Notes: Not really the story I would have pictured writing for Micky/Davy, but I got song-swiped (as you can probably tell from the title) by Don Henley's 'The Boys of Summer' and Josh Ritter's 'Change of Time.' And then this happened. Concrit most welcome :)
The thing is, life as a Monkee is kind of like a funfair ride. It's this blur of noise and riotous colour and fast movement – a chaotic Tilt-a-Whirl that constantly sends them all spinning off in unpredictable directions.
It's a breathless, lunatic trip is what it is, a crazy, stomach-jolting rollercoaster, or a bone-jarring, high-speed spin in a rubber-rimmed bumper car.
Except.
Most people seem to forget that every funfair ride has to come to a full and complete stop sooner or later. And then, you have to queue up for the next ride, and maybe the line stretches around the block, or the ride-operator's taking his lunch-break, or you've run out of money and then it's time for the funfair to move on anyway.
What Micky is saying is – the thrill ride is only half the story. The other part is made up of waiting and kicking your heels and trying to stave off boredom until the next attraction opens up.
But the thing is – that still, calm piece is just as much a part of life as a Monkee as the up-and-down and round-and-round of the Carousel.
Maybe it's not as exciting as the other stuff, and hey, it's not like he's saying that 'subdued' is his bag, exactly, you know?
It's just, sometimes, things happen in the spaces too.
Didja ever hear the one about the two bored musicians? They started to play each other's instruments…
…you dig? Ba-dum-tss!
(That's the drum roll, in case you're wondering).
And that's how he and Davy start – during a long desert stretch of tedium. The fairground is empty, there's no bread (literal or figurative) and not even the sniff of a potential gig to distract them. It's a choice between resorting to simple, homespun pleasures like fucking around or banging their heads repeatedly against the walls (and Mr Babbitt's pretty protective of his walls).
So, fucking around it is!
Maybe it's not the most auspicious start in the world…but see – there's the problem about trying to make life fit inside a story. You end up having to pare it down and parcel it up into neat, easy pieces. Because every story's got to have a beginning, a middle and an end, and they've all got to hook up neatly together – tale bone's connected to the plot bone, plot bone's connected to the ever-after bone…
But that's not how life works.
Sure, you can look over your shoulder and string the past into a pattern like beads on a necklace. You can even put on an affected accent and call it 'destiny' (or, as Micky intones it when he's wearing his blue fortune teller's costume, 'deh-stin-eee'), but at the end of the day, that's just a cheat.
Because there's no such thing as the past – or the future, when you get right down to it. Five minutes ago, a year, two hundred…it doesn't matter, they're all just as over and done as each other– and tomorrow never actually comes to pass, only stays ahead of you, hovering barely out of reach…
…in the end, all that really matters is now, immediate and messy and exhilarating.
Which brings him right back to him and Davy.
"So?" he asks just before, eyebrows raised and –
Davy bites his lip in consideration before he agrees, "…yeah."
There are no longing looks, no tentative overtures, no starry-eyed declarations of mutual infatuation. Just a workmanlike rolling up of sleeves as they stave off complete stultification by touching each other up, getting each other off on the ratty old couch downstairs – making an abrupt, out of the blue left turn from dingy Dullsville and heading for the bright lights of Spontaneity City.
It's no hang-by-your-fingernails loop-the-loop, more of a homemade teeter-totter – but man if it doesn't have the same effect in the end, leaving Davy panting, with Micky next to him, breathless and invigorated, and no longer in danger of chewing his nails down to bloody stumps from sheer ennui.
"So," he says afterwards, heart still thumping hard in his chest and –
"Yeah," Davy replies, still breathing fast.
And that's it.
Maybe it's not how a love-story ought to begin, born out of skin-clawing boredom and not much else…yeah, well who says it's a love-story, anyway?
Then again, who's to say it's not?
So, that's the start, but it's nowhere near what you might call the beginning, which happens somewhere in the middle, and goes something like this –
To set the scene, it's been a while since they first started playing doctor, and discovered that in the absence of a suitable female patient, a fellow medical professional will do in a pinch. They're on the beach, and in the middle of the conversation, Micky says, "Why America?"
