C12 - TUESDAY, STILL NIGHT
Having caught his breath in what was approaching a near regular fashion, Micky was now otherwise motionless, all his faculties devoted to trying to deal with feeling even more heartsick and emotionally ridiculous. Sitting here exposed as he was, all that came to mind was to apologize again, and so he did. His eyes had long since lost focus on Mike and had drifted off to the front once more where he didn't feel like he would draw as much attention from him.
Damn it., Mike cursed himself. He wiped his own tears away angrily with the back of his hand and, knowing he absolutely didn't have the right to, wiped Micky's away gently in turn with his thumbs. He abhorred seeing his dearest friend like this, and it was eating away at him. "Would ya stop sayin' that? It's me who's sorry.", he corrected him.
Helpless about the inexplicable left turn their lives had taken this evening, Micky tried to speak again but failed with a sigh, shaking his head almost imperceptibly.
Mike wasn't sure the downturned look Micky had been wearing since earlier in the evening was ever going to leave his mind's eye, and he selfishly couldn't stand to be faced with remembering Micky like this for the rest of his life, remembering the hurt that he'd caused him. "What is it?", he prodded in a desire to change it, not registering he'd spoken an encouragement until it had already exited his mouth. He had made a mental note earlier not to spur Micky on to debate this topic as he believed it would do nothing but to draw it out and make things harder on them both.
Micky, eyes dropped, only marginally wagged his head again, not knowing what to do.
This's reduced him to bein' a mute. I am the worst person on Earth, and I definitely don't deserve him. "Mick?"
With Mike's nickname for him that Micky had always loved to hear from his lips, he managed to meet his eyes now, if only for a few moments. "Please don't leave.", Micky whispered, then paused, at a loss as to how to put how much he thought of Mike into words, and he shook again as he spoke. "It's my fault, so I'll go instead. I'll go.", he stressed with a single, curt nod. "You shouldn't have to lose them over this. And they shouldn't lose you." I can't lose you, his mind rephrased, but I already have.
"Micky, no.", he choked out, perturbed that just like that, just for him, Micky would put himself in the awful position of giving up his close friends. "This is my fault." This is my fault. Not yours!, he echoed in a yell at himself. He then carefully brushed away the last of the liquid from Micky's skin before hugging him for what he anticipated to be the last time. Face buried in the crook of his neck, he breathed him in, then braced himself. I have to say no. I have to say no. "You don't get it. And that's my fault too." Intending to be comforting, he rubbed circles across Micky's back before sighing and finally letting his guard down, squeezing his eyes shut to say what he didn't want to admit for the power it could hold. "I shoulda told you: I love you more than anything in this world. But—"
"Hey, they're still hugging!", Peter whooped as he came around to the passenger side door.
With the sudden, unexpected intrusion, self-consciousness plowed into Mike, and like a magnet being repelled, he automatically retracted from and retreated from Micky, shifting himself back behind the wheel as if he were just a casual dude out for a Friday night drive.
"Hugging it out is a good sign, isn't it, David?", Peter asked curiously, ostensibly guileless as the day is long.
Davy flicked his eyes to Peter and then down to the front seats ahead of him where he warily eyed Micky and then Mike. He wouldn't bet money that the situation was completely sorted. With his jaw set, he intended to glower and carp at their cantankerous chauffeur, but noticing the both of them had red-rimmed eyes and wet cheeks, and never having seen Mike cry before, Davy chose in that moment to go easy on him. "How hard do I need to smack you upside the head?"
It was clear to Mike that the comment had been directed entirely at him. Not trusting his voice, Mike absently indicated in the negative and did so without looking up; he'd just wiped at his own face again, so he didn't feel as though he could be a man and acknowledge anyone by looking them in the eye.
"Have you gotten your act together now? We want you to stay. It really is that simple."
Simple., Mike laughed inwardly, lacking all humor. This is anything but simple. His mind hopped back to what he had said out loud to Micky, and recognition of the entirety and depth of what was behind his statement really hit him then like he hadn't ever allowed before. I love him. I'm so far gone for 'im it's not even funny. His eyes closed in defeat. I think I've always known that, though. But I love him, and I told 'im I love 'im. I shouldn't'a done that. He shook his head once with dismay. I shouldn't'a, but it felt so right to. I'd give anything for that ta be the right thing t' do. Why should it have ta turn out so wrong?
Davy waited, but not getting a response, he lost patience and pulled the door open as Peter had just done on his side, and he climbed in, shutting it behind him.
The cracking sounds of the doors closing jolted Mike from his lament, and he found himself at a crossroads. In a matter of hours, he'd gone from feeling a detached need of protecting Micky to the dread and grief of ripping Micky off like a scab to anger at himself for what he'd done to Micky, and then he'd wrapped it all up by feeling more and more like an ass as the seconds and minutes ticked on.
