wasn’t really about singing. Audiences? They couldn’t get enough. People weren’t coming to hear us, they were coming to see her. She wanted us to start writing and performing our own material, so after we caught our big break, we wouldn’t just be doing covers. She couldn’t wait for the war to be over, not because it was stupid and immoral anymore—that was the old Jacy—but because when it ended we could go back home and show Vance and Don and Viv and all of Greenwich what she’d become. She made me promise we’d change the name of the band from Big Mick on Pots to Andy’s Revenge.”
Lincoln still looked uncomfortable. “It must’ve worried you, how she was changing.”
“I guess I should’ve been,” Mickey acknowledged. “I mean, her need to drive men nuts? The guys in the band were all talking about it. But it was the early seventies, you know? Janice Joplin was drinking a quart of Southern Comfort at every show. The Who were smashing their guitars onstage. Jim Morrison was whipping it out in front of live audiences. It was all about freedom, remember? Richie Havens at Woodstock?”
Teddy couldn’t help smiling. The decade Mickey was trying so hard to explain through its iconic cultural moments was one Lincoln had basically opted out of. Richie Havens?
“Anyway,” he continued, “one night she missed the table and that was that.”
“What happened?”
“Too much weed? Too much mescal? The ataxia? Maybe she just got tangled up in the mic cord. But when she landed…”
He paused, remembering. Vividly, Teddy could tell.
“Anyway, end result? Concussion, broken elbow, busted kneecap and two cracked ribs. She was in the hospital for a week, which was where most of her remaining money went. Not being Canadian citizens, we didn’t qualify for the public health care. Anyhow, we paid the bill, or most of it, and we were sent home with two different prescriptions, one for a painkiller, the other for depression, because it was clear from the beginning that it wasn’t just bones she’d broken. Overnight, she became a whole different person. Bitter. Morose. For her, it was all over. She’d never return to the States in triumph. We’d never play that gig in Greenwich. Andy would never have his revenge and neither would she.
“I tried my best to cheer her up. Told her she’d be back with the band in no time, but she’d just look at me like I was somebody she’d known a long time ago and couldn’t quite place. Her right leg was in a cast from calf to midthigh. She’d raise it up off the sofa and say, ‘That’s what you think, Mick? You really believe I’ll be back leaping on tables anytime soon?’ When I pointed out that some people did manage to sing without jumping onto tables, she told me to go fuck myself. Because for her, that’s what singing was about.
“Anyhow, it all unraveled. I kept hoping that once the cast came off and she was mobile again, her spirits would improve. Most nights we had gigs, which meant leaving her alone in the apartment because she wouldn’t dream of letting anybody see her in a wheelchair. We weren’t nearly as good without her, of course. We had to go back to playing smaller, crappier venues. It was just music again, no show at all. I told myself we needed the money, but I was just glad, really, to get away for a few hours, to lose myself in the music. Mostly I went home as soon as we finished the gig, but this one night I went out with the guys instead. Got pretty hammered. Did some coke. By the time I got back to the apartment, the sun was coming up. I figured she’d be asleep. Her meds made her sleepy, and most days she was out till noon, but no, that morning she was wide awake, watching an old movie. ‘It occurs to me now what I should’ve done,’ she said when I came in, not taking her eyes off the TV. ‘I should’ve fucking let you go to Vietnam.’ I remember standing there looking at her, thinking that eventually she’d say she was sorry, but that was the thing about Jacy. You couldn’t shame her. She wouldn’t say she was sorry until she was fucking sorry.
“Anyhow, that afternoon the cast came off, so heading home from the hospital I suggested we go get a beer to celebrate, kind of a no-hard-feelings gesture. ‘Do