It was cold, the coldest this year, maybe colder than last year too. Snow wasn't falling but it might as well have been.

The car circled yet again and Issy stared out the window up into the night sky~ clear, bright, shimmering. The crisp temperature seemed to catch everything and hold it perfectly still, except the car of course.

His back was to her now as he gazed out the window opposite.

There had been no fight, no harsh words spoken; just a phoenix of memories rising as the Dakota lurched tall in the dead of the night.

The building enveloping John with memories.

Memories of that moment.

The clock ticked. Hands chasing and capturing late evening.

It was another night much like tonight. Chilly, but clear. Not a cloud marring the night sky.

The night he had consciously decided, in these past few years, that he could compartmentalise. Could shut off tight and secure, deep in the confines of his mind.

Close off the sights and sounds that now thundered back into view.

Stirred into remembrerance as the town car crept toward the Dakota.

Sharp cracks, snapping like thunder.

But it wasn't a storm.

Flashes of light, like miniture bolts of lightning that came to them, touched them. Came closer than lightning should ever be.

Yet, there were no clouds.

There were six, no seven.... The sheer number of those fearful sounds were concise, building fear and terror like a rolling unbridled thunderstorm.

And there was no rain. Yet, there was, a cascade.

Of deep dark red.

Too much red.

A flood of red... on the sidewalk.

No English Gardens.

No waiting for the sun. No rain.

Frank parked, pulling close to the kerb, the engine warm and idling, his cold un-gloved hands hovering. One on the steering wheel and the other over the indicator lever ready to pull away and circle once again.

The forecourt was devoid of movement, bare of people, he glanced at Issy in the rear view mirror and she stared back. Frank had been here before, but a while ago now.

John Lennon~ Frozen in time.

Her brain warned her, said stay away, give him room.

Give him space.

But all she wanted to do was hug him, stroke his back, bury him close to her body, keep him warm. Keep him safe.

He had shrugged her hand off his shoulder twice; so now, she just sat and stared at Frank in the mirror as the car idled. Hoping Frank had the answers. Hoping she could find them too.

They waited.

Waited for John to yell...

'Move the fucking car, Frank'

...as had been done all the times before.

John stared too. His eyes boring into the sweep of distance from edge of roadway to safety. The safety of the buildings' foyer, beyond the doors. The Fortress.

Hidden behind thick doors and bullet proof glass.

He'd been so good, so relaxed. He dug the palms of his hands into both eyes, his glasses swinging in the air from his fingertips.

Security be damned, time go to hell.

Its now.

Here Today.

The chill winds, dark skies...

The unseen in the shadows.

His breathing bottomed out, and a gasp for his sanity sounded. Isabelle turned him into her body and he was a little boy again. Lost, frightened and scared of the big bad man that hurt him and took life from right there in front of him.

Callous.

Unbothered.

Unhinged.

Isabelle was speaking but he couldn't hear her. The sound soothing like an old familiar tune playing somewhere in the background, low and full of radio static. But the high notes and bass guitar and drum fought through all that and made you aware that the noise was sounds you knew. He tried stretching his ears, pricking them for more, more of her, but it was no good. The noise and static of imagined thunderstorms grabbed and twisted the sounds and he cowered, wishing to be swallowed inside her, warm and safe, instead.

Issy held on with all her might. He was always so sure, so strong in everything he did.

He was John Lennon.

But here, now she held fragility and pain and horrible memories. A shuddering frightened boy clung to her and it ate her alive to see him so wholly broken, a statue of impressive manhood so small. Issy murmured quietly, not wanting to startle him.

Frank moved the town car away from the building. Slowly drifting back into the lane, trailing slowly after a clutch of traffic that had sweep through from the previous set of traffic lights.

The corners were taken slowly, no hurry, nothing pressing to get to, nothing to attend, nowhere really to go.

And finally they were back.

But different this time. Very different.

