Chapter Text
Los Angeles, June 1999
Billy could hear the movie playing but it felt distant to his well-honed ears. All he could focus on was the slick sounds of the wet press of his mouth against hers, her occasional low throaty moan, his own grunt as she pulled his warm body even closer to hers.
Their lips met, clung, parted, and clung again. He ran his hands slowly up her back, could feel her muscles even through the soft material of her cotton top and longed to touch more of her, to touch more of her bare skin.
Her arms were looped tightly around his neck and those clever, calloused fingers played with the hair at the nape of his neck. Tugging, then twisting, then finally scratching not so lightly till he shivers pleasantly against her then bites that full lower lip of hers in retaliation.
She pulled away laughing. “Hey, what did I say about the biting?”
Her skin is flush. Her lips shine wetly in the afternoon sunlight, red and swollen. Her eyes are that shade of impossible ocean blue that he never could quite forget. He thinks her eyes are even more noticeable with the framing of the glasses she’s sporting. He lets himself get lost in looking at her for a minute before responding to her question, leaning in to suck her earlobe into his mouth before biting down and growling.
“I think your exact words were ‘more please.’ You know, between all the moaning.”
Daisy shoves him away laughing. “What did I say about biting today? About distractions today? I said you could come over before dinner but that I would be working, and I didn’t need you distracting me, so you better find something to keep yourself busy till I finished. Somehow you moved from the other couch to this one. Somehow, I ended up practically in your lap. How did that happen again? Did you get confused? Do I need to worry about senility in your advancing years?” She fakes a curious tone and tilts her head curiously. All it does is draw his eyes to her long vulnerable neck where he wants to place his lips.
“I was working. In fact, I was doing some of my best work.” He offers her in defense. The smile he offers her is all teeth.
Daisy had been in L.A. for three days on a work trip and they’d barely had any time together.
She’d arrived Thursday morning had immediately been holed up at Miramax studios watching the print of the Daniel Grant film she’d agreed to help curate the soundtrack for.
His own work had been a grind that week. The Wilco album was close to finished but the label already had Billy in with another band. The heat from his work with Fire Rainbows leaving him in demand.
Pulling double duty, finishing one album and starting another had him pulling twelve-to-fourteen-hour days. He was in studio all hours of the day.
Between their clashing schedules, they’d had next to no time together.
Thursday night, he’d slept at her place but Friday he’d gone home to his. Daisy had made plans with Lisa that evening and urged him to keep his plans with his friends from running club.
“Baby, as nice as it would be to spend all my time with you while I’m here, I do have other people to visit and see. And really, Lisa and I can only talk about you and Warren freely when you aren’t around. Besides, you have plans with your friends. We’ll have Saturday night all to ourselves.”
He'd been looking forward to Saturday night. A chance to spend some actual time together on this brief visit.
While they continued to find many ways to talk throughout this long-distance relationship of theirs, finding time to be together in the same place was harder.
He knew she was planning to work at her house all afternoon, so he’d wormed his way into an invite to come over a few hours early.
Of course, keeping his hands to himself turned out to be just as hard as he’d expected it to be and when she’d opened her door, looking adorable and casual in blue jeans, a white tank top she was clearly braless under, and a black grandma cardigan, her hair in a messy bun on top of her head, his mind automatically started to plot on how to get her naked.
What had really done him in though, were the thin wire framed glasses she had been sporting.
She had seen the smirk on his face when he spotted her glasses and immediately cut him off at the pass, defensive.
“Before you say it, yes, I wear glasses. No, I haven’t worn them long, just a few weeks. Remember, I mentioned having to go to the eye doctor last month? This is a new and unfortunate development. It’s a mild prescription and I only need them for reading and only occasionally, but I had a bit of a headache this morning. Yes, I hate them. Ok, now you can speak.”
Even with his limited ability to read a room or other people’s reactions, Billy could tell that she was nervous about her glasses.
Daisy’s physical beauty was as much a part of her as her voice. As much as she seemingly took it for granted when they’d first met, maybe even resented it and how it made people treat her, she also counted on it. How could she not in an industry where image was at least 50% of the job? As she’d once said to him, at least a quarter of her job was about people wanting to fuck her or be her. In the time he’s been back in her life, he’d seen how hard she worked to maintain her image as she aged and seen hints of her insecurity and vanity.
