This is a work of fiction, loosely based on the real person, Russell Crowe. I do not know Mr. Crowe, although I certainly would like to! and do not intend any insult or invasion of his life by writing this story about totally fictional characters and invented events. ©2003 by WILDBEARIES

Convergence - Chapter One

 

The first time I saw Russell Crowe in person was when he was in Princeton, NJ in the spring and summer of 2001, busy filming "A Beautiful Mind" on the campus of Princeton University. I went one evening with a group of friends - all fans of the man we'd swooned over as Maximus, then discovered in earlier films as Bud White, Jeff Wigand and as Cort, the gunslinger in "The Quick and the Dead". I hadn't had such a crush on a movie star - or anyone, for that matter - since I'd been in high school. I was now 27, successful in my career as a registered nurse, and I guess it was time for some frivolity in my life.

At any rate, I had gone to see "Gladiator" with my flock of girlfriends and we had all emerged from the theater with stunned looks on our faces and a bad case of movie star crush on the superbly manly man from Australia. Okay, New Zealand - at that point, none of us knew enough about him to know that much. That watershed event led to our hunting up his earlier films - everything from "Blood Brothers" to "Virtuosity" to "The Sum of Us" and "Romper Stomper". All during the rest of 2000 and into 2001, we were happily gathering each weekend to watch his films and try to decide if we were all turning into lunatics at our advanced age.

When he won the Best Actor Academy Award for "Gladiator" we were thrilled. We found that the shooting schedule for "A Beautiful Mind" was out there on the internet for anyone to find and that we could actually watch the filming - from a polite distance, of course - so we all decided to get really silly and go. I had to miss the first trek - I got called in to work an extra shift that night, much to my dismay, and the next day I had to listen to everyone gush about how they'd gotten "this close" to him, gotten him to sign autographs, actually spoken to him - I just wanted to scream in frustration. "If I'm going to be silly," I told my best friend, "I want to be totally silly - can we go so I can get an autograph? Do you think we'd be lucky enough to get that close?"

She agreed that we certainly could go, and she also thought - given how amiable the now-superstar had been with everyone there the evening before - that I would probably get to have something signed and stand at least reasonably close to his own very personal space. I made sure I wouldn't get called to work extra on the day we set to go, and, that evening, we made our way over to New Jersey to watch the filming of some night scenes they were doing outdoors on the Princeton campus. I was so excited I wanted to run instead of walking in a sedate, adult manner. My friend had to remind me that it would be best to not appear to be a lunatic. "They frown on people just running at him, Lori."

"Yeah, yeah," I griped. I forced myself to be a bit less over-excited. Shortly we saw some signs pointing the way to the set, and saw a small group of people who looked pretty much like us standing watching something across the street with the intensity of onlookers at an unfolding drama of some sort. "There," I said, pointing and trying not to look as if I was a totally moonstruck idiot. We mingled with the group and found ourselves caught up watching the filming of a scene where the young John Nash speaks to the spy master portrayed by Ed Harris. They reshot this scene several different ways, and it was fascinating to watch how Russell changed little nuances such as body language, the speed of his walk, tone of voice, obviously trying to "get" the essence of the character just right. When the director - Ron Howard - yelled "Cut - print!" we all jumped. We'd been so caught up in the action it had almost seemed like reality. Everyone exchanged little guilty laughs and milled around a bit now that it wasn't necessary to maintain silence.

"That was so cool," I murmured to Maribelle. She nodded, eyes shining. Of course, I reckoned, she had already seen them filming when she was there a couple of nights before, but she seemed just as caught up as I was. "I wonder if he'll come over. . ." I stopped in mid-sentence because, indeed, Russell Crowe himself was meandering across the street towards the group of 20 or so people waiting on the other side where a production assistant and a security guard made sure we had stayed. "Oh, I'm going to barf," I heard one lady say in a breathless voice. She didn't though, she just practically expired when she was the first person he came up to.

