Mister Cellophane: A Song For You
There's drunk, and then there's drunk.
Orlando passed the standard 'drunk' about three exits back and is currently cruising the Pissed-Out-of-His-Tree motorway. He's using a bottle of Bell's Irish Whiskey as his gearshift, and shortly he expects to take a roundabout to the Alcoholic Poisoning freeway.
It runs parallel to the A25. Much like the hallway he's currently staggering down.
It's a long hallway. A very long hallway, and yes, he's most definitely shit-faced. Generally, that isn't a bad thing, except for right now when it's about half two in the morning, and he's alone. 'Alone' means he's not sharing his drunken-en-en-ness thing with anyone, and he was taught when he was wee that sharing is good. So this is bad, and alone means that nobody loves him. He's just Mr. Invisible Drunk.
Orlando likes being drunk; he doesn't like being invisible.
That's bad; and he knows a song about this.
Not a song about being invisible when the bloke you fancy doesn't even know you're alive. No, he doesn't know that one, but he knows lots of tunes about being drunk. Orli knows lots of songs -- bad songs - about that. He knows the one those daft anarchists did about getting pissed down the pub and he knows lots of exceptionally dirty songs that really aren't supposed to be sung out loud. He knows the one about the girl from Newcastle, and... and this isn't about Orli being drunk.
This is about him being ignored.
He must know a song about that. At least one.
The thing about being ignored is that it sucks. A lot. And Orlando, he's not going to go on and say he's the best looking bloke about, but he doesn't necessarily think he's that hard on the eyes. There are loads of girls and blokes who'd like to get off with him. He thinks. Potentially. Possibly. Okay, there's always somebody left at the pub who can't even stand up straight, and surely, at least they'd be willing to go home with him. If nothing else he'll provide taxi fare, and that has to count for something. Besides, he's in New Zealand shooting this movie, and maybe it might even be big.
Everybody loves a movie star, don't they?
The problem, however, is that Orli doesn't want everybody to love him. He really doesn't even want this guy to love him. He just wants this guy to like him, to pay attention, and notice that he's around, because Orlando always notices when Viggo's around. Always. But then again, who doesn't? Because Viggo's a star, not like Elijah, but he's done lots of movies and Orlando hasn't really done anything. Yes, okay, he was somebody's rent boy, but he'd rather not have that as his epitaph if only cos his mum would skin him. Only it's not about the fame thing either, cos Orli doesn't want Viggo to notice him cos he's famous.
Orli wants Viggo to like him. To really like him, and okay, they've only been shooting for a month, but Orlando gets the distinct impression that Viggo couldn't give a toss about him either way. He never says anything to Orli, they don't go out and get drunk together. Maybe if they were mates then it might be easier, but Viggo's always so bloody private.
Fucking tosser.
And he just, he's nothing like anyone else that Orlando knows.
And the truth of the matter is that Orlando talks a lot, but his confidence? It's really not that good and he just wants to be liked, for whatever reason.
Besides, he's a good person, isn't he?
His mum, well, she's biased, as is Sam. And Andre, Andre'd tell him anything if it means that Orli's buying the next round, so sometimes he's not so sure. There are some mornings, before makeup gets hold of him and turns him into a bleeding elf, that he thinks he's a nice looking bloke. Those are the days that when the waitress down the pub winks at him, and he grins back.
And then there are the other days. Like today.
At 23, he's at this crap stage where he's not supposed to need other people to like him, but he can't help but still want their approval.
When Orli was fifteen, Emma Wilkes told him his ears were too big and the rest of him was too small, and she'd never even walk on the same side of the street as him. It hurt at the time, but he bets she'll be kicking herself as soon as this movie comes out. Well, either that or she'll think she was dead lucky to get away in time.
In year eleven Tommy Burton helped Orli wank off before footie practice one day. He then proceeded to black both of Orli's eyes and give him a broken nose. It was a special feat considering that football doesn't require any sort of hand-to-hand business.
And yes, it hurt, just like Emma and her mates clucking at him and calling him 'Chicken' hurt, but at least they noticed he was there. At least they never ignored him.
