddrabbles]

Taggled by @gillianthecat

NAME: Gale. Might be more reluctant to hand that out, but I was on the 'net in that weird, comfortable point between 'ACK THE PREDATORS WILL GET YOU!' and 'ACK THE GOVERNMENT WILL GET YOU!' so it's already out there. Any really determined stalker could find me and I've accepted this.  

SIGN: Cancer. I don't actually believe in astrology, but I love sets and symbolism, so I've paid attention to it since a young age, and I've yet to see a description of my sign that isn't a pretty sharp little personality snap shot. And before you say 'Oh, but they're made vague so you can interp-' no. That's the point. I've never seen a description of, say, Taurus that you could make resemble me if your life depended on it; I've never seen a description of Cancer that needed interpreting what so ever. I don't believe in it, but it describes me. Also, having grown up on the coast and loving the moon, the adjacent symbolism resonates.

HEIGHT: 5'9 3/4"

TIME: 6:57, give or take

BIRTHDAY: July 8th. Typically have dinner with either Mum or Dad and Step-mum, depending on schedules, and open presents. Also take a moment to recognize that I've surrvived another year without going nuts, being hit by a truck, contracting the black death, etc.

FAVOURITE ARTIST/BAND: Over all, probably Heather Alexander, but I'm a music fiend, so take that with salt. Lots of salt.  

LAST MOVIE: Encanto, I believe, although it may have been Downton Abbey: A New Era. I think Encanto though.

LAST SHOW: Can't remember the last show I completed. Probably 'Good Omens' if mini-series count. If not...Jeeves and Wooster. Currently watching BBC Ghosts.  

WHEN I CREATED THIS BLOG: Sometime in 2017  

WHAT I POST: It was created for getting inspiration for my fanfiction, so bits o' ficcage, but it's expanded to pretty much anything Downton related, or just 'stuff I like', with a good helping of whatever I feel like whinning about right now (largely writer's block and my cat keeping me from the bathroom), and the occasional bit of politics if I feel it's super important. That doesn't happen much, though, because I absolutely detest politics.  

OTHER BLOGS: @snapsandshots is my photography blog and @allthemonsters is my Monster High specific photography blog

DO I GET ASKS: Occasionally, but normally in response to something I've asked first. Don't mind as long as people aren't being trolls. I ignore trolls...or I would, if they tried contacting me. I don't think that's ever actually happened.

AVERAGE HOURS OF SLEEP: Around 8, assuming lack of insomnia

WHAT I'M WEARING: White Calcutta cloth trousers, green microfiber polo, glasses, slippers. Hatred of temperatures over 75.

DREAM JOB:  Nothing that actually exists. Being able to make a living off of my random collection of hobbies is a literal dream, and I would love it.

DREAM TRIP: My parents gave me a trip to the UK in 2020 as a 40th birthday present. ... ... ... It'll happen eventually.

FAVOURITE SONGS (and quotes from them, just for some spice): This list is too long for words, so I'll just toss up a few things that people have probably not heard before.

Hap'n Frog of Cambreath (Heather Alexander): How many of you can catch a fly?

A Gypsy's Home (Heather Alexander): And the road is wide and the sky is tall and before I die I will see it all!

Stone Soup (Heather Dale): The stone is in the kettle, the water's on the boil, the work is always lighter when there's many hands to toil.

Somebody Will (Heather Dale): But I am willing to sacrifice something I don't have for something I won't have, but somebody will some day!

Letter Between A Little Boy And Himself As An Adult (Abney Park): Dear Mr. Brown, one day I’ll be you, and though I’m only eight now, you need to hear my rules.

Were-owl (S.J. Tucker): Who, who, who is it dares to find these feathers, stroke this skin?

The Rift (Leslie Hudson): So cut me out ‘cause I will hurt you Lock me up ‘cause I will make you fall Turn your back ‘cause I’ll betray you For love or loss I’d give my all

And as always, I am absolutely miserable at tagging! So if you would like to do this, have a blast!

[joleanart]

okay i saw this while browsing through my tags as usual and i had to tell you guys about the differences between julie e os fantasmas and julie and the phantoms!! (the ones i remember anyway cause it’s been almost ten years already)

– first of all: it was much darker. the boys were somber, there was little to no comic relief in their arc (from what i recall) and even their appearance was like that, they were really, really pale and had deep dark circles under their eyes—they leaned into more of a stereotypical image of a ghost

– okay. the way they died: a lot of people think that the way the boys died in jatp was really ironic and kinda “funny” (in air quotes cause dying is not funny. anyway) but the boy’s death in the original was like.....darker too. they were trying to recreate the cover of abbey road - the beatles and a car hit them

