Buckingham Nicks A/U Series Part 4: The Dance

Looking Out For Love

Los Angeles, California
Tuesday, May 20, 1997
(4:30 pm)
********************

"Today is gonna be the day that they're gonna throw it back to you...By now, you should've somehow realized what you gotta do...I don't believe that anybody feels the way I do about you now..."

Stevie had not said a word since she and Karen had gotten into the car. She was staring out the window on the passenger's side, watching the Pacific Ocean whir by in the distance as they drove along the 1-10 at the beginning of rush hour traffic and listened to "Wonderwall" by Oasis on the car radio. Julia loved this song, Stevie recalled as she sang along in her head, and she had taught her parents to love it as well a few years ago when she was in high school and still living at home, playing the What's The Story, Morning Glory? album on repeat in her bedroom. Lindsey was more partial to "Don't Look Back In Anger". Stevie's favorite was "Wonderwall" - it reminded her of their relationship in the Seventies, when they were young and broke and dramatic and jealous but so in love they both knew there was no turning away.

"Backbeat, the word is on the street that the fire in your heart is out...I'm sure you've heard it all before, but you never really had a doubt...I don't believe that anybody feels the way I do about you now...And all the roads we have to walk are winding...And all the lights that lead us there are blinding...There are many things that I would like to say to you, but I don't know how...because maybe...you're gonna be the one that saves me...and after all...you're my wonderwall..."

Karen reached up and pulled down the sun visor above the steering wheel, the afternoon sunlight starting to create a blindspot as she attempted to direct the car into the middle lane. She hadn't said a word either; she knew that Stevie needed to be alone with her thoughts. She wondered sometimes, when she was driving Stevie somewhere - or home from having been somewhere - if she ever felt upset that she'd let her driver's license lapse in 1978 and never gotten it back, if only to be alone with her thoughts in the car when something major was happening.

Something major was happening.

Pregnant at forty-nine. Stevie had felt her soul leave her body when her gynecologist had entered the office about forty minutes before where she'd been sitting patiently, legs crossed, hands folded neatly over her knee, and he'd sat down behind his big mahogany desk, manila folder of test results in front of him, and said, "Well, Stevie, I guess you can't count yourself out of the race just yet! You are six weeks pregnant. We should schedule a follow-up for next week so you can hear the heartbeat and we can run a few tests. Bring Lindsey in if you want; I'm sure he'd like to hear the heartbeat the same as the last three."

Stevie had not told Lindsey - or anyone else besides Karen - that she had made the appointment. Three days of nausea as of Saturday had turned to four, then five, and by Monday afternoon she'd begun to suspect that morning sickness was the culprit when her period still hadn't appeared and she'd begun to add breast tenderness to her growing list of symptoms. She'd sneaked off to the dressing room on a break from rehearsal with The Mac to call for an emergency appointment, and then called Karen so she could get a ride downtown to Cedars where her doctor's office was. Mick had been roaming about the corridor while she was dialing Karen's number, and she'd spoken in hushed tones.

"Karen, you have to take me to Cedars to see Richard tomorrow at three, and whatever you hear, you keep your mouth shut for me, okay? If this is what I think it is, I'm going to have to tell Lindsey, and he'd hate it if anyone besides you knew first."

"I get it," Karen said over the phone, sounding audibly stunned and a tad bit judgmental. "I'll pick you up at rehearsal at, like, two, just in case of traffic." There was a long pause, and Stevie could hear her breathing on the other end of the call before she said, "Am I allowed to ask how the hell this happened?"