This story will be told from Orli's POV. We all have our own idea of how he is. Please don't bother telling me this isn't how you pictured him - I understand that. This is completely my interpretation and if you don't like it... well, then don't read it. Thanks to Wisdom's Fool for the idea, and breaking through my writer's block, and to Kayla for her encouragement and name searching...

the way you're bathed in light

reminds me of that night

god laid me down into your rose garden of trust

and I was swept away

The Dolphins Cry - Live

“So you gonna ask her out or what?” I took a long drag off my cigarette and cast a glance at over at Elijah, whose blue eyes were surveying the boats in the marina thoughtfully.

He shrugged. “I don’t know, Orli… maybe.”

“Can’t be that hard to figure out if you like the girl or not.”

It was late in the afternoon and we had spent most of the day at the beach, surfing and meeting the bathing beauties who hung out there. One in particular had caught Elijah’s eye, and she had given him her number, but since then he had said nothing about it. I had a score of numbers in my pocket and doubted I would call any of them. At first it had been so overwhelming, having these girls throw themselves at me. But the novelty was beginning to wear off. I now understood why some of my idols had gone into seclusion. It was impossible to tell how many of these women actually liked me for me or simply because I was the latest hot star in Hollywood. Elijah had been through it all before, had grown up in the midst of it. He seemed to take it all in stride, shrugging it away as if it were something one got used to. I just didn’t know if I could, ever.

We talked about it a lot since I had moved to LA. What happens when you really and truly fall in love? How do you know they really love you in return? Do you even want to take the chance? It seemed marriages in Hollywood could be bought and sold at any local vendor. Daily you would hear about actors who had been married barely a year who were suddenly getting the “quickie” divorce. I hated the idea of such a thing, hated the eternal loneliness that is seemed to imply. Many of my acting mates back home had warned me not to become too embroiled in Hollywood, that I would be happier if I stayed in England and commuted to movie sets. But the lure of LA pulled me. I wanted to be near my cast mates from “Rings”. I wanted everything that LA had to offer. I just hadn’t counted on the futility and damnable loneliness. It was so simple to stand in a crowded room anywhere in the City of Angels and yet feel utterly and completely alone. I hated that feeling. So I tried to stay away from it, I tried to take it all in stride like Elijah did. Only he had years up on me in the mental training and I was being told daily by my agent that I hadn’t even begun to reach the peak of my popularity.

The truth of it was, it scared the living shit out of me.

It took me a moment to realize that Elijah was saying something. I blinked at him in question.

Elijah sighed, giving me that look I had come to know so well. The one that wondered if I ever paid any attention to him. “I asked if you’ve ever been deep sea fishing before?” He nodded toward the boats surrounding us on the pier. “It might be cool to rent a sailboat one of these days, down in the Caribbean, get the guys to go with us. Just sail around the islands for a few weeks. That sort of thing.”

I shrugged, up for anything really. Something new maybe. “Swimming with sharks,” I added. “I’ve always wanted to do that.”

“You would,” Elijah replied as if I had just suggested diving into a pool full of razors.

The pier extended out from the beach about half a mile and we were finally nearing the end. Not far out in the water was a small island constructed of piles of rocks where scores of sea lions gathered, barking loudly at one another, causing a general raucous that almost seemed to sing in harmony with the seagulls overhead. The sun was slowly beginning to set and a breeze blew in off the ocean, making me glad that I had opted for jeans and a sweatshirt over my swimming trunks. Reaching the edge of the pier, I glanced over at Elijah who was just pulling out a cigarette and lighting up, the freshly lit smell of cloves assailing my nostrils. He was quietly eyeing the boat behind me I could tell, his dark blue gaze flickering over my shoulder, contemplative. I was beginning to wonder if he was thinking of buying a boat of his own, which for some reason seemed very funny to me, when his eyes suddenly widened.

“Or – “

Before he could finish my name, I felt something, or someone, knock into me from behind, pushing me forward. There was this moment where I felt suspended in time, just sort of hanging there, knowing that I was attempting to regain my balance, also knowing that I was not succeeding, and then I was falling forward, toppling off the pier and was quickly swallowed by the cold, dark water.

