GUESS WHO was standing about a hundred feet away abusive father. I froze. The only thought that went through my head was: How the hell am I gonna escape?
John looked at me curiously. "What is it?" he asked. Fear must have been written all over my face.
"John," I whispered, slowly turning my head back to face him, "I... my father’s over there."
Now he looked confused. "And? You’re afraid he’s going to have a primal because you’re with me?’’
I wish you knew.... "No. I’m afraid he’s going to kill me." I spoke slowly and deliberately, amazed at how calm my voice sounded. I was shaking now, terrified. Of my own father. I should’ve told someone. I should have let John know.
His eyes went as wide as the saucers we’d had our tea on. Now he looked wary, almost afraid himself. "Whaaaaa? Why?’’
"No time to explain," I said shortly. "See him? Tall, heavyset, menacing." I jerked my head in his direction.
John’s eyes followed me, and he paled instantly. "Christ, he looks like a criminal mastermind," he breathed. I was surprised to see how intimidated he was. John Lennon, the "cocky Beatle." Obviously his personality was in sharp contrast to his image. Part of it, anyway.
I nodded. "Yes. He is. We have to get out of here. We can’t go to the Dakota, he might come back. Somewhere far away."
"Ah, come on, Alida," he protested, his eyes darting wildly now, as they had done at the grocery store. "He won’t see you."
Yet he already had. His eyes ablaze, he started towards us. As if I were on a spring, I jumped up and began to run as fast as I could in the other direction. John didn’t matter. The other people didn’t exist. The park was no longer there. All I could see was the street ahead of me, and my father behind me. I kept running until I was out of the park and on the sidewalk. There I stopped briefly, trying to catch my breath. I’d made it out, and my father was nowhere in sight.
"Tired?’’ a male voice said, and I screamed, starting to turn and run again. A hand caught my arm. (My good arm, thankfully.) "It’s me! It’s only me! Christ." That oath brought me back to earth. I realized it was John gripping my arm, and he’d asked the question.
"Oh, fuck," I sighed, panting. "Thought you were him. We’ve got to get a taxi."
"To where? You know somebody?" John looked bewildered.
"No. I’ve just got to get away from here," I said desperately.
He sighed in frustration. I wasn’t making any sense, I know that now, but at the time I thought it should’ve been clear from the beginning. "Alida, it’ll be okay. Let’s go back to the Dakota--"
"No!" I shrieked. "I can’t! He’ll--"
"Listen!" he said, interrupting me. "We’ll go to my fla--apartment. He’ll never find you. I’ll go back to 'John' when we get in the building. We’ll stay in there all day."
I sighed, not entirely relieved, but a bit more relaxed. "Okay," I nodded in agreement. "But... can we take a taxi?" John stared at me a moment, then pointed to the massive building where we lived. I then realized how close we were to the park, and felt a fool for asking. We were practically across the street.
"All right, fine, but if we get killed don’t blame me," I muttered.
His response to this was a bark of laughter. "You and your imagination," he teased.
"You don’t know the half of it." It was then that I remembered just how little we did know about each other. Although when we met it seemed as if we’d known each other for years. Funny, really, that I was roaming New York City with a near perfect stranger.
"I’m sure I don’t," John chuckled. "But I know enough already." He led me to the Dakota, and we used the elevator to get to Apartment 72. Before we exited, John looked around the hall carefully to see if there was anyone around. When he saw it was clear, we hurried across the hall to the apartment. John quietly opened the door to the kitchen and the two of us slipped inside. Fred was in the kitchen, smoking a joint and looking moody. "So, Fred, had a good day?" John greeted him cheerfully.
The younger man’s head jerked up in alarm. "John," he gasped. "Damn, you scared me. Where were you all day?" His gazed shifted to me, and his expression changed. He raised his eyebrows at John as if to say, "Horny so soon?"
I rolled my eyes. "We walked around Manhattan and went to Central Park."
Fred relaxed a little, actually smiling now. Mainly at me. "Oh. Did you have a good time?"
"Wonderful," John replied dryly.
"Yeah, you’re a great lay, John," I added sarcastically.
Fred and John both looked taken aback by that statement. John quickly recovered and burst out laughing. We seemed to do a lot of that. Laughter became predominant in everything we did together. "It’s been a long time for me, too," he joked, not missing a chance to make jokes about sex. A gleam appeared in his eye, one I hadn’t seen since the old pictures of the Beatles.
Fred joined in, remarking how typical it was of John, which only caused more laughter. Yet his eyes kept drifting from John to me, and he wore a puzzled expression that I couldn’t read. Maybe he was as curious as I was about the sudden gleam in John’s eye.
"Oh, well," I said, shrugging. "At least you’re not like P--a Playboy." Paul McCartney’s name had nearly escaped my lips. From what John had said of his former friend in interviews, I thought it better not to mention his name. Speak Not the McCartney Name Lest We Claw Out Your Eyes And Display Them As Trophies. Fortunately John didn’t seem to notice my near slip of the tongue. I thought this odd; he was very observant and things rarely went unnoticed by him.
"Where’s Sean?" he asked curiously, gazing at the refrigerator where many paintings hung. They looked like the work of someone much older, but I figured they must be Sean’s; John was looking lovingly at them.
"Sean’s playing in his room," Fred told him. ``Want me to go get him?"