“Wow, ok. Dais, I like the glasses. It’s a good look for you, very sexy librarian.” He had leaned down to press a kiss under her ear, then another to her jaw, then finally dropping another kiss lightly to her mouth.
She had fiddled with the glasses self-consciously before sighing and leading him through her airy mansion. By now, he’d been there enough times that the scale of the house didn’t fill him with quite as much awe but still he was reminded of how successful she had become over all the years. While he’d been in bigger homes, namely those of studio executives, it still was one of the bigger homes he’d ever been in.
While he took her home in, Daisy just continued complaining about her new look.
“I despise them. They make me feel old. This is like the third time I’ve worn them.” She’d grumbled, pouting.
“Well, you look hot. I’m serious, Dais! Wait, if you’ve only worn them three times, am I one of the first people to know?” He can’t help but feel absolutely delighted in seeing this side of her, being let into her world.
“I mean, aside from the eye doctor, my EAs, Harper, Byron, and Simone, well then yes, Billy, you’re one of the first. Glad my suffering makes you so happy.” She rolls her eyes at his delight before moving on.
“I hate getting old. On another note, as much as I’d like to stand around all afternoon and hear about how attractive you find me, I did tell you that I planned to work. Daniel let me take a print of the film home to work on so I’m just re-watching it scene by scene with his script notes to get a sense of where the soundtrack will cue in instead of the score, the tone he’s thinking of, and how the music can add to the emotional beats of the story. I need to return the print to the studio tomorrow morning so I’m on deadline till he can send me my own cut to access in the studio’s New York offices. What will you be doing while I’m working?” She asks suspiciously.
He pulled the sheaf of papers from where they had been tucked securely under his arm and held them out to her. “I’m ordering some new studio equipment.Normally, we’d have our assistant do it but I’m pretty particular with my orders, so I figured I’d do it myself. Probably easier.” One of the things he was working on in therapy was being more conscious of how his actions affected other people.
He cringed when he remembered the last time he had one of the office assistants complete an order for him. There had been yelling (his) and awkward tears(hers).
At first, when he tells her his plans, Daisy’s eyes light up and he just knows that she is desperate to ask him about what equipment he needs to order and what his plans for it are, but she schools her face to hide her interest because she knows damn well same as he does that, they both can get distracted when talking about studio setup. They’d once spent two hours on the phone talking about speaker selection in Billy’s home studio which somehow led to phone sex.
Instead, the corner of her lips had turned up and she’d offered him an indulgent smile like a teacher humouring a dimwitted student. “Billy Dunne, particular about something? No way! But doing the orders yourself probably is easier on everyone. A+ self-awareness, baby.” Then she’d risen on her tiptoes to kiss him softly as if in reward.
He had other thoughts on how she might reward him and many of them involved her wearing those glasses and nothing else.
An hour later, he had been almost done filling out all his order forms and entirely done being a good boy.
She’d barely paid any attention to him, too engrossed in watching the same three scenes repeatedly. She would look away from her tv screen, look down at the script, then start writing in her notebook. At certain moments she would hum or talk to herself. He watched her brow furrow in concentration.
This was the first time he’d gotten to watch her work in more then twenty years and while it wasn’t quite the physical punch of watching her write a song, it was still Daisy in creative mode. And Daisy Jones in creative mode would never fail to be anything but unbearably sexy to him.
He watched her nibble her pen cap and hum and was painfully reminded of the way she wrapped those same lips around his cock and hummed the last time he’d sat in this same room.
He couldn’t help but shift uncomfortably in his seat and then a bit closer to her, moving from the couch he was sitting on to sharing hers.
“Dais, I think we’ve both been working hard, and we need a five-minute break. Baby, you had a headache this morning. It’s not a bad idea to take a few minutes to rest.”
She’d looked up from her notes and at him and her surprised expression made it clear that she’d forgotten he was even there so caught up in her own flow.
“Seriously, five minutes. I promise.”
“And what do you want to do with this break, Billy?” Her eyes are laughing as if she knows exactly what’s on his mind.
“Oh, I know. How about a snack? You look hungry.” She had lifted herself off the couch but, in an instant, he’d managed to pull her into his lap.
Five minutes had turned to ten minutes, had tuned to fifteen minutes before she had finally pulled away.
“You over there,” she said, pointing to the other couch with her index finger. “Me, here.” She motioned to the couch they were both still on.
