Say You Will Part 1: Destiny Rules

Like A Tunnel To The Sea

Hollywood, California
Tuesday, May 29, 2002
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Lindsey Buckingham considered himself to be a good father.

When Lindsey had lost his father suddenly to a heart attack in 1974, not long before he and Stevie had gotten the call from Mick Fleetwood that had changed their lives forever, he had spent a lot of time thinking about the things he and Jeff and Greg had learned from him in his time on earth, and he had confided in Stevie one night that he was not sure he had what it took to be Morris Buckingham and be a good father.

"But that's the thing...you won't be Morris Buckingham...you'll be LINDSEY Buckingham...and you'll know what to do, baby."

Stevie had found out she was pregnant two days before. She knew when it had happened - it was the day she'd accepted his apology for Aspen and they'd danced in the kitchen with Ginny the dog to "Dance With Me" by Orleans. Jess had told her to set a six-month time frame for the music to work out before coming home to finish college and become a teacher, and if she had the baby, she knew, Jess and Barbara would help them get married and get a house and start their family back in Northern California...Part of her could already picture Lindsey in a pool with his son, teaching him to swim as she sat under an umbrella in the yard with a glass of lemonade and her journal, composing a poem about how everything she needed was right there in the water before her.

The fantasy had come to an abrupt end two weeks later in the middle of the night in a pool of blood instead, Stevie screaming for Lindsey to wake up out of his marijuana-induced sleep and take her to the emergency room. In the end, they'd been left with an ER bill they couldn't pay and Stevie crying in their Toyota with no reverse, Lindsey telling her they'd try again when the time was right, both of them secretly knowing the universe was telling them to keep pursuing the music, that they would get the rest of the dream later, when a three-hundred-dollar hospital bill didn't bankrupt them.

She had written a poem in her journal for her baby and named him Aaron Morris, her grandfather and his, and sketched a picture of a man with long curly hair and a goatee in the ocean with his toddler son.

Stevie knew Lindsey loved his children. No matter what was happening between him and his wife, Will and LeeLee knew their father loved them and she could already see the stereotypical relationships forming - Will followed him around like his personal hero and LeeLee could get anything she wanted if she acted cute enough. It was sweet to watch...

But they should have been hers.

Kristen Buckingham knew what she was doing the day she'd spoken to Stevie at the studio before the Memorial Day weekend. She knew that her words hit Stevie right where she lived, knew they would cripple her on her birthday as punishment for being the woman that Lindsey loved no matter what ring he wore on his finger. She was a little surprised at Lindsey; apparently he had not shared the information about their two pregnancy losses with his wife any time in the last four and a half years, from the way she'd spoken. She was glad, at least; there were still some things between them that remained sacred.

They had been arguing about Kristen, in fact, when they lost their second pregnancy. When Stevie had found Kristen's greeting card to Lindsey wishing him good luck on The Dance, still in his overnight bag in her bedroom, indicating it meant something to him, she begun yelling at him...stopping only when she was suddenly doubled over in pain, the familiar bleeding that was the loss of Lindsey's child starting before she could even make it down the stairs.

It might have been too early to tell the sex of the baby, but in her heart, she'd known it was a girl. Once again, she'd written a poem in her journal, and named her baby Robin Barbara Buckingham Nicks - the two most important women in her life, and both of their last names because she had been their ultimate collaboration.