Buckingham Nicks A/U Series: That's What Love Is All About

Through Thick And Thin (Rehearsal Dinner, Part One)

Birmingham, England
Friday, December 13, 2024
(6:00 pm)
********************

Stephanie McVie had fallen in love with the camera before she even knew how to spell the word photography.

Standing in her bedroom in the large English castle her aunt and uncle had rented for the week of their wedding and touching up her hair with a flatiron, she briefly considered being upset that they'd chosen to hire professional photographers to document the Big Day. Uncle Aaron had told her it was nothing personal; he and Aunt Olivia had decided it was more important for her to be just a member of the family and have fun at the wedding than to rush around all day and night with camera equipment.

"It has nothing to do with your abilities, Steph," Uncle Aaron had told her back home in California. "Your work is beautiful! We just think you shouldn't have to pull double duty as our niece AND our photographer. Enjoy the party! You know your grandma needs you out on the dance floor."

Uncle Aaron had a point, she thought. Grandma Stevie loved to dance, and she had a great time out on the floor at every party with her daughters, with Aunt Lori and Aunt Sharon, with Grandma Chris when she was alive, but she knew there was a special connection between the two Stephanies whenever she stood on the sidelines at any event and heard her grandmother's squeaky rasp over the music, calling out, "I can't do it without Stephanie Jr., baby girl! Get your butt over here and dance with me!"

Stephanie remembered one particular Thanksgiving Day when she was only three, when her brother John was a baby and being fawned over by all of the adults and leaving her sitting in a corner of Grandma Stevie's living room wondering how her brother being born had rendered her old news. Aunt Lori had been playing a CD of Barry Manilow's greatest hits, and the sound of the silly song "Jump Shout Boogie" had filled the room, Grandma Stevie had hoisted her up in her raspberry velvet dress and spun her around the room, shouting, "Stephanieeeeeeeeeeeee!" and causing her to giggle. Before she knew it she was on a table and being told to "dance like no one's watching, baby girl" and that once upon a time in a bar in L.A., her own granddad had put her on a table top and said, "Show me your dance moves, Stephanie." She may have only been three years old, but Stephanie McVie had known that day that her grandmother was carrying on a tradition, and it was making her smile in a way she'd never seen her smile before. They sang along to the silly lyrics like "when the fuzz buzzed" and "boogie woogie beat" and she laughed, which made Grandma Stevie laugh, which made Grandpa Lindsey smile, and made her mom pull out the video camera to do what she did best - document a real moment on film.

Thanksgiving had been Stephanie's favorite holiday ever since.

"Steph? Can I come in?" The sound of light knocking on the door mingled with Stevie's voice. Stephanie unplugged her flatiron and fluffed her long blonde hair and bangs in the mirror.

"Yeah, it's cool, Grandma," she called back, and her grandmother stepped into the room and closed the door behind her conspiratorially.

Stevie had turned seventy-six in May, and she looked at least a decade younger. Her long blonde curls were looser this evening - more like beach waves - and she stood with her hands on the hips of a simple blank velvet suit, which she'd paired with her usual layers of gold moon necklaces. Stephanie had a flash memory of Grandpa Lindsey saying once when she was little that Grandma Stevie was like a ray of sunlight in any room...and she knew he was right.

"I just wanted to come up before all of this commotion starts up again to make sure you were okay," Stevie explained. "You didn't say much downstairs, and when the rehearsal was over you ran up here right away."

As was tradition for modern American weddings, despite this one's English setting, the bride and groom and all members of the wedding party had rehearsed the ceremony with the minister downstairs earlier that evening. Dinner for everyone was due to begin at six-thirty, and there were going to be many heartfelt and tearful toasts to go along with the catered affair.