Settling Down

2

July 23rd, 1990

The girls were still sleeping, he trusted them enough to be home by themselves. Emily was 12 and that's how old he was when his parents started leaving him home alone. So he was enjoying his morning cup of coffee out on his front porch swing. The front of the house faced East so the sun would rise there every single morning. They had been there for two days, and met the old couple that lived next door and the older woman promised she'd at least peep in on them throughout the day. He cocked an eyebrow as a woman with brown curly hair came walking up to the front door.

"Lady you do realize you're on a cops property." Lindsey states.

"That's pretty blatant." She points him up and down. "No, I'm Karen Johnston...I work for the woman that lives across the street."

"Oh so someone does live behind that giant ass property fence." Lindsey Points to the walled off land across the street.

"Yeah, and I'm here to serve you with an NDA. Unless there is a direct danger to the occupant of that house, such as a fire or a robbery you will not step foot on their property, you will not question the people that come in and out of that gate, and you most certainly will not look in on the occupant."

Lindsey just cocks an eyebrow.

"Not like I was planning on it anyway..." He lowers his voice, "I didn't even want to make nice with Mr. and Mrs. Healy over there, I just wanted to make sure that my kids were looked in on while I was at work. So you don't have to worry about it, but feel free to let the occupant know that if they need anything, I'm licensed to carry and I'm a cop. If I must sign that piece of paper, I will...but my twelve year old and my eight year old will not be."

He clicks his pen and scribbles on the line before he shoos her off of his property. His time in Santa Monica was looking bleaker by the day. He was going to have a hard enough time paying his HOA fee, and his water bill and he didn't want to worry about some person living across the street who didn't want any onlookers.

***

When Lindsey got home from work, he gathered his girls up and still in his uniform-he got off at six, his stupid lunch was at 3 so he could pick his kids up from school in the fall-he was hungry and in desperate need of groceries so he loaded his kids up and took them to the grocery store that was a block away from their subdivision and when he got there, there was a security detail out front and the store was for all intents and purposes shut down. There were customers outside the doors groaning and complaining because they needed bread and milk so looking at the scene, Lindsey hauled is girls up to the guard.

"Officer, what's going on here, can I be of some assistance?" Lindsey asks. He was still in full dress so if he needed to call for backup he very well could.

"Nothing Officer, we're the security detail of Stevie Nicks. She's in the store getting groceries for her tour bus. So we're going to have to kindly ask you to wait with the rest of the shoppers until she's out and we've cleared the scene."

"You're fucking kidding me...what do you think is going to happen, someone's going to mob her."

"Yes actually."

"Oh for the love of god. How does pizza sound for dinner girls?" Lindsey rolls his eyes.

"Yes please." Stella gives him a small smile.

Still being new to the area it takes them a while until they find a pizza parlor and then when they see the first one they whip into the parking lot. They order a pepperoni, cheese, and mushroom pizza and as they're eating, silently Emily looks at her father.

"Whose Stevie Nicks?"

"Stevie Nicks...she's um, well, she's a rock and roll singer. You know that song Edge of Seventeen...."

"No..." Emily shakes her head.

"Just like the White Winged Dove sings a song sounds like she's singing." Lindsey tries to sing the song.

"Oh yeah...I love that song...she sings Stand Back too, right?"

"Yeah she does. That's who Stevie Nicks is." Lindsey nods.

"And she was at the grocery store so they shut it down...that seems kind of stupid." Stella states.

"Stella we don't say Stupid." Lindsey shakes his head.

"Fine, Dumb. Why would they have to shut it down if she's just getting apples?" Stella asks.

"Well, see...Stevie Nicks has a lot of fans and sometimes fans can get a little too carried away, like when we went to that USC game a couple months before mom died, and those fans got in a fist fight?" He asks.

"Yeah, that was scary." Stella nods.

"Well, her fans can get scary too but in a different way. No one's going to punch her or anything, but people might decide to follow her home, or they might decide that they want to try and take something from her, or touch her that kind of thing." Lindsey shrugs.

"Like giving a hug?"

"No, a little bit more inappropriately than that."

"Oh like if a stranger was going to touch my privates and I had to scream and yell for help?" Stella asks.

He was a cop so his kids knew about rape, murder, drugs, alcohol, he didn't hide anything from them he just gave them a PG version of it all.

"Yeah kind of like that. They're just trying to make sure no one hurts her...but I do think it was kinda dumb to close out the entire store, because they could've just stuck four or five men around her to keep people away from her." Lindsey explains.

"Maybe she's the one that lives across the street behind the fence."

"I doubt it." Lindsey sighs biting into his slice of pizza.

"She could, she was at our neighborhood grocer." Emily points out.

"While that's true, I don't want you girls trying to go over there. I got served with papers this morning saying we weren't to step foot on that property unless it was an emergency." Lindsey shrugs.

"Fine. Ruin our fun." Emily huffs falling back against the chair.

"If you do it, do it sneakily, and DON'T GET CAUGHT!." His girls were too much like him so he knew they were going to try and investigate whether he told them they could or not.