GO BACK IN TIME with Ringo11: story of the century!!
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Juk! Only have read the beginning - was intrigued!!! I mean the story or rather scenario at 1 page! So it was in 2004 - didnt anybody interest in it i mean professionally? If not - i sorrow for them - cause its dynamic and can bring many allusions about time, fame and life... Great, great, great - i promise to read it through!!! Good luck Ringo11 and dont stop to create! New creations! LOL
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on the second page??? Can't be! BUMP!
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But mid-page 2?!? I think not!!! BUMP!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Still new readers? Amazing. One day I really will write a novel. One day. I doubt it will be a best-seller, but at least I know I'll have some readers if I post it here bit by bit
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Hey, Rings! Good to see you're still with us in some small way. It's a bitch how living your life seems to get so in the way of other things, huh? Are you still studying? Are you deep in the throes of Southern Hemisphere winter? Obviously you're in our thoughts! All the best!
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I almost couldn't find this at all, what with all the reorganization and all..... Now where to look, just in the off-chance that Rings shows back up looking for all of us??
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Bottom of the page!? I think not. BUMP!
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Staying remarkably strong, holding our own, but still needing a bit of a BUUUUUuuuuummmmpppppp!!!
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Really cool idea. You toss in a bunch of Beatles history details that the average person might not include.
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Bump!
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: Honestly, having to go dredging about in the alternative links aisle is demeaning. Surely there are more of us out here to check in more regularly........... Just to keep the home fires burning, so to speak. BUMP!!
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It's been a while since the last instalment.... BUMP!!
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Bump! It's been a while since I've been here. Glad to see everyone is keeping it up.
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Hello all my lovely fans! Great to see you're all still here. It's such a long time since I started writing this thing - I was so young! I've graduated now, with a degree in art history and theory with honours (first class) and I must say I didn't have nearly as much fun writing my thesis as I did writing this. I may even still have some unposted material, but it's past midnight so that will have to wait. A bit about my life now (apart from the degree): I'm now a big blues fan and still keep up with my classic rock and Beatles of course. I'm still working at a library, the same one in fact, and also at a museum now too. Time travel is still my greatest fantasy. I've been to Liverpool, to Paul's house as amazingly well described in this story for someone who'd never been there, and I have spent about six hours sitting outside Cav Ave, just because every Macca fan should do that once. No sign of him of course. My future hopefully holds some serious time spent in London, doing whatever, and regular visits to Liverpool (in my mind it will be 1959, always). Anyway, if anyone's interested I might post some more stuff when I get a gap in the Christmas cover shifts. Bump up! And see if you can't start a new thread linking to this one to make it easier to find in this brave new forum world.
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SEVENTY-SECOND INSTALMENT Far from looking normal, a bunch of four sooty, cold and still slightly stunned young hooligans gets off the bus in Gambia Terrace. You?re shivering. You lost your top somewhere along the line, and your sooty singlet does nearly nothing to keep out the cool Liverpool breeze. You look around at the rest of your group. Paul still doesn?t look at all healthy. His face is paler than usual and he?s staring into space, his teeth chattering slightly with the cold. John, on the other hand, has taken control of the situation. He and Jenny had managed to get out of the house relatively unscathed. He hammers on Stu?s door, stepping back and peering in the windows. ?That bastard better be home,? he growls. Just then, the door opens. John almost hammers on Stu?s head before he realises there?s no door there any more. ?What took you so long?? he demands. ?What the hell happened to you lot?? asks a sleepy Sutcliffe, scanning the four of you in awe. ?Cup of tea and something warm to put on, then you?ll hear the whole story.? Stu steps back into the flat out of the way, and you file past him. You give him a glum, slightly embarrassed smile. He follows you through to the flat, and rummages round for some jerseys, blankets and coats while you all try and find a place to sit. John puts the kettle on, and when you?re