Davy shrugs, staring ahead at the sea. "Dunno. It just seemed like it was time to leave the nest."
"America though," Micky says. "That's some long-distance migration." He shakes his head, and idly builds on the inherent drama of Davy taking wing and soaring out of England by pulling out his best imaginary Bogart. Of all the countries in all the world, he hadda walk into Micky's…
But the sun beats down and bleaches the thought of the requisite bitterness, stretches it out into a kind of languorous satisfaction instead.
"Always wanted to see America," Davy says, and gives him a sidelong look. "You keep going on about it though, and I'll start to think you don't want me here."
"Well, we can't have that." He puts Bogart back in mothballs and sprawls out on the warm, golden sand.
"What are you doing?" Davy asks, eyeing him skeptically.
"Just think of me as your own personal welcome mat," Micky tells him, wriggling a little to level the soft swells of sand under his back.
"You must be joking," Davy says. "I mean, I've heard of American hospitality, but this is taking things a bit too far, isn't it?"
"Think of it as a historical re-enactment. I mean, it wouldn't be the first time we let you walk all over us."
"Be the first time you laid down for it, though," Davy points out.
Micky grins up at him, suggestive. "No it wouldn't." He shakes his head, mock-sorrowful. "Oh, how quickly they forget."
Davy's laugh is sudden and ebullient, and he cocks his head at Micky before getting to his feet.
Micky squints up at him. "You gonna plant your flag?" he enquires.
"If you ask me nicely," Davy tells him, with a flash of white teeth, before lifting his leg to place one bare sandy sole right in the centre of Micky's chest.
And this is it. This is the moment, sprawled out on the sand, with Davy standing over him, foot planted solidly on his torso, chanting, "I hereby claim this land in the name of David Jones and England, and I do so call this land…well, a bad investment, probably, but that's neither here nor there" –
It's the closest thing they've got to a story-beginning, though it doesn't feel exactly like that to Micky.
He just looks up at Davy, all tanned skin and hair shining in the sunlight, mouth still moving and foot warm and grainy in the centre of his chest…and all it feels like is now. But, a different kind of now than he's used to. More intense, visceral…a now that resonates. Like…everything that came before, and everything that might happen after…it all either comes back to or leads up to this. It leaves him lying completely breathless on the sand.
Turns out it really is the ultimate trip.
You can't pin life down on a page, clean and perfect, like a butterfly. When it comes down to it, it's more like trying to wrestle a two-headed mammoth onto a sheet of paper.
But if Micky's got to flatten this three-dimensional thing down into a regular old two-dimensional narrative, this is the middle.
Micky's sitting on the bed and Davy's getting ready for a date.
Yeah, there are girls. Why wouldn't there be?
A word of friendly advice - don't get hung up on the chicks (which is hard, Micky knows, since some of them are real knockouts). The girls are immaterial. They're not the point of this story, which is maybe a love-story, or maybe something else – but whatever it is, it's definitely not a drag. Come on, they're long-haired weirdoes – you can't expect them to follow convention.
So there are girls. Mostly Davy's, but that's nothing new – just lather, rinse, repeat, ad infinitum.
Micky's always preferred to riff, to improvise, while Davy's got this dog-eared script he falls back on with all the girls he dates – like he's holding interminable auditions for Davy Jones and His One True Love, with a revolving door cast of leading ladies. But the thing is, even if he's too much of a gentleman to deviate from the screenplay with his more feminine co-stars, he's pretty good at ad-libbing with Micky, given half the chance.
Look, if you're still bent out of shape about the girls, maybe the thing to focus on is the fact that no matter how many times Davy ends up there, he always gets stage-fright when it comes to 'happily ever after'.
(If you're still bent out of shape about him and Davy though, well, man, Micky can't help you there).
So anyway, Davy's getting ready for an intensive screen-test with The (current) One, and Micky's kicking his heels against the bed-frame while Davy ignores him, when he notes, "– hey, are you even listening?"
In response, Davy turns and starts in exaggerated surprise. "Micky! When did you get here?"
Micky makes a face. "Oh ha ha. Meanwhile, if there was a girl sitting on this bed, you'd be all ears. And hands." He studies Davy and comes to the conclusion, "Y'know, if I was a chick, you'd dig me."
