Ah, the classic days of LOTR castfics. I proudly (?) present, from long ago (possibly greenGAFF), Adolynn of England's "first posted fanfiction", On The Other Side of the Curtain. Thanks to Azzandra for reminding me how to find it.

The story opens with the Mary Sue, Ada Cleam -- she's repeatedly called "Miss. Ada" or "Miss. Cleam", apparently from the idea that if "Mr." has a dot after it and so does "Mrs.", then "Miss" should too -- awakening in the hospital with a leg "broken in five places". Conveniently, all the fractures are located such that her cast only extends up to her knee. She calls her family and gets the boilerplate Abused!Sue reaction:

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"Yeah, hello?" A Male voice asked from the other end. "Dave, let me talk to mom." "Why?" "I'm in the hospital. I got in somekind of wreck and need someone to go and pick up so things for me." "And...your point?" Ada's eyes filled to brim with tears. "I need her to come, put her on now." "Bug off, Ada. You think we care?" Click...the other line was dead.

One has to admire the subtle restraint with which the author establishes characterization. It's possible to surmise from this scene that Ada's relationship with her family might be under some strain, but it's not overstated or telegraphed too bluntly.

Anyway, she calls a friend, who brings her "a Cosmo Mag" and a rented video -- which turns out to be "Troy":

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As the part of Paris kissing Helean in the beggining, she laughed slightly. "Shame, shame." She whispered shaking her head. "Yeah, I had to argue with the writers on using the origanal version, I didn't want to be known as a wife stealer." A British voiced boomed.

"Boomed"? Who's her roommate, BRIAN BLESSED? Why no:

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"What the heck?" She tried to reached for the curtain but failed. "Don't strain yourself love." She heard him say and watched as he pulled the curtain back and smiled a goofy smile. She gasped loudly when she saw who it was. Orlando Bloom.

Why yes! It really is Orlando Bloom. In connection with whose voice the word "boomed" has never really struck me as being overpoweringly appropriate, but I digress. He introduces himself ... and Ada begins insulting him. For absolutely no reason, and from literally their very first exchange, she flings gratuitous insults in his face, something like walking up to a stranger on the street and greeting him with "Fuck you, asshole":

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"Oh, uh-uh! Nope, now way, no! You are not there...I'm dreaming, yep dreaming." She pinched herself and whined loudly. "Noho! I do not have this man as my roommate!" "Uh, pardon me. Should I be offended?" He asked with confusion etching his face. "Naw, you think?" Elijah Wood

who apparently has nothing better to do than hang out in Orlando Bloom's hospital room, five years after the end of filming LOTR

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spoke entering the room. "I'm switching rooms." She muttered searching for the nurses' button. "No use, darling. Every other room is bunked. Your stuck with me. By the way, what's wrong with me?" She looked at him with a smirk on her face. "Where do I begin. Let's just say, we wouldn't get along well if I said anything." Elijah sat down next to his bug and tried to wipe the gron from his face. "Do tell. You're the first person who doesn't swoon around Orli here. I tyink I'm in love." Ada thought for a moment and desided it wouldn't hurt...she would resite the list of 'I am Mad at Orlando Bloom!!!

There's a break here -- the story was posted on a discussion forum -- and the next entry will call for some serious reformatting, as it's studded with what I can only call NotVerySmartQuotes.

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Ada cleared her throat and began with her list: 1."You are a snob 2.Your too cute to be real 3.You cheated on your girlfriend 4.Your self-centered 5.You look like my ex-boyfriend And…oh, hon, they'll be more" Orlando looked at her with his mouth hanging wide open and Elijah laughing in hysterics behind him. Never, in his whole entire life, had a woman EVER said those things to him. 1."I'm not a snob 2.I am very real 3.I never cheat on anyone 4.I don't ever want to do anything for myself, only for others and 5.Your ex-boyfriend is blessed to look like me!" "But, I read-" "Don't believe everything you read, love." He interrupted her gently, Ada looked at him with her sad green eyes and pressed her lips together nervously. How dare she be so mean to a complete stranger!

