Work Text:
The dress is beautiful.
Dark red with long flowing sleeves, a subtly-woven pattern across the neckline, a skirt just long enough to dust the upper thighs and show off the matching stockings.
Running his hands over the soft layers of fabric that make up the skirt, John feels decidedly ridiculous. It's a delicate thing, made of chiffon and lace. John, with his calloused hands and broad shoulders, really has no business wearing it.
The second he heard that Paul wouldn't be back to the hotel tonight he'd jumped at the opportunity. Waltzed right into a department store and bought it before he could second-guess himself, for once not even brave enough to be cheeky with the woman behind the counter.
"Oh, how sweet of you," she'd said. "I'm sure she'll love it."
Fucking hell.
He's not a woman, not anything remotely close to a woman. And yet—that stupid Shakespeare show, trouncing around in skirts. It was nice. Not suffocating, like the suits and ties he squeezes into as a Beatle. Just nice, even if it was for a laugh. Thing is, though, it'll always look like a laugh, won't it?
He's not pretty like girls are—he's got eyebrows like caterpillars, thick veiny hands, narrow hips. The dress looks terrible on him, hugging his angular body in all the wrong places, accentuating his total lack of femininity. His mop-top, longer than it's ever been, barely brushes the nape of his neck. Even the eyeliner he'd nicked from a groupie, so lovely around her eyes, does nothing but bring out the dark circles under his own. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
John's head swims with the force of his self-loathing, and he barely resists the urge to hurl a fist at the mirror. Jesus, what a circus act. Probably the result of some loose bolt in his head from his mother dying, like everything else in his life. Loony Lenny strikes again.
He really thought that the red would suit him. Paul loves John's red suit; he's all over him every time John wears it. Handsome lad, he always says, so soft and fond it makes John feel red in the ears. It was part of the reason he was so drawn to this particular dress in the first place, the idea of Paul wanting him like this, wanting him the same way he wants birds. Not handsome, but…pretty.
John's eyes catch on the extra fabric hanging loosely around his chest, and he scoffs. Fat chance of that. He's certainly no Jayne Mansfield.
He's seen Paul with girls, the way he wraps a clever hand around their waists and pulls them close, whispering sweet little words in their ears. Always a proper gentleman, is Paul, even if he's only skirt-chasing. He's not really like that with John. John isn't a girl, some shapely, soft thing of perfume and lipstick that needs to be treated special. The only problem is he doesn't feel much like a man these days, either.
He takes one last look in the mirror before reaching behind himself for the zipper, a sick feeling rising in his stomach. It's going to take more than one scotch-and-coke to forget this disaster. He's more than ready to head to the hotel lounge and get a head start.
He reaches behind his back to tug at the zip when he hears a key in the lock.
John stops cold, eyes going wide. Paul was supposed to be out with Mal tonight. Why the hell is he back already?
"Fuck!" John hisses, casting his eyes around for his normal clothes. If he's fast about it, maybe he can run to the bathroom across the suite and change. He trips over his own feet in his rush, and barely catches himself. He doesn't make it to the bathroom.
Paul opens the door to John, frozen in place and wearing a frilly red dress. John would laugh at the absolute absurdity if it wasn't absolutely fucking mortifying. The sound of the door shutting behind him feels deafeningly loud in the silence that ensues.
"John?" Paul says, openly staring. He looks John up and down, from face to body and back again, like he's not sure how he's meant to react. "…Why are you dressed like a girl?"
"I—" John starts, opening then closing his mouth.
His cheeks feel hot. Fuck. He wants to run away, or maybe crawl into a hole somewhere and die. Infuriatingly, Paul knows all of John's tells and won't let it happen. He takes a step closer, expression pinching in a strange mix of concern and confusion.
"Are you alri—"
"Just having a lark," John cuts in. He's got to at least attempt to cover for himself. "Thought I'd surprise you. I didn't think you'd be back so early, 's all."
Paul remains visibly unconvinced. An awkward silence stretches out between them. "John, is this, er, some sort of sex thing? I'm not opposed, like, but—"
"No," John says, and it comes out harsher than he expects. "Like I said, it was for a laugh. Don't get it all twisted."
"Right," Paul says at length. "You can tell me anything, y'know. I won't get mad at you, even if it's weird. Just saying."