"Good evening, folks," Russell greeted our group. He looked from face to face, smiling a little, "nice night, eh?" A chorus of responses, all of us trying to be cool. He caught my eye and I beamed, hoping I didn't look like a fatuous idiot. He started with the nearest person to him, the breathless lady who didn't throw up, and shortly was moving down the little line we formed almost without thinking, chatting briefly with each person and signing whatever was held out to him. "This is nice," he said, holding up a ballpoint pen and peering at it in the street light to read the lettering on it. "Oh, shit," he exclaimed and started laughing, "A Viagra pen? What is this for?" he asked the woman who'd given it to him.

"For when you want to write on something really hard," she told him, bold as brass. He continued laughing, and that was the first time I heard his famous giggling laugh. I could listen to it for hours - it made me want to join in and just giggle at the world. Instead, when he came to me and we were face to face, less than a foot apart, I was struck almost speechless.

"Got something for me to sign, luv?" he inquired softly when we'd just stood gaping at one another for what seemed like an eternity.

I jumped and came in possession of part of my brain cells. Enough to hold out the liner from the Gladiator soundtrack CD for him to sign. "Name?" he asked when I just smiled at him.

"Yes," I answered. Maribelle snickered and I wanted to elbow her. I realized what he meant and exclaimed, "Oh! My name - er, Lori."

"Is that E-R-L-O-R-I?" he teased me, blue Sharpie poised over the liner notes.

"Huh - oh, no - just L-O-R-I - I'm sorry, I'm so nervous I might just pee my pants." Beside me, Maribelle groaned and shook her head, pretending she wasn't with me. I turned beet red and just made some gobbling noises, trying to explain and apologize at the same time while Russell wrote something on the liner, handed it back to me, and stood holding my icy fingertips in his much larger, much warmer ones.

"It's okay, luv," he reassured me, "don't be so nervous - I don't eat little girls for supper on alternate Wednesdays, and this is an alternate Wednesday, right Ralph?" His security guard, who was smilingly taking in all our nerves and silliness, just nodded and waited patiently for Russell to move down the row. Instead, he squeezed my fingers, his remarkable, clear-as-rainwater eyes locked on mine. Later, I would recall what long eyelashes he had, and how his lips were so soft-looking, and how great his hair was, but at that moment, all I could think of was how nice his fingers felt wrapped around mine and how much I'd like to be hugged against that chest. When he finally moved on to the rest of the well-behaved group, he still looked back at me several times, each time with a slight incline of his head or a widening of his smile that sent shivers down to my toes.

As Maribelle and I walked back to the train station, we were both silent for a long time. Finally, I sighed and said with great feeling, "What a man!"

"No shit," she agreed.

It was going to be difficult to concentrate on the daily grind of being an OR nurse, but I managed it. I work at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, usually as an OR nurse, with occasional forays into the ER just for excitement and extra shift pay, but working in the OR is my first love. I framed the liner notes and gleefully plotted with my friends to go watch the filming when the ABM crew moved to one of the smaller colleges in New York proper a week or two later. It would be a whole day - my day off, by luck - and we planned on making a fun day of it.
 

That's how I found myself in another crowd of fans, this one slightly larger, standing face to face with a running-suit clad Russell Crowe - green baseball cap tilted down over his aqua eyes - chatting about music, theater and the joys of living in New York and environs. He said he loved being there on location, he'd been to a lot of plays, done a lot of shopping - "I just jam a cap on, slouch around and basically nobody bothers me," he said when I asked him about being annoyed by fans or the press. Amazing - I was actually having a conversation with my idol!

"So," he said, grinning, leaning closer, "Miss Er, Lori, would you ever consider having a drink with me?"

I almost dropped my teeth. "But - you don't date fans," I said in as low a tone as I could, not wanting anyone to overhear.

"I don't?" he answered, left eyebrow lifting a bit. He turned to Ralph, "I didn't know that about me - why didn't you clue me in, mate?"

I felt like a total idiot - but he turned back to me with a warm grin and just repeated his question. "If you don't want to, that's all right, luv - just thought you might like to spend an hour or so with me while I unwind. I promise to get you home before you turn into a pumpkin."

