“ I know we are supposed to meet here, but meet me in ________ instead, it will be fun,” said the voice on the other end of the phone. I know it sounds strange, but sometimes back in the day people actually spoke to each other on the phone. Crazy concept now.
The here the caller referred to was NYC, which I had been looking forward to going to for a month. Not only for the city itself which I love, but also for the person who was trying to convince me to meet her elsewhere. We rarely managed to coordinate schedules to see each other. Our meeting was one of those meetings you think can only happen in a movie. We were both standing outside the Ed Sullivan theatre in NYC on a very rainy day. At almost the same time our umbrellas were destroyed due to a high wind gust and the quality manufacturing process used when making the $5 umbrellas sold on the streets the second a drop of rain appears.
We both pointed at the other and started laughing and two minutes later we were inside trying to dry off and ordering pizza. I knew who she was. I had seen her the day before in a television commercial and at that time her face was everywhere. I asked her if she was going to be on Letterman that night and she said that she was just going to the show because she wanted to watch the musical guest. That guest used to be an A list singer before playing out her string and then during a possible career revival period in her life threw it all away in one night of ranting. That was a long time in the future though.
From that first second, we clicked. The gorgeous openly gay female (FX) and me. Not gay, not female, and only handsome to his mother. Oh, and my grandmother, but I’m pretty sure my grandmother was drunk when she said it. Hey, it runs in the family.
We hung out and talked for about an hour before heading over to the show. We had exchanged phone numbers and promised to stay in touch. Remarkably we did. Not every day or even every week, but a few times a month we would connect over the phone and every few months we would end up at the same place at the same time and spend a great couple of hours together. I’m not sure I have met someone in my life who just fills a room like she does. It is hard to describe. She has a huge personality, and is so well liked by everyone that she meets or speaks to that as she does a walk through a party everything becomes more animated –more alive. She brings life to everything she does.
About a year and a half after we first met she invited me to the premiere of a movie in which she starred. That was the first time I met (GI). She was not a huge star back when I met her. She is now. I knew her best from one of still all-time favorite movies. I don’t know why I like it so much, but I do and I certainly remembered her in it. As soon as I saw the way FX and GI were interacting I was pretty sure they were a couple or at least having sex. Because I am subtle I asked FX if they were indeed having sex. GI stepped in and said something to the effect of sex is at one level and we are about five levels above that. I have never reached that level. I’m not sure if that is something you need a special code for or what, but I am definitely down at level one. The other thing I remember from that night is getting ridiculously drunk and making a series of outrageous passes of the lead in the movie (BC) who I had been crushing on since seeing her on television for the first time about six months earlier. Here she was and I had just seen her naked in the movie. I thought all my lines and moves were stellar, but they were all swings and misses. To her everlasting credit she was extremely sweet about the whole thing and she told me a few months later when we ran into each other that because of my constant fawning over her that night I saved her from the lead actor in the movie. Apparently they had a fling during filming and then he dumped her once the movie wrapped and wanted to hook up with her again which she probably would have if I had not been there. She said she would have regretted hooking up with the actor again. Apparently he was dating his future wife at the time while sleeping with a variety of other women. Well, he certainly didn’t change.
Over the next couple of years FX and I continued what we had been doing. The phone calls and semi-regular dinners and just a great friendship. So, fast forward to a month prior to the phone call and FX calls and invites me to NYC. For a weekend. She said she needed some help with something and that it involved GI and she laid out this grandly complicated scenario that took me a good 15-20 minutes to process. There were lots of moving parts. She thought I could help her with one of those moving parts. I agreed.
Now though, the plan had changed. Just a few days before I was scheduled to be there for the weekend she wanted to meet up instead in _________. Of course I said yes.
Coming up tomorrow, we meet everyone who made the weekend, The Weekend. Five Academy Award winners/nominees and enough plots and sub-plots and sex to make any daytime soap opera writer proud. The thing is though this was real-life.
