Graham: I walked up and down the hallway of that hotel, over and over and over and over. At the end of the hallway there was a window, and I put my head on it. My forehead. And I looked down at all of the people below me. I was only a few floors up from them. I watched them walking from place to place, and I felt jealous of every single of one of them. That they weren’t me right then. I wanted to switch places with every man down there.
When I pulled my forehead off the glass, there was a huge greasy smudge where I’d touched it. I tried to wipe it away but it just made the window cloudy. I remember looking through this cloudy window, trying to rub it to make it better and nothing would help. I just kept rubbing and rubbing and rubbing. Until Rod found me somehow.
He said, “Graham, what are you doing? We gotta be in Chicago this afternoon. Bus is gonna leave without you, man.”
And somehow, I put one foot in front of the other and walked with him down to the bus.
Chicago
Stadium
July 12, 1979
Rod: It started like any other show, really. We had it down to a fine art. The lights went up, the band went out there. Graham played the opening of “This Could Get Ugly” and the crowd started screaming.
Billy: Camila was on the side of the stage. She let Julia stay up late. The twins were back at the hotel with the babysitter. I remember looking out onto the side, behind the curtains, and seeing Camila there, holding Julia on her hip. Camila’s hair was down to her waist, practically, by that point. And it was normally brown but the summer had made it lighten up a bit, it looked more gold. The two of them—Camila and Julia—had earplugs in their ears. These bright orange things poking out of either side of their heads. I smiled at them and Camila smiled back at me. Such a gorgeous smile. Her incisors were flat. Isn’t that funny? Everyone’s incisors are pointed. But hers were kind of flat. And it made her smile perfect. It was a straight line. Her smile always put me at ease.
And that night, in Chicago, when she smiled at me from the side of the stage … for that brief moment, I thought, Everything is going to be okay.
Daisy: It killed me. To look at him look at her. I can’t think of any two things that make you quite as self-absorbed as addiction and heartbreak. I had a selfish heart. I didn’t care about anyone or anything but my own pain. My own need. My own aching. I’d have made anyone hurt if it could have taken some of mine away. It’s just how sick I was.
Billy: We played everything. The way we normally did. We did “Young Stars” and “Chasing the Night” and “Turn It Off.” But it didn’t feel right. It felt … it felt like the wheels were coming off.
Warren: Karen and Graham seemed like maybe they were mad at each other. Pete seemed checked out. Eddie had been complaining about Billy—but what else was new?
Daisy: Someone in the front had a sign that said, “Honeycomb.”
Billy: People requested “Honeycomb” a lot on that tour. And I usually ignored it. I just didn’t want to sing it. But I knew that Daisy liked that song, I knew she had been proud of that song. And … I don’t know what came over me but I said into the mike, “Do you guys want to hear ‘Honeycomb’？”
Graham: I was sleepwalking through that show. I was there but I wasn’t there.
Karen: I just wanted to get through it and go back to my hotel. I just wanted some quiet. I didn’t want … I didn’t want to be up on that stage watching Graham watch me, feeling his judgment.
Warren: When Billy said “Honeycomb,” the whole place sounded like thunder.
Eddie: We’re all just here to perform the way Billy wants us to, right? We don’t need to be told we might play a song we haven’t played in a year.
Daisy: What do you say to a roaring crowd? Do you say no? Of course not.
Billy: Daisy said, “All right, let’s do it.” I got up to her mike and the moment I did it, I regretted it. I could tell she didn’t want me that close. But I couldn’t leave. I had to make it look like everything was okay.
Daisy: He smelled like pine and musk. His hair was about half an inch too long, you could see it hanging behind his ears. His eyes were clear, and green as ever.
People say it’s hard to be away from the people you love but it was so hard to be right next to him.
Billy: It’s sometimes difficult to say what I knew and when I knew it. It’s … it’s all a mess in my memory. It’s hard to parse out, I guess. What happened when or why I did what I did. Hindsight bias. But I do remember distinctly that Daisy was wearing a white dress. She had her hair pulled back in a ponytail. She had big hoop earrings on. Her bracelets. And I looked at her, just before we started singing, and I think—I really do think this—I think I thought she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen in my life. In that way that you appreciate things more acutely … I mean … you appreciate people more acutely when they are fleeting, right? And I think I knew she was fleeting. I think I knew she was leaving. I don’t know how I knew. But I feel like I knew. I probably didn’t know. It just feels like it.
So I guess what I’m saying is, when we starting singing “Honeycomb,” I either knew I was losing her or I didn’t. And I either knew I’d loved her or I didn’t. And I either appreciated her, for all she was in that moment … or maybe I didn’t.
Daisy: I started singing and I looked at him. And he looked at me. And, you know what? For three minutes, I think I forgot we were performing for twenty thousand people. I forgot his family was standing there. I forgot we were singers in a band. I just existed. For three minutes. Singing to the man I loved.
Billy: The right song, at the right time, with the right person …
Daisy: And then right before the end of the song, I looked over to the side of the stage to see Camila standing there.
Billy: And I just … [pauses] God, I was so frayed at the edges.
Daisy: And I knew he wasn’t mine.
He was hers.
And then I … I just did it. I sang the song as Billy originally wrote it. No questions.
“The life we want will wait for us/we will live to see the lights coming off the bay/and you will hold me, you will hold me, you will hold me/until that day.” It was the hardest line I’ve ever had to get through.
Billy: When I heard her, singing the lines as I originally wrote them, singing about this future that Camila and I would have … There had been so much doubt in my heart. So much doubt in myself that I could keep going down the good road I was on. And I … [breathes deeply] Those lyrics. That small gesture. For one moment, Daisy didn’t remind me that I might fail. She sang the song like she knew I’d succeed. Daisy did that. Daisy. I didn’t know how much I needed it until she gave it to me. And it should have just made me feel better but it hurt, too.
Because if I was the man I wanted to be—if I could give Camila the life I’d promised her—well, I mean … there was loss in that, too.
Daisy: I fell in love with the wrong guy who was exactly the right guy. And I had made decisions time and time again that made it worse and never made it better. And I’d finally pushed myself right over the edge.
Billy: When we got off the stage, I turned to Daisy and I didn’t have any words. She smiled at me but it was one of those smiles that isn’t a smile at all. And then she walked away. And my heart sank.