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justgeorgeharrisonfic · 4 years

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HAMBURG 10

ASTRID’S AGAIN, AND THE GIRL WITH GREEN EYES

“Ein Tafelteller.”

The matronly German lady handed the dripping plate to George, who took it and began to dry it with the already damp tea towel. “Ein Tafelteller,” he repeated obediently.

“Ein anderer Tafelteller.”

“Ein anderer Tafelteller.” Whilst drying the second plate, he cast a sideways sly glance at the lady, and treated her to his slow, lopsided smile.

She smiled back. And blushed.

“Vier Loffel,” she announced.

“Nein,” George answered.

She looked at him in surprise. Her eyebrows expressed the surprise.

“Funf Loffel,” he said, fanning out the spoons to show that there were indeed five and not four. The lady burst out laughing.

“Sie haben vollkommen Recht!”

The kitchen door swung open a little further and Paul came in. He looked pink, and damp, and scrubbed, and he grinned at Astrid’s mum before saying to George, “Your turn.” He then stooped to push his pile of filthy clothes into the washing machine.

They’d tossed a coin to see who would go first for the bath, and George was last. He didn’t mind. It meant he wouldn’t have anyone pounding on the bathroom door saying he was taking too long. So John and Paul had in turn soaked and scrubbed and shampooed, while he’d helped Astrid’s mum with the washing up and put up with her trying to teach him German words. She seemed to like him. And he was used to helping mums with washing up. He smiled at Astrid’s mum, and turned and left the kitchen, for all he knew leaving Paul to finish the drying up. He padded up the lushly carpeted stairs and slipped into the bathroom.

His friends had left it in a terrible state, as anyone with any sense would have expected, with water all over the floor, wet towels left in pools of damp and the bath filthy, yet this was luxury compared to the Bambikino and George barely noticed. He ran hot water into the bath and, whilst it was filling, pulled off his grubby, sweat-encrusted clothes and left them in a heap on the floor. He climbed into the bath as soon as there was enough water for him to sit in it and let the rest of it fill around him as he lay back and savoured the sensation of freshness and unhurried pampering.

He dunked his head under the water, and shampooed his hair and rubbed fiercely and vigorously and then dunked again to get the soap out. He lay in the hot water, and leaned his head back against the back of the bath, and his enjoyment was marred only by the knowledge that he would soon have to get out again. But he was last, so he didn’t have to hurry. He relaxed.

This bath, as well as being more enjoyable than he’d have thought an ordinary bath could be, was essential. He’d been worrying, and this invitation to the house had come at just the right time. He’d been so anxious to get clean that he’d even contemplated just turning up at the house, with a towel under his arm, as if he was going to the local swimming pool, and begging for a wash. Thing is, he’d more or less worked up the courage to ask this girl out, whatever that meant in this crazy place where he spent more or less all his waking hours “out”, but he couldn’t do it reeking like a tramp. She looked like she had some standards, and these days he fell way below anything that he could call standards.

He didn’t even know her name.

She had green eyes.

You couldn't see that across the club, in the dim lighting, but he could see it when he looked up from his guitar and saw that she'd moved to the front near the stage. She was standing with the two other girls, all with drinks in hand, and all three were looking up at him. And she was the prettiest. Maybe. Or maybe she wasn't actually prettier than the other two; but he liked her face best. And her smile. And her green eyes.

He’d noticed her quite a while ago actually, but she didn’t generally go to the front; she and her friends usually grabbed a table near the back, in the corner, and they’d sit together and laugh and talk and tap their feet. He never saw them dance though. Not that that mattered, but they didn’t. And he didn’t really know why he noticed her. But he found his eyes drawn to her, and her friends of course, whenever he noticed they were in. Tuesdays; they came on Tuesdays. And then he looked up one day and she was near the front and they were looking at him. What was really good was that he was singing right then. Three Cool Cats. So he sang it to her, and she smiled at him.

They started to come more often, not just on Tuesdays. After that, he always sang his solos to her, and when he did her smile grew brighter and the green eyes glowed.

