Things quickly unravelled in Fleetwood Mac soon after Christine's birthday. Lindsey's ongoing problems with the band triggered a devastating domino affect, causing past resentments to unfurl between all of them. It had gotten so bad that the toxicity started affecting Christine and Stevie's relationship, something neither of them were emotionally prepared for.
Stevie returned from a television interview she took part in with Lindsey and it was clear from her face they had had a massive falling out. Christine was half-listening to Stevie's rant when the subject suddenly changed.
"Oh and is it true you wrote Little Lies about me?"
"Sorry?" Christine blinked.
"He told me Little Lies was inspired by how you didn't trust me and thought I was an unstable, crazy bitch." Stevie accused. "Is that true?"
"Lindsey's exaggerating, I never said it like that." Christine answered.
"So you did write that song about me! Why didn't you tell me?!"
Christine looked at her steadily but felt prickly and uncomfortable remembering her initial guilt over the song and what Stevie would think. She was also annoyed Lindsey betrayed her confidence in the first place.
"Does it really fucking matter now?" She ran her hand tiredly through her hair. "But yes, if you must know, I wrote that song about you because I was frustrated by how you were acting at the time and it was after you called me an alcoholic. I was upset and hurt so I poured those feelings into my music, it's no big deal now."
"I'm your girlfriend!" Stevie exclaimed in disbelief. "Of course it's a big fucking deal! Or do you not give a shit about my feelings?"
"I'm assuming you've conveniently forgotten about the billions of whiny ballads you wrote about Lindsey?" Christine countered sarcastically. "What about his feelings? Or John's feelings for that matter? We've all written songs about each other so feel free to write a revenge track about me if it bothers you so much."
Stevie opened her mouth to retort but changed her mind, choosing to shrug sadly and leave the room. Christine watched her go, feeling too exhausted and drained to run after her.
----
Christine mooched around her studio before she went looking for Stevie to apologise for her guilt-induced reaction. Technically, Stevie was right; but her delivery was terrible and it raised Christine's guard up immediately. She was starting to have problems differentiating between 'normal feisty Stevie' and 'unwell Stevie' and it drove her up the wall.
"Stevie?" She called out as she walked around the house with Layla trailing after her.
No answer.
Thinking Stevie might have taken a nap, Christine made her way to their bedroom. Instead of sighting a Stevie sized lump under the blanket, she found clothes and shoes strewn all over the bed and Christine realised she had gone out without saying a word. Sighing, she tided up Stevie's mess while Layla looked up at her bewilderedly.
"Mummy's legged it." She said to her crisply.
Christine cleaned up the bathroom, growing more and more frustrated as she rinsed out eye shadow flakes in the sink and wiped down pressed powder smudges on the counter. Unable to help herself, she opened the medicine cabinet and examined Stevie's pill organiser, disturbed to discover she had missed a day's worth of doses.
She numbly placed the box back in the cabinet and sat on the toilet seat with her head in her hands. She gave Stevie her privacy and naively trusted her to do the right thing when clearly she should have been more hands on. Stevie was out there doing God-knows-what while withdrawing; she had to find her.
After some terse phone calls, she put together that Stevie was having dinner with her Wild Heart tour director and their mutual friends somewhere in West Hollywood. Christine pondered her next move and realised there was no point in driving around trying to find her or anxiously ruminating at home. She eventually decided to go out to dinner with her own friends, leaving it to the ether to bring her girlfriend back safe and sound.
----
Christine returned at 10pm and Stevie was still missing. Sick with worry she stayed up until Stevie strolled in at around 2am, mildly inebriated and irritatingly oblivious to Christine's edgy mood.
"Where the hell have you been?"
"Out." Stevie replied with a slight slur. "You know this because you were spying on me. Ginny told me you called her."
"What?" Christine frowned. "I wasn't spying on you! You left the house without saying anything and I was worried sick out of my fucking mind so I made some phone calls."
"So I have to ask for your permission every time I leave, do I?" Stevie snapped. "You're not my mom."
"Stevie," Christine began measuredly. "Think about it. You and Lindsey had a row and then you came home and engaged in some unpleasantness with me. Of course I'd be concerned about what you would do after."
"I'm not a nut-job! I wasn't planning on throwing myself off the Hollywood sign or anything like that." Stevie shot back scathingly. "Is that really what you think of me?"
Christine took in Stevie's heightened demeanour and figured confronting her about the dose skipping wasn't a good idea. "No, honey, I don't. Let's go to bed."
