FIC: Accept What You Cannot Change, AU, Entourage, Vince/E, R, 1/2
Title: Accept What You Cannot Change
Fandom/Pairing: Entourage, Vince/E
Series: Yes; This accompanies another AU story, Best of Both Worlds; it's the final installment, and E's POV. Please read the other first, or this might not make that much sense.
Notes: Thanks to shoshannagold for her beta read!
Accept What You Cannot Change
Eric woke to the noise of the ocean. He groaned and reached out, expecting to feel sand or sleeping bag, trying to remember if they’d staggered out to the beach last night after drinking, but instead felt nothing but a wide expanse of soft bed and silk-smooth sheets. He opened his eyes: he was in bed. A huge bed, in a huge room. An unfamiliar room. He sat up and gasped. Where the fuck was he? Where the -
“Good morning!” Lloyd’s bright voice was unmistakable. The double doors at the far end of the room swung open and Lloyd - in a dark suit with a morning tie - strode in, carrying an espresso cup in one hand and a sheaf of newspapers in his other.
“Lloyd?” Eric gasped, and then looked at the rumpled bed next to him. He clutched the sheet a little tighter to his bare chest. “Uh - what the fuck?”
Lloyd stopped dead, still ten feet from the bed. His eyes went wide. “I’m sorry,” he said, ducking his head, “am I early? I didn’t - I’m so sorry, I would never wake you if -”
“Lloyd, stop,” Eric said. Whatever was going on, clearly it wasn’t Lloyd’s fault. This was clearly some kind of prank, the guys were messing with him. Or maybe - maybe he’d had more to drink last night than, well, than ever before. “I’m not - I didn’t mean you. I’m -” He shook his head. “It’s fine, I’m awake. What’s, uh, what’s going on?”
Lloyd gave him a quick, evaluative look, then stepped hesitantly forward. He handed Eric the espresso and paused, and Eric realized he was supposed to drink it. He did, fast, like a shot, and then handed the cup back, struggling not to make a face. He was a latte man. Lloyd spread the papers - Variety, the Hollywood Reporter, both the L.A. and New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and a few neighborhood papers that Eric couldn’t guess his interest in - out in a fan on the bed, expertly, apparently well practiced. Eric continued to gape at him, and Lloyd looked back, expectant and oddly humble. Something totally fucking weird was going on.
“Is this some kind of joke?” Eric asked.
Lloyd flinched. He reached out and straightened the L.A. Times so that it was even with the other papers. “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t -”
Eric rubbed his face. “Please stop apologizing,” he said, and Lloyd shut up instantly. OK, that was nice. Eric looked up. Maybe he wasn’t fucked up - maybe the world was fucked up. "Lloyd, if I tell you something, right now, do you promise not to freak out?”
“That’s what the confidentiality agreement says I swear.”
“Oh. OK,” Eric said. He paused. The espresso was already working; his hands felt a little jittery. At least his voice sounded right. “I’m, uh, I’m not where I’m supposed to be.”
Lloyd’s eyes went wide, again, and he drew a Blackberry from his pocket. “Sir, I rescheduled the UA meeting like I thought you said, I -”
“That’s not what I mean,” Eric said, then sighed. “OK. I think, maybe this will work better in a few minutes. I’m going to get up, take a shower, and meet you in the kitchen in, say, fifteen minutes. OK?”
“What should I tell him you’d like?”
“Who?”
“Andre,” Lloyd said.
Eric blinked. “Andre.”
“Chef Andre.”
There was a chef? Ari didn’t have a chef. Where the fuck was he? “Uh. Maybe, just a bagel?”
“In place of the usual or in addition?” Lloyd asked.
“Uh, whatever,” Eric said, “whatever’s easiest.”
Lloyd nodded. “Fifteen minutes in the kitchen.”
He turned and left the room with a militaristic spin that freaked Eric out a little. When the doors were closed, Eric climbed out of bed, grabbed a heavy robe hanging nearby, and looked around. This was the largest bedroom he’d ever been in, maybe ever seen, and it was also, perhaps, the least inviting. There were tall bookshelves along one wall with lines of antique-looking books and small clusters of awards; a flat-screen television took up most of another wall, with a sofa angled in front of it, before a coffee table with three neat stacks of script pages. A huge painting of wide boats on a green sea hung just behind the bed, which had matching green linens and looked like it was possibly two King-sized beds combined. Vince must be doing insanely well to afford us staying here, he thought, and then he realized where he was.
This was the what-if.
“Ha,” he whispered, looking around. This was what Vince could have had, if he’d listened to Eric all those years ago. Eric felt a warm swell of pride and laughed to himself. Wait until he found the bastard.