– their sound is also different. in the original, they died in the 80s and not the 90s (which makes sense if you consider that the shows also have a 10 age gap between them) so their sound was more like the rock brazilian bands from that era

– there was no hologram act, they performed with julie wearing these animal masks thing and i honestly don’t recall how things worked lol

– and their personalities: okay i don’t remember that very all either but there’s little things that kinda speak to the new version of the characters. the original reggie (martim) was also a flirt and the funniest of them. alex (felix) was also anxious and the one who worried the most. but luke (daniel) ohhh boy:

– i’m not gonna sugarcoat it: he was a massive asshole. omg i hated him !! he was arrogant, very cold, had a superiority complex and was kinda mean to julie of all people. seriously. i think in the first ep he called her ordinary and said “you’re way more invisible than me” or something like that. ugh what an asshole, no wonder i didn’t ship them back then. i’m SO glad luke’s personality changed completely cause seriously folks–

ok there’s one more thing but idk it could be a bit of a spoiler ? i don’t know!! oh well. it’s under the cut anyway:

– julie x nick it’s endgame. i mean, given the luke we had in the original i was  glad tbh. i don’t remember much of the original nick (his name was one of the few that didn’t change) but he could’ve not been worse than original luke. srsly. 

but we’ve got a super cute luke now and it makes me sad to think about that finale even though the whole human x ghost deal hasn’t changed but ughhh

[blackberry-gingham]

Idk how you may feel about this au! But time travelingreader! is my fab. Could you do one in the teddy boy era. (I just imagine the resder predict or say some anachronism and the guys being ?. Socially speaking its so interesting. ) thnks :)

Lol, this IS an interesting trope! Also, a very difficult one to write, from my understanding haha. All in good fun I suppose, but still I want to try and make something worthwhile, so I hope this turns out alright for you all!

Sorry for the hiatus, but I think I'm coming back finally :D I hope you enjoy this snippet

---

A cool, fresh breeze washes over you, tickling your face. You sniff and rustle peacefully, as you sleep. Another one comes, this time stiff and cold.

You roll over, swatting at nothing as a small patch of grass blades stab your nose. Wait, grass?

Your eyes shoot open, and you sit up to attention, taking in your surroundings. It looks like you're in some type of park, but the foliage is far greener and push then anywhere you know of. As you look around, a thought comes to you.

You've only a foggy idea where you were before and no idea how you got here. In fact, where even is here?

Panic over takes you, and you whip out your phone for answers, only.... Huh, no signal. That can't be, you're in the middle of a town!

You shake your head out and decide to go talk to some people instead.

And that's when things really go down hill.

The street is filled with cars that look like they belong in a museum or auto show. Not only that, but they're all driving on the opposite side of the street, a-and those save streets are lined with little telephone booths, and-

This must be a dream, you tell yourself as you run up to a newspaper stand, yet another thing you've never seen before. In your frantic haste, you grab one and search for the date, only now realizing you've never actually read a newspaper before. You're hardly able to read "The Daily Mail" and June 13, 196-something, before...

"Oi, this ain't a lib'ry love! Pay up, or keep walking!"

You're so taken aback my the man's accent and mild threat, that all you can do is stutter and back away. Paper in hand, that is.

The man gets up off his stool menacingly, "Are you deaf? Do you want me to get the coppers on ye'? I'll-!"

"Oi, fuck off!", another male voice comes from behind and you go stiff as a rod as you back into a strong, leather clad chest. " 'ere's a quid for the paper ya bastard, keep the change"

You whip around to see a boy about your age. He's tall, with a long, sharp nose and bright, auburn hair as he looks down leads you away from the paper stand by the arm.

All you can do is let it happen. You're so bewildered by each new development that you can hardly keep up. Last you knew, you were in America 2021, now you're lost in England, around 60 years in the past.

"You must really love that old rag to be trying to pinch it, eh?", the boy gives a mirthless chuckle and turns around briefly to catch a glimpse of you. And for a split second, it hits you.

You know that profile anywhere.

"John?", you stop dead in your tracks, disbelief written all over your face. John whips around, aa your voice changes from shock, to imesuarble relief, "John Lennon?"

"Yeah.... How do yo-?"

You cut him off, doing everything within your power to keep from shedding tears as you bump into him with a hug, "You're alive!"

John freezes up and makes a face that, to anyone who knew him, would say that he was about to shove you off to start. And he would've too, except... "Alive? The fuck are you on about, 'course I am!", John chooses mercy and merely shakes himself free as you reel.

Now that some space is between you, he catches a good look at your shirt. "The Beatles", it says, in bold white lettering with a picture of Abbey Road on it.

"Ey!", John points, and then squints to make sure his eyes aren't playing tricks. When he's sure they aren't, he looks at you suspiciously, "What all this? That's my band's name!"

Uh oh.

