Decades

California Dreamin'

From across the room, she heard a guitar being played, and it was being played really well. Stevie Nicks, or Stephanie as she had started introducing herself lately, was trying to focus on the conversation she was having with some of the girls from her new school, but the music kept distracting her.

She found herself inching closer to hear better. She could hear someone singing, and there was something about his voice that drew her in. When she wove her way through the crowded room, she saw the most gorgeous, dreamy boy playing. He was sitting on the carpeted floor playing his guitar and hadn't looked up. The young man was more focused on his instrument than he was on anyone else in the room.

Stevie listened for a bit and admired the dark-haired young man. He was long and lean, and his limber fingers really knew their way around the strings of his guitar. He began playing California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas, and Stevie didn't hesitate. She closed the few steps between them, sat alongside, and began to sing with him.

When her voice began to harmonize with his, he looked up at her mesmerized. He gave her a wide smile of encouragement and looked at her with the most beautiful eyes she'd ever seen. They seemed to light up just for her.

As they sang the song together, watching each other closely, their voices wrapped around each other beautifully. It was clear to anyone within earshot that something enchanted was happening. To the two teens, it felt like magic, as if there was a shift somewhere in the universe. Stevie looked down at her arms and could see the chills that formed there, her reaction to the way they sounded together.

As the song came to an end, there were only the two of them in that crowded room. Stevie held Lindsey's gaze until the last note had faded away completely. Then she flashed him the most dazzling smile he'd ever seen and said, "We sound good together."

"We do," Lindsey beamed at the tiny girl with the big, beautiful voice.

She reached out her hand to shake his and said, "Hey!" giggling at the late greeting and introduction, "I'm Stephanie Nicks." As she looked into Lindsey's blue eyes, she had a strange sensation. She felt that he was familiar to her, though she was certain that she'd never seen him before that night.

She wasn't sure if she believed in such things, but it almost felt like maybe she'd known him in another life, and she was oddly awash with relief that he'd found her again in this one. 

Strange, she thought, shaking her head slightly to clear out the strangely romantic, otherworldly notion she was having about a perfect stranger. She chuckled at herself for her ever-present mystical thinking.

The smile never left his face. "I know who you are," he said with a knowing smile. Everybody does," and they did. She'd swept into school and gotten everyone's attention without even trying.

"I'm Lindsey Buckingham." He took her hand and shook it, his striking blue eyes holding hers.

"Stephanie, Stephanie!" and finally, the name to which she actually answered, "Stevie!!" she heard from across the room.

"I guess I need to go. I think my ride is leaving," she said as she looked across the room. The friend she had ridden with was motioning at her to leave.

"This was fun. Maybe we can do this again sometime," she smiled at him with her big, open smile.

"Yeah," Lindsey agreed, returning her smile and nodding, "yeah. I think we should," he told her.

Something important, though unspoken, was happening. Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham never broke their gaze. They didn't realize it at that moment, but they were looking into the eyes of the person with whom they'd have the most pivotal, most significant relationship of their lives.