Davy doesn't miss a beat, keeps combing his hair. "Yeah, an early grave."
"No, for real," Micky says.
Davy spares him a glance, tells him flatly, "You're not a girl. Believe me, I'd have noticed by now."
"That's not what I'm saying," Micky says. The less interested Davy seems, the more fun it is to keep pushing. "I'm saying, if I was a girl, you'd be into me."
Then Davy does pause, comb poised just above his hair, frowning.
"You know it's true," Micky says, like it's a simple statement of fact. It kind of is, given that Davy's never met a girl he didn't like, so it's a pretty safe bet he'd go for a feminised Micky. Besides, look at the evidence. All he'd had to do before was throw on a wig and a floor-length dress and he'd had landlords and generals fighting over him. Men of stature and property (bug-infested, over-priced property, but still…). And he hadn't even had to flash any skin or put out. Now that's what you call 'natural allure'.
"Don't you mean 'unnatural allure'?" Davy asks, when he points this out.
"I'm just saying, if I was a girl, I'd be a pretty hot property."
"You'd be a smoking hole in the ground," Davy scoffs.
He raises a shoulder, careless. "Go on then. Tell me, if I was a girl, you wouldn't like me."
Davy looks away for a moment. Then, the comb makes a hard click as Davy sets it down on the dresser, and crosses over to him.
It comes as a surprise when Davy kisses him, a little exasperated, hands holding his face still. Then, when Davy pulls away, he looks into his eyes and says, matter-of-fact and almost annoyed, "I like you just fine the way you are."
He still goes out on his date, of course. But then – there's no reason he shouldn't, and Micky even trails him downstairs, and waves him off.
"Enjoy your date with Tansy-Rose!" Peter says.
"And we'll just have a quiet night in with the cactus," Mike says, flicking a glance at Micky who says, "What? I'm the cactus now?"
"Well, you do thrive on neglect, don't you?" Mike says, with the kind of good-humour that has a tiny sting in its tail.
He can't help it. It's not that Mike's uptight, exactly, but he's a worrier, and he's been doing overtime on the open secret of Micky-and-Davy.
It just comes down to a fundamental difference in world-view. See, even when Mike's doing a full-on tango with the present, he's still peering over its shoulder, trying to catch a glimpse of some bright future that might or might not ever show up. Meanwhile, Micky's always figured that the best thing to do with the present is...unwrap it.
Mike's got this habit of prophesying upcoming doom when it comes to him-and-Davy, and knowing Mike, he's probably right. Probably this whole thing's going to come crashing down around their ears, and the band's gonna be affected and nothing's ever going to be the same again.
What Mike doesn't seem to get though, is that this plausible preview of coming attractions doesn't change right now one bit.
And right now is where Micky lives.
So he makes sure to say out loud, before Davy goes, "I'll see you later, yeah?"
But maybe Mike isn't the only one who worries, because Davy just stands and looks at him for a long moment, with the same searching expression he had just before he kissed Micky upstairs. He doesn't seem particularly happy or sad – just eventually acknowledges, solemn, "Yeah," before he turns and closes the door behind him.
Micky's okay with that, because he's heard the saying, 'Familiarity breeds contempt' before – but mostly, he knows, familiarity just breeds more familiarity.
When he makes his way to the kitchen, Mike's right behind him, and Micky can feel his eyes on him as he roots in the refrigerator. There's a can of pop and some moldy cheese in there, along with a stack of photographs and the phone (Peter's giving a pretty literal interpretation of 'the cold shoulder' to some acquaintance).
"Hello? Hello? Pete, are you still there?" a tinny voice comes from the phone handset, when Micky reaches in and grabs the can. Then he shuts the fridge door, and turns back to Mike.
"Look, Mick – the thing is, you can't unread a book," Mike says, arms folded across his chest.
"Sure you can," Micky says, tone flip. "Just run the film backwards."
Mike's not distracted, and he studies Micky before saying, not unkindly, "You know, one of these days, one of those girls is going to take."
"Yeah," Micky agrees. "And then, Davy'll probably leave the band and get a real job and start turning out lots of little Davys. Even littler Davys," he corrects. He considers it. "Man, maybe you oughta start worrying about that, instead." He pats Mike's shoulder as he saunters away.