It suddenly occurs to you that perhaps interacting with your idol's past self was not a good idea. "W-well yeah, I know! O-or wait, actually-!"

But John clearly isn't listening, instead it would appear he's thinking up a new name. Perhaps The Quarry Men isn't so bad?

Suddenly, the text on your shirt starts to flicker, and "The Beatles" starts to morph into something else... It only takes you a second to realize what's happening, and you snap into action.

"No no no!", You wave your hands in front him, "Don't do that! Look, it is your band! See, this is you, and Paul, and George, and-"

John squints again and leans in very close. In any other circumstance, you'd be quite excited indeed. It's hard to see anything on the beat up tee however, but... He'd recognize Paul's profile and Ringo's big old hooter anywhere.

He gaze shoots back up to you, and now it's his turn to be wordless and in disbelief, "How?", is about all he can manage.

Well... The truth can't hurt, right? "I-I don't know, alright? And you wouldn't believe me anyway..."

Suddenly, John seems extremely interested, "Well hey now, don't be like that! Are you um, are you a fortune teller?", he creeps a little closer, lowering his voice, "D-do you know if me and the lads make it in the end?"

You freeze a moment, "Make it...?"

"Well yeah, you know... Do we hit it big? We must if shite like that's going around!", he points excitedly to your shirt

You release the breath you'd been holding. Thankfully, it seems he's forgotten the little matter of you thinking he'd been dead. Well, only because... He is. And George....

Hopefully you won't have to touch that topic. Besides, right now you need to figure out how to get back to your time. Although...

Surely it wouldn't hurt to spend a little time with your idol

"Do you? Do you ever!", You light up, unable to mask your excitement, "You guys become the biggest band in the world!"

John's eyes go wide as saucers, and whether it's because he feels you have some credit, or because simply wants to believe, he seems to take you at your word. Suddenly, he grabs onto your wrist, "Come on then! We need to tell the lads!"

And with that, the two of you race on.

[johns-prince]

Hey love! I hope you’ve been doing well! I have some thoughts about some stuff I’ve noticed recently, so I hope you don’t mind listening to a bit of a ramble.

Basically, I was listening to Here Today and being emotional, as you do, and I thought to myself “Y’know, why don’t we give John’s old demos a go as well. Wouldn’t hurt to cry a bit more while listening to Now And Then.” However, as soon as I went to their links that I had saved so I could access them easily, Youtube gave me a notice saying they were taken down due to a copyright claim from Yoko. Now, I know copyright is obviously a thing that will happen since she’s basically in control of the Lennon empire, but I found it a bit odd that they were specific recordings, at least from what I noticed.

The Now And Then recording that I was familiar with was removed, and the only ones that I can see that are still up and older than about a month (which are the age of ones I think people have reuploaded after the others were taken down) are either clips from documentaries or edited versions that people pass as “Beatles versions” of the song. The other that I noticed being recently removed was the third demo of Real Life. Both have extreme hints towards Paul in them, Now And Then basically being wholeheartedly about Paul and that Real Life demo in particular having certain lines that seem to point to Paul (at least in my opinion).

I may be reading WAY too far into all of it and if I’m completely wrong then that’s fine by me (at least that would mean the only reason would be copyright), but after the whole thing about her replacing Paul’s introduction to John’s book with her own recently AND knowing the lengths she has gone in order to keep her and John’s “love” alive in the eyes of the public, I wouldn’t be surprised if there wasn’t at least a bit more going on beyond the basic copyright claims in terms of some of these recordings. You’d think with a company that large, they’d have taken those videos down due to copyright pretty soon after they were posted, but they let them stay up for a fairly long while and were only taken down because Yoko herself decided to do so. I don’t really know honestly, just speaking my mind I guess.

I don’t mind rambling, all I ever do is ramble. Thank you for enjoying my rambling lol

Because I’mma ‘bout to ramble here myself—

So, let’s address some things that have been going on with the John Lennon Estate as of late, and the... Eight other companies that were linked to Yoko Ono (and apparently shared with The Beatles) because I think it’s important in maybe getting to the bottom of why the Hell this is happening now, and why so many demos, and even certain videos like the one with John filming and saying, “Paul, my dear one,” was even hit with copyright and taken down.

The companies that are in charge of John’s music rights are: 

Lensolo, Lincoln publishing, and Apple Corps. I think Apple Corps. is the only one shared between Yoko Ono and The Beatles?  

I’m not sure when she exactly did this, but from these two articles published in November, 2020 [x] [x] it must have been last year Yoko Ono apparently handed over business interests (The John Lennon Estate) over to Sean Lennon. 

So, Yoko has been managing the Estate, and the other companies, since John’s unfortunate death in 1980. Last year is when she apparently handed over management control to Sean:

“The musician has also joined the board at Lensolo which manages the music rights of some of his father’s solo output, The Mirror reported.  

