hang out in your heart

i should have slept with one eye open

Kristen knows what people think.

Of her, of Lindsey, of their marriage. She may be young and relatively new to this rock star life, but she's not an idiot. She's heard it from her friends throughout their whole relationship thus far. 'Are you sure you can trust him, Kit? You know his history with...her.' Kristen can't even count how many times she'd reassured family, friends, even acquaintances she'd barely known (other moms she's met at Will's school have a tendency to be far too nosy for their own good) that yes, she knows that Lindsey and Stevie have a very long history, and no, she's not worried about it.

And it's true, for the most part. After all - she looks down at Stella, the baby resting comfortably on Kristen's chest as she sleeps, contentedly full after her feeding - I'm the one with his kids. I'm the one with his name. As much as Stevie may want to fool herself into thinking that Lindsey still has feelings for her, the cold, hard facts state otherwise.

Oh, Kristen knows, too, what Stevie thinks of her. From the second she'd first met Lindsey's ex-girlfriend, she'd gotten the message loud and clear without the singer even needing to speak. He's mine. And Kristen had been polite, shaking the blonde's small hand, all the while rubbing her pregnant belly in her own unspoken communication. Not anymore. And as the next two years flew past, she and Lindsey had had another child and gotten married (and yes, she admits that she really did have to push Lindsey into that, but honestly, it's just like a man to need to be threatened before he would commit). And where was Stevie? Nowhere to be found, cementing Kristen's place as the most important woman in Lindsey's life, bar none.

It had, therefore, been a bit of a shock when this tour had started up and Kristen had experienced what it was really like to spend any significant amount of time with the famously intense Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham. She admits it had disturbed her, at first, to see how tight the bond between her husband and his ex was. Even when they fought (and Kristen has to admit that she'd relished those times), shouting at one another loudly enough to bring the house down, they still had some unexplainable hold on each other that nobody could break into. They knew exactly how to hurt one another, and she'd never seen her husband so wounded as when Stevie really got a dig in. For someone Lindsey claims has such a place in his heart, Kristen has never seen people be so openly hostile to one another, so willing to launch an attack. And when they weren't fighting? Well. Kristen kept a close leash on Lindsey, staking her claim, which he seemed to appreciate. After all, not only does she have the kids and the name on her side - she has all the power as well.

She places Stella gently into her carrier, nodding to Alex and sweeping out of the small dressing room without a word. She heads up to the stage to catch a quick glimpse of the show; the band is playing a few new songs, and they have been rehearsing almost without ceasing to get it all right. She might as well take a look to see how they're going. Lindsey's been so stressed about it, so distracted at home; he's barely been spending any time with her alone in the past several weeks. She knows how worried he can get when he wants everything to be perfect, and she doesn't blame him for his preoccupation. Besides that, some of these songs haven't been played since the seventies - before her time - and she's sure he's fretting about that as well. No wonder he and the band had been rehearsing so much.

She is horrified, therefore, when she creeps up the stairs and hears panicked yelling, sees people milling around in horror with their hands over their open mouths as Ray Lindsey frantically works with a guitar, bellowing angrily at the people around him. What the fuck happened?

"The guitars are completely fucked up," she hears in her ear, and she turns to see her niece almost shaking with embarrassment. "We have no idea what happened."

Oh, god. Lindsey would be in a rage about this. Kristen, his own wife, is barely allowed to even touch his guitars, let alone do anything that might mess with their tuning, and that's at home, in their own studio. The idea of the guitars being out of tune onstage is incomprehensible. She's almost afraid to see how her husband is reacting, but she makes her way to the edge of the stage; maybe she'll be able to catch Lindsey's eye. After all, there's nobody who can soothe her husband like she can, and he probably needs her now, is most likely wondering where she is.