“Who’s the bird, George?”

“Fuck off.”

“When’re you going to talk to her?”

When indeed?

When he was clean.

And that was now.

He pulled the plug and clambered out of the bath.

All three had brought a change of clothes. Stu more or less lived there now so he always had his stuff there, and Pete had gone off somewhere, so only John, Paul and himself were taking advantage of the rare chance to clean up. George rubbed himself as dry as he was able with the one small dry towel that was left, and then got dressed and went downstairs again. He squeezed his filthy stage-wear into the washing machine in the kitchen, and nodded to Astrid’s mum, who was still finishing the washing up. Perhaps Paul hadn’t stayed to help after all. “Danke,” he said to her and smiled. She beamed back at him.

George slipped into the sitting room. Astrid and Stu were sitting close together on the sofa, his arm around her and her legs curled up next to her. At the other end of the sofa sat Paul; he was leafing through the pages of a large book on surrealist art which he’d taken from a shelf and was offering commentary on each print. John was sprawled across the carpet with his back against an armchair and his booted feet crossed at the ankles. He was offering commentary on Paul’s commentary. The sense of competition was bubbling relentlessly just below the surface. George quietly and smoothly lowered himself onto a floor cushion in a corner.

The conversation about Magritte and Dali and their comparative merits rumbled on. At least you could see what Magritte was painting. But it was a load of rubbish. No, it was there to fool you, to make you think you were looking at something you weren’t looking at. Paul was leaning forward to argue. His face was earnest and serious, eyes wide, left hand gesticulating. Paul was making the point that he was an earnest and serious student of art. John was clearly indifferent to Paul’s seriousness, as he leaned his head back against the armchair and blew smoke at the ceiling. He took the opportunity to point out to Paul that he, not Paul, had been at Art College. Paul countered with the fact that he had studied Art A Level and, unlike John, he’d worked at it. Yeah, but what was the point of a picture you had to work at?

Astrid didn’t understand a word that was being said, on this lazy afternoon in her mother’s sitting room, and she didn’t care either. She was wrapped in Stu’s arms and was comfortable and content. Stu did understand what they were saying and was clearly amused by the conversation; he had the girl he loved in his arms and was also comfortable, and also content to let his friends snipe at each other about the subject he knew far better than both of them put together. The two of them watched the performance being played out in front of them; and performance it was. Each of the young men was working on developing and demonstrating the persona which would in fact be amplified and publicised to an unthinkable degree over the years to come. Astrid watched them; and then her eyes turned to George.

He was sitting on a cushion on the floor, thin arms around one raised leg and his chin resting on his knee. He wore jeans and a white teeshirt, his feet bare, and his hair, usually swept up and gelled and starched into its usual ted style, was falling loose across his forehead. Divested of his customary aggressive stage clothes, he looked impossibly young. He looked like a schoolboy which, had he not so determinedly turned his back on formal education, he still would be. He too was watching Paul and John, his eyes moving from one to the other as they uttered and pronounced; and then they moved across the room and met Astrid’s gaze.

And Astrid inwardly paused, surprised. Those large dark eyes were not the eyes of the little boy, the sweet child, das liebchen Kind, the box in which she’d placed him when she’d first invited them to her home. His eyes met hers, coolly and appraisingly, and then an eyebrow rose and his expression could only have been described as sardonic. Amused. In fact, dismissive. Little George was utterly unimpressed by the play acting of his band-mates. The subtle half smile and the momentary lowering of the long eyelashes let her know that that was them and this was him and he was not they. They, the small half smile said, were sometimes idiots.

His gaze held hers.

George, Astrid realised for the first time, was very much his own person. Was every bit as confident as Paul and as John. He simply didn’t bother to shout about it.

Astrid smiled back at him, complicitly, and the small half smile turned into his familiar, lop sided and so endearing grin.