Here comes the son: Sean Lennon, 45, has been appointed a director at eight companies linked to the family and the Beatles, including Apple Corp.” [x]

“Now Sean, 45, has been appointed a director at eight companies linked to the family and The Beatles according to The Mirror, including the multimedia Apple Corps.

Apple Corps had reported assets of $36million last year, and Sean is also believed to be taking over at Lensolo, managing John's solo material, Maclen, which publishes John's work in the US, and Subafilms, a music film company.” [x]

You then have Stans like this claiming Yoko isn’t in charge of The Lennon Estate, so we should just stop being spiteful and blaming her for what’s going on with these copyright strikes and removal of these videos/recordings— which by first glance at any of these articles you might be inclined to be like, “Huh I guess you’re right,”

But...

“A spokesman sad: ‘Yoko continues to oversee John’s estate but has drafted in Sean as a director to assist where necessary.’” [x] [x] [x]

So... She still oversees The John Lennon Estate, even though she supposedly is retiring... Simply making Sean the director to assist when necessary. Basically, “UK paper The Mirror now reports Ono has handed most of her duties over to son Sean Ono Lennon.” and “ While Ono has not commented on his new roles he has been actively following the passing of what would have been his father’s 80th birthday on October 9.” 

She’s incorporating Sean into business matters, but it appears she is still overseeing everything and still in charge. 

Then you have this;

“Despite it being 40 years after the death of John Lennon, the singer's estate is still raking it in, much to the delight of Yoko Ono.

Last year, he was named the seventh top earning dead celebrity by Forbes, with an annual income of $14million.

The 50th anniversary of iconic album Abbey Road boosted sales and streams of The Beatles catalog, proving a healthy stream of income to the estate.

The Lennon estate also owns memorabilia. his art and a number of properties.

The income might be more if not for the legal wrangling over the ownership of The Beatles catalog, which was once owned by Michael Jackson and then by Sony.

Yoko has kept a steady hand on John's finances, amassing a reported $700million fortune off the back of his estate.

As a key shareholder in Apple Corps, she profited from his music sales and other ventures which featured The Beatles, such as Rock Band.

She also owns multimillion-dollar properties in Manhattan and hundreds of acres in Delaware County.

But in recent years, she has sold off a number of them, selling a West Village penthouse for $12million in 2013, and an Upper West Side building for $10million in 2017.

According to Companies House in the UK, Yoko was registered as a director in a number of companies including Apple Corps, Maclen, which publishes Lennon's songs in the US, Lensolo for his solo work, and Subafilms.

Yoko has also made money off her own artwork, which has sold for up to $50,000.” [x]

Make of all that what you will. 

What do we know? We know that Sean is now somewhat working behind the scenes of the John Lennon Estate, so this could be his doing since these copyright strikes and removal of demos and certain videos had just started happening this year— but as we’ve learned, we don’t even know the full extent of control/management Sean actually has, and if he even has the position to be calling the shots and making important, noticeable decisions. 

It appears, by the research I’ve put in and what I could find about this, that it would be Yoko who’s still in charge. Meaning, she’d be the main one behind greenlighting these copyright strikes/claims and getting the demos and certain videos removed/taken down.

I think you’re right in your thoughts, and being suspicious of the reasoning behind these copyright strikes and removals, especially when we start looking at which one’s are being hit. Why now has the Estate started copyright claiming all these demos and getting them removed? Even versions of this bloody video had been struck down as copyright, and removed— which I think is extremely suspicious, and just... unnecessary? Petty? Stupid??

We can’t say with 100% certainty of why The Lennon Estate is doing this now, why Yoko (and now Sean, to an unknown extent) has decided to start copyright claiming and striking down certain demos, and even videos/clips that involve John (we just love how easy it is to claim copyright on Youtube)— but it’s suspicious, and doesn’t help improve one’s perspective and impression of the John Lennon Estate, Yoko Ono, or Sean Lennon. 

[marymccartneyphotos]

Paul Weller in conversation with Mary McCartney: ‘We used to pinch a lot of Beatles songs’

For this Woking-born son of the 1970s, there were four father figures who underpinned everything, from his first guitar to an inspirational career that continues to expand and explore more than 50 years later. On the release of his latest solo record, his third in three years, we asked Paul Weller to pick through the past with an artist who knows better than any how The Beatles shaped the generation that followed. By Dylan Jones; 4 June 2021 from British GQ Magazine

(edited for Mary McCartney content only)

For Weller’s latest GQ appearance, we thought it would be good to put him together with an old friend, the photographer Mary McCartney. Which is what we did...

Mary McCartney: So, Paul, when did you become a Beatles fan? When you were 12?