“No more breaks or distracting me until dinner. And keep those hands where I can see them, Dunne.” She commanded as if his hands were dangerous weapons.
He can’t help but laugh. “Daisy, didn’t you ever have a study date? Taking breaks to make out is expected. Hell, it’s encouraged. That was tame, my hands didn’t even make it under your shirt, yet alone down your pants.”
“Billy, how many study dates did you actually go on? Didn’t you skip most of your classes in high school so how would you know about proper study date behaviour?” She’d teased.
“Ok, point made. I never gave a shit about school that never stopped me from the occasional study date, but as a man who raised a teenage daughter, I had to act as a chaperone to quite a few.”
“I guess we can consider you the expert between us then because I never had any study dates nor have, I experienced the horror of having to chaperone any yet. I skipped over dating handsy high school boys completely went right past that to troubled rock stars. Seriously, the other couch now, Billy.” She pointed again.
“Never been on any study dates? That’s just sad. A gap in your education. I’ll go to other couch because you can’t keep your hands off me and I don’t want to distract you.”
Then he moves to the other couch, crumbled papers in tow, sits down and holds his hands out in front of him as if she’s the police. He sees her mouth open as if to argue with his last comment. His shoulders shake with laughter. He can’t help but enjoy getting a rise out of her.
“I’m ignoring you now, Billy. And every time you interrupt me is going to add fifteen minutes to the time I’m working.” She said fishing the VCR remote from where it had fallen to the floor when they’d both been busy.
With dawning horror, Billy realized something about Daisy he had only ever suspected before. “You’re evil. How did I not know this about you?”
“Billy, I think you’ve always suspected. Why do you think my shorts got even shorter and tighter in the summer of 1976 when you couldn’t stop looking at my legs? Of course I’m evil! Now you know how I keep Harper in line.” Daisy let out a pleased little snort.
It was another ninety minutes before she was finished. In that time, he’d finished his orders, gone to the kitchen and eaten a snack, and gotten lost in her extensive music collection. He hadn’t interrupted her even once though he debated asking her to let him muck around in her home studio. He shut that idea down quite quickly. She was even more particular and protective of her home studio then he was, and he’d only been let down there twice and never unsupervised.
When she was finished, she’d put all her papers down on the coffee table, placed her glasses and pen on top of the pile and done a full body stretch while sighing. She had looked so pleased with herself that he felt his heart skip a beat.
“Ok, done for now. All yours. We have forty-five minutes before dinner is delivered. Since you were so well-behaved, it’s dealer’s choice.” She gestures generously, letting him know he can have whatever he wants.
“You naked except for the glasses. Right now. Keep your hair up.” He doesn’t even hesitate. The image of her naked with her glasses sliding down the bridge of her nose has been dancing through his mind all afternoon.
“Really? Really? That’s what you want?” She asked dubiously.
“Yes, fucking really, Dais. Now it’s only forty-four minutes and thirty seconds. We’re wasting time.”
“Ok, alright, you want the glasses? You get the glasses.” She reaches for them and slides them back on her face delicately.
Then she looks down at him disapprovingly and he feels like he’s seventeen and checking out the new pretty librarian. It’s almost embarrassing how aroused he gets.
A groan falls from his lips.
Her violet eyes widen in realization about just how much he likes the glasses and he’s both excited and scared to see what she’s going to do with that newfound knowledge.
She hops off the couch and starts walking away without a backwards glance.
Then she drops the black cardigan to the floor. “Forty-three minutes, Billy.”
By the time he chases her out of the room and down the hallway he finds her jeans discarded and her white top on the staircase railing, she’s calling back, “Forty-two. Better hurry.”
He can see the silhouette of her body in the fading sunlight, naked except for a pair of green panties at the top of her stairs before she takes those off as well, leaving a trail to find her.
Thirty-nine minutes later, they lay together in her king-sized bed, sweaty and naked, recovering.
He’s lying on his stomach, face pressed down against the expensive mattress, and Daisy lays diagonally, half on top of him, sprawled across his back. She’s running her hands soothingly through his hair.
“Fuck Billy, you were not lying about the glasses working for you. I had no idea.” She pants out, still a little breathless.
“They really do. Are they growing on you a bit more now?” He asks.
“After seeing your reaction? How they ‘grew’ on you? Fuck yes. I hate them just a little bit less. Do you know what I would have done with this knowledge in the seventies? Things, Billy. Very, very bad things.” She finishes on a little moan.