"Sure," I nodded happily. Maribelle was giving me the fisheye, but I was too full of joy and excitement to even talk about it. I waited with the others in the group while Russell moved down the row of people - occasionally glancing back to give me a toe-curling smile and wink - then bolted for the nearest place I could sit down and consider my good fortunes.

"I believe I could hate you," Mari said - then laughed and pounded me on the back, telling me how happy she was I was actually going to have a drink with our idol. "You lucky dog," she repeated a couple of times, adding later, "Don't think because he buys you a Long Island Tea that you have to blow him or anything."

I turned deep red and shook my head, reassuring her I thought nothing of the kind. "I'll be grown up, don't worry."

"That's what I'm afraid of," Mari answered darkly.

I thought the afternoon would never end. Ralph came over to me at about seven p.m. and took me to one side, telling me in a low voice that they would wrap shooting for the day in another fifteen minutes or so, and he would walk me to the car now so I could be there waiting when Russell came. I nervously agreed, bid Maribelle an excited goodbye, and followed the tall, dark body guard down a little side street to where a huge blacked-out SUV sat idling at the curb.

I sat waiting in the rear seat of the big car, glad I'd worn decent, if casual clothes and not just thrown on a tee shirt and jeans or something. I'd had no clue I was going to be asked out that morning when I'd dressed - I was just lucky, for once. The car door opened while I was in the midst of my nervous fretting and there he came, propelled inside by Ralph's hand on his back. "I'm in, mate," he called back to Ralph, "no need to shove." He flashed his grin at me, informing me that Ralph liked to make sure he was safely in the car and not about to go bounding back outside to get into trouble with fans or find an excuse to go wandering off. "He thinks he's my nursemaid," he finished, seating himself beside me.

"It's not an easy job, either," Ralph informed me from the front passenger seat.

"I imagine it's not," I answered, liking the husky, dark guy.

Russell nudged me, "Hey, luv, no flirting with the hired help - I'm the important one here." The driver and Ralph hooted at this bit of egotism, and once I was sure he was teasing, I joined in. I could tell it wasn't going to be easy figuring Russell out - if I even could - he was brimming with energy and seemed to have ten trains of thought going at all times. His sense of humor was also not simple - as I found out over the course of the evening.

For instance, he seemed to love to poke fun at very serious matters by deliberately misunderstanding things and going off on a tangent of rhymes, limericks and silly bits of songs made up on the spot. He also could tell long, involved stories that seemed never-ending and then suddenly getting to the punchline, bringing everyone into a state of helpless laughter because the story was, after all the build up, hilarious. And he used funny voices and even funnier faces to illustrate whatever tale he was telling. He must've thought I would react badly to this, because he said, "I've been this way since I was a kid, Lori - try to keep up, cos I don't think I'm gonna change at this late date."

"Jeeze, don't change on my account," I fired back, "I've been thinking of doing a special course in abnormal child psychology - you'd be a great case study."

Ralph snickered while the driver suddenly got real intent on the traffic. I just smiled blandly and when Russell realized I'd just zinged him right back, he reached over and gave me a mock shaking, "Ya got me, babe," he chortled, "I thought you were totally serious too!"

"How do you know I'm not?" I wanted to know.

"Your dimples are showing - you wanna smile and you just won't let yourself, that's how I know."

I let the laughter through then and had to admit he'd read me pretty well. Just then we arrived at his hotel. They drove in through an alley alongside the building and stopped. "Okay, we can do this one of two ways," Russell said, facing me. "You can wait down here for me and let Ralph entertain you with tales of how fun it's been shepherding me around, or you can get really daring and come up to my suite to wait while I change out of my work clothes into something more comfortable. Which is it?"

Dilemma. If I waited downstairs, would he think me hopelessly prudish and fearful? If I went upstairs with him, would he think me too forward, would he make a serious pass and assume I'd go along with it because I'd been bold enough to come up to his room? On the other hand, this was probably going to be my only chance to see what a suite in the Mercer Hotel looked like, and I had no doubts I could fend off any attempts at getting too physical - I was in good shape and had taken self-defense courses. "I'll come up and wait in your suite, if that's okay."