Paul Weller: When I was five years old. I had some of the singles, because my mother bought them, but the first time I saw them was the Royal Variety Performance in 1963, when I was five. From the time I saw The Beatles I loved music and then when I was around age 12 I started trying to learn to play guitar. Me and my mate had a few lessons for a bit and got a few weeks in, but the guy was trying to teach us how to read music, so we got bored with that. And as soon as we learnt enough chords we stopped the lessons and we just start doing it ourselves.

MM: When did you actually start writing songs?

PW: As soon as we – me and my mate Steve Brookes – learnt the three or four chords. I’m still mates with him now. We started a band and we just learned together and we just kept swapping whatever we’d learned in the week, swapping back and forth. It was just me and him and then we just gathered up people as we could find them. There was never any doubt in my mind that’s what I would do and, even at around 12, I thought that was definitely what I was going to do for a living. Well, I didn’t know it could be a career, I just knew I was going to do music. So by the age of 14 we were playing pubs, working men’s clubs and social clubs with The Jam. But your dad’s band was the catalyst for all of it.

MM: You know, I’m directing a documentary about the history of Abbey Road Studios at the moment, so I’ve been taken back to those times. There is a photograph of me aged three months on one of the sofas in the studio, so I was there before I can remember being there. Whenever I walk in through the doors I still get a funny feeling. But I’m learning a lot about The Beatles’ recording process, though. What was your writing process in the early days?

PW: When we started to write songs we just used to pinch a lot of The Beatles songs. They were very basic, just us taking our first steps as songwriters. I was actually very passionate at the time, but I didn’t have the skills to articulate that passion. That kind of developed. Our first songs would have been nonsense songs, just “My Baby Love Me” stuff... But, like every other fledgling songwriter, I just started off by aping other people, like The Beatles did, like Dylan did. Everyone starts out copying other people.

MM: I assume you recorded your new album during lockdown?

PW: I did. I had about four or five tracks left over from [last year’s] On Sunset and they were just lying around, unused. So I started working away, chipping away, trying to put together a new batch of songs. As ever, I recorded them all in the studio down in Surrey, just me and a guitar singing along to a click track. If I couldn’t record with the band, I’d send the recordings to them and they’d play their parts and then send them back. It was a very odd process, but it worked. However, when we could finally all record again together, it was like the first day of school after the summer holidays. It was great. The writing process was actually the same as it always is, but because I knew I didn’t have any live work for the foreseeable future, we just created all this space. I think the lockdown was actually hugely influential in a way, as all the quiet made me appreciate nature in a way I hadn’t done for quite some time, maybe ever. I could really feel and hear and see nature again, it started to take over. I loved hearing the birds sing and not seeing any aeroplanes in the sky. It helped me think about things I would never normally think about in any situation. I felt more in tune with nature. I had a thought that if we weren’t here, if we all disappeared, which I’m sure we will do one day, the earth would just reclaim itself and that it will always be here and we won’t.

MM: It was such a nice feeling, actually stopping and looking and appreciating, not rushing around. I was lying in bed one night in the middle of London. It was 2am and it was so quiet it felt like we had gone back 100, 200 years. I couldn’t hear the rumble of the underground and it was almost as though cars hadn’t been invented.

PW: How was your lockdown, Mary?

MM: Mine was good, but we’re not here to talk about me. I’m grilling you today. But mine was good. Well, I say it was good, but it was unnerving. I think, on a global scale, it was just unnerving because it was like living in a science fiction movie. I think the main thing a lot of us benefitted from was having to slow down and not being able to just go and do things. So, in that sense, it wasn’t a bad thing. I was obviously worried about people’s health and the economy, but, like you, I really got in touch with nature. I did a lot more photographic work outside. And, of course, I started to prep for the Abbey Road doc. What’s the perfect recording scenario for you?

PW: Well, I love my studio and, to be honest, I’d be quite happy to never come out of the place. I could quite happily stay there forever. I bought the building in 1999, but it’s only really been the past 15 years or so that we’ve really got it together, with the sound and the vibe and the equipment. I’m continually making little acoustic adjustments to the room. We’ve got a drum kit set up all the time, as well as a mic’d piano, so it’s always ready to roll. I can play guitar, obviously, as well as bass and piano, but I’ve never really enjoyed playing the drums, because I can’t sing and drum with any conviction. It’s a different art altogether, playing drums. I like drummers who play the song, who can play the tune and who aren’t trying to do their own thing. That requires a certain amount of discipline, a different discipline: not playing too much but playing the right thing. Your dad is a good drummer.