Maybe Mike's right, and maybe there's some girl out there who's going to sweep Davy off his feet.
But then again – maybe not.
And anyway, even if she is out there, waiting in the wings – she's not Tansy-Rose, and she's not here yet.
There isn't an end, because things don't end. Not for sure. They taper off, maybe, or they pass away, they can dissolve, or cease – but those aren't endings, not really, because nothing ever truly ends until you do. So you wind up carrying everything that's ever mattered with you, folded up small and tucked into your metaphorical pockets – still part of you, and somehow still delicately shading now with their very presence. Or absence.
Anyhow, this isn't an ending – but it'll do for a finale.
Micky has this dream.
He's standing on snow-tinged, frost-salted ground, a glacier next to him. For all that, it's not freezing – the air is that misty, early-morning kind of cold, even though his breath comes out a pure, startling white.
What really gets him is the silence. When he moves, he can feel the snap of frost under his feet, but he can't hear it. He takes seven steps and he's at the edge of a precipice – and below him, choppy waves crash against the cliff noiselessly. The only sound he can hear is the stertorous sound of his own breathing in his ears.
He doesn't try to talk. (He's said this is a dream already, right?)
There's this rickety rope bridge stretching out from the cliff, over the sea, and into the distance. Micky stares across, but he can't see what it leads to – the bridge kind of fades away in the vast bare expanse.
He doesn't know where it goes, only that he's certain it goes somewhere, and that that's where he needs to be, and that dream-certainty causes him to grasp the rough rope and take a step forward. Looking down and across, he can see that some of the wood planks are missing, creating great perilous gaps, underneath which the rough waves look like teeth. He holds on to both sides of the rope, and begins to move.
The closer he gets to the dipping, swaying middle of the bridge, the harder it gets. The rope is frayed, decaying in places, and more and more planks are missing. The sea is a very long, cold way down, and every time he licks his dry lips, he tastes salt in the air. But some strange compulsion keeps forcing him onward.
He places one foot on the next plank, then, when it seems steady, the other – and it happens. The wood gives under his weight with an inaudible crack, and he falls.
It's an excruciatingly slow drop into the water below, the kind of weightless, haunting fall you only ever get in dreams, and he enters the sea with a silent splash. He goes under, gulping water that feels like water, heavy and liquid in his mouth, but somehow breathable, in spite of that –
- and then he wakes up.
It takes a few minutes for his eyes to adjust to the darkness – they're playing a week's worth of gigs in a one-horse town (literally – the equine's name is King, and His Majesty's got a mean hind kick). It's also a one-hotel town, and as part of their payment, the Monkees have been put up in the finest box rooms lack of money can buy.
Luckily, there are a couple of small holes in the walls, so a little light leaks in, and soon Micky can make out shapes in the dimness. He turns his head to the side, and there's Davy, in the narrow bed next to his. He's asleep, lying on his back with one hand flung over his head. Micky never heard him come in after his date with the hotel-owner's daughter.
But he's here now.
Micky takes the opportunity to study him. In spite of the Swiss cheese walls, the light is pretty faint, and Davy doesn't look altogether like Davy to him. The slope of his nose, the curve of his chin…in the dimness, his profile becomes almost abstract, like a map - like a shoreline.
Micky looks at him, and he feels this ghostly footprint over his heart. Because…well, just because you aren't trying, and didn't bring a map, doesn't mean you're not going to arrive at a destination anyway. The destination's still there, whether you set out to reach it or not.
See – Micky used to bang on pots and pans when he was a kid, and that's all it was. For real. But now…now he's a drummer. He never planned it, but he turned a corner, and somehow he became part of a band. Just because you're not looking for something doesn't mean you're not going to find it eventually.
Christopher Columbus hit on a whole new world by accident. It doesn't make it any less of a discovery. Drift long enough, and you're bound to hit land sooner or later.
It's very quiet inside the room. The fairground is dark and deserted, and all that's left is this steady silence – a hushed kind of space that might have you fooled into thinking nothing's happening.
In the stillness, Micky takes one last look at Davy. Then he closes his eyes, and starts swimming.