Billy
It was from the minute that Daisy answered the door that I knew. Of course, for no specific reason, my heart sunk and my eyes burned. But I knew.
Listen, I’ve been married for over a decade. I know what love looks like.
Or, if it wasn’t love, it was certainly something - a strong something that I couldn’t shake off.
Daisy opened the door and immediately froze. Her right hand remained stuck, still hovering over the doorknob. When, after a long and drawn out moment, she finally seemed to find her voice again, it was strained and strung out.
“Hey, Angela. How are you doing.”
“I’m good. Just wanted to return your jacket.” The other woman’s voice - Angela’s - was similarly distant. Yet, there was a blush on her cheeks and unsteadiness in her posture. She swayed gently, fidgeting with the leather jacket in her hands.
Daisy’s gaze shifted to the jacket and lingered there for a moment before looking up again. Her eyes shifted to a point farther than Angela, clearly not daring to look her in the eyes.
“Thank you.” Daisy’s voice was still cold and detached. She gingerly accepted the jacket, her fingers immediately recoiling when their hands grazed, as if touching something scalding.
The other woman - Angela - pretended not to notice. She stood there an extra second, until she began to turn away. “Good day.” she said, an air to finality in her voice.
Angela barely took two steps until Daisy flinched. “You know, it’s an amaze that letters keep getting lost in the mail. You would think that the US postal service would be more reliable, after so many years of use,” Daisy blurted with an edge to her voice.
The woman - Angela, I promise I won’t keep forgetting her name - turned back with a start, still standing a few footsteps away from Daisy. “You know, I could say the same. Especially when certain people are so busy. How has your songwriting been going, Daisy? Busy with lots of record deals?”
Daisy flinched again then straightened her back. “What does that have to do with anything? At least my career took off. And I wasn’t in the habit of ‘never reading’ my mail.”
“Shut the fuck up, Daisy. Continue with your work,” Angela snapped, raising her voice. Her eyes darted to me, as if noticing me for the first time. “Go be with whoever this new man is. Maybe he’ll get more than a few hours of your time. It was a mistake coming here.”
Angela turned again, this time speedwalking down the gravel of the road on Daisy’s house, as if trying to get away from her as fast as possible.
“Fine. I will! ” Daisy yelled. She shut the door so hard that the hinges rattled, wiped her glassy eyes, then turned back around facing me.
“Sorry you had to see that,” she muttered, embarrassed.
A soft, sad smile played on my lips. “That’s some the situation you have there.”
I should have been happy for her, that she found someone else - if only for evidently a short amount of time. I shouldn’t have been so selfish. But for some reason, I was. Maybe selfishness was so deeply ingrained in my system that I could never avoid it - at least when it came to Daisy.
She was like a magnet, alluring and bewitching, gravitationally attracting everything and everyone in her vicinity. No one, even I, was immune to her magic.
Still, I regrouped my thoughts. After all, we were just friends. Friends. I could do that.
“Yeah, well, that’s what happens when some people are just bitches,” she retorted, as if still speaking to Angela - even though she wasn’t in the room anymore. “Okay, sorry, I shouldn’t be calling other women bitches. She just gets at me. I know I ran off, but I wrote dozens of letters, called dozens of times. If she won’t respond, then she should at least tell me that. It’s the honest thing to do.”
She began pacing around the room, fidgeting with the ring on her index finger. “And it wasn’t that I was asking for anything. No, all I was asking for was a coffee. And it would have been perfectly in her right to say no. But to just not respond? To ignore it? To ignore me? What type of a person just does that, slides things under the rug when I’m giving her an out?”
I, watching her fully entranced, had nothing to say. Partly because I didn’t know the whole story but also because I don’t think she noticed me in the room.
I noticed the clouds had cleared and the sun now shined in her auburn hair. She was at the end of the sun ray’s, as if an extension of the sun herself. I knew she wasn’t mine anymore and had completely moved on, but God, she was just simply beautiful.
I, too, was entranced.
That is, until she bumped into the coffee table in the center of the room.
“Fuck!” she yelled, jumping back on the couch and clutching her calf in pain. Then, as if noticing me and recalculating her bearings, she paused and looked up. A faint blush rose to her cheeks. “Um, yeah. Sorry you had to see that.”
“No worries, Daisy,” I said. “But, um, quick question and let me know if I’m overstepping, but is she an artist by any chance? I’m sure you’ve heard about the party at the flower-flotted mansion that everyone in the music industry is going to.”
I don’t know why I was helping. I mean, I do, but I really don’t.
“Yeah. She’s a pianist, actually. Why?”
“I mean, she’s probably going to be there, right? Why not go and see if you can apologize to her? Or thank her for the jacket?”
“Okay, but why should I apologize to her?” Daisy asked. She looked at the jacket sitting in her hands. “If anything, she owes me an apology.”
“Sometimes, love requires some help. Don’t let this chance slip away.” I looked back at her, hoping she could see the unsaid words in my eyes. I would never want her to vocalize them - at least, not now - but I wanted her to understand. Understand that sometimes, life doesn’t give you second chances.
She paused for a moment, studying my face. “You know what, Billy Dunne, you might be right. When did you get so smart?”
She playfully threw a pillow at my chest and I laughed. And I will continue to laugh, because I have no other choice. I will always laugh if it means that Daisy Jones can find her happiness.