I closed my mouth in time not to have too much of the salty water make it into my lungs, but it did go up my nose, which felt horrible, making my climb back to the surface that much more frantic. I broke out of the water, sputtering, trying to get the stinging salt out of my eyes, and wondering just what the hell had happened when Elijah’s peels of laughter finally broke through my haze. Treading water, I wiped my eyes, glaring up at my so-called friend who was now sitting on the edge of the pier, laughing his ever-loving ass off and pointing at me. I contemplated trying to reach for his leg to pull him in with me but knew I would never reach it. The pier was a good six feet above me.

“That’s – the funniest – “ Elijah began then broke off laughing once more. He grabbed his stomach as if it were hurting, holding it as he finished, “Funniest goddamned thing I have ever seen!”

“Oh! Please don’t say that!”

It was the first time the female voice penetrated my focus and I turned my head to see a woman standing near the edge of the pier, wringing her hands worriedly. She caught my look and quickly dropped to her knees, hanging over the edge.

“Please tell me you’re okay! I didn’t kill you did I? Gods, I am so clumsy! I didn’t see you there and I’m awfully sorry!”

Elijah just laughed harder.

I fought against the grin that threatened. If Elijah didn’t stop laughing I was going to begin to see the humor in the situation and right now I wanted to stay mad. At least at Elijah. He shouldn’t have been laughing so hard. And that fact that I lost a perfectly good cigarette. I watched it go floating by me before I glanced back up at the panicked woman.

“Nope, not dead, love. But getting slightly water-logged,” I commented, hoping one of the two nut jobs above me would get the hint. I didn’t know who was loonier. Elijah or the female who put me here in the first place.

“Oh! Of course!” She scrambled to her feet and disappeared from view. I found myself wondering if she wasn’t going to decide to run to the nearest phone and call the police. Or maybe the coast guard.

Glancing over at Elijah, I noticed that he had finally controlled his laughter somewhat, and was now taking a long drag on his cigarette, just watching me with that goofy grin. “You could be helping me, ya know,” I commented, thinking I would get more help from the sea lions if I swam over and joined them.

“I know.” Elijah blew out a steady stream of smoke. “But this is so much more fun. Wish I had a camera. The guys are gonna love this.”

“Paybacks are a bitch, Lij,” I warned him.

He looked at me with those damnable innocent eyes of his. “I’m not the one who pushed you in. She was.” He cocked his head toward the aforementioned “she” as she appeared once more with some sort of aluminum ladder, made to hang over the back of boats, in her hands.

“Here we go,” she announced, propping it on the edge of the pier, then sitting down between it to hold it in place. “Can you reach?”

I had to kind of jump out of the water like a dolphin to grasp the bottom rung, which sent Elijah into peels of laughter again, but I did catch it and slowly pulled myself out of the water. And there I was, standing on the pier, dripping everywhere like a wet rat, silently cursing the breeze that was blowing in from the ocean, with curious onlookers peering over the boats at me, undoubtedly laughing just as much as Elijah.

“I really am very sorry,” the woman was saying again as she pulled the ladder up.

I turned to her, uncertain of what to say. “No problem” didn’t seem quite appropriate because it was a long drive back to the house and I was already getting cold. She turned to meet my gaze with a pair of very large, very bright green eyes that for some reason made me smile. She wore her dark hair in a high ponytail and her nose had recently been sunburned, was slightly peeling, and had tiny freckles sprinkled across it. She smelled of Coppertone… and fish.

“You’ve got to be freezing,” she said, stating the obvious to me.

Being a guy, of course I only shrugged non-committally, ignoring the fact that I had my arms wrapped around my chest and was bouncing lightly in place to keep my teeth from chattering. I still was not about to admit that yeah, I was freezing my goddamned ass off.

“Come on. I may have some spare clothes aboard the boat.” She nodded toward the enormous fishing boat that Elijah had been staring at earlier.

I glanced back at Elijah who jumped up to join me and we followed her toward the boat. She glanced back at us when we reached it, her gaze on Elijah.

“No smoking.”