"Yeah. Oh, Sean’s my son, he’s three," John said quickly to me as Fred left to retrieve Sean. He needn’t have bothered; I’d heard enough about the Lennons to know they had a son, and know his name too.
"I know," I answered. "I’ve heard."
"Ah," John said, his expression changing completely, "but you’ve never seen him probably. He’s the most beautiful kid." He looked like a proud parent to me, almost boastful. His son must be one hell of a kid, I thought, amused. I’d only seen him look so affectionate when Yoko had briefly graced us with her presence.
"No, I haven’t seen any pictures," I admitted.
Fred returned then, a little boy in tow. The boy was clad in nothing but an orange and red striped shirt and a pair of underwear. I saw immediately where he’d gotten his looks. Apart from his eyes, which were more almond-shaped than John’s, and his hair, which was darker, he was a dead ringer for his dad. His thin lips, his creamy skin, the expression on his face, and when he saw John, the smile that lit up his face.
"Daddy! You’re home!" he cried, running to him and jumping on his lap.
"Sean!" John exclaimed, chuckling and kissing his son. "What did you do today?"
"Made some paintings," the little boy replied, pointing to the refrigerator. "See?"
"I saw," John nodded, cuddling Sean. "They’re very good, sweetheart."
Sweetheart? My mother had never called me sweetheart, much less my father. Odd how my "respectable, well established" parents were incapable of showing affection, and John, the "oddball recluse" was so loving. Then again, I guess you can’t show affection for someone where there is none. Sean beamed. Then his eyes swiftly turned to me, standing there watching the scene with almost too much curiosity. He became just as curious as I was, furrowing his brow and saying, "Hi! Who... who are you?"
I had to smile. This kid’s enthusiasm was infectious. "I’m Alida Horowitz, and I’m your new neighbor."
"Oh. Why are you in our apartment?" he asked, not being rude or thinking I was intruding, just curious about my presence. If I were used to my father and mother hardly ever inviting anyone in, I’d be confused if a strange girl was in the kitchen one day out of the blue, too.
"I’m just going to have some... tea," I told him, noticing Fred getting out some teabags and cups. "Your daddy and I met in the elevator the other day." I then shut my mouth, knowing I was going to say something that could be taken wrong if I didn’t.
John agreed with me quickly. "Yeah, Sean, she lives right across from us. Now you’ll have someone else to play with."
Sean’s eyes lit up. "Neat! Maybe we can make up games!" Then he put his little hand out to shake mine. I obliged. I didn’t care much for little children, but Sean was a unique little boy, no doubt about it. I wouldn’t mind playing with him.
"I’d like that," I said sincerely. Concocting fantasies was what I did best. Sometimes I wished my life was a fantasy, but I settled for making up stories in which my life was good and relatively easy. When I was little I used to pretend I was an orphan. Even out in public. I’d try to get lost in crowds and make someone think I was all alone so they’d take me home. Sallie would always pull me back to her, of course. I could’ve killed her for that sometimes, but I knew she was just acting out of instinct.
"Do you like stories?" he asked, his dark eyes fixing on me seriously, reminding me of John.
"I love stories. I write stories," I answered automatically.
The chestnuts widened in interest. "Wow! Do you write books?"
"I do, but you can’t buy them in stores. Maybe I can show you some of mine," I offered without even thinking about it. My behavior was surprising me. I never offer to show people my stories. Well, it’s usually because they’re not interested. These were the only people, besides Sallie and Ellen, who seemed to give a shit about me and what I did.
He nodded eagerly. "Yeah!" After giving me a beautiful smile, he turned to John. "Daddy, I’m gonna go and play now. `Bye. `Bye!" he said to me as he jumped off John’s lap and ran off to his bedroom.
John grinned at me. "Isn’t he smart? You seemed to like him."
"I did," I admitted. "He is smart. I usually don’t like little kids, but Sean seems different than most little kids." It was odd. He did the ordinary things little kids did, such as finger paint, draw, and play, but there was an awareness about him, an aura of intelligence. I hate to compare father and son, but he seemed just like John.
"He is," John said, almost absently. After a minute, he returned to normal. (Well, to the way he had been, anyway.) "Where’s that tea, Fred?"
Fred was at the stove, preparing the tea. "It’s coming, it’s coming. You’ll get it before the end of the day."
"At 11:59 p.m.," I jumped in. John chuckled.
"She’s got ya pegged, Fred," he teased, the New York inflections revealing themselves. I knew Fred was rolling his eyes, even though his back was turned to me.
"Yeah, yeah, she’s psychic."
He turned around and joined John at the table. I sat as well, realizing I hadn’t yet sat down although I’d been there at least ten minutes.
"No, I’m not clairvoyant, exactly," I said slowly. "I just have feelings about certain things. Occasionally."
"Maybe you can guess who’s not at home right now," Fred said with a grin.
I thought a moment, trying to get a sense of what the apartment felt like. "Yoko," I finally said. It wasn’t so much that the place felt emptier without her, it was mainly the energy of it and the fact that Fred didn’t seem tense as a soldier about to go into battle.
Fred nodded, glancing at John to see his reaction. "Yeah, she’s... well, she’s gone out with friends."
I looked at John, who showed almost no emotion. "She’s always out with
'friends,' Fred." Despite his neutral look, something about his voice carried
a hint of... resentment. Probably another man. Man, things really aren’t
what they seem.
C.J. © 2002