Stevie vehemently shook her head. "I'm not tired. You can do whatever you want but I'm going to write some music."
"Fine." Christine said; deciding to stay up with her to make sure nothing bad happened while she was coming down.
She camped out on the couch with a coffee and drew while Stevie sat at the piano and began 'working'. Her voice sounded reedy and the chord progression was all over the place. The noise was so bad that the dogs started barking from the kitchen.
"Maybe just focus on one thing?" Christine suggested.
"Don't coach me."
Christine rolled her eyes and got back to her mindless artwork until exhaustion eventually overtook her. She fell into a troubled sleep, jolted awake by the weight of Stevie's body draped across her. Christine was relieved to feel her even breaths against her neck and soothingly ran her hand down her back.
"Babe, you're kind of crushing me." She mumbled, gently nudging Stevie to her side.
Stevie slept into the afternoon while Christine went about her day. She made them lunch and placed Stevie's morning Klonopin dose on the kitchen counter, the gesture was hardly subtle but Christine was done with niceties by that point.
"Hey." Stevie yawned as she shuffled into the kitchen.
Christine assessed Stevie's appearance while she poured herself a coffee and chowed down her sandwich. She looked hung over and dishevelled, but otherwise it was like the previous day never happened.
"We need to talk."
"About what?" Stevie asked, drifting to the pantry to pull out a bag of chips.
"Yesterday. Do you remember any of it?"
"Lindsey was being an asshole, then we got into some random fight so I went out to lose some steam," Stevie recollected lightly as she sat back down and opened the bag. "And then I came back and worked on some music, right?"
"Yes and no." Christine handed her the pill. "You haven't been taking your medication, Stevie. Please don't fight with me about this and just take the bloody thing. You can't keep doing what you're doing, it's scary and I'm so worried about you."
Stevie stared at the pill and looked up at her with an apathetic look on her face. "I feel like shit when I take it and I feel like shit when I don't take it, I don't know what I'm suppose-"
"You're supposed to be following Dr. Renmark's orders." Christine finished for her. "Whatever happens after you take your dose, we'll deal with it. But it's worse when you skip them like you've been doing recently. How many times do I have to repeat myself?"
Stevie clucked her tongue impatiently and took the medicine, washing it down with a glass of water Christine quickly handed to her. "There. Happy now? I took it for you."
"This is not about me, gorgeous," She gently turned Stevie's scowling face towards her. "You're a beautiful girl inside and out and deserve better than what you're doing to yourself. Let me help you properly, I'll keep your box and make sure you're taking them. I don't think I can trust you to manage the tapering by yourself anymore."
Stevie's lip quivered and Christine was struggling to keep her own emotions in check.
"For fuck's sake, don't give me that puppy dog look when I'm trying to have a serious conversation with you." She laughed dryly, wiping a tear from her eye.
"I can't help my face." Stevie retorted jokingly. "Look, keep the pills, manage them for me, whatever. Just don't manage other aspects of my life."
"Do you think I do that?" Christine asked her quietly.
"No, but you know I've always done my own thing." Stevie said. "I felt simultaneously attacked and smothered yesterday."
"I was worried about your state, honey. But I'm sorry I didn't tell you about Little Lies earlier. Everything changed so quickly between us and I'd forgotten a lot of what happened last year. Our life together can be crazy."
Stevie cracked her knuckles nervously. "I know you didn't sign up for this, a crazy relationship with an ex cocaine addict and prescription meds misuser."
"We all have baggage and shit we're dealing with, it doesn't mean I love you any less. We just need to be on the same page with your medication and work as a team, yeah?" She reached out and held Stevie's hand.
Stevie nodded with a slight roll of her eyes and Christine slowly pulled her hand away, feeling deflated and discouraged.
----
A few hours later, Christine was working in the studio trying to come up with possible material for her solo album when Stevie dropped in with a cup of tea.
"I thought you might want this." She said, leaving it on the table near her keyboard.
"Thank you, that was thoughtful of you."
Out of nowhere Stevie plonked herself in Christine's lap and kissed her ardently.
"What was that for?" Christine asked breathlessly when they finally separated.
Stevie ran her thumb slowly across Christine's bottom lip. "Because I love you and I'm still in love with you and I wanted you to know that."
----
A/N: Thanks for reading. I'm sorry this chapter was a bit unpleasant but the girls are going thru it. Feedback and comments are always welcome, especially regarding Stevie's growing Klonopin problem. Cheers, Ava x