But he's absolutely kind and understanding and forgiving. After Wood (gratuitously referred to in narrative as "the shortie") leaves, Ada pleads with Bloom to insult her back, but he refuses:

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"Would you do me a favor?" She asked guiltily. "Sure, what can I do for you?" "Please say that I was being a cruel and snobby jerkett. It would make me feel better." "No way! I don't talk to women like that." He spoke almost offended. Ada looked at him, eyes large and boggled as she smiled slightly. "I guess my best friend was right. You really are a gentlemen."

There's a short chapter in which Ada, desperate for the bathroom, waits an hour until she's sure he's fallen asleep because she's wearing only a hospital gown and revealing underwear. When she emerges, Bloom is "gentleman" enough to admit he was feigning sleep and peeping at her, but argues that it was her own fault for "wearing the skimpy black lace that women call underwear in the first place". (This after she did everything she could to conceal herself.)

The next day when Ada awakes, Bloom is not in the room: a nurse who has apparently never heard of patient confidentiality cheerfully tells her, "Oh, Mr. Bloom had to be taken upstairs for his Leukemia tests."

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The door opened a few minutes later and in came Orlando in a wheelchair and hospital gown. Most girls would got gaga to see him like that, but it just broke her heart. Once he was back in bed, she asked him. "How did the tests go?" She asked quietly. Orlando swallowed hard and shrugged. She could see his chin quivering slightly and started going over to him, she sat with her leg hanging of the side of his bed. When she put her arm around her shoulder, the actor who once seemed strong and powerful broke and cried in her arms like a frightened child.

Bear in mind that they have known each other, as far as I can tell, for perhaps eighteen hours.

His leukemia is "pretty advanced", and there will be some difficulty finding a bone-marrow donor because he has an uncommon blood type. He seems deeply distressed at the possibility of losing his hair. Ada sings him to sleep and goes in search of his doctor -- to my complete absence of astonishment, her blood type is the same as his. The procedure is completed within a few hours, but not before Bloom's fever triggers what Elijah Wood calls a "federal seizer" (I think this is supposed to mean "febrile seizure"). Ada leaves the hospital the next day with her friend Beka, ordering that Bloom not be told who his donor was. He learns, of course:

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"I feel better...did something happen?" "Yeah man, you had a donor. They did the transplant last night and said that it's starting to take fast effect. They said that you were going to make a full recovery and...this is the best news...you aren't going to loss you hair!" Orlando laughed at his bud's humor and looked over at the empty bed again. "Where's Ada?" Elijah faked a smile and replied. "She was able to home with her friend...so, you hurting anywhere?" "Elijah? What aren't you telling me?" Orlando asked as he noticed his friend’s reluctant look and sudden change of subject. "What do you mean? I'm not, not telling you anything. You're paranoid." "Shut up man and stop kidding around. Where's Ada?" "Home! With her friend like i said!" "You're hiding something! Don't make me get Viggo over here and whip you until you tell me, Hobbit!" Elijah yelped slightly and gave in. "Fine! Geezee, Ada was your donor. There, I said it, okay? She told me not to tell, but she was a blood match so she gave you some of her bone marrow." Orlando almost shot up in his bed. "She did what?! Dangit! That was so dangerous, she could have died! Why did she do that!" "To save your pretty elf neck, man. [ ... }"

Yeah. In 2005, conversation between Orlando Bloom and Elijah Wood is studded with LOTR references. And as it turns out, she demanded the donation be kept secret so she could tell him herself, leaving him a white rose with a note "wrapped around the steam":

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Dear Orlando, I figured Elijah couldn't keep a secrete to save his little life, so I decided to write you and tell you myself what I did. yes, i am your bone marrow donor. Orlando, I could not sit back and watch you die, knowing that I could help. I had to do it. I don't know why I feel such a connection with you, but I know this, you are worth giving a part of me to. You are worth living on in this life. I hope to see you again someday, but if not, I leave you with this rose to remember me by. Take care of yourself and I ask you a favor...I gave you bone marrow from my body so stop throwing yourself off of cliffs. Thank you in advance. Always, Ada

(There is a disappointed author's note about how her copy of the story has Ada's note in a pretty handwriting font.)