The bathroom was just as palatial and spare - gleaming white and green marble tiles, a bathtub large enough to sail in, a shower with twelve heads, two benches, and eight different kinds of shampoo in elegant dispensers, and a mirror that showed he was definitely not Ari. After a shower and a shave - with an honest-to-God pearl-inlaid razor - Eric walked back into the bedroom and realized he had no idea what to wear. Well, couldn’t be that hard to figure out, he thought, and soon stumbled into a room, maybe the size of his bedroom in the normal house, full of shirts, slacks, and expensive shoes. He picked a green T-shirt and a white button-down to go over it, going with the room’s theme, and a pair of gray slacks under that. No label. Tailor-made. Nice.
By the time he made it to the kitchen, it had probably been twenty minutes, maybe longer. Lloyd looked panicked. “What is it?” Eric asked, concerned.
“I thought I’d misheard,” Lloyd said. “I thought -”
“Lloyd, take it easy, all right?” Eric said, patting his shoulder, and Lloyd gaped at him. Eric started to ask what that was about when he noticed the plate of food sitting on the butcher’s block just behind Lloyd.
A single biscuit with sausage gravy sat next to a perfectly poached egg; two half-dollar pancakes shared space with a small round of hashbrowns; and a bagel, with a perfectly even layer of cream-cheese with real blueberries smashed in, sat on the next plate over.
“Holy shit,” Eric said. Even the juice - which looked to be fresh-squeezed pomegranate - was artfully displayed, with an orange slice cut into the shape of a flower clipped on the rim.
“Is it OK? I didn’t know about the blueberry cream cheese, but they only had frozen strawberries.”
“This looks amazing.” Eric sat in front of it, and Lloyd hovered. He glanced up. “Do you want some?”
“No,” Lloyd said, too quickly.
Eric took a deep breath. “Let’s, before I get to this, let’s talk, Lloyd, OK? Have a seat.”
To his surprise, after Lloyd sat down, he started to cry. “I knew it, I knew this was coming,” he said. “I’m so sorry, E - I mean, Eric, Mr. Murphy, I did everything the best I could, I know it wasn’t always good enough -”
“Lloyd!” Eric reached out and squeezed his shoulder. “Jesus, I’m not firing you.”
“You’re not?”
“No! You’re - Lloyd, you’re an amazing - whatever it is you are,” he said, and Lloyd smiled through his tears. “Seriously. No. I wanted - I was going to tell you something, remember?”
“Oh. Yes. Of course.” Lloyd reached for his Blackberry, and Eric flinched. “No notes?” Lloyd said, and Eric shook his head.
“You won’t need them,” he said.
He told Lloyd the whole story, from the elevator ride to waking up in the monstrous bed. “So I need to know what’s going on,” Eric said. “You know? This is a whole new life for me.”
Lloyd’s brow furrowed. “Is this - some kind of movie you’re pitching?”
“No, Lloyd, it’s real life,” Eric said. “And why would I be pitching a movie? Where is Vince, anyway?”
“At the gym until 9:10,” Lloyd said, almost like a recording. “He’s probably just finishing the weight room, should I -”
“No, no, it’s fine.” Eric picked up his fork. “You’re sure you don’t want some of this?”
“I’m allergic,” Lloyd said, looking at the food, and Eric looked down, too.
“To eggs?”
“To egg substitue,” Lloyd said, and when Eric flinched Lloyd gasped. “Oh my God, you really are a body-switched Eric!”
“You got that from the eggs?”
Lloyd twirled the plate and pointed at each item. “Vegan gravy over low-carb biscuit; organic hashbrowns cooked in grapeseed oil with no salt; poached fake egg; mango spears with cinnamon, very good for your heart; and flax-seed pancakes with no syrup.”
Eric tapped the bagel. “This?”
“Whole grain, locally grown, with toasted oatmeal. The cream cheese was handmade by Andre, all organic, with fat-free milk.”
“Jesus.”
“Your blood pressure was a little high a year ago, that’s when you hired Andre.”
Eric took a bite of the bagel, which was really quite delicious. “When did I hire you?”
“Four years ago.”
“And I still make you cry?”
Lloyd shrugged. “You’re demanding,” he said. “But you’re brilliant.”
“Me?” Lloyd stared at him. “Lloyd, what am I brilliant at?”
“You’re only the most sought-after director in Hollywood!”
