Running Down A Dream

It Was Always Cold, No Sunshine

Regent Berlin Hotel
Berlin, Germany
Monday, October 3, 2022
(11:30 pm)
********************

Reruns of The Nanny were somehow funnier dubbed in German.

Lindsey was lying in bed in his suite at the hotel and watching The Nanny, too lazy to change the channel or just open up Netflix on his laptop and find a movie to fall asleep to. From what he could make out, the episode had to do with Mr. Sheffield having told Fran he loved her on a turbulent flight that almost went down, and then taken it back. He somehow remembered watching this episode before, in English...and suddenly it came to him.

Stevie had made him watch The Nanny with her every week in 1997, the year they'd recorded The Dance for MTV and taken it on the road...the year they'd been together again...the year before everything had changed.

He could remember so clearly sitting on Stevie's living room, curled up on the couch, her little yorkie Sara Belladonna in between them, shoveling in hot buttered popcorn and feeding it to each other, until inevitably someone would have a dribble of liquid butter on their lips or in the corner of their mouth, and the other would kiss it away, leading to a sweet make-out session reminiscent of high school lovers even though they were in their forties then. Lindsey continued to watch the episode dubbed in German and he could almost smell the popcorn, remembering Stevie, in his Rolling Stones t-shirt and pajama bottoms, had kissed him by surprise when the show went to commercial.

"Butter drip...I didn't want you to miss it, baby."

Lindsey smiled, watching as Stevie took the bowl of popcorn and placed it on the coffee table, and then climbed onto his lap. His arms went around her as she straddled him, her arms around his neck for support, as she leaned in for another, longer kiss.

"Mmmm...now THAT was not to catch dripping butter, I'm sure," Lindsey teased as their mouths slowly pulled apart. "You're just being naughty."

"That's because I'm your little dirty girl...remember?" She was whispering her words into his lips, and he was growing increasingly turned on beneath her, as she could feel. He knew she could because she had begun to rock her hips ever so slowly against him, gently back and forth.

"Ooh...I didn't know I'd be seeing my dirty girl tonight," he said, and he leaned in to begin suckling softly at her neck. "Dirty girl...what do you want me to do about that? How do you want me to love you, Stephanie? You can have anything you want." He was nibbling now, his warm, wet kisses on her neck making her moan, until he brought his mouth to hers again and kissed her long and passionately, his tongue caressing hers and making her whimper right into his mouth.

"Baby..." Stevie whispered as their lips parted, then touched and parted again. "You know how I like it...you know exactly how to touch me...I trust you...you won't let your dirty girl down."

In a flash, Lindsey lifted her from his lap and she was beneath him on the couch, whimpering as he covered her body with kisses. The popcorn and the TV forgotten, he was pleasuring her with his mouth and she was gasping for breath, crying out begging him.

"Baby...I can't...it's too good..too much, Lindsey...Lindsey!" Her pitch went higher and higher as he tasted her coming against his mouth, shaking and whimpering and finally just collapsing beneath him.

"That's what dirty girls get, Stephanie," Lindsey hissed against her skin as he brought his mouth back up to hers for a kiss. "They don't get a warning...they just get it hard and fast..." He was positioning himself above her, watching her recover just in time for him to thrust himself inside of her with a long, low moan that she matched with her own. His hands were at her waist so he could pull her into him again and again, looking down at her and suddenly slowing down so he could take it all in with his eyes - her long blonde hair splayed out against the sofa like rays of sunshine, her eyes shut tight in concentration, her lips parted slightly as she panted with his every move - and he couldn't imagine doing this with anyone else ever again. He loved her so much it hurt, and a few minutes later, when he was holding her tight against him and pouring into her, he whispered, "My God...Stephanie...I love you so fucking much...oh God, I love you!"

He wanted every night to be like this for the rest if their lives.

Lindsey turned over in bed, determined to actually get some sleep tonight. A few of the members of his band had taken him to dinner for his birthday but called it an early night, telling him he had to rest if he was going to tour the U.S. venues he had planned to play at throughout the fall. He'd spoken to all three of his kids on FaceTime, thanked Kristen for her happy birthday text and told her he hoped she was doing well. Then TV channel surfing had been the only thing left to do besides scrolling through Instagram on his phone and looking at footage of Stevie on her own concert tour.

She'd brought Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam out to sing duet with her on "Stop Dragging My Heart Around" at the Ohana festival, he'd seen recently. He knew how much she missed Tom Petty; she'd had several men sing that song with her since his death but he knew there was a hole in her heart that would never again be filled. She was performing at the Hollywood Bowl tonight, he'd read, and several people on the internet were speculating that Harry Styles would make an appearance. He doubted it. But he knew John McVie would be in the audience to cheer her on; John had told him on the phone when he'd called him for his birthday.

He pictured her out there with her tambourine in hand, dancing along the front of the stage to "Edge Of Seventeen", dedicating "Landslide" to someone with a story behind it, trying not to get emotional when she sang "Free Fallin'" and twirling in the middle of "Stand Back" in her black and gold cape.

And he pictured himself standing backstage when she was done, an armful of red roses waiting for her, smiling as she leapt into his arms and he told her how proud he was of her, how much he'd missed her, and then take her home and lock the door behind them and never leave her side for the rest of their lives. But he'd lost that right.

He'd lost it when he'd dragged his feet for years in a marriage that had been wrong from the start.

He'd lost it when he'd mocked her as she'd made her heartfelt speech about Tom at MusiCares.

He'd lost it when he'd refused to apologize and instead pretended he was the injured party.

He'd lost it when he'd left the hotel room as he heard her sobbing to everyone that she loved him and not gone back inside.

He'd lost it when he'd sued Fleetwood Mac instead of calling her to try and make it right.

He'd lost Stevie when he'd assumed she'd always be there and not fought for her.

Now he was lying all alone in a hotel room in Berlin, missing his home, missing his life, wishing it would stop raining. It had been raining all week, no sunshine, and all he could think of when he wished for a sunny day was how Stevie's hair looked like the sunshine whenever it spilled around her while she was lying beneath him, looking up at him with so much love in her eyes he almost couldn't take it.

His doctors had told him he could fly home on Friday if his results improved.

He wondered where Stevie would be on Saturday morning when he landed. It was time to make things right.

********************