MM: Yeah, he is. Mum introduced me to a song he played drums on years ago, called “My Dark Hour”, by the Steve Miller Band. He’s credited as “Paul Ramon” and he does backing vocals, guitar, bass and drums. It was recorded in Olympic Studios in London towards the end of 1969, after an argument Dad had had with the others over Allen Klein becoming their manager. The others had gone off and he said Steve Miller walked in and asked if he wanted to play the drums on this track he was recording. I think the drumming on it is so good, but you can tell he’s letting out a lot of tension.

PW: I love that first solo album of your dad’s, the one with you as a baby on the back. That’s probably one of my favourite records. It was lo-fi before lo-fi was even talked about.

MM: I love the rawness of it, as it’s just so personal. I still listen to McCartney and Ram a lot. They shot the album cover up in Scotland. They were horse riding and he zipped me up in his jacket. He put me in the jacket so I was safe, as he was going riding. I love that picture from a photographic point of view as well, as it’s very real. It’s taken at the end of the day, during the golden hour. It’s so natural.

PW: Now, what was it like growing up, then, as a daughter of a Beatle?

MM: Well, it was more like growing up as a daughter of Paul and Linda, because they were such a great couple. But,

also, they were such adventurous people. So, we were kind of following them around and going on lots of adventures. We went on tour with them and we really only stopped when we needed to go to school. So I have lots of memories of travelling as a girl. I even remember going on the double-decker that they used as a tour bus in 1972. The seats on the upper deck were replaced by mattresses and bean bags.

PW: I assume it was your mother’s inspiration that made you want to be a photographer...

MM: I think so, as I think I just always saw her taking pictures. She had such a casual style too. She didn’t do a lot of setting up and neither do I. It’s just so much nicer when you connect with your sitter and when you just casually take pictures. I much prefer that and I certainly know that you don’t like to have your picture taken in a very set-up kind of situation. What really got me into becoming a photographer was looking at Mum’s pictures from the 1960s. They were about her being with someone and taking pictures and very much not “This is Jimi Hendrix”. Again, casual. When I became a photographer, I took Mum’s talent for granted. She would take pictures out the car window and then they became these books or a print on the wall. When I started doing it myself I’d put the camera up and I’d be like, “Dad, can you turn the car around so I can take this picture?” And he’d be like, “No.” She would take pictures so effortlessly and I didn’t realise there was a knack to it. Mum and Dad would treat everyone equally; I do remember that. We were always surrounded by people, so I suppose that’s why I think I am a bit of a people person. I like meeting people and I like connecting with people, but I still find I’m quite shy about it. I find it stressful, but I like it. But I could never in a million years get up on a stage, ever. Even thinking about it makes me feel like fainting. When did you first walk out in front of a big crowd? How does that feel? Is it just feeling that adulation and love and appreciation and then giving that back? Does that feel really healthy? I always think when it works perfectly, it just must be such a healthy feeling.

PW: It’s almost a weird thing, because just prior to going on stage, especially in the hour before, I’m in bits. I’m so nervous and so don’t want to be there and want to go home, and then within minutes of actually being on stage, as soon as that first tune strikes up, I automatically feel as though this is completely where I’m supposed to be. It feels like the most natural, most comfortable, Zen-like place you could possibly be, it’s so weird. I’ve always felt nervous before going on stage. That’s never changed. I mean, it’s got a little bit better as I’ve got older, but not much. I think I need to have that feeling. It was weird, because there was a time when I tried to stop drinking – before I stopped completely – and when I stopped I suddenly wasn’t nervous before going on stage. And I didn’t like it. It felt really odd.

MM: Isn’t there something superstitious about this?

PW: No, I don’t think so. I just think it gives you an edge. Those nerves can make you edgy and I think that’s important for me.

MM: And then did the nerves come back?

PW: When I started drinking again they did.

MM: But now you’re not?

PW: When I finally stopped drinking it took me at least two years to get used to that feeling of going on stage totally sober and straight. And now I love it. But it took a good two years to get comfortable, as it was really odd at first. I’d be on stage and I’d notice so much, like there’s a guy in the front row who’s wearing a green shirt or something, and now I don’t feel that at all. Now it feels natural and I have a greater appreciation of it. That’s the other thing as well, getting more from it and being more conscious of what we’re doing.

MM: Growing up, watching Mum and Dad on stage just felt natural. But I’ve seen you play a few times and it makes me realise how much I couldn’t do it myself. There is such great energy and it’s really entertaining and you look completely natural, but I wouldn’t be able to feel comfortable in that position. Also, to me, it feels like your music has to be played live. I went to a concert before lockdown and the person was so vacant and not connected to the audience and, because of that, it made me nervous. You could tell they were going through the motions, that it was an act. They had no connection at all. Whereas when I look at Dad on stage he’s all about connection. I think I had taken it for granted before that, but when you see someone who doesn’t connect, you realise how important it is.