Eric didn’t have time to respond to that, because Vince suddenly walked into the kitchen. Lloyd gasped, and Eric nearly had the same reaction. Vince looked - well, he looked angry, but he also looked beautiful. Actually fucking beautiful. Eric had lived with the guy for ten years, lived next to him forever before that, and he knew Vince had his moments. Vince had a great face and a great metabolism, but he’d always been pretty casual about his body. He worked out when he had to, he bulked up or trimmed down for movies, and on the set, on the screen, he was, sometimes, exactly as hot as everyone thought he was. At home, he was usually a different creature, laying around in dirty jeans, brushing his hair at the last minute, loathe to shave, just casual about everything.
This was a different Vince. The Vince standing in front of him was wearing flat, tailored black slacks and a silky green shirt; his hair, in loose dark waves just at chin-length, looked silky and possibly freshly, expertly styled; his eyes were brighter than usual, and Eric suspected contacts; his fingernails were manicured, and Eric saw a gold band on his left hand. His face was just thin enough that his cheekbones seemed higher than usual, and his arms were clearly muscular under the fine material.
He looked like a movie star. More than that: he looked like a grown up. And he looked fucking hot. This was Vince at his best - this was his full physical potential, Eric realized, and it was all he could do not to let his mouth drop open.
But Vince was more than just physically hot: he looked, Eric saw, mad as hell. “What the fuck, Eric?” he said.
Eric coughed. “What the fuck what?” Eric picked up his glass, and that’s when he saw it - the ring on his own finger. How did he miss it up until now? He was married? Vince was married?
Vince was glaring at him like they were about to get in a fist fight. He tipped his head, including Lloyd in the glare, and Lloyd squeaked. Eric understood, because he didn’t want to be caught in the middle of whatever was about to come, either. “It’s OK,” Eric said, and Lloyd nodded and practically hurtled out of the room. Worse came to worse, he’d just tell Vince the truth.
“Trent,” Vince said.
Eric couldn’t think of any Trents. He took a sip of his juice, and waited for more information. He’d eat the whole plate one tiny bite at a time if he had to, to avoid having to say anything.
“Trent, my bodyguard,” Vince snarled. That was a tone Eric had really only heard a few times. Vince was furious. Eric cut a wedge of pancake and chewed it very slowly. It was dry, tasted kind of nutty. Vince recrossed his arms. “You’re just not going to say anything?”
Eric swallowed. “What do you want me to say?” Please, tell me, he thought.
“I want - what does it matter what I want?” Vince asked. “Apparently nothing, right? Apparently.”
“Just tell me what you’re talking about,” Eric said.
“He told me about your little meetings.” Vince was practically thrumming with anger - his fingers were drumming on his arms. They both had rings. Matching rings. Eric blinked and looked up. He remembered the big bedroom, the big closets. Made for two. Made for them. Oh, yes, Eric thought, fighting back a grin. Vince, this hot perfect Vince, and this beautiful house, and - yes.
“Pay attention!” Vince said, slamming his hands on the table. “I know you have eighty seven thousand meetings to get to, I know you’ve got all your plans, but for one minute, Eric, engage with me, here. Pretend you fucking care that I’m upset, that I’m trying to tell you something.”
“What?” Eric said. “I’m - I swear I’m listening. I was just - I’m sorry. Distracted.”
“Not distracted. Avoiding,” Vince said. “You don’t want to talk about the fact that you’re paying someone to spy on me.” He took a few steps closer. “Spying, Eric! How does it even work - does he get extra if he tells you some juicy detail? Is this why you were so pissed about my lunch with Jess last week, because he told you some fucking lie about it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Eric said, honestly, spreading his hands.
“Oh, fuck you,” Vince said. “This shit is sick, Eric. If someone else was doing this, you know what would happen? You know what we’d do, we’d fucking call the cops. You’re stalking me,” he said, and Eric heard something under the anger that was worse - he heard desperation, and maybe a little fear.
“I’m not,” Eric said. “I don’t - I didn’t mean -”
“Whatever,” Vince said. Eric slid off his chair and put out a hand, just to stop Vince from rushing past him, but Vince flinched away from him, knocking into the cabinets, and then walked back out the way he’d come.
Lloyd tiptoed in a second later, while Eric was still standing with his arm out. “Oh dear,” he said, and Eric looked over at him.
“What the fuck was that?” he whispered.
“You’ve been spying on him,” Lloyd said.
Eric sat down again. “Maybe you should start at the top.”
So then he got the full story. He’d come to L.A. when Vince had, fifteen years ago, and he’d worked catering somewhere and managed to push Vince’s audition tape into the right hands. From there, he’d sculpted Vince’s career in a way similar to how Ari had run things: commercials, then small parts in films, then a commercial success not unlike Head On. That was where the stories changed. Eric had still found Queens Boulevard, but there was no Billy.