The pedestrian ramp by the crossing became one tyres passage and another tyre bumped with ungraceful elegance over the kerb.

With a few words, Issy had fixed one of John's fear. The expansive of distance from kerb to safe haven.

After the climb over the kerb the car drove straight and slow, all the way to the heavy-set doors of the building called Dakota.

She had him within feet of the foyer now, the chasm of distance but a few tiny steps.

John bolted, he had startled as the tyre thumped up onto the sidewalk. Eyes searching as the car crossed the expanse.

As soon as the car due to stop he was moving. Door slamming, feet flying, head low. Hands ever scratching, dragging and digging deep into the hair on his scalp.

Inside the fortress now.

Long strides carrying him over the partically lit foyer to the elevator.

The button was hammered.

Doors opening.
Doors closing.
Then silence.

He remembered Issy as the numbers passed by the fourth floor to the fifth and he stared at his feet as the numbers kept climbing higher.

He was on a mission.

Get to the apartment.

Open the door.

Curl into a ball.

Hide.

She was not in the front of his mind right at this moment. He kicked repeatedly at the wall of the box as it passed the sixth floor, hands still threaded deep in his hair.

Coward, child, no man was he to leave a woman abandoned like that, but he did.

She would not want to be around a child like that. Like him.

A spineless boychild that left her to fend for herself. The shudder broke through from the pain underneath his skin and he leaned on to the wall. And, as he felt his legs begin to give and buckle beneath, the ping sounded announcing a floor, his floor, had arrived and the ornate door opened onto the hallway where he had kissed her silly and lusted after her like a brazen caveman.

But now a small child lurked where the man once stood.

Running now... his footfalls raced demons and nightmares and remembered sounds of bullets striking.

*

Issy followed him slowly, she couldn't go any faster, the elevator was waited on, the button tapped, the flight to the seventh floor the longest she had ever taken.

Half expecting the apartment to be bolted and locked up tight, Issy pressed the door open with one finger and slowly walked through all the beautiful rooms.

Switching a few table lamps on as she went, she decided a muted affair was the way to proceed. John was lost here somewhere and, she guessed, he was not wanting to be found.

Should she turn on her heel?

No, they had been through too much for her to abandon the one thing in her life that felt true. No, she needed to rise now, be his mettle, mother him, nurse him. Tend, cuddle, caress and soothe him.

The charity dinner was a success and she had garnered a rare dance with the best-looking bloke in attendance... And it wasn't Benny Hill, as John had joked when she had uttered the compliment to him.

Jokester, lover, human, wonderful. John had danced her into the middle of the harlequin floor and held and squeezed her as she floated on his cloud, the one where he usually resides. His eyes crinkled as he grinned and his orbs sparkled as he gazed upon her and those lips spoke of her radiance then quickly teased her about her impossibly messy hair.

Issy heard the shower in the second bathroom running.

Slipping from her shoes beside the couch in the tv room; the second room with a tv that she had seen in the sprawling apartment thus far...
She dropped her small clutch to the table and quiet footsteps led her closer to the steaming room. The door was open wide, no overhead lights were on; the hallway lent its beams as she laid her eyes on him.

Him. He was always so....'John'.

He was now hunkered down fully clothed in the bottom of the bathtub. The steaming shower overhead, raining over his body as he hugged his knees and stared into the base of the tub.

Silently she plugged the bath and turned the water on at faucets. She left the shower tumbling over his head and shoulders for now. She spotted some bath bubbles, dropping a tiny bit in. John ignored her throughout and she tried not to let it eat away at her.

And as she had entered the apartment, all alone, trailing after him; she had decided that, whatever he said, whatever he did, she would accept it as part of the night. A different night in all the nights they had shared.

The bath filled rapidly.

Warm, soapy water.

Issy stepped to the vanity and fished about her back for the eye and hook, then the zipper of the gown,it silently slipped down, shimmying it off her body and laid it neatly over the large wide vanity. Stockings discarded, bra and panties still in place, she slipped in the tub behind John and went about drawing him near.