Several weeks later Ada is at home, completely recovered. We're treated to such all-important information as that she's "listening to the Last of the Mohicans soundtrack [ ... ] wearing her white blouse with her restaurant nametag still on and a green skirt that came a little higher than her knees. Her hair was pulled back into a messy ponytail but her makeup was still almost perfectly done. She was a cute sight that night." With no warning, Bloom shows up at her door, carrying "a wilted white rose." He asks why she offered the donation: she says she doesn't know, but that she "felt a connection". They kiss, and Bloom is seized with an inexplicable wave of self-loathing:

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When he pulled away, he pulled her into his arms and held her for the longest time. He kept his face in the crook of her neck and held back the tears of resentment. 'That's what wrong!' he thought. He resented himself. He resented the actions he done, the tings he'd said, the hollow feeling inside of him. Ada felt the tears on her skin and brand her for life. She ran her fingers through his full hair and spoke soothingly. "Don't resent yourself." He looked up at her, amazed at how she red him perfectly.

Well, what should he expect? She's Ada Sue.

And then we get the Conversion Scene:

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"I can't help it, love. I have done some incredibly stupid things in my life." "Who hasn't?" "I know, but right now, I feel like not even my Buddhism can give me peace." Ada gently pulled away from him and crossed her arms from an undetectable chill. "Are you surprised?" She asked carefully. "I-I..." "I'm not going to stand here and chide you like most people, Orlando, because you know the truth. Buda can't give you peace, nor the heaven you desire, but in your heart, thanks to your blessed mother, you know what can." He looked at her with a confused look on his face. "You have got to be kidding me Orlando!" She laughed throwing her hands in the air. "Do you honestly believe those Bible reading contests were for nothing? Look at yourself in the mirror, do you think a hot guy like you came from a dirty, flee-infested ape?"

This is scintillating scientific argument, worthy of ... oh, Ray Comfort.

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Orlando sat down on the couch and cocked his head to the side, still not understand what on earth she was talking about. Ada's face softened as she took a seat next to him and took his large hands in her small gentle ones. "Orlando. I heard that your into this whole protecting the rainforest thing and that you fell head over heels in love with the Land in New Zeeland. When you're standing in one of those area's filled with the lush green trees and the smell of the beautiful bright wildflowers, do you honestly think that it 'just happened?' Hon, that hole that you feel inside you cannot be filled by a woman

i WILL NOT i WILL NOT i WILL NOT

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or Buda, only God, the Lord Almighty can fill that emptiness." Orlando and Ada just looked at each other in complete silence. He could not figure out why she made sense. She kissed the back of his hand and smiled tenderly. "Orlando, think back to the day you fell from that three story building. Think back to the feeling you had when you could not move your legs. You had to have been afraid, but I have a strong feeling you didn't look up and say 'O great Buda, please help me!', did you?" He shook his head no. "What did you say?" She probed holding his gaze. "I said, 'Dear God please help me.'" He answered clearing his thick throat. "And he did, Orlando! You could have fallen on you head, broken you're neck, died all together or never walk again like the doctors said. But you didn't! You lived! Not only are you alive but also you're walking! God heard your prayers and He gave you a second chance. And just a few weeks ago, He gave you another chance...don't make Him regret it."

Oh, dear.

What's interesting to note at this point that Ada's religious belief is so crucial, so all-important, so central to her life that it's never been mentioned before. She did not invoke her God when she was offering to donate bone marrow. She did not kneel by her bed and pray for Bloom to recover. She did not ask God for strength. In fact, she never once even thought about God ... until she, or her author, decided Bloom had to stop being a Buddhist.