all settled and starting to warm up a bit, John tells the whole story, glorified of course, from beginning to end. You chip in with your perspective, and Paul and Jenny don?t say much at all. ?Don?t tell me I?m gonna have the police knocking at my door!? Stu complains. John assures him that you all got away safe and sound before anyone else saw anything. He also claims not to know how the fire started. ?I wasn?t smoking, were you Paul?? Paul shakes his head between sips of tea. ?Could have been electrical or something,? you offer. No one replies. You sit around for some time, just sipping hot tea and staring into space. At some point someone puts a record on, Elvis or something, but no one pays much attention. Suddenly you realise you must have been hiding out in this little flat for hours. It?s even starting to get dark outside. ?Er, Paul?? you say. He looks at you in reply. ?What are we going to tell your Dad?? He just shrugs. He doesn?t seem to care much, which is unlike him. You realise you?ll have to make the decision yourself. ?Stay here if you like,? offers Stu. You hadn?t even thought of it, but on consideration it doesn?t seem to be a bad idea. You can?t exactly walk in the door and greet Paul?s dad wearing nothing but a whole lot of soot and a singlet. ?Good plan,? you reply, ?Thanks. Will your dad mind?? you ask Paul. He shrugs again. ?Fat lot of use you are,? you mumble. ?Maybe I?d better ring, let him know where we are,? you say a little louder. This time you get no response from Paul at all. He just stares into space. Is he tired or what? ?Ring him how?? Stu asks. ?Ah. I see. No phone?? He shakes his head. ?Sorry.? ?Ah well, that solves that problem. Paul can do the explaining when we get back. If he?s with us by then,? you remark.
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SEVENTY-THIRD INSTALMENT You exchange your singlet for one of Stuart?s shirts. It fits surprisingly well, and you remember having read somewhere that Astrid and Stu would later swap clothes a lot. Stu and John provide blankets and you attempt to make a nest on the floor. You huddle down in the little room with the other three, trying to get comfortable enough to sleep. The combined body warmth of four people soon stops your shivering and the exhaustion of an exciting day overcomes the hardness of the floor and the worry you have about Paul, eventually allowing you to drift off into a restless sleep. When you awake there is light sneaking in through a tatty blind on a grubby window. Your back and side ache terribly and you don?t seem to be able to move your neck much either. It takes you some time to realise where you are, who you are with and how you got there, and as the information resurfaces in your mind it brings with it a sinking feeling. You try and move slightly. From somewhere near your shoulder comes a quiet grunt. You look down on tousled dark brown hair. Paul awakes slowly and you watch as he gradually becomes aware of the pain in his ankle. He doesn?t remember you?re there until you put a hand on his shoulder. He looks up at you and smiles. ?I don?t feel too great,? he says, stating the obvious. ?You?? You smile and shake your head. ?I think we?d better get going though,? you point out. You and Paul carefully extract yourselves from the pile of blankets still containing John and Jenny and, creeping out of the room ,shut the door gently behind you. You make your way back through the suburbs to Paul?s house in such a daze that when you arrive you barely remember having made the journey. You can?t have slept very deeply last night. Paul suggests you try and creep in without disturbing his father. As neither of you has any idea what the time might be, you agree that that?s a good idea. When you get inside the house you realise it must be later in the morning that you thought because it seems that James Snr. Has gone to work already. The house is empty. The first thing you do is sit Paul down and examine his ankle. The swelling has gone down and he seems to have regained most of the movement, though he winces while you gently rotate his foot. ?Oh, don?t be such a wimp,? you tell him and he smiles at you. ?How about a bath? I can still taste smoke and we?re both covered in black.? You make him go first and you head upstairs to find yourself a change of clothes. You pick out something warm and decide to be modern and wear jeans. You leave some clothes for him outside the bathroom door. Once you are both clean and have had something to eat and several cups of tea each, you hear a knock on the door. Paul, who has regained the colour in his cheeks and the ability to walk, sneaks to the window just in case. ?It?s George,? he says as he opens the door. ?Hullo, what ?appened to you lot then?? George asks as he enters. You see he has brought a newspaper with him open to a page in the middle somewhere. He hands it to Paul, who looks at it and hands it to you. You see a medium sized article headed ?Fire of unknown cause in empty house.? ?It says they thought it might have been a cigarette lit by squatters but they can?t tell. They found a boarded window had been broken open from the inside but the fire destroyed any