Fingers pulled his shoulders gently and the flinch that he used to tear himself away from them garnered a gasp of worrisome torture from the owner.

He tore his shoulders away. Attention and any love offered him, not warranted nor deserved. Anger swirled at the intrusion to his private hell of brokenness.

He had never had a witness to this before. This private place of his where he curled for hours as endless water drift over him all the way from near boiling to stone cold. She shouldn't see this. This is weak, useless, powerless, and utter mental defeat.

This is me. Broken from a mad mans idea of earth cleansing. A madman's idea of ridding the world of a calamity of ideals and societies downfall- me.

Isabelle touched his shoulder and the flinch and anger radiated from deep within. The anger of her discovery of him now, a child.

I will not cry, I will not let more weakness shroud what a man should be. I'm stronger than a cry baby, I'm John fucking Lennon, I'm all powerful to the masses and singer of love songs for the lonely.

I will not- Cry.

I will not let her see that. I won't. I can't. I will never be a man again, just some child that needs affection from a mummy. A mummy's boy, I want my mummy.

Fucking hell... pull it together man.

She tried once more and John finally gave in to her love and affection. Her hands surrounding him, her toes wiggling and shuting off the water. Fingers reaching for the shower knob. The tide of water lapping the edge of the tub threatening to displace over the side.

She held on.

She held him.

She held him safe.

She held him long.

One hour, two.

She held him til the water cooled complete and his body had stopped shaking from his memorys' hauntings.

She held on until she felt him soften. Held on with bated breath, as his fingers tightened over her own to keep her there with him.

She held on until he pulled his tie away and, as he pushed her hands up to his top button, she held on to hope he was now freeing himself from the night. There, fingers chilled, she tugged and pulled at his saturated frozen icicle of a shirt as he shucked it from his body.

She let go, leaving him bereft as she climbed out of the tub. A human iceblock in bra and panties held her hand out to him. He allowed her to pull him up and out. He cede his manhood again, and again, as she mothered him. As she striped him bare. As he stared at the floor like a child, with unequally embarrassment.

Lifting legs one at a time like a toddler, cold fingers holding her shoulders for support.

She dried him.

She led him to a bedroom.
She located his pyjama bottoms and t-shirt and dressed him as he turned his head, and tried not to look at her face.

He didn't want to see the pity written all over her face.

Quickly looking away from Isabelles eyes as she watched over him. He collapsed down to the mattress as she tenderly pressed him to sit, pressing lightly on his shoulders yet again to sink him to the mattress to lay flat, legs askew still jammed over the edge on the floor. Then it happened, the child was arranged. She lift his legs, one by one, from the floor.

This was bad.
He wasn't a child.
He was much worse; He was a baby.

He struggled and she stepped away, moving to the doorway, ready to leave. Of course she was leaving. She was going. You've chased her away, you child.

"Don't" Was choked out and she came toward him. Issy knelt on the floor close beside the bed, fingers running through his hair.

"I'm not going anywhere John, I'm getting us some tea. Alright?"

Issy held all her tears in. Binding her emotions tight inside to stay strong, to not let him see her fracture from the shock of watching him cave.

John shook his head in the negative. He didnt want her to leave

"Tea John, I'm going to come back. Promise" He nodded reluctantly and stared vacantly as she walk away.

She was freezing, not bothering about her own self. She stared at Central park in icy bra and wet panties as the kettle boiled.

He watched the doorway with leaden eyes and listened for her movements or what he could hear of her anyway.

Was she still in the apartment?

His breath held, he listened for any sound. It was so quiet.

Was she gone?

The whistle of the kettle trilled and abated hastily.

Yesssss. She was still in the apartment.

He breathed.