He nodded, putting the cigarette out and tossing it to the pier. We climbed aboard after her, glancing around at the stacks of nets and poles and sinkers that littered the deck. There were two older men near the bow, cleaning a pile a fish over the side. They glanced over at us, nodded to her, gave us curious looks, then went back to what they were doing. The smells of fish and salt and blood and oil wafted around us, causing Elijah to wrinkle his nose beside me. The woman ahead of us didn’t seem to notice as she motioned us toward the cabin and we followed her inside. For a moment I felt a little strange, dripping water all over the place, then had to remind myself that I wasn’t on some billion dollar yacht.

“You always carry men’s clothes where you go?” Elijah asked, watching as she dug through a trunk near the wall.

“Being a charter fishing boat, anything can happen,” she commented, pulling out a pair of sweats and t-shirt. “My uncle prepares himself for any eventuality with the customers. Here.”

She tossed the clothes to me along with a towel, then nodded over her shoulder. “You can change back there.”

I walked towards the back, ignoring Elijah’s grin, and entered the small room she had directed me to. It seemed to be some sort of Captain’s cabin, covered with maps and compasses and a tiny bunk in the corner. I peeled off the soaking t-shirt and then as I struggled, wondered if there was anything more uncomfortable in the world than wet jeans. I continued to glance around the room as I toweled off, taking in the old photos of boats and fish before putting on the thankfully warm and dry sweats and t-shirt.

I reentered the main cabin just in time to hear our hostess comment to Elijah, “I thought you looked familiar. You don’t look quite the same off- screen. I thought you were so adorable in ‘Forever Young’.” At this Elijah had the good graces to blush, which always made him appear that much more innocent and cherubic. “You were quite brilliant in ‘Lord of the Rings’.”

Well, here it was. She knew our identities and had seen ‘Rings’. I handed her the towel, waiting for the inevitable “Oh you were so wonderful as Legolas! Would you like to go out sometime?” but she just flashed me an awkward smile and carried it over to a hamper. My attention was pulled away from her when I felt a tug on my sleeve.

“Victoria here was telling me her uncle runs this charter boat – takes people out salmon fishing, marlin fishing, even whale watching,” Elijah commented, leaning back in the Captain’s chair as if he had made himself at home during the two minutes I was changing.

“Oh?” I couldn’t help but allow a bit of sarcasm into my voice. “Does his business include tossing people into the ocean as well?”

Victoria turned and looked at me wide-eyed for a moment, then it apparently occurred to her that I was teasing and she smiled. She seemed suddenly very pretty. “I’m the world’s biggest klutz,” she admittedly readily. “Is there something I can do to make it up to you? Some fresh salmon perhaps?”

I laughed. “Sorry, love. I don’t cook.”

“Oh. Well that won’t work, will it? A free trip on the boat then sometime?” She was walking back across the cabin, past me, and obviously did not notice the pile of sinkers on the floor at my feet, though I did, and reached out in anticipation of her fall, catching her just before she hit the deck.

I couldn’t help but notice that she was very soft beneath the pullover jacket and dark jeans, and she fit within my arms just perfectly. Placing her palms against my chest, she pushed back just a little, flashing me an embarrassed smile that I could only describe at that moment as enchanting.

“See?” She asked. “Klutz.”

Behind us, Elijah chuckled.

I let her go and she continued on across the cabin, apparently to pick things up. There were discarded cups and plates laying all about, as if the crew had recently eaten and then dispersed. “So are you an actor too, Mr. … ?”

She paused and I realized Elijah hadn’t bothered to introduce us. He was just grinning at me still and I felt like dumping him over the side of the boat.

“Orlando Bloom… You can just call me Orli. Everyone does,” I explained and she smiled again. “And yes, I am. An actor, I mean.” For the life of me I couldn’t understand why I was suddenly becoming tongue-tied and at a loss for words. I should’ve had her charmed off her feet by now.

“He played the Elf, Legolas, in ‘Lord of the Rings’,” Elijah added.

“I’m Victoria Adams,” she introduced herself, turning to look at me once more, frowning. She stared for a long while then finally shook her head. “I don’t see it. You had blonde hair and blue eyes in that, didn’t you? I only saw it once but I remember… “

I nodded. “Yeah. Wig, contacts. Not my usual look.”

She raised a well-shaped brow. “Hmm.”