For the last few days, he'd been convinced that it would be easy to flip the switch on what they had going and cool things off. Then this evening, although it had started off a little harder, he still thought it would be easy enough to alter the plan to flipping a different switch and carrying out the decision he thought would be far and away the most reasonable for all involved. But doing so had proved both a more complicated and lengthier operation than he had anticipated as well as impossibly difficult now for the four of them. Slowly coming to his senses, he was willing to admit that he may have screwed up.
Against his previous judgement, he was coming around to accept the idea that maybe, in the end — and in spite of him being the eldest and the de facto leader of their group — it wouldn't be right if he were the one to unilaterally decide what was best for Micky and, by extension of their household and band, Davy and Peter too. He thought he really should give them some credit; just like him, they were basically all adults, and they deserved to be treated as such.
As he started the engine to leave, he came to the decision he had to do a better job of being an adult himself, to communicate better, and to not act as if he were going off the rails and thereby screwing everyone else up too. With Peter and Davy now securely in the Pontiac, he pulled out of the parking lot more gingerly than he had pulled in and headed back onto the freeway.
Davy leaned against the interior of the car door as they went, left arm draped over the outside, running his fingers along the window sill. Given that Mike hadn't spoken up since they'd gotten back in, he figured they'd all continue to be recipients of the first class silent treatment from him, meaning that just whenever it was that Mike would crawl out of whatever hole of a psychosis he had fallen into would surely remain a mystery for awhile longer.
In the seat across from Davy, Peter had settled back in and polished off his maple iced with a pleased look on his face. He had banked on Mike not minding too much if he ate in the car; Mike usually didn't as long as they cleaned up after themselves, and sometimes he did have to remind them to. So Peter lifted the sack just before he was about to offer everyone else their doughnuts, but that action coincided with the moment Mike decided to speak up.
"It's a felony, you know." Whether Mike had intended to sound serious or offhanded, neither Micky nor Davy could say right then.
Puzzled and crestfallen, Peter looked down at the contents and whined, "I thought doughnuts were legal in all fifty states, Washington, D.C., and the dependent territories."
Davy almost facepalmed. Sometimes Peter really made him wonder if it was all an act or if he really was just dumb.
Having calmed down just enough to regain minimal use of his annoyingly tingly arms and hands again, though still feeling rather numb all over, Micky tangled his fingers together on his lap.
Mike, eyes firmly glued on the road, began to clarify his words. "A relationship. Between Micky an' me."
At him mentioning the concept out loud to the guys, the other half of that equation did a mental and almost visual double-take. But you don't— ...What? Micky was nothing short of confused.
Davy was far less caught off guard, even by the permanency of how Mike had made that concept sound — appreciably different from a temporary tryst that would last until they got it out of their systems and more like a defined and seemingly serious, longer term affair.
"It's not a light slap on the wrist for that; it's completely illegal.", he stressed. "So no, Davy, it's not that simple. If we were found out, we could be beaten or shot, not to mention arrested, and somethin' like that's at least a year in prison." He hazarded a glance over in the direction of his front seat passenger, but Micky did not meet his gaze. Mike then looked back to the other two in the rear-view mirror. "No ever gettin' t' vote again or even gettin' t' leave the country. Plus it could be real tough ta ever get any job 'round here again."
It took a series of slow attempts for Micky to process all the related explanations that were leaving and continued to leave Mike's lips. And all he was able to fathom was that Mike had chosen to feed their friends a line so as to save face for the both of them; it was apparent to Micky that Mike pointing out the social impossibility of a relationship would come off as drastically less character-annihilating than the truth, that Micky had taken advantage of him, an inappropriate and, moreover, unwilling party. He thought Mike was a saint for having put up with him at all these last few days and then for sticking up for him now.
Mike tried to will the tension out of his arms but only ended up gripping the steering wheel harder. "And then there's guilt by association. The band — that'd be the end of any gigs or music careers. But if I'm out of the picture, then problem solved. You can all get on with your lives." Mike swallowed the lump in his throat. He had ceased checking for the reactions of the others, apprehensive of how they would digest the facts he had laid out. They were younger, and the realities of their society probably hadn't had time and opportunity to really sink in yet. He shook his head, thoroughly rankled at himself for not having made that clear off the bat. Or at least the day before. Or the day before that. Or I should never've kissed 'im at all., he reminded himself, the ache still lodged in his chest.
Peter, the culinary loot resting forgotten on his knees, answered sincerely and naturally. "But we don't want you out of the picture, Michael. We're all better off with you." The other two wouldn't normally argue against that either.