“Wait, no Billy Walsh?” Eric asked, and Lloyd frowned.
“Your cat?”
Eric rubbed his head. “We have a cat named Billy Walsh?”
Lloyd nodded. “After some crazy guy you met at a party. It’s a pretty ugly cat.”
“I’ll bet,” Eric said, shaking his head. “Go on.”
Entrenched in Hollywood culture and tired of taking shit from their agent, Vince and Eric had produced Queens Boulevard themselves, and Eric, having endured seven years of sitting on set with Vince, directed it. It killed at Sundance, and by the time they left there, they were both stars - and they were outed, thanks to a celebratory kiss at one of the panel discussions.
Lloyd led Eric into the den to complete the story, and Eric gasped. There were two Oscars gleaming on the bookshelves, next to a Golden Globe; there was also a picture of them from the front of Vanity Fair, Vince’s chin resting on Eric’s shoulder, their arms tangled together over Eric’s chest, the headline: The New Power Couple. The pictures on the wall showed Eric and Vince with any number of other famous people, even, in one shot, with a presidential candidate. “Jesus,” Eric said.
“You’re very sought-after,” Lloyd said, standing primly by the door.
Eric took a seat on a leather couch. He couldn’t really believe he was famous yet, so he focused on the stuff that seemed most important. “What’s the story with Vince?”
“You’ve been paying his bodyguard, Trent, to report to you on what he’s doing.”
“Why?” Lloyd shrugged, and Eric said, “This is no time to be delicate, Lloyd.”
“You think he’s cheating on you,” Lloyd said.
“Is he?”
“I doubt it,” Lloyd said. “Trent hasn’t seen anything.”
“I’m pretty hard on him, huh?”
Lloyd shrugged. “You have your ups and downs.”
Eric closed his eyes. “He seemed pretty fucking angry. And it kind of sounds like he has the right.” Lloyd didn’t say anything; when Eric opened his eyes again, Lloyd was looking tastefully away. That answered that; this was all his - well, this Eric’s fault. He cleared his throat. “What about the guys?” Lloyd looked confused. “Turtle, Drama.”
“Last I heard, Turtle was working at the Nike Store,” Lloyd said.
Eric laughed. “Turtle, working?”
“He’s pretty broke, with the lawsuit,” Lloyd said. When Eric glanced across, Lloyd said, “Sorry, I forgot. You’re suing him. The papers were filed earlier this year.”
“Sue - I’m suing Turtle?”
“He took thousands of dollars of merchandise intended for you and Vince and sold it for his own personal gain,” Lloyd said. “He cheapened your image.”
“Was that in the court filing?” Lloyd nodded. “Jesus fucking Christ. I’m a real asshole, huh? Where’s Drama? I’m maybe stalking Vince, his brother’d have something to say about it.”
Lloyd frowned. “Half brother. You had a test administered, before -” He paused and looked away.
“Oh, what, Lloyd? Cut the dramatics, can you?”
“He’s missing. Just up and left, three years ago.” Lloyd looked sideways again. “There are rumors of suicide.”
Eric felt light-headed. Drama had run away, maybe killed himself? Drama wasn’t Vince’s brother? “He - because I -” Eric tried to choke out.
Lloyd shrugged. “He’d also recently been fired from his TV show.” Eric looked up, and Lloyd blinked. “You might have had something to do with it.”
“Jesus,” Eric whispered. “Oh, Jesus.”
“Are you all right?”
“No,” he said, “no, I’m - I’m evil, here. I’m worse than Ari.” He rubbed his face. “Why is Vince still with me?”
“I’ve always assumed the sex was amazing,” Lloyd said, and Eric groaned. “Plus you can really be very charming.”
“Sure.” Eric sat back. He felt like he might throw up, or like he might need to throw something. He closed his eyes and prayed: Let the world go back to normal. When he opened his eyes, he saw only Lloyd in front of him. Even that felt like too much of an audience. “Listen, can you, uh, whatever I have today, can I get out of it? I mean - I don’t think I’m up to -”
“I can do that,” Lloyd said. He glanced at his watch. “I should do that now.”
“Good,” Eric said. “I need a minute.”
After Lloyd left, Eric looked around the room. It was full of these trophies, these signs of success, and everything within made him sick. What the fuck, he thought. How had they gotten here? How had - he swallowed, seeing the smile on Vince’s face in the framed photo. Well, OK, he thought. He’d seen movies like this - Groundhog Day came to mind - where the character had to make some major shift, come to some realization, set certain things right - before he could move on. Eric was going to do exactly that: set things right, as fast as he fucking could. He’d be flying blind in this Eric’s life, but with Lloyd’s help, he could probably get things figured out.