If only it was that easy. As wrapped in layers of confusion and self-loathing as this hangup of John's is, he doesn't know if it's even possible to get to the root of it all anymore. Doesn't know if there even is a root, or if he's just fucked in the head. Both are probably true. Either way, there's no chance Paul will understand.
John sighs, rubbing the backs of his palms against his eyes until he sees stars dancing along his vision. His hands are smudged with black liner when he lowers them. The sight makes his heart lurch painfully.
"John?"
Paul steps close again, and John feels a hand land on his shoulder. His demeanor is open, free of the judgment and disgust that John knows ought to be there. Just curiosity, curiosity and gentle concern in that stupidly sappy manner he's prone to. The familiarity of his silly doe-eyed face lifts a bit of the weight off John's chest. It's only Paul, same as always.
John might not be able to make him understand—hell, John himself hasn't a clue what half of this means—but he's yet to find a problem that can't be solved by he and Paul putting their heads together. Maybe John just needs to bounce the idea off of Paul, the same way they do when writing. Figure out the resolution to John's fucked-up desires the same way they find the resolution to a chord progression.
John lets himself fall back onto the mattress, patting the space next to him expectantly. Paul gets the hint and lies down next to him, so that both of them are pressed side to side. It reminds John of the chats they had as kids, cloud-watching and smoking shoplifted cigarettes on top of gravestones at the cemetery.
He takes a breath. Might as well jump off the deep end first. "Have you ever thought about what it'd be like to be a girl, Paul?"
Paul's eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. He frowns and stares at the ceiling, seeming to seriously consider the question for a moment.
"I don't…I don't think so? I mean, I thought about it maybe once or twice as a small kid, y'know, what it'd be like to have long hair and all. But not since then."
Right, of course. As usual, John is the strange one. He bites his lip, not sure what to say next.
"You've thought about it, then?" Paul presses. His tone is carefully light—unsure, but trying. At least it isn't outright disgust.
John swallows. "Yeah. A lot, actually. Dunno why."
Paul nods, considering. John can see the gears turning inside his head, and he only speaks again after a short pause.
"Do you remember, in Hamburg, the prossie I had who ended up being a boy?"
John remembers. He probably remembers better than anyone. Shock had run through him like a bucket of ice water as Paul recounted the tale to him afterward.
"John, I just had the strangest night of my life," Paul said. "That girl I was with? The blonde, fantastic tits, real knockout? Well, I took her back, and when I got her clothes off, she had a prick."
"What?" John froze. He glared at Paul. "Don't be daft. Sounds like you had too much to drink."
Paul shook his head. "No, really! And the sex was good, really good even, but…I didn't expect it, obviously. I've never seen one of those transvestites look so real, like an actual woman. Crazy."
Like an actual woman—John had spun those words around in his head for weeks afterward. Paul didn't see her as a real woman, or even a bloke with tits, but some other category of thing. An imitation that lives only in the in-between, the sort of spectacle you tell your friends about afterward in amused voices.
Hamburg had been his first time ever seeing someone like that. He'd heard of female impersonators, and queers that got off while wearing dresses, but nothing like Paul's prostitute. Not someone who, in another world, John might've pinned next to Marilyn on his wall. She was nothing more than a beautiful woman at first glance, and stayed that way no matter how long he looked at her. It never made sense to John. Having a cock should seal your fate, shouldn't it? Locks you into manhood; doesn't matter how you feel about it. Can't do much about it.
He'd spent a lot of time with the transvestites in Hamburg after that, mostly fucking them, out of some unsatisfiable curiosity. Not all of them called themselves that, of course; transsexual was the word some of them used. John never really understood the difference, or if there even was one. Either way, some of them were indistinguishable from women, sans cunt. Their perfumed skin was soft, their tits full and perky, and their legs felt the same as any other girl's when wrapped around his waist. Speaking to them wasn't like speaking to other blokes, either.
But some of them weren't like that at all, with strong hands and sturdy builds similar to John's own. Even stranger still, some seemed at home that way, like they were happy in bodies that made no goddamn sense. He always felt strangely sorry for those ones. Just like John, they were cobbled together out of mismatched parts. Must've had whatever neurosis John has that fucks with your head, makes you feel all mixed-up.
"John?"
Paul is still looking at him. John blinks, flying back to the present.
"Yeah. 'Course I remember. Hard to forget something like that."
"Well, maybe you're something like that," Paul says. "A bloke who likes to play at being a girl sometimes. Wearing dresses and makeup an' that."