PW: I know some people who turn up just before they go on stage and as soon as they finish they get in the car and they’re off. I don’t understand that either. It’s a far bigger thing than that for me, because I’m looking for that connection. As much as the audience might be, I am as well, and my band too, because I’ve seen it happen with my own eyes and there are some nights where you get so connected together by an audience that this thing just grows and grows. It transcends the moment.

MM: It’s like magic.

PW: It’s something special. The last time I played at the Fillmore in San Francisco, a couple of years ago, it was like that, and it wasn’t because of gear. It was almost like we took off, like the whole room just lifted up.

MM: Have you got a ritual for after the show?

PW: No, not really. No.

MM: My dad has this sandwich and a Margarita, because he doesn’t eat before he goes on. He waits until after.

PW: I have a cup of tea these days. In the past, I would have got off my nut, but I don’t any more. But if you have a gig like that and that becomes your benchmark, you’re always looking to get back to that moment, which is not always possible. But that becomes the thing you’re always searching for, to find that connection. We’re always striving for the spectacular. It’s the same with record companies. Sometimes you have to compromise, but what you really want to do is pursue your own passions. It was more difficult when we first started, because the record company tried to step in more and tried to guide us to do this or that. In the early days of The Jam they even suggested we cover a 10cc song. We said, “No fucking way is that going to happen.” You’ve got to stick to your guns. You’ve got to pursue what you set out to achieve.

MM: Fashion and clothes feel important to what you do, maybe because they make you feel a certain way to be able to perform?

PW: Yeah. But although I was too young to be really involved in the 1960s, I still lived through that time and that whole thing has never gone away for me. I love that period and it informs a lot of what I do, including how I dress. The whole look and sound of that time is just really formative. I don’t feel I’m stuck in that time, but it will always be the cornerstone of everything I do. I just thought it was such a brilliant time for music and fashion and art and all that stuff.

MM: What do you think it is about it? Is it experimentation?

PW: I think so. It was those postwar years, coming out of all that austerity, that bleak black and white, grey world – large parts of the country were still like that in the early 1960s. There were still bombsites. There was still slum housing. So it took a long time for Britain to become modern, but when it did, it was explosive.

MM: Dad describes it as it all suddenly going technicolour.

PW: Yeah, I think that’s true and you just see the clothes and music expanding. Men stopped wearing demob suits and started wearing all these bright-coloured clothes.

MM: And the pill came about and made life a lot easier.

PW: Then the other pills came a little bit later and helped expand everyone’s horizons. These people were pioneers. And also look at the art world – Peter Blake, David Hockney, Bridget Riley. It felt as though everything was becoming more modern and opening up and becoming different and colourful. I was only a very tender age, but, nevertheless, that influence was of great importance and value and always has been. Punk was probably the first time I experienced that freedom. We missed out on the 1960s, had a lift with Bowie, but after that it was largely a cultural wasteland. I was always looking for when I thought it was going to be our term. The 1970s were still very much in the shadow of the 1960s until punk. And then it all blossomed. Then it all started to make sense.

Fat Pop (Volume 1) by Paul Weller is out now.

Producer: Grace Guppy. First assistant: Pedro Faria. Digital technician: Alexander Brunacci. Make-up: Jane Bradley. Retouching: The Hand Of God

[themagicalmysticalboy]

lennison fluff however you wanna do it :)

a/n:  i got inspired by a sentence prompt i saw somewhere. If i can find the one i’ll @ the blog.

John swore as he ran up the impossibly long driveway. The dark sky and pouring rain had surely stretched the walk out an extra mile, the ground lights he followed looking few and far between. To add to it all, he was shivering and weighed down by his heavy peace offerings. Fog and rain coated his specs until he was more blind with them than without but he didn’t really have the free hand to do much about it. In lieu of any sort of help, he continued his jog and trusted that following the row of lights would lead to George’s door. It all made him wonder why he was so stupid in the first place. Though, that must mean it was an effective punishment.

With care to not slip on the steps, he finally made it under the safety of the stoops overhang. He was panting, the frigid air seeping into his wet clothes, but he took a moment to collect himself before assaulting the doorbell with his elbow. The ring of it was barely audible from outside, mostly drowned out by the water slamming against the concrete and roof. He bounced from foot to foot as he waited, in a vain attempt to garner some warmth. When no answer came, he elbowed it again, holding down for good measure. 

The click of the bolt in the door gave him hope and he stepped back. He smiled as it was pulled open. There was a dark figure in front of him, backlit by warm lights. Though he couldn’t see a clear shape to save his life, he knew the severely blurred outline was George.

His teeth chattered as he said, “Beautiful night, isn’t it? Not a breeze to be spoken of.”

“Go away.”

“Oh, come on, Georgie. I’ve got pizza.” He held up the box that, unlike him, was protected by a rain jacket. “And beer.”