And, at the very least, he knew where to begin.
Vince was in their bedroom, pulling clothes from one of the closets. Eric stopped just inside the door.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m leaving,” Vince said. The shirt he was holding shook just a little in his hand.
Eric nodded. “Where are you going?”
“New York,” Vince said. “I’ll stay in the apartment.” He threw the shirt onto the bed and crossed his arms again. “Say something, Eric.”
“You should,” Eric said. “Leave me, I mean.” Vince blinked. “I’m an asshole.”
Vince smirked. “That isn’t going to work,” he said, and turned back to the closet.
“I don’t - I’m not trying to talk you out of it,” Eric said, sitting on the bed. He picked up a shirt and started folding it. “Things are pretty bad, huh?”
“Whose fault is that?” Vince said from inside the closet.
“Mine,” Eric said. He closed his eyes, tried to imagine what the thing to say would be. What would this Eric not give? The truth. “I’m jealous. I’m greedy. I’m controlling,” he said.
Vince walked out and leaned on the doorjamb. “Go on,” he said.
Eric looked down. “I’m mean,” he said. “Cruel, even. To you. To everyone.” Vince didn’t say anything. “I do love you, though.”
He was surprised when Vince sat next to him. “That’s never been our problem,” he said softly, and then he said Eric’s name. Eric had the feeling that something very bad was coming. Why did Vince keep calling him Eric, anyway?
“Vince,” he said. He reached out and put his hands over Vince’s. It felt awkward, but it was exactly what he would have done if he was having this conversation with his girlfriend, and Vince didn’t pull away. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what?”
Eric understood this was a test, and he knew, instantly, there was no way he could pass. “For the stuff with Trent. That was fucked up, and I will never do that again.” Vince didn’t move. There was more, he was sure, so much more to be sorry for, but he didn’t know enough yet. “Shit, Vince, I’m sorry for everything,” he said. He was surprised when Vince reached out and drew his face up. Vince was looking at him with very little hope but a painful amount of earnestness.
“I don’t understand how we got here,” he said.
“Me either,” Eric said. He swallowed, surprised to find he was close to tears. “Is there any way, you think, that we could - not be here?”
Vince frowned. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t think so.”
“What about - counseling?” Eric asked.
Vince flinched. “Now you want to go to counseling? I asked you two years ago, you remember what you said?”
Eric shook his head.
“You said you’d rather be dead than pay someone to tell you how to live with me.” Vince drew back. “You said if I felt the need to flap my jaw, I could just suck you off more often.”
“Jesus,” Eric said, and he covered his own face. “Holy fuck, I’m a bastard.”
“That’s news,” Vince said.
“Stay here.” Vince started to talk, but Eric talked over him. “Stay in the house. I’ll go, uh, I’ll leave. OK?” Vince looked surprised, and Eric kept talking while he had the advantage. “Let’s at least be in the same town.”
“Eric,” Vince said, but he sounded tired, not angry.
“Just stay,” Eric said. “I’m going to fix this.”
Vince shook his head, but he said OK. Eric sensed that this was the limit, that he couldn’t push Vince for anything else, so he stood. He touched Vince’s face, but Vince kept looking down. “I’ll go,” he said, and walked out of the bedroom, closing the door carefully behind him.
Lloyd was waiting in the living room. “I need a place to stay,” Eric said.
“The suite at the Beverly Hilton?”
“No,” Eric said, glancing back down the hall. “Somewhere quiet. Somewhere no one will see me. And - clear up what I’ve got this week, OK? I need to focus on this.”
“This?”
Eric blinked. “He’s leaving me.”
Lloyd snapped out his phone. “I’ll order the flowers. New car? He liked that Porsche last month from -”
“No,” Eric said. “Lloyd. This isn’t just a fight. This is - I’m going to fix this. I’m going to turn this around. For real. No buying him anything, no trying to smooth it over.”
Lloyd slowly tucked away his cell phone. “So - what do you want to do first?”
Eric sighed. “Take me to Turtle.” Lloyd nodded. “And get my lawyer on the phone.”
“Which one?”
By the time they reached the Nike Store, Lloyd had given him a complete briefing on the Turtle situation and Eric had everything worked out. Maybe he wasn’t a Hollywood Superstar in his usual world, but he knew how to get stuff done on the fly, and here, he didn’t even have to drop Vince’s name to make people jump. They stopped at a Kinkos en route and took over the fax machine, then emerged with a folder full of papers that Eric carried into the Nike Store.