Issy walked back in with a more determined gait plus tea pot and cups on a tray. She was learning. She smiled as she lift the pot, knowing his eyes followed every single movements as she poured a cup. She watched him shimmy up the bed, his face downcast looking like that of a chided naughty child and lingered waiting, wanting to catch his eye again as she carefully passed him the tea.

Sweet and milky and warm, and just right.

She used the pot.

She's standing there.

John eyes shot to hers and she smiled sweetly, just for him.

"I'm going to get changed. Is that ok?" Issys smile widened this time, a hint of embarrassment flooding her face.

John looked from her face down her body, confusion addling his thoughts.

She was still wet, soaked through.

God she'd be freezing.

She rubbed her arms and he nod sheepishly. He stared hard, following her body as she walked from the room.

Then she was back.

"I thought I'd.... Well anyway, here I am"

Issy stepped toward the dresser on the other side of the bedroom, laying her big oversized t-shirt on it.

This room was smaller, perhaps a guest room, definitely not one of the boys rooms. She had been in the kids rooms before, looking at Julian's old toys and awards and seeing Sean's favourite things he had left behind when he went to boarding school.

At first, she was going to strip and dress in the bathroom and return but, as she clutched the t-shirt, she decided to be with him, see if she could entice a little of her stronger John out of the shell he was currently residing in. She wanted him to feel stronger. No, not to create lust, just to awaken him to himself again. He needed time, and cuddles tonight.

Holding a towel over her arm she tore the bra, that was stuck wet to her torso, off then wiped herself dry. Her body was shaking, chilled to her bone. Next, she carefully dried the ends of her hair that had touched the bathwater. Issy dragged her panties down her legs, tussling with the wet fabric as they clung, and nearly fell as the damp material caught on a toe. She swore and giggled.

A noise, that sounded suspiciously like a snigger came from Johns lips. Issy glanced up hopeful; The fearful child was slowly, very slowly, starting to flee from his body. He coyly returned to look back down into the cup, swirling the sweet liquid in an eddy rush.

Issy dried herself complete and felt a little warmer. Making a bit of a big deal over the t-shirt, she bounced on toes to wiggle the shirt over her residue of damp skin. She picked the wet underwear from the floor. Clutching it all in a cold hand she made her way past the bed, John grabbed her, drawing her closer, his lips pressed against the tshirt, pressing against her stomach. Before she knew it, he was hugging her waist.

Fingers worked over his hair gently.

"Throw it in the hallway" John spoke roughly, his throat haggarded from all his rampant emotions. It must have been the first words he had uttered in over three hours, apart from the 'don't' wrenched from his lips minutes before. She watched as he lay askew, her, clutched in his embrace. "The undies, chuck 'em all in the hall, please darlin' Isabelle"

Issy throu the underwear wet and cold over her shoulder, flicked the light switch and crawled over John to the other side of the bed, he lifted the covers and she snuggled down close to his body to steal the warmth now radiating off him.

John dragged her to him, swallowing her whole in his arms. Close and safe, like they should be.

"I'm sorry"

"Shushhh. Let's snuggle and sleep, alright" Issy tugged him even closer and somehow he was cushioned to her, his ear pressed listening her heart beat, her softness pressing into him like a dream.

"Your hair is a right mess Isabelle" His voice was so tired and sleepy sounding, a hint of a smile lacing the words shining through. A smile she had prayed for since she lost him on the sidewalk of his nightmares.

"Let's fix that particular problem in the morning shall we? Snuggle and sleep now"

"I'm... so ... tired"

"Sleep. I've got you"

"Isabelle...." John breathed deeply now, sinking into sleep, gradually letting go of wakefulness "Hold me... " he begged.

Issy squeezed him again so he knew she was there, his face nearly hidden under the sheets as he pressed and nestled into her body.

She felt his breathing relax and deepen. Falling away into his slumber with her whispered words "Always and forever" blessing his ears;

"One thing you can't hide - is when you're crippled inside"