#jp things

May 1982

The phone had been ringing for a while before Paul noticed. It threaded itself into the hush of the kitchen, even and patient, like it knew he had nowhere else to be.

He was standing by the counter, watching the kettle breathe steam into the cold air. The radio was off. The dishes from breakfast still sat in the sink, flecked with dried yolk and tea leaves. Outside, the sky was that washed-out grey that never quite decided on rain.

He let the phone ring. One more. Two. The sound came from the hallway — distant enough that he could pretend he didn’t hear it.

When he finally went to answer, it wasn’t because he wanted to. Just something in the rhythm of the ringing made him move, as though the silence had grown too heavy to bear.

He picked up the receiver, half expecting nothing.

Then, a sharp inhale, and a nasal voice he'd recognize anywhere, spoke, bright and irritated and whole:

“’Bout time you answered, Macca. Thought you’d fallen asleep in your bloody music room again.”

Paul froze. The sound of the wind against the window vanished.

“Hello?” The voice laughed lightly. “You there or what? We’ve got ten minutes before George starts sulking, and you know how he gets when he’s bored.”

Paul stared at the floor tiles, at a faint crack running between them. He couldn’t breathe right.

"I thought I'd never see the day I arrived at Abbey Road before our little McPerfectionist, but you learn something new everyday, eh?"

The kettle whistled behind him — a long, rising note — but he didn’t move. The receiver was warm against his ear, heavier than it should’ve been.

“Come on, sunshine,” he said. “Don’t go quiet on me now.”

The whistle screamed, the line hummed, and Paul stood there, listening — terrified to speak, terrified to stop.

“Seriously, Macca, what's going on? You forget we’ve got a session or something?” John’s voice carried a grin, half-mocking, half-affectionate. “George is pacing about like he’s in a bloody zoo, and Ringo’s threatened to go for chips if we don’t start soon.”

Paul’s throat worked soundlessly. He pressed his back against the wall next to where the phone was, his head making painful contact with it.

“You hear me?” John asked again, sharper this time. “I can practically see you standing there with that daft look, like you've forgotten why you entered the room. Still hangover, I gather."

Paul drew a shallow breath. The sound of John’s voice — so alive, so there — hit him with a dizzy kind of vertigo. He could hear movement in the background: the clatter of something metal, George’s laugh, a faint, impatient drumbeat. Life.

His hand shook.

“God, you’re useless when you’re in this state,” John sighed, the teasing turning softer around the edges. “Alright, alright. I’ll tell George the Second you’re on your way. Just don’t make me come drag you out myself.”

The laugh that followed was quick and real — that same sharp burst he hadn’t heard in nearly two years. It seemed to travel through the line like light through water, bending everything around it.

Paul squeezed his eyes shut. If he spoke, he wasn’t sure what would come out — his voice, or the sound of something breaking.

“Paul?” John’s tone shifted again, a hint of unease creeping in. “You there, mate?”

He almost said I’m here. Almost. But the words wouldn’t move.

John exhaled — that familiar huff of exasperation. “You’re bloody hopeless. Fine, suit yourself. See you in ten.”

Paul’s mouth opened. “Wait—”

But the word came too slow, too soft — swallowed by the click of the line cutting out.

The dial tone hummed in his ear, flat and endless. He stood there with the receiver pressed against him, listening as though it might still change back.

Then came the silence. A long, steady kind that filled the house like fog.

Paul didn’t move. The phone felt heavier with every breath, his fingers stiff around the cord. He caught himself waiting — absurdly, helplessly — for it to ring again.

Nothing.