Turtle was helping a teenaged boy try on shoes while the boy’s mother fretted over the cost. Eric watched them from the end of the aisle, saw that Turtle was really working to be kind even though the mother was becoming increasingly negative and the kid was getting whiny.
“I’m not paying a hundred and fifty dollars just so you can not make the basketball team again,” the mother said, and Eric stepped forward.
“Aw, great,” Turtle said, shaking his head and gathering crumpled stuffing paper into a shoe box.
“Who’re you?” the woman asked.
“He’s no one,” Turtle said, and Eric stepped forward.
“I’m in management,” Eric said. “This is my assistant, Lloyd.”
“Hello,” Lloyd said.
“I really need to borrow this guy for a second,” Eric said, and Turtle rolled his eyes.
The woman crossed her arms. “We were here first.”
Eric nodded. “You let me borrow him, I’ll pay for your shoes. Whatever you want. Lloyd, could you help her out?”
The woman blinked, then grabbed her son by the arm. “Come on,” she said, and Lloyd led them to the front counter.
Turtle closed the shoe box. “Real slick,” he said. “Buying some new friends?”
“Is there somewhere we could talk?”
“Like court?”
Eric sighed. “Give me five minutes,” he said. “I’m not fucking with you. Five minutes and I’ll make this all go away.”
Turtle picked up the box and tilted his head, and Eric followed him across the store, back into the storeroom. “So talk,” Turtle said. “But there are cameras around, you should know, in case you’re pulling some freaky trick. My lawyer said I shouldn’t come anywhere near you.”
Eric nodded. He slid the folder across the countertop to Turtle. “You can run these by him, then, if you want.”
“What is it?”
“It’s the end. It cancels the whole thing and says you’re not liable for anything you ever acquired. Plus it admits your damage claims and returns all of your lawyer’s fees.”
Turtle gaped at him for a second, then frowned. “What, this is your idea of a joke, right?”
“No joke,” Eric said. He flipped the folder open. “I already signed. Get them signed and send it over when you can.”
Turtle looked at the papers, seemed to actually read a page. Eric glanced around the storeroom, which was stacked with shoes and smelled like wet cardboard, musty. He’d spent half his life teasing Turtle about being a lazy asshole, but Jesus, he didn’t want him ending up here, 30-something and working retail. “I don’t get it,” Turtle said, finally.
“I’m an ass,” Eric said. “I’ve been an ass. I’ve been - pretty fucking terrible. This should stop. It’s ridiculous.” He spread his hands out on the counter. “I’m turning things around, and this is - it felt like the place to start.”
The folder was still between them. Turtle flipped to the back page, which was actually just a check, enough to get a car and a down payment on a decent place to live. Lloyd had confirmed that Eric could easily afford it. “That’s yours,” Eric said. “No matter whether you sign or not. We’re - we were best friends, man, our fortune should have always been yours.”
Turtle swallowed. “This is - I don’t know what to say. Do you, like, are you dying or something? Is something wrong with Vince?”
“No,” Eric said. “I mean - things are bad with us, but I’m working on that, too. In fact - I know you probably can’t ever, like, forgive me, but if you can see your way to letting things slide with him, you should. He could probably use a friend, you know?”
“Yeah,” Turtle said. He shook his head. “I don’t know what to say, E.”
“Don’t say thank you,” Eric said. “I don’t think I could fucking take it. Just, uh, run them by your guy, get stuff notarized, and call me - or Lloyd, if you don’t want -” He stopped, because he felt weirdly choked up at the idea that Turtle wouldn’t want to talk to him. “I can let you get back to work,” he said, stepping backwards.
Walking out of the store, he didn’t exactly feel better. If anything, seeing Turtle at work had driven home what a fucking bastard he’d been in this fucked up version of L.A. Lloyd was waiting outside, and he drove Eric to an upscale tourist hotel. The whole way there, he talked about business, about the projects Eric was currently involved in - the production shingle he and Vince shared was, apparently, a very big deal - and the movie he was supposed to start shooting in the fall. Eric tried to pay attention, but nothing Lloyd was saying seemed to make sense. He wasn’t really famous. He couldn’t be. That was Vince’s deal.
Eric told Lloyd they’d pick up again tomorrow, turning down his offer to get some dinner sent over. “I’m pretty sure I can find the delivery menus myself, but thanks,” he said. He squeezed Lloyd’s shoulder. “Remind me tomorrow, whatever you’re making, you need a serious raise.”
