I HATE PAUL by Peter Nolan Smith

The Beatles began their infestation of America in 1963 and the following April the Fab Four dominated the US charts with 5 #1 hits. I WANNA HOLD YOUR HAND was followed by one chartbuster after another. My next-door neighbor favored John Lennon. Addy Manzi had seen the group at Carniege Hall in December 2, 1964. Her father had played with big bands in the 40s and his old music contacts had scored the tickets.

”I screamed John’s name a million times. He never looked my way,” the beautiful brunette told her brother and me after she came home from New York. My ex-babysitter remained flustered until seeing the Beatles at Boston Garden a week later.

“John played every song for me.”

Every girl in the audience thought the same and the adoration of teenage girls transformed the English group into gods with the release of A HARD’S DAY NIGHT and RUBBER SOUL. No one in the rest of the world paid much attention when John Lennon claimed that the Beatles were more popular than Christ in the summer of 1966, but priests and preachers throughout America sought to burn their LPs in Nazi fashion, however the bonfires of the Bible Belt were shunned by millions of virtuous girls willing to sacrifice their maidenhood to Beatlemania.

This defloration fantasy was shared by the majority of New England girls.

Most girls pined for Paul McCartney. My younger sister wrote ‘the cute Beatle’ a dozen letters. She was not alone.

Kyla Rolla was the cutest girl in my 8th Grade class at Our Lady of the Foothills. She wore her blonde hair long like Paul’s girlfriend, the British actress Jane Asher. I knew her since we were 8. She hadn't said three words to me in five years.

My band was the outlaw Rolling Stones. I couldn’t tell Kyla that SATISFACTION was the greatest rock song of all time or that I loved the B-side of the 45, UNDER-ASSISTANT WEST COAST PROMO MAN. In order to gain her heart I committed treason to the best rock and roll band in the world and pretended to like the Beatles.

I stopped visiting the barbershop in Mattapan Square. My hair grew over my ears. Desert boots were abandoned in favor of Beatles boots. I wore a Beatles jacket without a collar. It cost $15. Matching pants were another $10. I wore the suit to school.

The nuns sent me home with a note for my parents, breaking my perfect attendance streak, but Kyla noticed my belated surrender to Beatlemania and after school on the bus ride home, she sat next to me for the first time in years.

“Who’s your favorite Beatle?” Her uniform skirt was four inches over her knees. The nuns sent home any girl with a higher hemline. There was only one answer.

“Paul.”

“Me too.” Kyla moved closer.

Her skin smelled of Ivory soap and her hair bore the faint fragrance of Johnson’s Baby Shampoo. Her green eyes were the color of the emeralds stolen by Murph the Surf from the Museum of Natural History in New York.

I prayed that she didn’t notice my breathing her scent, as our conservations revolved around Paul McCartney trivia.

Paul was a Gemini like me. He was 22. I was 12. His favorite color was blue.

"Mine too." It was the truth.

I told Kyla that she looked like Jane Asher.

She let me hold her hands.

I sang her songs off BEATLES 65. ‘YOU’VE GOT TO HIDE YOUR LOVE AWAY.

Kyla closed her eyes dreaming that I was her Paul.

“Kiss me, Jane.”

“Oh, Paul.”

Our lips met at the red light before the local church. Paul’s soul invaded my body and my hand touched Kyla’s cashmere sweater. Her ribs felt like thick guitar strings. My fingertips inched higher.

“Oh, Paul.”

My hand grazed the bottom of her breast and Kyla gasped with outrage. A slap to my cheek devastated my imitation of Paul.

“But I thought that____”

“You thought wrong. You’re no Paul.” Kyla pulled down her shirt and stormed down the aisle to the girls her age.

My older brother had seen the entire episode. His eyes warned the other boys to not make fun of me. It didn’t stop their snickers.

Every day I begged Kyla for forgiveness. She ignored my every entreaty and went steady with Jimmie Lally for the rest of the school year.

His hair color was closer to Paul’s than mine.

I didn’t hate him or her, because they were accurate caricatures of the greater world beyond the confines of Boston’s South Shore.

