Say You Will Part 1: Destiny Rules

That Always Seems To Heal The Wounds

Santa Monica, California
Wednesday, May 30, 2002
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"Did you ever cheat on me besides the guy who had the same name as me?"

They were laying all of their cards on the table. It was after three in the morning when both Stevie and Lindsey found themselves awake after dozing off in each other's arms, waking up to make love a second time, and then sleeping some more. Stevie had shaken Lindsey awake in near hysterics at two o'clock, telling him he'd better get his ass home or he'd be in trouble, but he'd told her he had it covered, that he'd just explain that he fell asleep in the studio and was too tired and/or stoned to drive home until morning, telling Stevie it worked before. "How do you think I was able to hold you all night on the couch on your birthday, angel?" They had taken some time to regroup - using the bathroom, creeping downstairs for two bottles of Fiji water from the fridge, Stevie grabbing Sulamith to bring the tired, confused dog up to bed with them while Lindsey threw on his t-shirt and boxers, and once Stevie had dug into a dresser drawer to find her white nightgown -the little white nightgown he had loved her in since the weekend they recorded "Twisted" together some years before, they had crawled back into bed to talk but had wound up in a deeper conversation than they'd expected, hashing out everything they had wanted to say since 1968. They were taking turns answering honest questions in a game of Truth Or Dare that was really just Truth, and Lindsey asked that question knowing of her one-night affair with the guy who was ironically named Lindsay, whom they knew from a friend's restaurant.

"No," Stevie answered honestly. "I cheated on others with you, but never the other way around."

"Okay." Lindsey sighed, accepting her answer. "Your turn, Stevie."

"How much of your relationship with Carol Ann was love and how much was a campaign to make me miserable on the Rumors tour?" Stevie could still see Carol Ann draped all over Lindsey as he sat shirtless in a pair of flared jeans, before he'd cut off all his hair, signing albums with a permanent marker backstage in Japan, talking about how a person could get high just signing autographs because of the marker fumes.

"I'd say it was about thirty percent of each of those," Lindsey replied.

"That's only sixty, Linds," Stevie said, her nose wrinkling in concentration. Lindsey couldn't help but lean over from where he lay on his stomach, hands thrust under his pillow, and kiss her nose. She is so adorable, he thought. She is fifty-four! How is she still so darn cute?!

"The other forty percent was pity," Lindsey admitted. "Pity for her. I'm actually ashamed of that." He took a deep breath in and out and took his turn, asking, "Did you love Joe Walsh more than me?" He'd heard her talking in multiple interviews for years about how Joe Walsh was the love of her life.

"Not more, just with more intensity because I needed to see if I could love intensely again," Stevie admitted. "I loved Joe a lot, and I'm sorry you have to hear me say that...but not more, sweetheart...just differently." Stevie, too, was lying on her stomach in bed, facing him with her head turned on the pillow as Sulamith slept in a circle between their knees. She asked, "What was your honest reaction when Mick came to you and told you he and I were seeing each other?"

Lindsey swallowed hard; he would never forget the nervous, pained expression on Mick Fleetwood's face when he had come to Lindsey's hotel room door in 1977 and told him over scotch that yes, he was married to Jenny, but he and Stevie had been sleeping together since Hawaii and he was in love with her. He answered honestly, "My first reaction? Actually, it was my second reaction that was jealousy. My first reaction was concern for you."

"Why concern, baby?" Stevie reached out and stroked his cheek. He was still such a beautiful man...those eyes! My God, why were they so damn blue?!