I Can't Stop

Part 35

"This song is one that I wrote a few years back for the last studio album we did together called Say You Will and it was written about Stevie, as many of my songs are. But this one was written at a time when, unlike much of the body of work that you're more familiar with which was written at a time when all of our illusions were intact and, you know, much of the struggle that we all went through was right at hand for much of that and fueled a lot of the subject matter, this song was written long after that, at sort a time when most of those illusions, I think, had fallen away. The thing about illusions is that you need them in order to dream, but you sometimes need to cast away illusions in order to grow, so as we move into a new year, uh, and new perhaps way of thinking, new set of possibilities, I'm gonna dedicate this to this beautiful lady that I've known since I was about 16 years old and I'm, she's mad now, because it's gonna be difficult to do the song, it's okay, so... this is for Stevie, it's called, Say Goodbye."

The show was nearly over and everything went fine, considering. They had one last song to do and Lindsey chose to dedicate it to Stevie. She didn't expect that, she didn't expect him to say all the things he said. Lindsey was right, it was going to be extremely difficult to make it through those few minutes, because he hadn't even started playing and Stevie was having a hard time, fighting her emotions. She stood in front of thousands of people, with the spotlight on her and she just stared at Lindsey, who gave her a small smile. He was saying goodbye and she didn't want that, she didn't want to say goodbye to him.

Stevie tried her best. Her bottom lip quivered, a tear slipped down her cheek. She kept her eyes on Lindsey through the majority of the song and he glanced at her back every few lines. 

Now I finally found my way
Now I know just what to do
Once you said goodbye to me, yeah
Now I say goodbye to you

Gripping her mic tightly, Stevie felt like she was about to break down completely, especially catching the supportive, encouraging words from the fans in the audience. It was not an act, it was their lives, their reality unfolding in front of everyone. 

A little world within a world
Yes, a dream, just a dream

They had always lived in their little world, within their own dream. Right now, it did feel like the dream was over and Stevie didn't know how to deal with it. She wished Lindsey hadn't done that during a show, they could have just talked after. However, they had always communicated through music, so she understood. 

The melody faded, Stevie turned her microphone stand and let go of it. She locked eyes with Lindsey and she didn't see any of the emotions, she thought she would. He seemed... relieved, like he had let it all go. Without hesitation, they closed the gap between them and he embraced her tightly. 

"I love you. I didn't think you'd be affected so much by it, Steph, I'm sorry." Lindsey whispered to Stevie as they stood in each other's arms, she just nodded her head. "I love you." He repeated and they broke apart to take the final bow in front of the crowd. 

Feeling completely physically and emotionally exhausted, Stevie returned to her dressing room. She couldn't get out of her stage clothes fast enough. There was a lot going through her mind. The last couple of minutes of the show kept repeating in her head, Don didn't come nor did he answer any of her calls. 

For the first time in a long time, Stevie felt alone. She just wanted somebody close right now, not to talk, to let out the bottled up emotions, to be held for a while, to be told that everything was going to be okay. 

It got worse, when Stevie came back to the hotel. There was no way she was going to be able to fall asleep. Stevie took her journal to bed in hopes to pass the time writing, but nothing came out. Frustrated, she threw it away and let the tears fall. She cried for her marriage, for Lindsey, for herself, for the way things turned out. She felt like there was nothing she could do to fix any of it. 

Then there was a knock on the door. Stevie sat up in bed and checked the time, it was well past midnight. She didn't really want to see anyone, but she got up, when the knocking echoed around the room again. With messy hair, red and puffy eyes, she opened the door.

"Hey."

"Hey." Stevie sniffled, pretending like she hadn't been crying for the past hour.

"I thought that maybe we should talk."