It feels like more and more they can joke about their shared past. They’d started to a bit when they’d first become friends but more recently since they’d gotten together, they’ve been alluding to their past more frequently.
Now when they talk about their history, it doesn’t quite cut him open and leave him bleeding. He’s not sure if it’s all the work he’s been doing on himself to face everything that happened then and, in the years since, or the fact that one of the greatest wounds of his past was losing Daisy and that doesn’t sting as much when she’s in arms reach of him. He knows that there are still painful parts they will have to deal with, but he isn’t as terrified to face them as he was before.
“Well, it’s probably best for us all then that you didn’t know. I had more than enough trouble trying to control myself around you in the first place.”
Daisy turns serious for a minute, all teasing gone. This is not the first time this subject has been broached. His want of her, his need for her that he spent decades denying but has always felt to him as gaping and vast as the Grand Canyon.
Her voice is soft and gentle when she responds. “You’re right. It’s probably best I didn’t know. Besides, we never would have worked then,” she acknowledges easily. Then she presses her warm mouth gently to his shoulder, not simply a kiss but a benediction.
Billy has fallen in love twice in his life. He couldn’t quite pinpoint the moment with Cam but somewhere between her unimpressed assessment of him in the laundromat and the night she stood up to her parents for him. Or maybe it was all the nights he’d call her from the road on tour discouraged, and her faith in him would buoy his own dwindling hope, her voice gentle and steady, and sure.
There was nothing gentle in the way he fell for Daisy. It had been a forest fire from the start. It took till Miami for him to even admit to himself how deeply he felt for her. Like he couldn’t quite put the pieces together, the attraction, resentment, musical chemistry, innate understanding, touch of the divine. Couldn’t add those together and see it for what it was. Sometimes he thinks it was the first time they sang together but most days he knows that was just chemistry, it could have been the first time they wrote together, or the tenth time she had cracked a joke at his expense, or a million other little moments. Mostly, he believes it was *that night on the beach. He’s never been sure though. He was in the middle of loving Daisy before he’d even realized that it had started.
He has had few true moments of clarity in his life. The day his father left, and Graham crawled into his bed to cry. That day he knew he’d always be his brother’s protector. The day Cam found him fucking around on tour and told him to get his shit together or risk the family and future they were building together. The morning after Chicago, because while he still ached for Daisy, it was the sight of dried tears on Cam’s face as she slept that pierced his soul and left him vowing to never let her down again. It was the day of Cam’s diagnosis that changed their family in an instant, when he knew that there was no battle, he would ever let her fight alone. And it was this moment right here.
The exact moment he’d crossed the line from loving Daisy Jones to being in love with her again.
He stays suspended in the feeling for a second before Daisy is throwing him off again. She bites him in contrast to that gentle earlier kiss, a provocation. “Besides, I’m much more diabolical now. Time, and patience to hone my craft. There’s a bright side to everything.”
At that moment the doorbell rings loudly and he’s glad for the interruption, still overwhelmed by this realization.
Daisy’s already up running to the bathroom and grabbing a sexy but casual sundress to throw on to greet the delivery person from the fancy restaurant she’s ordered from. Calling out to him as she runs that she can’t open the door looking anything less than presentable in case she’s recognized.
It is another reminder how few days off stars of Daisy’s rank have off. Even here, behind the beautiful, gilded walls of her gated community, snug and secure among other wealthy, powerful people, it’s still hard for her to fully relax.
Dinner is delicious. He is put on music selection duty tonight while Daisy starts opening their takeaway containers.
“Let’s eat in the kitchen. I barely use the dining room, it’s too big and it’s too formal. When Harper was little, she used to call it the sad room.” She shares chuckling.
“Kitchen sounds great. Give me a few minutes to throw something on.”
He shuffles around her seemingly endless collection for a few minutes. He wants something special for this moment, when he’s realized that he’s in love again. His fingers trail lovingly across the record spines and CD cases before he finds it. He smiles when he does.
When he walks back into the kitchen, Daisy is already softly swaying to the sounds of Nina Simone’s insistence that she’s put a spell on her lover.
She pulls him close for a moment to dance with him, and he lets her. Holds her close and sways to the beat.