Orlando has never been good with being ignored, and he doesn't plan on starting now. And that's exactly why he's staggering down the hall towards Viggo's flat: so that he can tell Viggo exactly what he thinks about his little mind tricks, and how rude is it to ignore people, and didn't his mum teach him better than that?
On second though, Orli'll leave out about Viggo's mum. That might not go over too well.
There's nobody about and all the hobbits, good little hobbits, have popped off to bed.
Orli's supposed to be in bed as well, only he can't sleep. Too quiet, too drunk, too much silence. No proper music, and too many eyes staring at him from photographs on the walls.
Viggo took those photographs and Orli was dumb enough to ask for them, to say 'yes' and 'please' and 'they're lovely.' Now, all he can do is curse his stupidity because its obvious that he acts very, err, feminine when it comes to Viggo, and he's not that way at all. Quite the opposite in fact. Fact of the matter is that Orli's not that bothered about his clothes or his hair. He's broken too many bones to care that much about his body, and his face, well it's his face. Full stop.
He doesn't try to be attractive, but that doesn't mean he doesn't want any one to notice him. He's not Mr. Vain, and he doesn't think anybody's singing about him, but that could just be the ringing in his head because he just tried to pull instead of push. One should never open a door with one's forehead.
And it's exactly at this time, when he's drunk and staggering into various doors, that Orli thinks he needs music to make this all better because that's what drunk people do: they sing. This logic may be a bit off, but lots of years of drinking have convinced Orlando that music is an integral part of getting completely pissed. Alcohol plus bad music plus mates equals an excellent time, and okay, so his mates aren't about but two out of three isn't that bad. And besides, everyone loves drunk people: they're allowed to say what they want, when they want, to who they want, and then they all get together and sing 'Vindaloo' and 'Come on Eileen' and no one thinks the worse of them.
It's what drunks are supposed to do.
And yes, drunkenly singing alone isn't really the same thing, but he'll just have to go on the best he can. Except that Orli doesn't have a very good voice.
He doesn't care.
He doesn't care that people are sleeping, and that this is most certainly not the door to his flat.
No, Orli certainly doesn't care at all, because Flat 314 belongs to one Viggo Mortensen who Orlando happens to fancy, and bugger it, but Viggo's going to know this whether or not he wants to. Viggo 'I'm So Bloody Great and I'm Going to be King' Mortensen is going to acknowledge Orlando Bloom, cos he's an elf, damnit.
Stupid human.
Orlando likes a lot of things:
PG Tips black with two sugars, the Evening Standard Sports copy, and bad 80's music while he takes his bath. He likes taking Maude for runs through Hampstead Heath, and taking the piss out of Andre when he comes home alone after another mucked up date. Sam even knows that he likes seeing musicals, but that's his business, because there's no law that says he has to share everything with everyone. Except that most of the things he loves aren't with him in New Zealand. Point of fact, virtually none of them are with him now, and so he's had to make due with others. Yes, the tea is still PG Tips, but it doesn't quite taste the same, and there's no Evening Standard so he reads The Dominion.
There's no Maude to sleep at the foot of his bed and keep his feet warm, and there's no Andre to tell him that mooning over someone he works with is truly one of the worst ideas that he's ever had. Not that that would actually stop him in any way, shape, or form, but it might at least give him pause.
Andre's not good for a lot, but they're best mates and he'd most likely stop Orli from singing show tunes outside Viggo's door at three in the morning.
"Suppose you was a little cat, residin' in a person's flat who fed you fish and scratched your ears?" Orlando's voice starts off normal, he thinks, but being drunk tends to affect his hearing, and it's been a long, long time since Orlando was this drunk. Actually, it's been a long time since he's sat down as well. Sitting down right now is probably a bad idea though because the ground is far away, but banging on Viggo's door? That's a good idea.
"YOU'D NOTICE HIM!" Orli shouts rather suddenly, pausing only when he realizes that he's started the song half way in. Doesn't really matter.