John grimaces. "It's not like that. It's like, I dunno. Like I'm playing at being a bloke instead."
Paul frowns. He bites at his thumbnail, the same as he always does when faced with something he can't understand or control. "But you are a bloke. Do you just… wish you were a woman? Like, a real one? Is that it?"
Silence. Tense, loaded silence.
What is he supposed to say to that? What does Paul even mean? Is that even an option, to be a woman—what, is he asking if John wants his dick lopped off? He hates this, hates showing his hand to Paul when John hasn't fully seen it himself. Why couldn't Paul have accepted his shitty excuse and fucked off to bed? Do you wish you were a woman— he definitely thinks John's a mental case.
"No—'course not, I mean, I— I don't want to—Christ, just forget it, alright? This was a stupid idea."
John feels like he's been cracked open, the unavoidable conclusion he's been trying and failing to ignore torn out of him without warning. It should make him feel better, like some grand revelation that changes his life, but at the moment, sitting in an ill-fitting dress with smudged eyeliner, it just emphasizes the wrongness of it all. Quickly, he sits up, the dress catching under him in his rush, but then Paul's hand is at his shoulder stopping him.
"John, wait! It's alright, it was just a suggestion," Paul says, staring up at him placatingly. "Sorry."
The earnest look on his face as he says it, which usually assuages John's ever-present self-doubt, just makes it even worse. He hates feeling pitied, like he needs coddling from Paul of all people. Huffing, he sits back down, dress spilling out underneath him.
"It's not fucking alright, Paul," John hisses, clenching his fists. He pulls at the layers of material gathered around his thighs, wants to tear at the sheer fabric until it gives underneath his hands. "I feel like I've lost my bloody mind."
Paul's hand moves from his shoulder, resting in the familiar curve of John's lower back. The gentleness isn't typical for them, rowdy and randy as they normally are. "Can I help?" he says.
John bristles. "I don't need you to help me—"
"I know. But I'm offering. I'm allowed to care about you, John," Paul says simply. "I don't care that it's weird or whatever."
You're safe with me goes unsaid. It sits between them anyway.
John doesn't need to look at Paul's face to know that he means it. When he gets a problem into his head, he can't stop tinkering away at it until he's figured it out—whether it's one of his silly Vaudevillian ditties or John's messed up head. There isn't any way to stop him once he's got himself latched on to something good and proper.
Even if Paul doesn't let it go, though, keeps prodding at the issue, it doesn't change the fact that John doesn't know what to say. The bits of it he does understand are too humiliating to put into words, and the other parts are too twisted and tangled to unravel, coagulated into a treacle-thick mess of black ooze inside his chest that churns every time he catches sight of himself in the mirror.
John's never been one for talking about his feelings—he hides behind his lyrics, his nonsense, his jokes. His emotions just run too deep. Every time he opens his mouth in an attempt at honesty it comes out as a barb, or ends in a dramatic breakdown where he's either throwing punches or sobbing. He's awful that way, but Paul, wonderful crazy bastard he is, never seems to hold it against him. It should be easier, then, to talk to Paul about this, or to take advantage of their knack for wordless communication, but it just doesn't come. Not even a cutting comment at his own expense, or at Paul's.
"It looks nice on you, you know."
John startles, whipping his head around to stare at Paul. "What?"
Paul smiles. It's hesitant, like he isn't sure if that's what John wants to hear. "The dress. Red really suits you. You look good in it."
"Don't patronize me, Paul," John snorts. "It's a disaster and you know it."
"It's not," Paul says, rolling his eyes in exasperation. The hand on the small of John's back comes up to cradle John's jaw. "You look lovely. I'm not putting you on."
"Uh huh. 'Lovely,'" John repeats, raising a skeptical eyebrow.
The word feels foreign rolling off his tongue. He hasn't ever felt farther from lovely. Frankly he felt more confident back in Hamburg walking down the Reeperbahn in his underwear than he does now. That Paul sees him looking the way he does and still feels attracted to him borders on unbelievable. Paul's always been like that, though, loving him in spite of the bits of John he himself finds repulsive. He's never understood it, really.
Paul certainly isn't lying, though; John sees the way his eyes linger.
"Well, I bought the thing 'cause of you, actually. You always liked my red suit so much, so..." John trails off, shrugging.
Paul's smile grows a tiny bit, verging on mischievous. "Ah, I get it. So you were just trying to get all dolled up to impress your lad?"