“You know, I really wanted you to dance with me that day. I’m not telling you this to make you feel guilty. I’m just really happy I get to dance with you now.” She whispers just loud enough for him to hear it over the music.
Then she rubs her face contentedly into his chest, over his heart, as the world narrows down to them and Nina’s incredible vocals.
He couldn’t hold her then, but he can hold her now. He wants to tell her that he will dance with her whenever she wants forever. He doesn’t.
They don’t exchange any more words, simply enjoying each other and the moment.
After they dig into their dinner with relish, he notes the smaller portion sizes on Daisy’s plate and while his dinner plate involves a steak so rare It could still moo, garlic butter mashed potatoes that he could eat an entire plate of alongside a healthy portion of salad and green beans, Daisy’s plate contains a smaller delicious looking chicken breast, green beans, and salad.
He looks at the differences in their plates and thinks of the girl who once ordered double burgers and fries for herself at the Apple Pan.
He knew that her trainer was strict, and she had a meal plan on tour and before events, and she was cautious about what she ate in general, but he hadn’t really thought about what that meant until now. How often she must have to deny herself.
She notices him eyeing the differences in their plates and explains.
“Billy, I’m a famous woman. I’ve been, more or less on a diet since nineteen eighty-four. You’ve seen me enjoy the occasional treat and I’m not as strict as some but basically aside from the holidays, I’m on a plan all year round. Now stop giving me the sad eyes because I’m looking at you like I want to roll you for those mashed potatoes.”
“Dais, I was going to offer you a bite but now knowing you’re so quick to violence has me re-thinking. I won’t even tell you how good this taste.” He teases.
They smoothly transition to other things, the album they're listening to, his insane week at the studio, a movie they want to rent and watch together when she’s next in town, their respective upcoming summer schedules.
“I’m so excited. A whole week in Mexico City with Harper! She loved it when she came out for the tour date last summer, was ready to move there. I’ve been trying to do all the planning myself but since I took this new project on, I cheated and asked Sheila to help. I’m trying to find a children’s play to take her to there. Her Spanish should be good enough to follow along but just in case, I want to find a theatre with subtitles. We have a whole week to explore. Well, more like five days since I have a few side trips outside the city planned. Have you ever been there? It's amazing Billy! You would love the music scene there. The way it pours from every doorway, the way you’re just surrounded by it.” She sighs happily.
“Oh, and I was thinking, I’ll still be working next month but with Harper at camp for three weeks, I could maybe come out here again and work from LA for two whole weeks? I know you’ll probably still be busy at the studio, and I’ll still be in the thick of it on this soundtrack, but at least we will be conveniently in the same city! We could even plan a weekend away somewhere. By third week of July, I’ll have to be back though for Parents’ Weekend and camp pickup. I’m still guilty that I missed it last year. And we haven’t talked August yet, but Byron and I met with our mediator on Wednesday because we knew summer scheduling was going to be a mess. He always got custody of Harper for most of the summer but now that we are on a joint schedule, he doesn’t just get five weeks uninterrupted in the summer. We’ve agreed he and Catherine can take her to his family’s place in East Hampton for part of August but I’m going to take a place there and we’ll switch custody weeks as needed. I’ll commute back to the city when I need to work and they’re both off right now so it will be flexible. Harper already has friends who will be out there with their families for the summer and now that she’s at Spence, it seems like all her friends will be there at least part of the summer. It worked out well actually. Remember how I mentioned to you that I had dinner with David Foster last week? He told me that he planned to be in B.C. most of July and August and wasn’t going to be using his place in East Hampton, so I think he’ll loan it to me or at least rent it. Though knowing David, it is probably way too big and showy. But beggars can’t be choosers in the Hamptons real estate game. What about you? Are you still thinking of going home to see your family for fourth of July?” She asks with a big smile and a shrug as if she hasn’t just laid her calendar out for the next several months without a care.
Daisy has essentially finalized her entire summer schedule without talking to him. She has barely thought to speak to him about her plans as if he is an afterthought in her life not someone she’s in a relationship with. He doesn’t even know where to start with this.
Suddenly the expensive rare beef feels like it is settling uncomfortably in his stomach.
“I am. I’m going to have my assistant book my travel next week. I was thinking that with Harper off at camp that you might have some time free and want to come with me?” He keeps his voice steady and aims for a casual tone.