Anyway, he takes her out to dinner. (In the time it takes her to change into "a long black dress with spaghetti straps and a modest neckline" -- an odd combination -- and pull her hair into "a normal updo", he magically produces a stretch limo in which he whisks her away to "Le Paris". After a bizarre little interlude in which Ada's friend Beka calls her, shrieking in uncontrollable excitement because she can see Le Paris from her own window and just saw Johnny Depp going in, Ada admits to Bloom that "I'm not quite the girl you think I am." But the only shameful secret she has to offer is the existence of her family.

We'd already learned that Ada's parents "disowned" her when she refused to take her brother's side after he was accused of rape. But, as she tells Bloom, THERE'S MORE:

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"My brother, Dave raped a girl in my school and he denied it. My parents took his side...but I couldn't...I knew for a fact he did..." "How so?" "Because he did the same thing to me." Orlando jumped back slightly and looked at her in horror. "But...you don't seem like it. I mean, most women would be terrified of guys now and..." "Orlando. Yes, what happened to me was awful. But I have grieved over it and made my peace with God. I know now that not all guys are like Dave, and that's why I've moved on. I just hope you can still look at me the same." He smiled and kissed the back of her hand. "I still see my angel. my beautiful angel."

He quotes Shakespeare and pop-song lyrics at her until they finally utter the magic, soul-uniting incantation of "I believe in Mary Worth" -- no, wrong incantation. They recite iloveyou iloveyou, at which point she abruptly gets up and flees. He chases her, and she argues that he doesn't know anything at all about her: "You say how much you love me, but what's my middle name? What age was I when I got my first detention? When did I break my first limb and what was it? When did I lose my first tooth? When did I stop believing in Santa Clause and Fairies?" He admits he knows none of these, but argues that he feels a "soul connection more than a knowledge connection":

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Ada looked at him and sighed. The streetlight behind him reflected in his eyes,

(Through his skull?)

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making them look deep and passionate. She couldn't help but groan as she leaned with her back against a wall. "You are a difficult man to fight with." She spoke weakly. "You're a difficult woman to convince." "Well, now that we've agreed we're difficult…" She giggled shaking her head. "Would you two kiss already!" An elderly woman asked watching them front the apartment above them. "Girly, don't you let him get away! Young are never as loving as he is!" She shut her window and Orlando started laughing hysterically.

They exchange phone numbers and part. (We're never told how he found her house in the first place.) The next day he calls her from in front of her house. They go to an Italian restaurant, walk in the park, and talk happily about their pasts:

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"I remember my first TV actor crush. It was the young Nicolas on General Hospital. My grandmother watched it all the time when I visited her and I got sucked up into it." Ada explained with a laugh after Orlando had asked her the question. "You?" (crud! I forgot the name, forgive me) "Blank Blank, from Dynasty." "Dude! Alright, I guess I didn't do much better. But I guess we're okay now, right?"

Brilliant writing there. He had a crush on Blank Blank. Anyway, he quotes more Shakespeare at her, sings a pop song, and proposes.

They go at once to pick out an engagement ring ("Ada picked out a simple silver band with a small diamond in the middle. She did not was something so big it would break her finger") and he asks her where she'd like to get married: she offers a subtle hint by singing him a song in Italian. He instantly pops her into his private jet and flies her off to Venice:

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Once they finally reached Venice, the airport was bustling with people. Orlando set their bags in his rental car and parked it near a hotel as they went walking on the cobble streets. Soft Italian music could be heard playing here and there and people were riding Condoles with men singing famous Italian love songs and rowing slowly under the candlelit bridges.

Translation: "Everything I know about Italy was learned from 1950s romantic movies."

But shortly they are mobbed by fangirls and have to fly off again, to England. She meets his mother and sister, who are pleased that he's found "TRUE love" instead of being captured by one of the "Hollywood hungry women out there". (If you care so deeply about him, where were you when he was fighting leukemia?) In the space of a week -- it has to be arranged quickly, to avoid the attention of the media -- they are married in a huge elaborate ceremony in "Canterbury cathedral", with Johnny Depp as best man and Viggo Mortensen giving the bride away. Because that's never going to attract the attention of the media. The author politely includes a link to a photo of Ada's wedding gown, and they all live happily ever after.