It's a joke. It's just meant to relieve the heavy mood, John knows that, but wow, he can't deny the shiver the words send down his spine. Like he's Paul's girlfriend, getting ready for a date with his—her?—his?—lad. Maybe in another life, that's what John was. Someone's girlfriend. Girls don't play guitar, though. Or throw punches, or scream into microphones at rock and roll shows. They're soft. John isn't. 'Course, he's not making a strong case for manhood right now, either.
He snorts derisively. "I've seen your girls, mate, and we don't have much in common. I'm still a bloke, last time I checked. The dress doesn't change much."
A strange look crosses Paul's face for a moment; for once John can't quite read it. He presses closer, and then there's no mistaking the look in his eye—determination. As to why, John hasn't a clue.
"Dunno, in that dress you're as pretty as any bird I've seen," Paul says. His hand trails over John's waist, pulling him closer, gentle. Reassuring. John sucks in a breath at the sudden change in mood. He's treating me like a girl.
"Paul…"
"Do you want to be my girl, Johnny?" Paul says, soft and sincere as anything, and John melts. He's nodding before he even has the chance to think.
Paul cups his jaw as he kisses him deep and slow, taking the lead like he would with any other woman. A hand creeps up his inner thigh, great red waves of chiffon parting like the sea. John feels faint.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. This is wrong. It should be against every instinct he has as a man, to let his best mate come on to him while he's in a dress and makeup. It shouldn't feel right. He's John Lennon—heavy-fisted, sharp-tongued bastard. A teddy boy, a man. He has no business doing this, feeling like this. Feeling like—
Like a girl.
It's too much. John pulls away, batting at Paul's hands. He stands up as fast as possible, putting distance between himself and the bed. "Stop, stop. I can't do this."
"Johnny?" Paul asks, the nickname landing like a ton of bricks on John's chest. He can't. He just can't. "Are you okay?
"I'm not a girl," he says, in a rush like he's just finished running a marathon. It's getting hard to breathe. Dizziness comes in a wave of vertigo, and John's suddenly sure that he's about to fall over.
Paul's up in a flash, putting an arm around his shoulders, steadying him. His rounded eyebrows knit together in concern. "Sorry, sorry, I just—breathe, love, you've got to breathe."
God, his heart feels like it's going to come out of his chest. He can't. He can't be like this. He's not some sissy, or a transvestite, or a fucking woman. Even if he hates the manhood he wears like an ill-fitting suit of armor, even if he wants to crawl out of his skin every time Paul looks at him and sees nothing but a bloke in a dress. Even if being Paul's girl, for just one tiny moment, felt like everything.
"Breathe, Johnny," Paul repeats, worried. "You're alright."
"Fuck," John croaks, leaning on Paul like a lifeline as he focuses on pulling himself together. He hasn't panicked like this in a very long time, though, and breathing is getting harder than it should be. God, it's humiliating, and the ache in his chest, now physical as well as mental, still isn't going away.
"Look at me, hey," Paul says, turning John's face towards him in an uncharacteristically patient gesture. "In and out, yeah? In and out. Just focus on that for a bit."
John isn't sure how long it takes for him to calm down, but with Paul's reassurances he eventually relaxes enough that he at least doesn't feel dizzy and faint like he's about to pass out. Paul stays glued to his side, a comforting, warm presence. It still takes him what feels like forever to finally find his voice again.
"I can't—I can't be whatever this is, Paul," John spits out, staring down at his shaky, mascara-smudged hands. "I'm a fucking Beatle."
"Sure," Paul agrees. "But you don't have to be one 24/7, John. Like right now, you're just here with me. You don't have to put on an act, 's just us, same as always."
John scoffs. "Paul, you called me a girl once and I panicked like I was about to get axed. Clearly I've got some marbles loose up there."
"I'm saying it doesn't have to be like that, though," Paul urges. "You don't have to drive yourself mad over it."
He takes John's hand in his own, interlacing their fingers. His hand is warm, clean of the makeup smudging John's.
"Look, I'm not gonna say I understand what you're thinking about all this girl business, because I don't, not really. But this is important to you, yeah? So if you want me to, y'know, treat you more like a girl when we're alone, I don't mind."
Paul gives his hand a squeeze, and makes sure to look right at him before he leans over, pressing a kiss to John's forehead. "I just want you to be happy, John."