He took the briefcase and bag that Lloyd or someone under Lloyd (could it be possible that his assistant had an assistant?) had packed for him and went up to his room, which was actually a suite and not the plain affair he was expecting. He knew he should open the briefcase, set up the computer that was inside, look over the spreadsheets Lloyd had provided to figure out exactly what he did and what he made, but he was exhausted. He threw everything into the corner, grabbed a beer from the minifridge, and turned on the television. What he really wanted to do was call Vince, get him over here, and just somehow get a do-over. Clearly, this bizarro bastard Eric would need to start from absolute fucking scratch - would possibly need some kind of lobotomy - if things were going to work out, and he couldn’t think of any way to do that. He wasn’t sure that brain-damaging himself would fix things, or, well, he thought he might try it.
He’d have to pump Lloyd for more information tomorrow.
For now, he finished his beer, then drained a tiny bottle of Jack out of the same mini-bar, and fell asleep in the hotel bed, missing home.
He woke up early and called for room service, then for Lloyd. He took a shower and, after that, took a hard look at himself. This was not the body he had in his own world. If Vince was at his peak physical potential here, so, it seemed, was Eric: his chest was well-defined, his arms and legs were hard and scultped. Experimentally, he dropped and started counting push-ups; when Lloyd arrived, he was just counting off 124, and had only just broken a sweat.
“Do you want me to keep your appointment with the trainer for today?” Lloyd asked, holding his Palm Pilot at the ready.
Eric stood and pulled on a T-shirt. “I don’t know. How weird is it if I cancel?”
“You cancel things all the time,” he said. “Business comes up.”
Eric nodded. “Cancel, then,” he said. “Let’s talk about this business stuff.”
He’d had a look at some of the papers over breakfast, so when Lloyd started talking about the in-process projects again, Eric knew them by name. He tried not to be surprised by the names of his collaborators, but really, he was: the elite directors and producers of Hollywood were apparently his inner business circle. As offended as he was by the majority of this life, he understood, a little, how this Eric could be impressed and enamored and protective of it all.
“So I’m a hotshot,” Eric said, and Lloyd nodded.
“You won the -”
“Lloyd, I get that the résumé is impressive,” Eric said tiredly. “But right now I’m more worried about fixing this stuff with Vince.” Lloyd nodded, slowly. “So, let’s get some basics. What’s our arrangement?”
“Arrangement? Oh. Well, you’ve had a civil union for five years, and you’re supposed to be re-married this fall. You’ve been planning the wedding for the past few months.”
“Wedding, really?” Lloyd nodded. “And now he’s leaving me.”
“Oh, that happens,” Lloyd said dismissively. “It’s a volatile relationship. But he doesn’t really have anywhere to go.”
“What do you mean? He’s - I looked at that stuff, he’s made some seriously successful movies in the past few years.” No mention of Aquaman or Medellin, Eric had noticed, but a lot of big-money box office hits with big awards attached. Vince’s dreams had pretty much come true: he’d worked with DeNiro and was starting a job with Clint Eastwood in the fall.
“Most of that has gone into your joint investments, which you control.” Lloyd shrugged. “You’re very good with money.”
Eric could hear himself making exactly that case to Vince, in either world. “So - let me get this straight. The house we live in, that’s - “
“Yours,” Lloyd said.
“Really?”
“And the apartment in New York, and the flat in London.” Lloyd pocketed his Palm and crossed his hands on the table. “I think the cabin at Aspen is in his name, but that’s because you never go there.”
Eric felt a headache starting. This was worse than he’d thought. A wedding coming up and everything already settled into his name - poor Vince didn’t stand a chance. “Do we have a financial guy? Someone I trust - no, someone who’s trustworthy?”
Lloyd nodded. “Clarence,” he said. “He’s your personal attorney and financial planner.”
“Get him,” Eric said. “Have him clear his afternoon.”
“What are you -”
Eric shrugged. “I’m going to get started on fixing this,” he said. “Hey, can you get me the wedding plans, too?”
“Absolutely.”
So after lunch in the suite - which Eric finally persuaded Lloyd to eat with him, even though this Eric apparently always ate alone - Lloyd drove them over to Eric’s offices, because it would be very out of the ordinary for him to meet anyone at a mid-level hotel. Eric had expected an office similar to the one he had with Vince now, maybe a little nicer. Instead, what he had was the entire top floor in a very upscale building, comparable to Ari’s MGA digs. He took Lloyd’s advice and pretended to be on his phone as he walked through, which saved him from any awkward encounters, and they walked past at least a dozen cubicles where people either looked up or looked busy as Eric passed. His office was an impressively large chrome-and-glass affair in the corner; next to his was a door with Vince’s name on it, he noticed, though Lloyd confirmed that he never used it.