Kyla broke up with Jimmy in May.

"You can write me in Florida," she said on the last day of school. Her parents were divorced and her old man was living in Miami.

"But why didn't you talk to me all this time?"

"Because I wanted to teach you a lesson."

"About what?"

"About wanting to hold my hand."

I wrote her letters that summer.

In September we were a thing again, but I could tell that her kisses were for Paul same as her caresses. I hated him and his poster over her bed. He stared at me all the time and I gave him the finger whenever she wasn't looking.

My parents bought SGT. PEPPER for my birthday. I listened to it once. Kyla had ruined the Beatles for me. The Rolling Stones regained my devotion. I played HIS SATANICAL MAJESTY’S REQUEST twice a day as if the Devil could transform Kyla’s love for Paul into stone, but the Beatles were more powerful than Satan.

Over the next few years Kyla and I never went all the way. We were saving it for our wedding night. Her mother was going a man from Chile. They spent nights out in Boston. We had the run of the house until midnight. I was almost a man.

Kyla introduced me to WBCN on her FM radio. “Mississippi Harold Wilson” was the first DJ to play Cream’s I FEEL FREE. She loved the Velvet Underground. I was a big fan of the Jefferson Airplane.

We lay on the couch of her dark living room. Our nights were everything except have sex. My parents understood that we were in love. My mother was okay with our dating as long as I got home before midnight. I felt a little like Cinderella.

My hair grew longer. Kyla and I talked about running away to San Francisco for the summer of love. We got as far as Wollaston Beach.

At summer’s end I spent a long night on the couch. Time disappeared from our universe, as WBCN’s night DJ played the Modern Lovers’ ROADRUNNER and Quicksilver’s MONA, then JJ Johnson announced over the air, “I have a special song to play this evening. A masterpiece. HEY JUDE by The Beatles.”

I stopped rubbing against Kyla’s thigh. WBCN never played The Beatles. Paul McCartney, my old rival, opened with vocals and piano. F, C and B-flat. The second verse added a guitar and tambourine. Simple and purely The Beatles.

“I love this.” Kyla pulled me closer. The four minute coda of ‘Hey Jude’ went on forever. At the song’s end I was still a virgin, but only just. Kyla opened her eyes and sighed, “That was good.”

I read the love in her eyes.

Paul.

Always Paul.

I looked at the clock on the wall. It was 2:10. I kissed her lips and dressed fast, as if my speed could turn back the hands of time. Kyla waved from the door way. She was wearing a silk robe.

“Tomorrow.”

“Manana.” I had learned the word from her mother’s boyfriend. He let me drink wine.

The streets of my hometown were suburb quiet. No cars. All the houses dark. My home was three miles away. I was on the track team and ran my best time for that distance.

A car appeared around a curve. A VW. It was my father’s car. He must have been coming to get me. His mood had to be dark. He liked his sleep. The VW 180ed in the street with a screech. It had a short turning circle. The car braked to a halt and the passenger door shot open.

“Get in.” It was a command.

I sat down expecting the worst.

My father read the riot act.

"All you had to do was call. Ten seconds and say you were all right. But you were only thinking about yourself.”

I never saw the punch coming. The VW never swerved. Blood dripped on my shirt. My father handed me a rag. I could tell that he was sorry for having lost his temper. He had never hit me before.

“You’re grounded for a week.”

“Yes, sir.” A month was punishment. A week was an apology.

He turned on the radio to WBZ. The disc jockey was playing HEY JUDE.

Soon The Beatles song seemed to be the only song on the radio. Kyla played it at home. My mother and my father knew the words. I couldn’t get them out of my head.

At the end of my grounding I went over to Kyla’s house. Her mother was out on a date. I looked up at Paul. Kyla put on SGT. PEPPERS LONELY HEART CLUB BAND. She pulled me to her and I should have walked out, but leaving Kyla wasn’t in my heart and I sang along with Paul. She smiled and kissed my lips.

I might not have been her Paul, but I was holding her hand and Paul never did that other than in her dreams.