They're the same words John has heard a thousand times before. From Mimi after she sold his first guitar, from a teary-eyed Brian pushing him away in Spain. From Julia, walking out of his life. From Julia, sending him back to Mimi's in the rain over and over. Nobody who says they want John to be happy ever actually means it; it's just another way of telling him no, John, you can't, it's for your own good.
Nobody except for Paul, who always says yes, John, you can, who grins and tumbles along headfirst next to him in everything. Who looks at John having a panic attack in a dress and, for some reason, doesn't leave him or punch him or run away laughing.
"I know, but I dunno what to do, Paul. I don't know what any of this means and it's bloody terrifying." John swallows around the lump in his throat. "But when you called me a girl earlier, it was like getting hit with lightning. Like a hundred thousand volts right into me head. I couldn't handle it, how right it felt. Still don't think I can."
Paul nods, rubbing the side of John's hand with his thumb as encouragement for John to continue.
"It'd almost be easier if I just wanted to be a woman and that was it. But it's not that. I don't feel like a man, but I don't feel fully like a woman either. Being a girl feels loads better, yeah, but I'm really just John, not anything else."
John's rambling. He doesn't know if he's even making sense. The entire thing is as nonsensical as the drawings filling his journals. He feels like one of the drawings in his journals—some distorted punchline of a person. Parts of a woman and parts of a man and parts of some other illusory thing, stitched together for a laugh.
"So we take it slow, then," Paul says. "If you're not sure. You don't have to be scared when it's just us. One day at a time and all that. Nothing the Nerk Twins can't figure out together, eh?"
He flashes John a wry little smile, and something very warm and very close to capital-L Love bubbles up inside of John.
"You're serious? Really?"
Paul nods. "You've got the right to be happy, John."
John blinks at him. Then he yanks Paul closer and kisses him breathless.
"I love you so fucking much," John says, barely stopping to come back for air.
Paul makes a surprised noise in the back of his throat before he kisses back, meeting his feverish pace.
"Love you too, Johnny," he says, the second they break apart. "You're alright, then?"
"Yeah," John breathes. "I thought you'd think I was some sort of circus freak."
"'Course not. You're certifiable, but that's just because of your personality in general, not the gender stuff."
"Oi," John laughs, thumping him on the shoulder. "Ruining our tender heart-to-heart by stomping on me poor delicate ego? Shame on you."
"Well, I can't let your head get too big, Lennon, or else we'll have to amputate." Paul gives him a boyish grin before letting it relax into something softer. "So what do you want to do now? I've got some grass in my bag if you want a smoke. Or we could just get to sleep. I reckon my bed's big enough to share."
The grass sounds tempting, and sleep too—but John is self-aware well enough to know that if he doesn't get every last bit of assurance possible right now, while both of their defenses are down, he won't be able to reckon with tonight's revelations come morning. If there's any room for doubt left, he'll let more and more of it in until it destroys him. All or nothing; John just needs one last tiny shove towards acceptance.
"I want you to tell me I'm your girl again."
Paul, to his credit, doesn't visibly react this time. Instead, he reaches over and tucks a stray lock of auburn hair behind John's ear.
"You're the most gorgeous girl I've ever seen, Johnny."
Emotion sears through him, John's heart leaping in his chest, and he chokes back an embarrassing noise. It's like finally breathing fresh air after a decades-long imprisonment.
It strikes him, suddenly, that in the tiny bubble of safety they've made for themselves, John really can just…be a girl called John.
Everything John sees as incongruent and wrong—his flat-chested figure squeezed into a dress made for a much curvier frame, his broad shoulders dashing any hope of an hourglass shape, hell, even just the fact he's named John—aren't things Paul has to look past to see him as a girl. They're just parts of John. Not gendered, but as neutral as the downward curve of his aquiline nose or the freckles dotting his shoulders.
To Paul, John refracted through some strange variation on the theme of womanhood is still just, well, John. Not some imaginary pin-up darling. He's still got calloused hands from playing guitar and a deep voice prone to cracking, not tits and soft hips. But somehow, Paul loves him just the same.
What insane fucking luck John had, finding him at that fete. Got to be once in a lifetime, that.
Paul raises an amused eyebrow. "What're you thinking? You look like the cat that got the cream."
John smirks back at Paul and turns his body, dramatically throwing his stockinged legs over Paul's lap. "Just thinking about how I'm all dolled up and I still haven't been ravished yet."
"Ah. Seems we've got to fix that, then," Paul says, and leans in, meeting John halfway.