George only stood there, doing or looking like god knows what. John squinted to try and make any hint of good will out but failed miserably. The smell of weed drifted out the door and John hoped it’d do some good in his favor. It at least meant George would be hungry. A start.

“I’m blind as all can be, son. Can’t tell how cross you are.” George grabbed the beer and slid John’s glasses from his nose. He had the creepy-intense stare going that somehow managed to look angry and emotionless all at once. “So, very cross?”

If he expected a response, he didn’t get one. George turned on his heels and walked inside. John watched from the threshold, feeling uncertain. “You’re not a vampire, are you? Get in here and shut the door.”

“Well, I’d hope not.” He sauntered in with a new bout of confidence. “Got garlic sauce for the pizza.” He hung up his jacket and slipped off his shoes before venturing into the living room where George sat. A bag of weed was casually on display beside a smoldering spliff on the coffee table. “I see you brought the oregano.” 

Indian-style music drifted from the record player as George looked up at him from his spot on the floor. As he took a drag from the spliff, John couldn’t think of a more George moment to ever have happened - save for him wearing his gardening gloves and being coated in dirt. It almost made his cutting glare less scary.

“Did you come ‘round to make jokes and stare?”

Jolting himself out of his daze, he scooted the bag with the edge of the box in order to have it take up space in the center of the cedar table. Still glaring, George took a slice of pizza and pulled a beer from the box. Though there wasn’t a single cue suggesting he had the right, John sat down.

He handed over a bottle opener and made himself as comfortable as possible in his clingy clothes. “Is my charming gusto not enough?” 

George slouched over, rubbing a hand over his face. “Get out.”

“Alright! Okay. No more joking around.” Tentatively, he garnered George’s attention. “I’m really sorry, honestly. I was just upset you’d blown off the meeting.”

George raised a brow and took a sip of beer. “I skip meetings all the time. Never got a slagging off like that for it.”

That had not been the best day for anyone. The memory of it made John cringe. He had really laid into George at the studio. Went all in on the insults with everyone standing around just watching in horror. He hadn’t meant a word of it. And George was right, he really didn’t care if he skipped on the meetings. They were dull and boring and the opposite of everything George liked. So that only left the truth.

“Well... “ it felt more than embarrassing to admit. “I was jealous, I guess.” He averted his eyes, scratching the back of his soaking wet head.

“Jealous of what? Wait!” His voice went up an octave before breaking into a laugh. “No way you’re jealous of Ken.” John didn’t look up. “John! Come off it.” The beer bottle slammed against the table, finally catching John’s attention. George was bent over in a fit of giggles, holding the bottle hard against the table.

Ken Mansfield had become buddies with George very quickly once his office was put in place in Abbey Road, leaving John a bit out of sorts. Maybe more than a bit. But that's beside the point.

 “You’ve been spending all this time with him.” John went on the defense but quickly relented, “I didn’t- It feels stupid now that I’m saying it.”

“Yeah, ‘cause it should. Go get yourself out of those clothes before you drowned the carpet.” He was pointing to the hallway with his slice of pizza, amusement winning over annoyance.

When John returned in one of George’s jumpers, he pulled at the newly adorned sweatpants. “These are mine. When did I leave them?”

George was laid flat on the ground but slowly pulled himself up upon John’s arrival. “I stole them ages ago.” When they were both sitting together, George handed him a newly rolled spliff. “Catch up. I’m one and one and three.” He gestured vaguely to his beer, ashtray, and pizza.

“So we’re good?” John mumbled the question as he lit up and took a drag.

“I don’t think your apology was finished.”

John narrowed his eyes and took another drag. “Fine. I’m sorry for saying you didn’t care about the band.” George looked on expectantly and John rolled his eyes. “And for saying Ringo could do lead guitar better than you.” He rushed through the words and turned to grab a beer. “Wasn’t that one just a given though? Come on.”

“Like pulling teeth for you, isn't it?” Taking up another bottle himself, he leaned back on his elbows, his knees pulled up to create a wall between them. “As I’d like to not be on the subject all night, I’ll exempt the rest of your offenses.”

Slotting George between his legs, he pulled him closer by the tops of his thighs and rested his chin on his knee. “Thank you, my gracious one,” John feigned gratitude, though a lot of it was more genuine than he’d like to admit. 

“If you act up again, though, I might just have to sick Ken on you.” George gave a toothy grin as John pulled a face in response. 

“Fair enough.” John discarded his spliff in favor of pizza. “Been reading a book I think you’d like.”

George let his upper body fully rest on the ground but hummed in interest. “Tell me about it.”

The rest of the night was spent in quiet conversation and periods of blissful silence. Even the buzz of the sitar that John usually didn’t care for all that much sounded sweet when in the company of George.