"And like I told you earlier," Davy added, trying not to come off as annoyed as he felt, "we're fine with you two being together. It's not like we're going to say anything to anyone and let the cat out of the bag."
"And yet you caught us immediately.", Mike pointed out right back.
"I live with you, you blockhead. Of course I'd be expected to see... you know, a little ...stuff.", he made a queasy face before shrugging it off.
One side of Mike's face crumpled in a frown. Then it could only be a matter of days or weeks before others who don't live with us would figure it out.
Peter chimed back in to back Davy up, almost opposite-reading Mike's mind. "I don't think anyone else will find out as long as it stays at home."
Mike hazarded a glance at Micky who, seeming a bit perplexed but more despondent than anything else, still wore a look of rejection, highlighted when his eyes closed and he swallowed, the sheen on his cheeks not yet fully dry. Mike flattened his lips, remaining hung up with anxiety.
"And even if someone else were to see something at the pad," Davy continued with a line of thinking that made perfect sense, "you could always pass it off as Micky just goofing around." But then he paused a second as he registered the potential full effect of what he'd said, and he leaned forward and eyeballed Micky from the side. "That was a joke the other week, kissing me under the mistletoe, wasn't it?"
Eyes going wide, Micky's head whipped around to him in shock. Without a thought, he broke his second stint of silence, voice cracking in the process. "Yes it was a joke!" He would never kiss Davy seriously. Or Peter, for that matter. He only was interested in Mike — Mike, who he was positive wasn't interested in him.
Davy outright shrugged this time, having previously assumed without a second thought that that was the case, so his reply needn't be tinged with relief. "There it is, then. Nothing to worry about." He waited as the moment dragged on. Willpower alone was not enough to resolve it, but he tried anyway. "So is everything sor'ed now?"
Mike bit the side of his lip, considering much of the argument that had been decently rebuffed. But that hardly meant it wouldn't still change their lives significantly if they decided to pursue a relationship, nor did it mean Micky would necessarily excuse him for putting him through this grief anyway. Both were very real hurdles for them to mentally get over. "Not entirely." He gave a meaningful look over to the man at his right and asked him discreetly, "Can we talk when we get back?" He wanted to say "back home", but he felt he had relinquished that presumption the moment he'd told Micky he was moving out.
Micky gave a short nod but, not seeming much less distressed than a minute ago and appearing to have shut back down again, couldn't vocalize an affirmation just then. If he had, it may have been too soft to be heard and laced with too much bitterness directed at himself to be understood. I deserve whatever he wants to throw at me, and I'll stand there and take it before I go., thought Micky with meek confidence.
Seeing his persisting disquiet, Mike was downright kicking himself. He wanted to be able to take hold of Micky's hand and convince him to smile again, but at this point he believed he had no right to, nor did he think the action would even garner anything resembling a smile now. And, understandably, it wasn't as if Micky had made any move to accept his embrace earlier. But whether there was any hope of them being together or whether there wasn't, Mike felt he needed to beg him for forgiveness.
The blond piped back up. "Great! We're all friends again! So are you ready for your doughnuts now?", he lifted up the sack once more with optimism.
Holding back the urge to laugh at the absurd assumption, Davy held out his right hand. Peter placed a napkin onto it and then filled it with the pastry as he'd planned to earlier. The other two weren't as amenable.
"Thanks, Shotgun, but I'll eat it later.", murmured Mike, thinking, I'll need somethin' ta eat when Micky makes my screw-up final and shows me the door after we get back.
Peter saw Micky, who couldn't conjure up an interest in food at the moment himself, barely shake his head.
"Mmm, a long john.", Davy hummed aloud, having missed in the store what it was that Peter had picked out for him. But he paused again, and around a mouthful of it he inquired, "Did you get this for me 'cause I'm shor'?"
Peter blinked innocently. "No, I got it for you because you like chocolate. That's the best chocolate doughnut there is."
Davy, willing to ignore the other situation for the time being, smirked at him and took another bite. "Thanks, mate."
Mike's thoughts were jumping here and there to try and tear his mind away from the subject of the mess he had made with Micky. To that end, he momentarily wondered, at 8¢ a doughnut plus tax, if the Brit was holding out. "Was there any change left over, Davy?"
"There was. Which I've appropriated in the spirit of combat pay." In reality, he decided he'd put it in the petty cash jar when they got home — which he then might keep close at hand overnight in case he had to wallop Mike with it and its contents. Yes, things did seem to be closer to on the right track with his two friends, but he wasn't convinced giving the one a smacking still wasn't out of the question.
Mike didn't seem particularly aggrieved by his holding out. "Fair enough." He couldn't help his thoughts drifting back to the storm raging in his head.