Daisy Jones & The Six(27)

Karen: Daisy and I were in the back minding our business the majority of that flight. We had these two chairs facing each other, a couple of cocktails, looking out the window. I remember Daisy pulled out a pillbox and knocked back two pills, washed ’em down with a sip of her drink.

She’d started wearing all of those bangles by then, as many as would fit on her arms. Everything clinked when she moved. So as Daisy is putting her pillbox back in her pocket, her bangles start clanging and I made a joke about how they were built-in tambourines. And she thought that was cool. She took a pen and wrote it down on her hand.

And then when she put the pen away, she took out the pillbox again and took two pills from it and put them in her mouth.

I said, “Daisy, you just took two.”

She said, “I did?”

I said, “Yeah.”

She just shrugged and swallowed them.

I said, “C’mon, don’t be one of those people.”

Daisy: I was irritated by that. I shoved the pillbox in her hand. I said, “Take them if you’re so worried about it. I don’t even need them.”

Karen: She threw the pills at me.

Daisy: But the moment I handed the pillbox over to her and I saw her put it in her back pocket, I started panicking. The dexies were one thing. That was fine. I could snort coke if I needed to.

But I could not sleep without the Seconals.

Karen: It surprised me how easy it was for her. To just hand it all over and stop.

Daisy: When we got to the hotel, Hank was already in my room. I said, “I ran out of reds.” He just nodded and picked up the phone. By the time I wanted to go to sleep, I had another bottle in my hand. It depressed me, how easy it was. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted the pills. I needed the pills. But it was just so boring, so repetitive. Having any narcotic I needed at any time, nobody really stopping me.

As I fell asleep that night—I think I was still holding a brandy glass—I heard myself say, “Hank, I don’t want to be with you anymore.” At first I thought there was another woman in the room, saying those words, but then I realized I was saying them. Hank told me to go to sleep. And I didn’t so much fall asleep as feel like I was disappearing.

When I woke up in the morning, I remembered what had happened. I felt embarrassed but also sort of relieved, to have actually verbalized it. I said to Hank, “We should talk about what I said last night.”

And he said, “You didn’t say anything last night.”

I said, “I told you I didn’t want to be with you.”

He just shrugged and said, “Yeah, but you say that all the time when you’re falling asleep.”

I’d had no idea.

Graham: It was pretty clear to everybody that Daisy needed to drop Hank.

Rod: There are a lot of slimy managers out there and they make the rest of us look bad. Hank was taking advantage of Daisy, clear as day. Somebody needed to be looking out for her.

I said, “Daisy, if you need help, I’m here.”

Graham: I think Daisy saw what Rod was doing for us—the way he made sure everything was taken care of. Rod was the first guy to tell anybody that we were going to rule the world. He wasn’t telling us to be happy with what we had and to keep our mouth shut. And, not to be a jerk but … he wasn’t sleeping with us and keeping us high as fuck so we didn’t know heads from tails.

I told Daisy, “Leave Hank and team up with Rod. He’s got you covered.”

Rod: I was already doing so much for Daisy anyway. I’d hooked up Rolling Stone to see the show. They were sending Jonah Berg out to come watch the set and then hang out afterward. It was a potential cover. I’d made a point of including Daisy in that. I didn’t have to. I could have pushed for it to be just a story on the band but I figured what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.

Karen: The day that Jonah Berg was coming, we were in Glasgow.

Daisy: I was stupid. I picked a fight with Hank right after sound check that day.

Karen: Graham had come over to my room that afternoon to bring me one of my suitcases. Somehow my things had ended up with his stuff. He was standing in the hotel hallway, at my door, holding a duffel bag of my bras and underwear. He said, “I believe this is yours.”

I grabbed it from him and rolled my eyes at him. I said, “Oh, I bet you just love having your hands on my panties.” I was just joking around.

But he shook his head and he said, “If I get my hands on those panties, I want to have earned it the old-fashioned way.”

I laughed and said, “Get out of here.”

And he said, “Yes, ma’am.”

And he walked back to his room. But when I shut the door, I … I don’t know.

Daisy: I broke it to Hank when it was just the two of us in my hotel room. He was putting his arms around me and I was done with it. I kept snapping at him and he asked me what my problem was and I said, “I think it’s time we part ways.” Hank tried to ignore me a few times, kept telling me I didn’t know what I was saying. So I said it really clear. “Hank, you’re fired. You should leave.” Well, he heard it that time.

Graham: Billy and I were planning on going out to grab a bite—I’d bet him he wouldn’t eat haggis.

Daisy: Hank got in my face. He was so angry and he was standing so close to me that as he spoke, his spit landed on my shoulder. He said, “You’d still just be screwing rock stars if I hadn’t found you.”