And, in the end, she was the one who asked him out. Sort of, well, she was the one who finally instigated a conversation. Perhaps she was getting fed up of waiting. She’d pushed to the front and smiled up at him and held his gaze, and made it quite clear that she expected some kind of reciprocation from him. He smiled down at her, and then walked to the front of the stage and knelt down to face her. It was in the middle of a number and there was a solo due in a few seconds but he knew the others wouldn’t mind. They’d done it themselves often enough, just pissed off somewhere else and then come back in a while. He smiled at her, shyly.

“Hello,” he said. A dazzling start.

“Hello.”

What was wrong with him? He’d no trouble chatting up girls at home…

“My name is Edith.”

Well, that saved him having to work out how to ask her in German. “Hello Edith. I’m George.”

She let out a peel of laughter, which he found incredibly attractive. “I know!”

He moistened his lips. This was stupid. What kind of chat up lines would work here? He knew exactly how often she came here. She already knew his job; and his name apparently. He could offer to buy her a drink – but there were pints lined up on the stage and she already had a drink in her hand. But he wanted to see her. Somewhere else, out of here. Just her and him.

So… “Can we meet up sometime, somewhere else?”

There. He’d said it. And watched the green eyes glow again. “Yes. That would be nice.” They looked at each other for some long moments, until she saved him again. “A walk?”

“A walk would be fab.”

“Fab?” The pretty brows creased in confusion.

“Very nice.” He watched her face clear in understanding, and pushed on while he was ahead. “Tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Where?”

“At the park, at the gate.”

“The gate of the park. Two o’clock.”

“Two o’clock, tomorrow.”

George grinned again, this time with no artifice but just genuine pleasure. “Fab. I mean… very nice.” She laughed. “I have to go and sing now.”

“Too fucking right,” came the comment from behind him, but mercifully she ignored it and nodded at him. “I will see you soon.”

“You will. Bye.” She bestowed on him a farewell smile and turned and walked away. George too turned, back to the stage, and even those erstwhile relentless friends had not the heart to try and squash the evident happiness glowing deep within in his dark eyes.

They did meet and they did walk, around the park and along the water’s edge at the dock. They could talk too, as her English was a lot better than Astrid’s and so they could just – chat. At first George employed all the devices he knew from home to impress her, the cute smile, the sideways glances, the faux innocence, but gradually his confidence grew and he dropped them all and just talked. When asked, he told her about his family and his house, and, when asked, she told him about her mother and her sister and her job. An anxiety which had murmured and insinuated just at the edge of his conscious mind was thereby brought into the light and blown away, when he established once and for all that Edith was not what his mother and aunts called a “working girl”; not a prossie. They were in the seediest part of Hamburg, you never knew, and she had come into his club. But she worked in a shoe shop and she came in because she and her friends liked music, and then, apparently because she liked him. As they strolled he ventured to take her hand and she smiled and glowed, and then he slid an arm around her and then he kissed her, and felt ludicrously happy. He asked if she had to get back at any special time and she said no. So they just stayed together through the afternoon, and found somewhere to eat. She liked Chinese food so they went to the place he and the other boys had found and ate and talked and drank.

And drank some more and then went to a bar she knew and found a corner table where they talked and snuggled and she bought him a drink, which he found very funny as girls didn’t usually buy him drinks. She wasn’t trying to leave. She wasn’t finding reasons, her mother wasn’t expecting her in, she hadn’t promised to meet her friends. They had met by the park at three o’clock and it was now late and dark and they were still together.

He wasn’t having to work very hard at this.

He slung his arm around her neck and drew her closer to him. She snuggled back. He leaned forward again to pick up his drink from the table, and when he leaned back she snuggled again without him having to do anything to encourage it. He took another sip of his beer, and turned to look at her. “Another drink?” he asked.

“No, thank you,” she said, except that the ‘thank’ always came out as ‘senk’. “I still have some.”

He nodded at her and, as he was facing her, and close to her, he leaned forward the few necessary inches and kissed her again. And she kissed back. She really kissed back. So they kissed for some time. And by the end of the kiss George was in some difficulties. He crossed his legs, hoping the action looked casual.