“To Pittsburgh? To the Fourth of July with your family? Isn’t that sort of a big holiday to dump a stranger on them for?” Her smile is fading by the second and her eyes are looking at him with confusion.
Has her voice risen by an octave? Oh, that was definitely panic, hot and greasy, rising in her voice. He lets himself feel the hurt for a minute but continues on.
“Daisy, the fourth is for family and friends. And you’re not a stranger. You know my family. You’re fond of Graham. You love my mother. You definitely love my daughter. I mean you had brunch with her in the East village just last week which she mentioned to me before you did, by the way.” He adds firmly, still calm.
“Ok, ok, not quite a stranger but still, it’s been a long time. Yes, I’ve seen Graham over the years, but we haven’t talked for more than fifteen minutes at a time since 1977. And of course I love Jules, I wasn’t talking about her. I’m always glad to see her. I just think you haven’t brought anyone home since your wife died and you might want to wait instead of bringing home someone you’ve only been seeing for a few months. Don’t you want to wait until it’s something serious?” Her voice has disintegrated into full blown panic at this point, her question more of a plea. He feels hurt and embarrassed at her outright rejection of the idea. He hasn’t ever seen her this panicked and this includes the time she had to perform on SNL stone cold sober.
He thinks of the words he practiced with Dr.Tate when he told him that he was thinking of inviting Daisy to spend the holiday with him. He doesn’t quite manage it.
“Dais, I want to spend the holiday with you and not have to recount our day on the phone or over electronic mail. Most people get to do that, you know, spend holidays with people they’re in a relationship with.”
“I’m aware that my wife died, Daisy. I’ve thought about who I might want to bring home. This is serious for me. I’m serious about you. If you don’t know that, what the fuck are we even doing here?”
Daisy looks at him, pale and shaken for a minute before responding. “What are we even doing here, Billy? I thought we were figuring out how to try to be in a relationship. I thought we had agreed to take it slow! Holidays with the family after less than four months isn’t slow, Billy. It’s pressure.” She snaps, Nina wails in the background.
“Fuck your fucking timeline. We’ve been doing well so far. Can’t we just have the holiday without all the drama? It won’t be pressure, I swear it. My family will just be happy that I’m happy, they’ll be glad to have you there!”
Daisy storms off from the table, “I need to turn this fucking music off before it ruins this album for me.”
Her reaction is so insane and so Daisy that it makes him want to laugh even though he mostly wants to yell (maybe cry tears of frustration).
A minute later, she comes storming back in. “It won’t be pressure? It won’t be pressure? Of course, it will be because they all know we’re dating and have all seen the highlight reel of our messy past, courtesy of your daughter’s documentary. And now the first woman you bring home after your saint of a wife died is the Jezebel who spent years throwing herself at you who you could barely admit to having feelings for. Fucking terrific, Billy. I don’t need this pressure when we are still trying to figure out if we work.”
“We work, Daisy. Its been working. It would work better if you could believe the words that come out of my mouth, but I get that you don’t. I’m not asking for a lot; can’t you see that? Especially because you’ve planned your next three goddamn months with barely a mention to me but extensive consultations with your ex-fiancée. A man you complain about at least half the time his name comes up. Have you thought about where I fit in your life at all? Just where do I land on your priority list?” He bites out bitterly.
“You’re being unfair, Billy. Do you even hear yourself? I think about you every day. I mentioned some of my plans to you, left space for you in them, but I won’t fucking apologize for planning my life around my kid. And I won’t fucking apologize for not consulting you to the same degree that I consult Byron and if you pulled your head out of your ass for a fucking moment and stopped to think about it, you’d understand why. Byron isn’t just my ex, he’s Harper’s father and my family. So yes, I get to complain about him. And yes, I get to plan with him. We have to make decisions as a family. And that is going to trump whatever relationship we have, especially right now.” She tosses out in response.
Daisy may have loved him for decades, but he isn’t her family. Why does that truth sting so much? It strikes him that he doesn’t have a title in her life. Byron is the father of her child, is her family. Billy is a man she was once in love with and is now casually dating. When stripped down to that comparison, Daisy has a point.
But Daisy isn’t done yet and she’s growling out her frustration.
“Billy, you don’t get to wield your feelings for me like an emotional cudgel to get your own goddamn way! I’m done with being manipulated by men and that includes you. Telling me I should know that you’re serious about me, or ‘what are we even doing here’ sounds like a threat. Jesus Christ, Billy.” She says in a tone of disgust and backs away from him.