That caught my attention. Not so much that she said it but how she said it. It was one of those “Well, isn’t that interesting but I don’t want to expand because I really don’t want to say what I am thinking for fear of upsetting you” hmm’s. I folded my arms over my chest, watching her as she flicked a bunch of switches on the panel near Elijah and then withdrew some keys from the ignition. “What do you mean hmm?”

“Nothing.” She turned and looked at me and I must have given her an expression that she understood because she finally elaborated, “It’s just that I had some friends that I saw the movie with who were all crazy over the blonde, blue-eyed Elf and I wasn’t impressed. I just think you are much better looking as yourself.” She then seemed to realize what she had said because she became very red, to her ears, and turned away quickly, losing herself once more in the panel before her.

“Thanks,” was all I could think to say in reply. Honesty was a rare thing to come by in Los Angeles so her comment kind of threw me off guard.

“Great,” Elijah commented beside me with a roll of his eyes. “As if his ego doesn’t get stroked enough.”

I reached out to smack him but he jumped off the chair and out of the way before I could touch him. So I had to content myself with flashing him a warning look, letting him know that the points were stacking against him. Payback was coming. Elijah blew me a kiss in reply then walked over to Victoria.

“My sincerest thanks for some very unexpected entertainment.”

“Don’t call it that!” She admonished, casting me yet another embarrassed glance. “It was completely horrid of me not to watch where I was going! If Mr. Bloom had hit his head or something, he could have drowned because of me.”

“Orli, love,” I corrected, feeling the need to smile again. “And no harm done. We’ll just write this one off as another adventure.”

Victoria flashed what appeared to be a grateful smile. She really did have beautiful eyes. “Thanks for not going all Hollywood on me. Uncle Tony once had this actor – I won’t name names – charter the boat and he fell overboard and tried to sue. Luckily, it was very obviously his own fault, but still… “

“That’s more publicity I don’t need,” I replied off-hand.

“You?” Elijah looked at me with a raised brow. “What about poor Victoria here? Can you imagine what thousands of teenage girls in the Los Angeles metro area would do to her if they found out she tried to kill the latest Hollywood hottie?”

Hollywood hottie. I winced at Elijah’s flippant comment and he knew I didn’t like it but he simply shrugged, turning back to Victoria.

“It was nice meeting you, even beyond the whole knocking Orli into the water thing.” He smiled with those big blue eyes of his and I wondered if Victoria was falling under the same spell as millions of girls around the world did whenever they were confronted with Elijah’s sweetness. “We have to get going. A friend of our’s has an exhibit opening tonight.”

“Oh shit! Viggo!” I had completely forgotten about Viggo’s Art Exhibit during the past hour’s adventures.

Elijah moved out of the cabin onto the deck and I followed behind Victoria. Elijah shook her hand and jumped back onto the pier, turning to wait for me as I glanced over at Victoria who was standing beside me. She was only an inch or two shorter than me, so that I was a little disconcerted when her green-eyed gaze met mine so directly.

“I really am sorry,” she told me again.

I shook my head. “Stop apologizing. I love the water.”

She smiled and the slightest dimple appeared at the left corner of her mouth. “Well if you ever want to be tossed in again…”

“I know who to visit.”

We both kind of laughed and I shook her hand, which was very tiny when enclosed in mine. You know how sometimes when you meet someone, you know without really knowing them that they are really good people and you want very much to get to know them better, to find out if your instincts are right, but then there isn’t the time or you get involved in something else and the next thing you know you are regretting that you never took the chance to become friends? Well all of that was running through my mind at that moment, in the space of just a few seconds until I realized that I still had to return the borrowed clothing to her and maybe then we would have the chance to talk some more.

“I’ll bring these back as soon as I can,” I told her, indicating the t- shirt and sweats.

“It’s no big,” she shrugged. “Not like you’re walking out of here in an Anthony Price suit or anything.”

I smiled, wanting to say something more, but Elijah called out from the pier, stating how we were running late as it was and was I coming or planning on taking another dip in the water. I told her it was nice to meet her and then I was back on the pier, following Elijah toward the parking lot, my thoughts soon turning to the evening ahead.

Chapter Two