Chapter eight

When Trixie dropped Micky off at the beach house the other guys were busy decorating the Christmas tree. Micky smiled when he saw them in the middle of putting up the ornaments, and doing it none too well at all. Right away he jumped in and began helping with the decorations. The job turned out to not be much better with his help, but they had a lot more fun with it. They all laughed and joked together, seeming more like they were playing around rather than trying to get the ornaments on the tree. When the tree was all done one of the guys had decided that they needed to decorate the rest of the house. They got part way through trying to wrap a ribbon around the staircase railing when somehow there was a pile-up at the bottom of the stairs. All four of them wound up tumbling about each other and fell to the floor in a bout of laughter.

"Now how the hell did this happen?" Micky laughed, breaking away from the pile

Davy stood up with a smile "Whoevah hires us to be their interior decorators should have their 'ead examined."

"Aw come on." Peter stood and looked around the room "It's not that bad once we eventually get things done. In fact I'd say it looks pretty good."

"Yeah I'd say we've done pretty well for ourselves." Mike added

"Well then mission accomplished!" Micky announced, brightly smiling

Micky began to laugh with all of them joining in on it. After their laughter had died down they looked about the room at their Christmas decorations. It wasn't very pretty, or anything one would find pictured in a magazine, but they were proud of the job they had done together. Seeing the house, done up like this really put them in the mood for Christmas, and it brought their excitement up to realize how close Christmas was now.

The next day The Monkees had a special gig at a Christmas party. This was their first paid gig in a few weeks so they were very excited about it. Since it was a Christmas party they guys decided to spruce up their band uniforms, making them a bit festive. It seemed as though everyone in the town was at this party; at least everyone that the guys knew. They were happy to even see Trixie and the guys of The Nuggets (with exception for Domino) amongst the partiers as they played their first set. However, this happiness was short-lived once they spotted Domino walk in through the door.

"We should keep an eye on him." Mike whispered towards Micky

"Way ahead of you." He whispered back while focused on Domino

The two of them looked over at Peter and Davy, and saw that they had the same idea. As they continued to play, the four guys kept a watchful eye on Domino to make sure that he wasn't going to cause a big scene with Trixie.

Over in the crowd of partiers, Trixie hung out with the other three guys. She and August quietly checked out certain cute guys together while Brownie was ready with one of his trusty joints from his seemingly never ending supply. Once the joint was lit their small circle of four quickly grew as people around them caught on. Soon other people added their own joints, passing them all around the room. They had even made their way up to The Monkees. Without missing a single beat the boys in the band hit the joints, passed them along, and continued playing their song.

Trixie let out her contagious giggle as she broke her way through the cloud of smoke. She walked over to the punch bowl, still laughing brightly, and accidentally bumped into someone. As she looked up her laugh died away when she saw who it was that she had bumped into.

"Domino! The hell are you doing here?"

"Baby I can go wherever I please."

"Just leave me alone, Domino."

"As I recall, you were the one who ran into me." He gave her a slight shove on the shoulder "Or was I wrong?" He smirked

"I said leave me alone."

"You getting testy? Here you need a drink." He reached for the punch ladle and a cup but she slapped his hand away

"I can get my own drink, Domino!"

"Alright, fine! I was only trying to do something nice for you, babe."

"Don't give me that shit and don't call me babe. It's too late for you to try to be nice to me. You should have thought about that before I left your sorry ass!"

"Aw come on, Trix. Don't do this with all these people here."

"Oh suddenly you're worried about starting things in public. That never worried you before. Just twice recently you came after me in front of other people. You're an asshole and you only care about yourself."

"That's not true! I care about plenty of people!"

She shook her head "You'll never change, Derek." She said, putting a special emphasis on Domino's real name "You'll never change because you don't know how. Even if you did know how, you wouldn't want to do it. You're nothing but a lonely pathetic low-life drunk." She paused "I should have left you the first time I realized this. And to think I've actually had my friends looking out for me, and protecting me from you. I should have had someone protecting you from yourself. But I suppose that wouldn't have done any good."