“I didn’t mean it that way.” He argues.
“How the fuck did you think I’d take it? How did you mean it then?” She bites out wrathfully.
He’s angry and twisted up in knots and it feels like he can’t make his words work. Like those endless months where he couldn’t quite find the words to articulate what he wanted. At least he knows that telling her he’s in love with her at this moment is the worst possible decision he could make so he avoids it and makes another bad decision instead.
He stays silent.
“Silence it is. Go home, Billy. I think we could both use some space tonight. I’ll call you when I’m back in New York.” Her eyes are dim and she sounds tired, like all her fury has simply evaporated.
He won’t leave it like this.
He pulled her towards him and kissed her. She turns her head away, twists her body away from his, and gives him her soft cheek instead.
Billy can work with that. He drags his mouth across her cheek towards the corner of her mouth and waits a beat, till she’s turning just enough for her mouth to meet his.
Her mouth opens to his like it always does, like it was always meant to and the kiss is gentle compared to all the anger and hurt feelings that had just filled this room. She whimpers into his mouth, surrendering to his kiss. It kills him a bit, this trust. How easily she’ll trust him with her body while she guards her heart from him.
She breaks away. “Sex isn’t going to solve anything. We can’t just fuck this fight away. Go home, Billy.”
“How do we know that? Maybe it does work for us? Shouldn’t we at least give it a try?” He’s being more reasonable than he feels at this moment.
For a second, her eyes flash amused, and he knows she’ll give into him. To the fire that burns between them always, undiminished by time or distance.
She slowly turns her mouth back to his and kisses him deeply.
Daisy breaks away from his mouth only to start peppering his jaw with kisses and sucking at the hinge of his jaw until he moans.
He needs more leverage, so he lifts her up and seats her on her kitchen island and brings his mouth back to hers. She loops her legs around him instinctively keeping him close to her.
Then his hands are looping around her neck and reaching into her hair to free her hair. It falls down around them like a curtain and her scent which has always been an obsession of his is everywhere.
He doesn’t try to undress her completely, simply kisses every bit of exposed skin that is within reach of his desperate mouth. Runs his hands along her body and fills his greedy hands with her soft flesh.
When he gets his hands under her dress and drags his hands up her legs until, he reaches her panties, he’s surprised to find her so wet.
He makes a little noise of approval, and she laughs entirely without humour and breaks the silence of this exchange.
“Don’t act so surprised. Yelling at you always makes me wet.”
He thinks of the countless fights in their past and how often raging at Daisy has made the blood run south. That whenever he’s angry at her, he wants to put his hands on her, make her submit to him even if it’s just with her body as he could never tame the force of that magnificent spirit.
He shouldn’t be shocked that they’re aligned even here.
He slides his fingers inside her and just feels her warm, wet, and pulsing for a minute. Fingers her a little more roughly than is polite but he knows she likes it that way and because they’re both still angry.
When she welcomes him inside her, when he thrust inside with one slow slide, Daisy bites her lip to not make a sound. But if he doesn’t get a title in her life, not yet, and maybe never, he wants at least this one clear acknowledgement between them; that she wants him and needs him more than she’s ever wanted or needed any other man.
So he waits and it takes all his control, until she starts shifting beneath him. Small, shifting restless movements, tiny jerks of her hips. She tightens her legs around him and digs her heels into his ass as if to tell him to get a move on. Still, he grits his teeth and doesn’t thrust and keeps them in this agonizing standoff.
Until finally, finally, she softly whimpers, “Please.”
“Tell me, Daisy. I need to hear it. What you want, who you need. Please. Please.”
“You, Billy. Always you.” She closes her eyes against the truth.
It’s only then that he lets himself start thrusting. He’s determined to make her come. To remind her of the truth she just shared. He’s the one she wants. He’s the one she chooses even if it’s just here.
The admission, her submission, is almost more satisfying than coming inside her. It’s only when he does that, they both realize that he’s fucking her bare.
It’s dangerous, and irresponsible, and the worst part is that he doesn’t care.
After, she grabs a clean kitchen towel to wipe at his come which is slowly leaking out of her.
“Do you feel better now? Go home, Billy. I’ll call you from New York.”
He doesn’t answer her question. Because he does feel a little better. Some petty corner of his heart had needed that.
