Heart of the Matter

5

May 24, 2018

Stevie turned down her fifth request for a 70th birthday party because she hadn't celebrated her birthday since her baby was taken. When she wakes up on the 24th, she sits up in bed and she starts crying. The same thing she's done every year for nineteen years. She eventually works her way out of bed down the hall to the nursery where she cuddles the baby blanket that Kendall never got to use and rocks in the rocking chair. To try and cope with it, she'd rock a baby doll but it was never the same. It wasn't the same simply because the baby doll wouldn't breathe, wouldn't wiggle around, wouldn't nuzzle against her breast. At one point she even stooped so low as to pull down her nightgown and place the doll against her nipple but it just wasn't the same. It didn't suckle and she wasn't producing milk and it just made everything worse. 

She's snuggling the blanket when Karen walks in. "Hey Boss, here's the album. I even got Warner Brothers to pull some strings and this is her address." 

"Thank You." Stevie sniffles taking the album and going into her bedroom, still snuggling the baby blanket. 

She puts the CD in her player and then flips the case around. 

1. I Hope

2. River Rose Featuring Craig Wade

3. How You Remind Me

4. Dammit

5. Let Me Go Featuring Lindsey Buckingham

6. Little Do You Know Featuring Lindsey Buckingham

7. Anyone

8. Good One

9. Hall of Fame

10. Wasted

11. Undo It

12. Love Story

She loved all of the songs, but she connected the most with Little Do You Know. She gnawed on her lip and stared at the blanket before grabbing at her journal. 

***

Instead of celebrating on her birthday, Lindsey had come to spend the day with Craig and Kendall on the day after, the 25th because it was a Friday. Kendall excused herself to get the mail and as she was walking back into the Condo Lindsey and Craig were hugging each other. 

"What's going on?" She asks.

"Well...I was going to wait, but I might as well do it now...Kendall Rose Buckingham...Will You Marry Me?" Craig asks getting on his knee and pulling a ring box out of his back pocket. 

The ring was silver, and the band was braided. With a not small but not medium-sized cushion cut diamond on it. 

"Yes." She giggles as he slips it on her finger and kisses her.

"He asked me and everything...Congrats kiddo." Lindsey laughs taking her in his arms.

"Daddy, will you walk me down the aisle?" Kendall questions.

"I was hoping you'd ask." He smiles as she hugs him again. 

"Alright...moving on, what was in the mail." Craig laughs as everyone pulls apart and retakes their seats in the living room.

"Bills mostly...I um, I got a letter though." Kendall sighs.

"From who?" Craig questions.

"S. Buckingham 105 Napoli Dr, Pacific Palisades, Santa Monica California, 90272." She reads.

"Stevie Nicks?" Craig questions.

"Yeah...Stevie Nicks, I'm shocked that she still goes by Buckingham though...I figured she'd change her name back to Nicks after our divorce." Lindsey chimes in.

"Well read it," Craig instructs. 

 Kendall sighs but she rips open the letter with her fingernail. 

"Dear Kendall...First, I would like to apologize for accusing Lindsey of sleeping with you. It was wrong of me to do that, but I...well, I won't get into it. This letter isn't easy for me to write...not for anything that you did, but May 24th is a hard day for me. 

"See, Lindsey and I had a daughter. Today would be her 20th birthday...but I also know from your Wikipedia page and the interview that we both attended that today is your 20th birthday also. You have the same name we gave our daughter...Kendall Rose Buckingham, though I'm almost ninety-nine percent sure that your last name isn't Buckingham...but there is one part of me that kind of wishes you were my daughter. 

"See she was born a little after two in the morning. Once she was checked out and I held for a little while, Lindsey and I knew we needed some sleep and though the Hospital said she could sleep with us, we insisted that we didn't want special treatment and if it was protocol to send the baby to the nursery we were going to send the baby to the nursery...At Cedars-Sinai that was the requirement. 48 hours after birth they were allowed to sleep in your room because that gave mom time to recover and sleep. 

"We were woken up around six the next morning to sirens and code pink being called. At eight, a nurse came in and told us that our baby was the baby that had been stolen. The police think she's dead, Lindsey and I don't though. The Los Angels PD closed the missing person case. 

"But enough about that...if I write anymore I'm going to bust out into tears and I don't want to ruin this letter like I did the last three I tried to write. Anyway, I was really writing this to tell you how much I love your album. River Rose is such a great album and I was looking at the little booklet. You wrote all of these songs and that's so impressive. A lot of songwriters nowadays aren't writing their own songs and I think it's horrible really. 

"My favorite one is Little Do You Know...I know, you sing and wrote that song with Lindsey and I feel like that's why I connected with it...It's our story, isn't it? It's beautiful and as soon as it started and your voice echoed...It was so haunting. I was in tears for the whole song and I just...I love that song. It's your landslide and I hope to God that when you go on tour, you and Lindsey sing that song every single night. I can't sing it with him, but you can. Everyone's blaming me for his firing and in a way they're right but there's more to the story and I think you figured it out without even knowing it and it's in several of the songs that are on this album...Little Do You Know, Dammit, Let me Go...You nailed it. 

"I hope to hear from you, Stevie Nicks-Buckingham." Kendall reads. 

"Kendall...I think you need to send her your birth certificate." Craig sighs.

"Um, I...I have her address so I think I might just go there tomorrow." She looks down.

"I'm not going with you, but the gate code is your birthday. the shortened version. Not the whole long thing." Lindsey explains.