I almost spilled my banana daiquiri in my lap.

There he sat at the end of the bar counter opposite me, the man of my dreams, the man I had been desperately searching for my entire life. The man destined by fate, God or some other sentient power in the Cosmos to become our leading man. The impossible. The improbable. The most important, most influential being ever to travel throughout space and time.

My dream man had perched himself on a stool in a practically empty bar near Lambert Field, St. Louis, nursing a tepid beer. He sat tall with a thin figure sporting short, chestnut brown hair mussed in that sexy, endearing manner. If I wasn’t mistaken, his attire consisted of a rumpled chocolate-colored business suit and a half un-done, chocolate and sky blue-swirled tie. He made a pained face at the first sip of his beer, sliding his long tongue across his top teeth as if to taste the individual components of the brew. He narrowed his large brown eyes and glanced furtively about the dimly lit, perpetually smoky room.

My God… It had to be him, but how on earth? My raging hormones must have scrambled my neurons. It couldn’t be him. He was a fictional character, for heaven’s sake. What a time to give up taking antidepressants! I’d finally dived into the deep end of insanity.

I vowed to stop drinking then and there, but I had to know. I had to find out if this perfect specimen would be willing to help us bring Sammy’s cinematic creation to life. I summoned up my courage, put down my drink and stood, ungracefully tugging my short denim skirt in place. I approached him.

“You come here often?” I asked, smiling.

I know it’s horribly clichéd, but it’s what guys who frequent this sort of establishment expect a lone woman to say. Right off, I want to make it clear I don’t usually engage in this sort of activity. I actually have other means of making a living. When I do hit the bars it’s more like moonlighting. As a multi-divorced gal who has seen her share of heartaches and financial disasters, it sure helps when I’m short on cash to pay the bills, or if I want to do some serious shopping at a con, or if I need to raise funds for a worthy cause quickly, as in this case.

Amazingly enough, my rusty overture did the trick.

My dream man stopped searching the room and focused his gaze on my face. His dark, soulful eyes connected with mine for a second, but it that brief span it felt as if all of time had come and gone and come again. The stale odor of liquor and cigarettes vanished to be replaced by the uplifting scents of sunlight and roses. The darkness of a thousand starless nights lifted like a veil from my mind. Life’s meaning became clear, and my psyche rang with childlike wonder. He read my thoughts and, surprisingly, he didn’t find them wanting.

He smiled that beautiful, brilliant, captivating smile I’d fallen hard for in his first episode. My knees turned to jelly, and my hormones shifted into overdrive.

“You come here often,” he repeated my words in what sounded like a British accent. The twinkle in his eye conveyed that he found my pick-up line both amusing and intriguing. “Yes, I do. Well, not to this specific place, mind you, but I have traveled to this…area…now and then.”

“I know this will sound strange,” I said, taking the barstool next to him and gripping the counter’s edge to remain upright, “but you look very familiar to me. Have you ever acted on television before?”

Up went the eyebrows. “Acted? On television? I took action against a television transmitter once, but I can’t say anyone has ever paid me to appear on the screen.”

“Really? I find that hard to believe. You look exactly like David Tennant.”

He tilted his head and scrunched up his face. “Who?”

I shuddered. The guy must be totally convinced that I was an escapee from the nuthouse by now, but I pressed on anyway. “David Tennant. He’s an actor who portrays the Doctor on Doctor Who. You’re the spitting image of him. It’s…it’s uncanny.”

For several long moments those big brown eyes searched my face again. I blushed under his scrutiny but remained transfixed. Even if I had ruined my chance to make a couple of bucks bonking another traveling salesman, I had at least found the perfect leading man for Sammy’s script. I couldn’t afford to let this—whoever he was—get away.

“Oh, Doctor Who the television program?” A light bulb of understanding popped up over his head. He settled back on his barstool and grinned. “Yes, I know what you’re talking about. I used to watch it when I was a kid. I loved hiding behind the furniture whenever the Daleks came onto the screen. Scary beasties, those Daleks.”

I relaxed. At least he didn’t seem to be an ax murderer, and he could very well turn out to be a fellow sci-fi geek. Perhaps I could appeal to his sense of brotherhood in the world of fandom.

“The Daleks can be nasty, but I’ve always thought the Cybermen were much more frightening.”

“You mean the tin androids with the torch on top of their noggins?” he asked.

“Torch? Ah, yeah, you mean a flashlight. I agree it wasn’t the best of creature designs, but it works for me. The Daleks are just plain too clumsy-looking—although in the new series with all the cool CGI animation they fly and do all kinds of scary things with those funky toilet plunger arms of theirs.”