Daisy does indeed call him from New York. But their conversation is off. More awkward and full of pauses.
He usually counts on her to carry the conversation like she has always done between them but that Monday, she barely even tries.
She begs off early. “Billy, I’m tired and I’m still thinking about Saturday. Let’s talk later this week.”
By the time it’s Wednesday, he is happy, no eager, to be off to therapy.
Dr. Tate takes one look at him, sighs, and then adopts a more neutral pose.
Billy will never be the kind of patient who is totally open and happy to share but he’s learned that all the bullshit does work so he forces himself to do it.
When he gets through his story, his doctor sighs again before speaking.
“Well that certainly could have gone better. You knew that it was perhaps a bit early to invite her home given your history. I’m sure that rejection still stung. She could have also managed her reaction a little better, but people rarely do well when they’ve been tossed a curve ball.”
“There are no ‘bad guys’ in the situation here. No right and wrong, just a whole lot of nuances. But can I ask you to consider something, Billy? How would Daisy know that you take her and your relationship with her seriously? I know you confessed to her that you loved her in the past and that you want her now, but this is a woman you didn’t take seriously in your past for many reasons, some valid and some not so valid. We discussed the madonna/whore complex you slotted her and your late wife in at length. Do you expect her to deprogram over twenty years of internalized and reinforced beliefs about your view of her in a few months? To be secure enough of you and your relationship to showcase it publicly to an audience to which you’d sent mix messages to in the past. Anybody would be wary.”
He wonders when their past will stop bumping against their present and future.
He spends the next few days thinking about Saturday and his most recent therapy session.
On Friday night he calls her. He knows her schedule enough to know she’ll be home with Harper. He calls after bedtime.
She picks up after several rings.
“Dais, it’s been a shitty week. I can’t stop thinking about Saturday.”
“Me too, Billy. I’m sorry. Well, I’m not sorry about what I said about Harper and the priorities in my life, but I am sorry for hurting you and reacting like spending the holidays with your family was like being marched in front of terrorists. It just all feels like too much, too soon. And while I’ve tried to be the kind of romantic partner who doesn’t trample over my partner's feelings, I’ve spent a lot of the last twenty years alone and the person whose feelings I had to worry about most were mine.” She admits and he can practically picture the expression on her face.
Her honesty makes him want to dig down, offer her his blood and guts, and all his messy truths. He’s not sure he can but he wants to try.
“I was an asshole. I just get pissed sometimes because Daisy, I really don’t know my place in your life. Byron gets a place and a title and consideration, but I don’t feel like I have any of that. I’m the man you fuck between meetings.”
“It feels unfair, right? I know it’s not precisely the same thing, Billy but when I loved you back then, that’s exactly how I felt. Camila was your wife, and the mother of your child, and your family. That had to come first. It was right that came first but I was the shameful secret that you still couldn’t even admit loving twenty years later. It’s different because we’re together and I’m not married but it wasn’t until I had Harper that I understood you and your choices better. Byron is my family and that will never change. You need to decide if you can live with it or not. You place, Billy, is in my head, and in my bed, and by my side and occasionally in my dreams of the future on the days I think we can maybe get that far. You have to decide if that’s enough for you.
“It is. I know I promised you slow. Then I broke that promise, and even got pissed at it, but I know you need time. Crossing guard, right?”
And her laughter over the phone is the most reassurance he’s felt all week that they are going to be ok.
“I’m taking back my request you come to Pittsburgh with me, but would you consider an alternate offer?”
“Go on, baby. I’m listening. Better make it good.” And the flirting more than anything else lets him know they are on more solid ground.
“Graham and Jeanine are coming out to LA for a few days in late August. Harper’s schedule permitting, and you did mention Byron and Catherine will be flexible that month, can you come to LA for a few days? If so, what do you say to the four of us having dinner?”
“I could do dinner. Send me the dates and I will do my best to make them work. And speaking of offers, if things are still going well at the end of the summer, maybe we start talking about when to introduce you to Byron and Catherine.”
He knows what this offer from Daisy means. It’s not meeting Harper but it is a path forward to that day.
“I could do that. Dais, I’m so goddamn sorry about Saturday. For what a dolt I was, for fucking you bare like that, for everything.”
“It’s forgiven. I’m happy we’re here, now. And before you ask, no you didn’t ruin Nina for me. That is a sin I might not be able to forgive you for.”