other trace of ?the intruders?,? you read to the boys. ?What makes you think this was us, George?? ?I?ve just spoken to John on the phone. He?s on his way over now.? As he said this you hear another, louder knock on the door and George lets John in. ?We made the paper,? he says simply. SEVENTY-FOURTH INSTALMENT You chat for a while, telling the whole story to an eagerly listening George, and discover that Jenny never wants to see John again, and that John actually can?t quite remember whether he?d had a smoke or not. It doesn?t matter, you all agree, because the newspaper clearly states that no one knows what started the fire of even whether there really was evidence of anyone in the house. Eventually you decide that it is not time to face the parents quite yet, so Paul writes a note for his father and you escape the house before he is likely to come home. You end up at John?s place and he organises some more food for everyone before you all head to his room. His guitar is leaning against the wall and George picks it up and begins to strum. John joins in on harmonica, you tap out a beat against the head of the bed and Paul grins and leaps in with a howling scream to start you off in a brilliant rendition of Some Other Guy. You spend the next few hours jamming and having fun, the excitement of the previous day seemingly having been put behind you by silent unanimous decision. In the end, though, tiredness gets the best of you and Paul, and you head back to his place, full of apprehension as to what will happen when his father wants to know where you both were the night before. When you arrive the front door is unlocked. Jim is in the living room listening to the radio. He looks up and smiles as you come in. ?Dinner?s on in a bit. You might want to have a little kip first though.? He can obviously tell how tired you are, but puzzlingly doesn?t seem to want to know why. Neither of you is going to argue with this and you head up to Paul?s room. You nearly fall down on the narrow bed, side by side, and stare at the ceiling for a few minutes. It doesn?t take long before both you and Paul have sunk into a deep sleep, fully clothed, in the tiny room above the front door at 20 Forthlin Road. ENDING You blink. Your eyes adjust to the screen and the words of a post on the Paul McCartney message board swim back into focus. But you could have sworn that just a moment ago you? You are aware of how hot you are, and realise you have a woollen vest on that you certainly never bought. It?s very old fashioned, and may have been hand knitted. You sniff it. It smells nice. Not perfumed, but it has a lovely natural smell about it. A smell you know and love. His smell. You stick your finger into the coin pocket of your jeans. There?s something in there that isn?t a guitar pick. You manage to pull out the large coin. It?s an English half crown, dated 1947. You look at your watch. Half past six, as far as you can tell. You look out the window and decide it?s definitely not half past six. So it was real. One of your family members enters the room. ?Where did you get that vest? It?s old looking.? ?Oh! um...the op shop. Three dollars.? ?That was a good find. It?s in great condition, doesn?t look like it?s had much more than a few months of use.? ?Um? yeah,? you can?t really manage much more of a reply. ?Bye then, I?m off to the shops.? ??kay.? It?s over. Will you ever see him again? Apart from in pictures that is. And will anyone believe you? or maybe you just won?t tell anyone. It?ll be your secret. ?You?ll never guess what happened to me?
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Hi! I can't believe that it is over after so many adventures! (and installments!) Well done - it was really great! Good to know what you've been up to recently and what you're doing now too. So much time has passed since I first started reading this! Don't disappear - keep in touch! Jules
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Didn't see this topic before and I just read the very first installment: what a nice idea! Going back in time to when The Beatles were just starting! Really great idea! It wasn't until I decided to print the story out (it was written very well and I was 'in' the story within no time!!!) that I noticed this topic has about 55 pages...! My goodness! Is there anyway to print this story as one...? Or do I have to print all 55 pages and pick out the post I want to read? Any chance on a pdf or something...?
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I'm thinking of publishing through Cafe Press. Questions is, do I go through and properly punctuate the first chapters and attempt to make it all consistent or do I leave it as it is? By the way, I started writing a sequel, but I'm not sure how far I'll ever get with it as it's much more difficult to work out. Let me know whether you want the edited version or the raw version published and I'll check out my options.
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Er... what's Cafe Press...? I don't mind getting the raw version, specially since that'll be easier, hence quicker, to do...? But don't let that stop you from making an edited version later on.