Kissing Paul was already on John's list of things he could do forever, but it's even better now that the desperation from earlier is gone. His hands roam up to tangle in John's hair, tugging lightly. John groans at the feeling, opening his mouth wider and deepening the kiss. Paul's pretty cupid's-bowed lips aren't only for show—he's a devastatingly good kisser, a talent that John can't help but feel a bit smug about getting to enjoy whenever he wants. Sorry girls, this one's mine.
Paul pushes and John goes down easily, his back hitting the mattress in a cloud of sheer fabric. "You're so gorgeous like this, John," he says, mouthing at John's neck.
"Fuck," John swears, craning his neck to give him better access. "I never thought in a million years you'd want me like this."
"Oh, come on, don't be daft. As if I'd ever not want you."
"Soft bastard," John says, trying and failing to suppress a smile. "I'm already underneath you. Stop trying to butter me up."
Paul pulls back with an exaggerated pout. "Aren't I allowed to compliment a pretty girl when I see her?"
John pauses. Her. That's…interesting. He's not a hundred percent sure how to feel about it. It must show on his face, because Paul hesitates too.
"Was that too much?" he asks.
"No, no," John says, waving off his concerns. "It's just, it's a lot, isn't it? Never really thought about someone calling me that.'"
It's strange being referred to that way. Frankly he's indifferent about the hes and the hims, but the shes and hers aren't something he's ever been brave enough to approach. They're not bad, though. Definitely, definitely not bad.
He turns the words over in his head, savoring the strange cadence of his name with a new pronoun attached. Her name is John, she plays rhythm guitar; have you seen John, I want to show her a new song I've written; tell John that if she's late for rehearsal again Brian'll have her head. That's John, she's my girlfriend. She's my boyfriend.
A girl called John—it's really got a nice ring to it, she thinks.
"Johnny?" Paul asks, evidently unnerved by his partner's silence. "Alright, love?
In response John hooks her arms around Paul's neck, pulling him closer so they're almost nose-to-nose. "I'd feel better if a certain Paul McCharmly stopped fussing and finally looked after that girl of his. I've heard she's feeling real neglected."
Paul looks surprised for a moment before letting out a delighted laugh. "Is she now? S'pose I should look into these terrible allegations, then."
"Mm. Maybe you should," John muses.
Before Paul can reply John coyly lifts a corner of her dress—miles and miles of thick, plush thighs, broken up only by the garter straps that disappear into the upper layers of her skirt.
Paul blinks a bit stupidly, looking from John's face to her legs and back again. There's a beat of tense silence before Paul surges forward and kisses her. Mouth colliding with her own, Paul kisses her needily and desperately, trying to feel as much of her as physically possible. Paul's hands are everywhere, sliding up her legs and underneath her skirt, and he groans when he finds what the garters are connected to.
"God, Johnny," Paul groans, sounding overwhelmed as he hides his flushed face against John's thigh, pressing kisses wherever he can. "I can't believe you thought I wouldn't want you like this. You're beautiful."
John takes in a sharp breath, feeling her cheeks redden. It's miraculous, absolutely unbelievable, that this is happening. Scarcely an hour ago John was almost paralyzed with disgust at himself, ready to lock this side of his life away somewhere nobody could ever find it, and now Paul is telling her what a beautiful girl she is with such adoration in his voice that it's impossible not to believe him.
John's eyes burn with tears and the defensive part of her wants to snap at Paul, to tell him off for being so goddamn soft and making her cry like—well, like a girl, but that's sort of a moot point now, isn't it? John sort of is a girl, at least when she's with Paul. At the very least she's something girl-adjacent, both Frankenstein and the Bride, different-colored bits and pieces of gender mixed into one John.
Thinking about it all sends her mind down rabbit holes she isn't sure she'll ever really be able to climb out of. At the very least, John knows she's not much of a bloke. Obviously it's still terrifying, and it might cause a fuck ton of problems for both Beatle John and Beatle Paul down the road. But not right now, not when Paul is wrapped safely around her and John around him. When the rest of the world filters out, when there's no screaming fans or record executives or Beatle-this or Beatle-that or gender bullshit that drives John mad, but just the two of them.
Just John and Paul off in their own little world again, where John doesn't have to be a man, or a woman, or anything else but Paul's. John grins to herself, letting Paul's warmth envelope her. Maybe she's getting a bit soft these days, too.