Reaching into the archives of Tales of Andrade, I bring you another story of Love’s Labour Lost. And yes, I have said the failures of my past love life are funnier than the successes but some of the failures have been spectacular blow ups. With that in mind, I give you my Alyssa Milano story.

Many couples who are comfortable and confident with each other play a Top 5 game. You each name your Top 5 celebrity fantasy hook-ups and if you happen to have that moment where a one-nighter is in the offing with one of those 5 celebrities, you may do so, no questions asked. I know many couples who have played this game but I’ve never known anyone to ever consummate the deal.

In the early Aughts, my girl, at the time, and I had our Top 5’s. Hers included Kevin Spacey (I won’t even delve into the psychological morass of that) and Norm Macdonald. Mine were, in no particular order, Gillian Anderson, Natalie Imbruglia (a tale for another post), Kate Winslet (don’t laugh), Drew Barrymore and…. Alyssa Milano. I would love to tell you of how charming and amazing I was when I met Alyssa and how I was able to enact every Embrace of the Vampire scenario and lived through a night of unflinching passion and spectacular ecstasy to conjure up and touch the face of God. Alas, this was not to happen.

June of 2002, I attended the Doves and Elbow show at The Mayan Theater in Downtown L.A., covering the bands for the magazine I worked for at the time. The Mayan doesn’t exactly have a sexy backstage so myself and a buddy of mine, were situated in the VIP area, near the stage. About thirty minutes into the show, my buddy nudged me and pointed to my left.

“Hey,” he said, “that’s Alyssa Milano. And she’s staring right at you.”

Stunned, I turned to my left and sure enough, twenty feet away stood Alyssa Milano and she was staring directly at me. Shocked, a wave of surprise struck me such to make me freeze. At this moment, and there may be an element of poetic license, it appeared to me that she gave me a flirtatious small wave. It might have been my mind playing tricks with me but definitely she was looking at me and it SEEMED like she gave me a small wave.

“She’s coming over here,” my friend hissed and indeed she was. She was walking over to me.

I take pride that after a certain pre-pubescent age, I held little fear when speaking to a member of the fairer sex. I didn’t and don’t get tongue tied, nervous or display any other tic. But at this moment in time, I was a mess. As she sauntered over, I quickly ran through scenarios of comments to make, in my mind.

“Well hello, my name is Kevin Andrade and I write for….”

or, “I see you’re a fan of Elbow. I’m here to interview Guy Garvey (lead singer of Elbow).”

Nothing good was popping into my head but whatever I was thinking, sure as hell beat what I said.

She reached me and she was beautiful. A shimmering radiance of a woman. I was a puddle of stale sweat. She stood next to me, smiling and took a sip of her cocktail. She leaned over to me.

“Hey,” she practically shouted as the band played louder. She nodded at the pad of paper and pen in my hand. “You here covering the show?”

A simple question. I replied with a simpleton’s response.

“Me. Write.”

And that was all I said. That was the entirety of my verbal illocution with Alyssa. As she grimaced at my Lenny Of Mice and Men verbiage, she shook her head with a polite sadness. She stood for about five minutes next to me as I screamed inwardly to say something, say anything to pull me from the abyss of embarrassment. Finally, she leaned over and asked a fair question.

“Do you know where the bathroom is,” she asked.

I delivered a stupid, red faced grin of a shrug and didn’t say a word. Chuckling, she looked past me at my friend.

“Do you know where the bathroom is?”

He politely pointed her in the correct direction and Alyssa Milano walked out of my life. Now, it would have been cliche to have that be a ‘meet cute’ and began a rom-com of an affair with a childhood crush but that would’ve been too easy. Rather, live with the pain of a once in a lifetime opportunity ruined by literally nearly pissing one’s pants. The show carried on and Alyssa and I went on to live our lives.

Now I’m fairly certain that she wouldn’t remember a mute baboon from 2002 who was unable to carry a conversation with her but maybe she does remember that moment. I know I shall never forget it. But, times change, people move on and evolve. She probably wouldn’t even be in my Top 5 anymore. Although I have seen every 178 episodes of Charmed. Twice.

Kevin R. Andrade