The thing is, I can understand the writer's motivation for the Jerk!Sue scene -- she wanted to establish that Ada cared for Bloom for himself as a person, not merely as Orlando Bloom The Famous Actor And Object Of Fandom. She wanted to show that Ada wasn't an_Orlando_Bloom_fan.

But for someone who's "not an Orlando Bloom fan", she certainly seems to have read an awful lot about him.

Here's a possibility for a scene in which Ada establishes that she's not a fan of his, without concurrently establishing herself as an irredeemable bitch:

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The nurse brought in a TV on a cart, with a built in DVD player. Ada slid the disc into the unit, pleased to note that it was the Criterion release of Michael Powell's Edge of the World. Only a few minutes in, she was distracted by murmuring voices on the other side of the curtain dividing the room. One sounded distinctly English: " ... perfect role," it said. "That's the director, isn't it? Bland sort of nonentity who only appears for five minutes. That's me." "No, no," the other voice, American-accented, said. "You'd have to be the hero, the John Laurie character." "I can't do a Scots accent, though." "Oh, come on. If I can do a passable English, you can do Scottish -- " "I'm sorry," Ada interrupted in some annoyance, "I can plug the headphones in if my movie is interfering with your conversation." There was a tangled babble of apologies from the other side of the curtain: " ... so sorry!" "Oh no, I didn't realize -- " A hand reached and drew the curtain aside. The man in the bed was still speaking: his was the English accent. "No, it's more that we didn't think. And this would be a good time to shut up, wouldn't it." He was in his late twenties, good-looking in an unremarkable way, with a narrow face and overgrown brownish hair. His American visitor was younger, soft-featured, with extraordinary blue eyes. "Honestly, miss, it's embarrassing because I really do like this movie." She had to smile. They were both so genuinely apologetic. "Never mind, if it's one we all like then let's watch it. My name's Ada Cleam, by the way." There was a hint of an awkward pause. "And I didn't catch your names?" The men glanced at each other. Both of them, oddly, seemed embarrassed ... and yet she sensed there was a sharing of mutual amusement. "Orlando Bloom," the man in the bed said. "I'm sorry -- Or ... ?" "Orlando," he repeated clearly. "Elijah Wood," his friend added. "How do you do?" she said politely.

(I was rather pleased with how that scene came out, for something I dashed off in half an hour.) The problem is that "Adolynn of England" never thought to write a character who'd ever heard of Orlando Bloom, possibly because it had never occurred to her that there might be such a thing as a person who'd never heard of Orlando Bloom.

I love how Elijah Wood is just...inexplicably there in this fic. Kind of like the real person.

Also liking the random LotR references. "DURR HURR WE WERE ALL IN LORD OF THE RINGS TOGETHER SO WE DON'T KNOW ABOUT ANYTHING ELSE! DERP."

And except for his mother and his sister (and Ada Sue), Orlando Bloom apparently doesn't know anyone who wasn't in either LOTR or PotC.

That implies that there're fanficcers who care about the actual story, instead of masturbation in written form.

I like that two patients of opposite sex with orthopedic and oncological conditions are sharing a room. The morning round of visits in that hospital must look like a treasure hunt. Also, I can't think of 'tests for leukaemia' that require hospitalisation. Annnd even if the donor Sue would be insta-compatible, Bloom would still have to undergo treatment to get rid of the cancerous cells, so there goes the hair. In short, this fic didn't get the level of research you'd expect at your primary school's Show & Tell.

I'm glad I stopped writing RPFs halfway through my Duranie phase, because mine were almost as bad. At least I didn't write a Mary Sue, and tried to give Simon some friends outside the band and the Drum crew... but the villain was a fat bootlegger, rather than bone marrow gone berserk.