"You know what?" He retorted, poking her in the arm "You're nothing but a little bitch!"

"Well now, that must have taken you a while to come up with that one. You should be proud of yourself."

Domino looked at her stunned for a couple seconds. He seemed as though he was going to say something else in reply, but instead he stormed away. As Trixie watched him go outside she stood there with a small smile. She never thought before that she'd get a chance to stand up to him, but now that she had done it she felt good. She felt as though she was no longer going to have any problems with Domino.

When The Monkees had finished their set they all separated and joined the party crowd. Micky had gone over to talk to the other three guys of The Nuggets. Mike went over to see Trixie. And then Peter and Davy spent the time trying not to seem as though they were avoiding each other. They still did not want to admit to anyone about the tension that they felt between them.

Mike tapped Trixie on the shoulder to get her attention. Since it was just moments after her rocky reunion with Domino, she appeared a little upset when she turned to look at Mike. But once she saw who had gotten her attention she allowed herself to smile.

"Oh hi Michael! You guys were great."

"Thanks. So how're you doing?"

"I'm fine."

"Saw what happened."

"Oh you did?" Her smile turned into a small frown

"Yeah. And I'm proud of you." He pulled her closer with one arm and then gave her a kiss on the cheek

"Well I figured that I couldn't let you guys stand up for me any more." She grinned "I had to do it for myself for a change."

"Looks like you've done well for yourself."

"Thank you Michael." Her grin brightened as she gave him a hug

"I've had very little to do with it." He grinned, hugging her back "But you're welcome."

Meanwhile, across the room, Peter looked over at Davy and sighed with a little frustration. He walked over to where Davy was and got his attention.

"Davy I was thinking. We really shouldn't let something as ridiculous as a girl get in between us."

"You're right, Petah. You're absolutely right. What were we thinking?"

"I know! We're better than this."

"I've already forgotten 'er name."

"You sure don't waste time." Peter chuckled

The two of them smiled and shook hands, feeling much better about everything. Right at that moment a set of very lovely looking twins walked past them. They turned their heads, taking in every detail of the two girls. Then smiling, they looked at each other.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" Asked Peter

"You get the one on the left and I'll take the one on the right."

"Right."

They walked over to the twins and saw that the girls were ever prettier up close. One of the two girls smiled brightly at Peter. She looked as though she had freshly applied a layer of lipstick that was the prettiest shade of read that Peter had ever seen. The other twin stood there sweetly gazing upon Davy. She had her long dark hair pulled into loose pig tails that rested over her shoulders.

"Excuse me, Miss." Peter said with a shy smile "I hope you don't mind me saying this but I love that shade of red on your lips. It reminds me of strawberry pie." He leaned in closer and lowered his voice as he looked into her eyes "And I bet they would taste just as sweet."

She blushed with a smile "Aw you're cute. What's your name?"

"I'm Peter. What's yours?"

"Mary." She flashed him a full smile

Davy looked at Mary's twin "Ye know I really like your hair 'ow it's in those cute lit'le pig tails."

She grinned softly "Thank you."

"Sorry." Davy rolled his eyes at himself "I didn't want to say something so stupid. But my friend just stole one of me best lines."

"That's alright." She wrinkled her nose a little as she grinned at him "I'd rather not hear a line any way."

"That must mean I don't 'ave t' try so hard. I'm Davy." He held his hand out

"Sandra." She shook his hand and met him in the eyes "Nice to meet you."

"Likewise."

Davy and Peter began talking to the twins. All four of them were having a real good time together until the guys had to join Micky and Mike for the second set. The rest of the party after they were done performing, The Monkees spent time with all their friends, including the twins that Peter and Davy had befriended. It was during this time when the guys had decided to invite their few good friends over to the beach house to celebrate Christmas Eve and Christmas together. This, the four of them thought, was going to be the best one they had together since they had become friends. And they all agreed that they couldn't wait for it.