Chapter Text
Billy was having a good day. It hadn’t been a definitionally good month, with Julia’s impending move across the country to begin her freshman year of college and all three of them still processing Camila’s recent lupus diagnosis. It certainly wasn’t ideal for two life-rattling events like this to be happening at the same time, but Julia was pursuing her dreams, Camila’s prognosis looked good, and he couldn’t deny that all this had brought the three of them closer together than they had been in years. Billy had been noticing himself feeling contentment in whatever simple, peaceful moments he got with both of his girls. Today, driving home from the grocery store to cook dinner with Camila and surprise Julia with a picnic, like they used to do when she was young, was one of those moments of contentment. A good day. His windows were down and he reached out to click on the radio, searching for a soundtrack to his sense of peace. Despite the noise from the wind and the shitty quality of his car radio, he immediately clocked the voice he heard. Her voice.
“Celeste is dancing in the stars,
She decides she hates the night.”
Billy instinctively dialed the volume up and paid attention to her words. This song must be new, because Billy knew every one of her songs, but he hadn’t heard this yet.
“Celeste could bathe in morning sun,
But she finds it far too bright.”
“Say what you mean, Dais,” Billy mindlessly urged aloud. He knew what she meant, of course, but he always thought a song hit harder when it had the confidence to be explicit. A sort of confidence Billy rarely had in his own life. Despite his lyrical critique, he found himself tapping his thumb against the steering wheel as the song built, leading into the first chorus.
“Trapped in a cage of her own insatiability,
Every lover’s got to flee.”
There it is.
Someone who didn’t know Daisy well would very likely hear the song and assume she was singing about herself. That the redheaded manic pixie rockstar that they saw was constantly floating from lover to lover, without any desire or capability to stay. Someone who understood her a bit more intimately – like Camila, maybe – would probably recognize that she was singing about someone else. They might theorize that this person who she had devoted herself to, who didn’t reciprocate such a devotion, was Billy. He didn’t think it was – he had a different hunch – but he made a mental note to try to avoid letting Camila hear this song anyway.
“To pledge her your soul is just so unsatisfactory,
She’s got somewhere new to be.”
“Fuck,” Billy exhaled. He hadn’t wanted his guess to be correct, but now he knew it was.
Only someone who knew every last habit of Daisy’s mind, only Billy, would understand that the song was about her husband, Tommy. That last line had confirmed his suspicions.
Daisy’s voice spit out a fiery second verse and Billy listened for more information.
“Her restless heart, her reckless games
Lost her the very best.
Nothing gold survives the greed
Of impossible Celeste.”
Tommy Levain was an acclaimed actor who Daisy had met back in 1984, while he was still a rising star and they were both chasing success. Tommy was also a black hole. You could pour love into him day after day and he would never be able to keep it, never be able to feel full. Billy knew that Daisy had seen an inspired, passionate, hopeful artist in Tommy, but his tendency to endlessly search for something greater than anything life could give him had proven to be a sort of curse. Passion and hope had revealed themselves to be restlessness and greed and Daisy was not one to wait around for a man to realize she was gold. (Somewhere in the back of his mind, Billy considered that perhaps he was the exception.)
He thought about the last time he had seen Daisy: five years ago, when his marriage was rocky and fate had given them a weekend together and then she had picked Tommy over him. Since then, Billy had come to make sense of her decision. She was choosing security, she was choosing a family, she was choosing exactly what Billy had always chosen. As circumstances had drawn Billy closer again to Camila over the past few months, he had a sort of revelation that he and Daisy had both chosen correctly. Each of them safe in their own little families with enough contentment to make it through life. A more peaceful life than either of them were ever guaranteed and certainly nothing to complain about.
“Trapped in a cage of her own insatiability,
Every lover’s got to flee.
To pledge her your soul is just so unsatisfactory,
She’s got somewhere new to be.”
Now Billy was realizing that his revelation had been a false god whispering in his ear. Tommy had made Daisy feel that she would never be enough for him and he had finally pushed Daisy to leave. For Billy it was different – he had always known he wasn’t enough for Camila. But Camila didn’t want him to go, she wanted Billy to stay, to keep trying, to devote himself to a lifetime of reaching for something permanently untouchable.
As if Daisy could read his fucking mind, her voice on the radio began to bellow the bridge:
“You’ll never be enough for her,
Never be enough for her,
Never be enough for her,
Never ever be enough for her,”
The song really was about Tommy, not Camila. Billy knew that. But everything in the world that was Daisy’s was his, too, somehow, and this song was no exception.
It didn’t matter, though. Camila was sick and their daughter was about to go to college. He loved her. If he hadn’t given up yet, he sure as hell wasn’t going to do it now. He was going to keep driving home and kiss her when he walked in the door and treasure a peaceful, content evening with their daughter while he could. Julia would light up at the surprise and half-heartedly protest, “I’m not a kid anymore,” and Camila would get to pull her into a hug and tell her, “You’re always my baby.” Julia would feel secure, Camila would feel whole, and Billy would feel like he did the right thing.
He wondered if Daisy had spent the last few years doing what he was doing, trying to convince herself that she was doing the right thing. He hoped she’d had good days. He tried not to think about whether she felt relieved now that it was over. Tried not to think about what she would do now, who she would go to while he was still going to his wife. But he was. He was still going to his wife.
Billy wasn’t home yet, though. For now, he turned up the radio, headed towards the backroads, and allowed himself to sing into the wind with Daisy Jones.
“Trapped in a cage of her own insatiability,
Every lover’s got to flee.
To pledge her your soul is just so unsatisfactory,
She’s got somewhere new to be.
You’ll never be enough for her,
Never be enough for her,
Never ever ever, never be enough for her,
Never ever ever,
Ever ever be enough.
You’ll never be enough for her,
Never be enough for her,
Never ever ever, never be enough for her,
Never ever ever,
Ever ever be enough.”