{The Jian Chonicles Continued}

{Continued from this post. But if you want to know the whole ridiculous story: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4} 

We were now in a pretty awkward situation.
Not only were we about to blow our own cover and confess to a complete stranger that we'd come to watch him walk down some stairs, but we were waiting for him outside the bathroom.

The bathroom.

I mean, I had my magazine to hide behind, but still. The bathroom.

I weighed everything: My pride. The potential. Jian Ghomeshi's pride. The bathroom. Karlie had a baby on one hip and a hand on the other. She was waiting for a decision. She wanted to say hi. I wanted to go sit behind my magazine and pretend like I was waiting for relatives to arrive on a flight from Yugoslavia. I didn't want to embarrass myself. I didn't want to embarrass Jian Ghomeshi. Pride. Potential. Pride.

Nobody's pride won, which might be kind of sad, I guess.

And so it was that we were still standing there when Jian Ghomeshi came out of the bathroom.

Towards us, obviously, because, as you'll remember: there we were.

Karlie took a step forward. "Um. Hi, Mr. Ghomeshi?" she said. Bravely.

I swear, there were a billion blank seconds that happened right there. Because I had time to think a whole paragraph of thoughts. Thoughts about how Jian Ghomeshi was standing right in front of me and had just come out of the bathroom and what if he thought we'd been timing him in there and what if he found out that I was that crazy girl from the emails and what if he wasn't the fantastically nice guy he appeared to be on the radio--what if he just said something nonchalant like, "Hey." and kept walking and is it stupid that my favourite celebrity is a CBC broadcaster and what if Ashley came over and kicked me and stuff like that.

I put my magazine up. Right up over my face. Like as though I were not with Karlie at all, but was standing by myself in the middle of an airport terminal reading a magazine, or rather, smelling a magazine, completely unaware of any bathrooms or celebrities in the general vicinity. I really did this, and I'm quite embarrassed about it now.

I heard Jian Ghomeshi say, "Mr. Ghomeshi is my dad! Call me Jian!" Which was, of course, a completely great thing to say.

The thing about your favourite celebrity being a radio star is that you recognize their voice pretty instantly in real life. I couldn't help but peek over my magazine. There was Jian Ghomeshi smiling at Karlie.

My magazine was shaking. I needed something bigger to hide behind. I tried to telepath a message to Karlie to make up a name for me. I closed my eyes. Anastasia. Tell him my name is Anastasia.

But it was too late. Karlie said it.

"Oh. Well I'm Karlie, and this is my friend Suzy."

"Suzy?" Jian Ghomeshi said in slow motion, turning to look at me cowering behind my magazine as though he were a Tyrannosaurus Rex instead of a radio guy. "Like, Suzy Krause, Suzy?"

He knew who I was. This was the worst thing in the whole world.

I did that thing that chameleons do. I turned bright red to match the wall behind me. I said, "Yeeeeeaaaahhhhhhhh..." in a squeaky voice. I dropped my magazine and made an apologizing face and waited for Ashley to appear with a rubber mallet. He was going to run away now. He was going to say, "You're stupid," or something.

But then Jian Ghomeshi was laughing and hugging me and telling me I was funny. I tried to say "Oh my goodness," but my red chameleon face was being smushed into the shoulder of his black leather jacket.

I stumbled back, floored. "You're not mad?" I blurted out.

"Why would I be mad?" he looked confused.

"Because I called you forty-something and put a gross old picture of you on my blog," I said. I don't know why I said it like that. I was wishing I'd worn different shoes.

He laughed again. I really didn't expect all this laughing, but I was grateful. I glanced around for Ashley. She was at the transportation booth. I bit my tongue so that I wouldn't mention that if he'd just let me give him a ride from the airport, Ashley wouldn't have to worry about the transportation booth.

"Here, can you watch my bag for a sec?" he asked, dropping his carry-on at my feet. "I have to go grab my luggage." I nodded and dropped my purse. My lip gloss rolled out. He returned it to me before trotting off to the baggage claim. I think this was around the time that we became friends. Because, you know, friends trust each other and laugh together and do favours for each other and all that.

Karlie and I gathered around the carry-on like it was a smoking meteor from outer space. I took a picture of it. I don't know why. She said, "This is Jian Ghomeshi's carry-on."

I said, "Cool."

Because we're, like, five.
So anyway, Jian came back then and I tried to act like less of an absolute loser and we visited for a bit. We talked about the weather and he asked if we'd heard the show this morning and I said something about the Arkells and he complimented Karlie on her baby.

Karlie asked for a picture and Jian called Ashley over to take it {which I was a little freaked out about, but it turns out that Ashley is ridiculously nice, so phew} and here it is:

Then I said, "Well. We should probably take off," as though we had somewhere to be. We didn't. But I said it anyway.

So that's the story of how we spied on Jian Ghomeshi at the airport and waited for him outside the bathroom and then built a solid relationship with him based on mutual trust and a common sense of humour. {I am the creepiest person alive.}

It is not, however, the rest of the story.

To be continued.

{UPDATE: PART 6}