"A human being's made of more than air. With all that bulk, you're bound to see him there." Orli's voice warbles and cracks, and the ends of the lines are punctuated by his pounding on Viggo's door.
The whole business is off-beat. Severely.
"Unless that human bein' next to youuuuu..." Here Orlando hits a note that even makes him wince, but he soldiers on because Viggo is going to listen to him. Viggo is going to pay attention to him. "Is unimpressive, undistinguished, you know whooooo..."
Orlando's tongue trips over 'undistinguished' several times, and the whole performance nearly comes apart when he leans over to put down the bottle of Bell's, because it's ruining his arm movements, and can't quite remember how to stand up again. However, by the time Viggo opens the door in all his just-woken-up glory, Orli's back on his feet and well on his way singing-wise. No one is going to shut him up, and he'll be buggered if Viggo 'Mere Man' Mortensen is ever going to ignore him again.
"Should have been my name, Mister Cellophane!" Viggo looks less than amused, but Orli is in the moment. He's a performer, an actor, an artist damnit, and if he wants to poke Viggo in the chest with his finger while singing then that's exactly what he's going to do. "Cause you can look right through me." Poke. "Walk right by me." Poke. "And never know I'm there." Poke.
He only stops when Viggo grabs his hand, and restrains it against the doorway. Orlando thinks there should be other people enjoying his performance, so he takes it up a few decibels. "I TELL YA! CELLOPHANE! MISTER CELLOPHANE!"
Perhaps Orli spoke too soon because a door opens somewhere and somebody tells him to shut it, and he retorts with a series of threats and diatribes that he picked up by watching 'Get Carter' and 'A Clockwork Orange' too many times.
By the time Orlando finishes delivering his threats about the person's genitals being stapled to a wall, the door has been shut again, and he's forgotten where he was. There's a warm hand over his though, and when his bleary eyes focus again, there's Viggo. Looking rather annoyed, and not a little shirtless. Ah, Orlando didn't notice that bit originally.
"Orlando? Are you finished yet?"
"You're interrupting the song." Orlando must finish the song. No matter what, and he dodges away when Viggo lets go of his hand to try and muzzle him. Orlando could probably evade Viggo better if he weren't drunk. It takes all of two seconds for him to trip over his forgotten bottle of Bell's, but the thing about being on his knees in front of Viggo is that it changes Orlando's perspective entirely.
Viggo looks so disapproving. So harsh, and that's not what Orli wants or needs in his life. The more he thinks about it, Viggo doesn't look so perfect at this time of the morning. And maybe Orlando doesn't fancy him nearly as much as he thinks he does. Maybe he's not drunk at all, and maybe he's just seeing everything clearly for the first time in ages.
He hasn't stopped singing though, and his voice is soft at he finishes the song kneeling on the hardwood floor. "Cause you can look right through me, walk right by me, and never know I'm there."
Viggo offers him a hand up, and Orlando wobbles a bit even though he's kneeling on solid ground. His voice is gone by the time he gets to the last line, but he sings it anyway. "Never even know I'm there."
"Orlando," Viggo looks severely distressed, but whatever he feels is never going to compare to how Orlando is feeling right now. "Do you want to talk about it?"
Does he want to talk about it? Now he wants to talk to him? Fuck him.
Fuck Viggo Mortensen and his camera and his calm demeanor and the way that he plays dead when Orlando tries to get his attention. Fuck him for not seeing that what Orlando wants is a little kindness and not his pity.
Orlando may be drunk, but at least he's not a 40-something man who has no idea what he's missing out on. No, Orli's not being narcissistic, he's just realizing that anybody who can't see what's probably all over his soused face isn't nearly as aware as he might like to believe. And what was he thinking anyway? This is work. This is his job. Orlando doesn't need everybody's approval, he'll be fine by himself and one day in the future, when he's surrounded by his friends, all Viggo will have is some random song that Orlando sang for him.
That's all he'll have in the end.
Grabbing up the overturned bottle, Orli gets to his feet and pushes away Viggo's outstretched hand.
He's nobody's charity case.
And without a word, he staggers back the way he came.