It may have done. But she didn’t help matters. He felt her hand stray into his lap, and linger. So, however casual his leg crossing may have looked, she certainly discovered the true situation at that point. He swallowed, and looked into her eyes.

She smiled at him. And, if that smile wasn’t inviting, then he wasn’t … whatever he was.

He swallowed, and took a deep breath. “Would you like to go?”

Without breaking her gaze, she nodded. Her hand was still in his lap and it was sending definite messages. He slid his arm back from around her neck, shifted away and got to his feet, and then held out his hand to her. She stood up next to him, and took the hand. They left their drinks, and left the bar, and once outside on the street George put his arm around her shoulders and drew her close again.

“We go to your flat, yes?” She asked, in a sort of husky whisper.

Speech was difficult. Coherent thought was difficult. He swallowed again, but his throat was dry. All he could do was nod at her; but then knew, as much as he hated to say it, as much as he’d have given his guitar to avoid saying it, he would have to say it. He had to. It was only fair. “It isn’t a flat, really. It’s just a room. And… a horrible room really. And…” This was the hard part but he had to say it. He was a good decent boy and he had to say it….”the other guys might be there. From the band. I haven’t got my own room.”

He’d said it. He’d been the decent boy he was. He’d thrown away his chances. But it would have been pretty unpleasant if he hadn’t and she’d…

“In zet case,” he heard her say through the buzzing in his head and the disappointed screaming in his mind, “we will have to be quiet.”

George stopped walking, so she stopped too and turned to look up at him. They stood, facing each other in the brazen, deafening unforgiving street. He still held her hand. He was still the decent boy. He had to say the next bit. “Are you sure?”

Her green eyes met his brown ones, and she nodded, and smiled again.

They carried on walking, his arm back around her shoulders, protectively. She snaked her own arm around his waist, and so he had to stop walking and kiss her again. Until she broke away, and laughed. “Come on! We’ll never get there!”

George didn’t know how he continued that well-known walk back to the Bambikino, but he paused at the door of their space, you couldn’t call it a room, and said, “They might be in there, asleep. Do you…?”

In answer, she put a finger across his lips to silence him, pushed open the door, and they slipped inside.

It was quiet, and dark, and they were there but he could hear them breathing so they were all asleep. Pete, and John, and he wasn’t sure about Paul. For one terrible moment all his emotions rose up in him in one and he thought he might be sick. But he wasn’t, and instead guided her the few feet to his bunk, and gently urged her to lie down there. She kicked off her shoes, so did he, and they lay facing each other and he yanked the one blanket across them both, and then raised himself on one elbow and leaned across her as she encircled him with her arm and pulled him down to her.

She knew what she was doing. Thank God. He forgot his nerves, forgot worrying he’d do it all wrong, forgot everything except her hands on him undoing his trousers and sliding inside to grasp him, and the feel of her thighs under his own hand and the wetness when he managed to tug the panties away and delve into her. And then he moved on top of her and she guided him in, thank God again. And then…

Oh fuck.

Oh my god.

It didn’t take long. He was seventeen and this was his first time. But he remembered what he’d read in his auntie’s encyclopaedia when she wasn’t watching what he was reading those times his family visited, and he touched her there and she seemed to like it judging by the sound she made. But, it didn’t last long.

He lay, over her, breathing hard and stroking her damp hair back. He kissed her again.

“Whoop Whoop!!”

“Attaboy Georgie!”

There was clapping. And cheering. George looked around blearily, and the three bastards were sitting up in their bunks and cheering and applauding him; and he would have liked to kill them all. Every one. Slowly. Painfully. He closed his eyes, and wondered how he would live through this moment.

Except that he did, because she was laughing too.

“Your friends are happy for you, yes?”

George looked down at her, her smile in the dim light, and she gave him another hug.

Maybe they were. Yes. Maybe they actually were.

George smiled back at her, and then rolled over to lie next to her and hold her tightly. “Fuck off you bastards! Some of us need to sleep.”

Chuckles reached him from around the tiny room, and George smiled into her hair and buried his face in her neck. She held him tight.

He was a happy man.

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