He looked pleased and gave my hand a friendly squeeze, "Good - come on then, luv. Ralph, we'll be about a quarter of an hour - be sure we've got our table, okay, mate?"

Ralph opened the door for us and nodded at Russell's instructions, then we were in the side door of the Mercer and inside a private elevator before I could even do much more than glance around at the hallway. It was just the two of us in the elevator and while I was nervous, I must not have looked it because he commented, "Bold as brass, aren't you?"

"Me?"

The doors opened and a middle-aged woman I realized was the concierge greeted him from an ornate desk in the center of a thickly carpeted foyer. Russell just gave her a friendly wave and led me to the right hand door in the opposite wall. One flick of a card key and we were inside. "Home sweet home - for now, anyway," he commented, and showed me into his sitting room.

It was elegant but not overdone, mostly comfortable upholstered furniture, some beautiful end tables and bookcases, and an antique armoire that held a television set and CD system. He flicked this on, and excused himself. "Have a seat luv - bathroom's over there if you need it, all sorts of little bits and bottles in there, feel free - I'll be out in a few minutes." As the strains of some soft Celtic instrumental music sounded from the stereo speakers, he exited through a door into what must be his bedroom.

I took advantage of his invitation to use the facilities and found myself in a medium-sized but lavishly appointed bathroom all done in green-veined cream marble with dark green moire wallpaper and antique mirrors. There were fresh roses in vases on the vanity, and, true to his words, there were baskets filled with "bits and bottles" - everything from shampoo to body lotion to perfume in beautiful little containers with the Mercer logo on their discreet labels. I perched on the john, gazing around while relieving nature's call. I felt like I was in some dream and hoped I didn't wake up too soon - not before the good part, anyway.

I combed my hair, applied some makeup, made sure I didn't have mascara down on my cheekbones, and wished I'd worn something nicer than a cream silk and cashmere sweater over camel colored tailored slacks. At least I hadn't worn sneakers - I had on my favorite shoes - a pair of mahogany colored Gucci loafers I'd gotten on sale at Saks Fifth Avenue. Such a change from my white nursing shoes - I felt very decadent whenever I wore them. "He probably has ten pairs of Gucci shoes," I told myself in the mirror when I was satisfied that I didn't look like a ragamuffin.

"He does not," came his voice from outside the door, "And I'm not eavesdropping, I just happened to be out here looking in my duffel bag." I opened the bathroom door and he looked up at me, grinning. Sure enough, he was on his knees on the floor, the contents of the bag strewn around him as he rifled through it for something. "There's the fucker," he muttered and held up a tiny cellphone in shiny blue metal. "Just got the thing and I thought I'd lost it already." He climbed to his feet, looking me up and down with a grin. "You look nice."

He was changed from his Nash clothes - retro slacks, shirt and sweater vest - to dark indigo jeans and a white tee shirt. Before I could say anything about his wearing just a tee shirt, he picked a folded sweater off the arm of the sofa and donned it. "There, better, luv?" he asked.

"I'm sure I wasn't going to say anything," I lied. Did he read minds?

He smoothed the dark blue cashmere and took his black leather coat off the coat tree, "Well, I'm not a total daggy person, I do know what matches - sometimes, anyway." He touched my hair, "You look fantastic, did you work magic in there or something?" We headed for the door.

"Just combed my hair," I claimed, leaving out the fretting, the make-upping and the gawping at the room.

"Well, whatever you did, you look very nice - I feel shabby in comparison." He waved goodbye to the concierge and we were into the elevator. "We're going for a drink and then dinner - it's not dressy at all, so don't worry about that - let's just have a nice evening and chat. I'd like to get to know you - that okay with you?"

Inside, my whole system was going "yes!" but somehow I managed to just nod and say, "That sounds great."

We were outside and back in the SUV before I could blink. We drove off down the alley, emerging onto the more brightly lighted street behind the Mercer and headed into the Village. I had no idea where we were going, I just knew it was going to be fun and interesting. No way I was going to miss this!

 

Click on Russell for Chapter Two

 

Graphics, Layout and Story 2006 by Wild Bearies