Things had been shaky between me and the band for a while; it was inevitable that there'd be a blow up, so Mick and Christine in particular were treading carefully. Lindsey had showed up in my hotel room the night after the MusiCares event. I hadn't even had a chance to take my make up off, and he started a battle.
I had been replaying the conversation over and over.
"So, anything new yet?"
"Lindsey, I'm touring. I'm enjoying playing. Please let me enjoy it."
"You know we need you for an album, Stevie."
"I really can't be with you in a studio. Not the way things have been."
"You can't be with me? Are you fucking kidding?"
"You know how you are. And you clearly don't like me that much right now, so it's bound to be a disaster. I'm too old for that shit."
"You made some of your best music when I didn't like you."
I rolled my eyes. "Can you just leave?" I headed to the door and started to open it.
"No. Not until I talk some sense into you."
"I don't need your 'sense' Lindsey. I need you to leave me alone."
"God damn it, Stevie. I've been waiting for over a decade for you to get your head out of your ass. Are you planning on stringing us along forever? If you want to leave, fucking leave. But you're making this miserable."
"Me? I'm making this miserable? I'm finally having fun! I've had a shit year, Lindsey, and for the past month this has been looming over me. I knew you couldn't just get through this event without starting something.
"You're doing this because of me?"
"It's always because of you, isn't it? Every fucking thing I do is because of you. I can't do it anymore. I don't want to be nagged about creating music for the sake of selling YOUR songs on an album."
"This is your job! You owe this to us."
"I owe you jack shit. Stop manipulating me."
"Stevie, you have to do this tour. And I'm tired of touring without anything new. Maybe you're fine resting on shit we did 30 years ago, but I am not."
"I have nothing to prove, Lindsey. You need to go now."
"Everybody can be replaced, Stevie,"
"Then fucking replace me! You've already done an album without me, a tour without me. Go make another one! I have other things to do right now."
"Look, you can sit there and mourn Tom for another couple months before we go if that's what you need, but -"
"Excuse me? You think this is about Tom?"
"You've basically been in a hole since October."
"Fuck you. My best friend died. I needed some time."
He shook his head, clearly frustrated. I was so angry I wasn't even sure what to say.
"We don't all have the luxury of selling out arenas on our own. Stop being so fucking selfish."
Still reeling from the Tom comment, I hauled off and slapped him. He looked stunned - I hadn't been this upset with him in probably 30 years. He wasn't expecting me to lose it. "Get. The. Fuck. Out. Of. My. Room." He watched me, frozen. "I swear to God, I will call the cops if you don't leave right now."
I must have sounded as serious as I felt in that moment. I hadn't heard from him since.
Mick, always the mediator, had tried to smooth things over. He had tried to get us to talk. Lindsey played nice and tried to make me look like the hardass, which did nothing but piss me off more.
Mick had called me repeatedly.
"Stevie, we need you. And we need him. Please. You don't even really have to interact with him."
"Mick, I will not spent 2 hours a night on stage with him. I won't do it. So if he's on this tour, I will not be. Make it Buckingham McVie. I'm fucking done."
"You're going to make me choose between you and him?"
"I'm not making you do anything. I 'm saying that I will not tour with him. If he is removed from the equation, I'd love to be on the road with you and Christine and John this year."
I tried to sound diplomatic, but Mick knew Lindsey had gotten to me. I'd never really been good at concealing my emotions.
When Christine called and told me that Mick had actually asked Lindsey to leave, I was stunned. I hadn't expected him to actually go through with it. My heart stopped every time I thought about it.
What had I done?