The office was very neat, almost spartan, with no displayed awards or posters. Eric’s desk had two flat-screen monitors, a very expensive-looking leather chair behind it, and a telephone that looked like it could launch the space shuttle. Christ, Eric thought, I’m Ari on speed. He took a tentative seat at the desk, and Lloyd sat facing him. Eric realized at once that there was a slight angle in the floor and a little height added to the chair: he would be looking down at anyone who sat across from him.
“So this is where the magic happens, huh?” he asked, resting his hands carefully on the desktop.
The phone buzzed, and Lloyd rolled his eyes. “Let me go turn everything off,” he said. “I told Tracy no calls!”
He jumped up and raced out, and Eric was alone, suddenly, in his big empty office. He swiveled to take in his view of [Sunset], then turned back, eyes glancing from blank wall to blank space. It was all so impersonal. So - businesslike. So empty. He pulled on the top drawer and found only a collection of expensive fountain pens. The first side drawer had a stapler and other office supplies. In the one just beneath that, Eric found a stack of papers, a ledger, and, beneath all of that, a headshot of Vince. It had to be at least ten years old - it looked like it might have been a picture Vince had taken in New York, even - and in it, he didn’t even look that great. Not compared to how he looked now, not by a long shot. Eric pulled it out and set it on the desktop, noticing now that it was in a thin plastic protective sleeve and, also, that it was signed:
To E,
Always.
V
Eric smoothed his fingers over the plastic. Vince must have signed this just before they’d come out here together. No wonder this Eric wanted it close. It was the first time Eric really felt a connection to this world, because this picture of Vince - young, vulnerable, eager - was one that he would have treasured, too.
Lloyd reappeared with coffee and Clarence, a tall, tanned lawyer in an expensive suit.
“Hey, E, I didn’t expect to hear from you until Friday to cancel our golf date,” he said, holding out his hand.
Eric turned the picture over before he stood to shake hands. “Well, I had some things to run by you,” he said.
“More things like yesterday?”
Eric cut a glance at Lloyd, who nodded briefly. This was the guy who’d dealt with the Turtle mess, then. “Similar,” Eric said.
“Never a dull moment with you, huh?”
“Oh, I try. You want some coffee?” Eric fell easily into a little jocular back and forth about business and life, the kind of guy stuff he was used to faking with people even back in his own L.A. Clearly this guy was someone that, like Lloyd said, this Eric was comfortable with. Eric hoped that would bode well.
He and Clarence took seats at the small conference table in the corner. Lloyd returned with coffee for them both, then looked at Eric uncertainly. Eric said, “I hope it’s OK if Lloyd sticks around. I just want him to take some notes.”
“Of course,” Clarence said. “So I’m guessing this is all business?”
“Well, maybe more personal than business,” Eric said. “I want to talk about making some changes.”
Clarence pulled a legal pad from his briefcase. “OK. What kind of changes?”
“Changes having to do with Vince.”
Clarence raised an eyebrow. “Tell me.”
“I want to make sure he’s taken care of,” Eric said. “I want to make sure that no matter what, he leaves me or I leave him, everything gets split. Everything. No shelters, nothing hidden. He gets the house if he wants it, he gets controlling interest in the company -
“That’s more than half,” Clarence said, and Eric shrugged.
“Taken care of,” Eric said.
Clarence leaned forward. “E,” he said slowly, “if this is the type of conversation that I think it might be - I mean, if you’re planning, uh, if you know that something may -”
“Nothing’s gonna happen to me,” Eric said. “I’m not suicidal, I’m not fleeing the country, I’m not going to prison. I’m probably not even getting divorced. I just want - I want everything I own, every document I file, every scrap of every thing you can think of, I want that all to say that Vincent Chase is my partner, fifty-fifty. And I want to know that he’ll be taken care of if anything happens to us. I want you to make it iron-clad, so that after today, it’d be damn near impossible for me to change my mind, and I want you to do it as soon as possible.”
Clarence shifted. He looked surprised, uncomfortable. “What you’re talking about then, I think, is a total shift of assets. Moving things into his name, giving him control of certain areas.”
“Yeah,” Eric said. God, yes, Vince needed some kind of control here. “That sounds great.”
“We can do that,” he said. “It’s going to take some time, of course.”
“How much time?”
Clarence frowned. “I can have some papers for you by the end of the week.”
“Good,” Eric said. “That’s good. Call me as soon as it’s done - the sooner the better.”
He stood, and so did Clarence; Eric was surprised when Clarence reached over and dropped a hand on his shoulder. “E,” he said, “is everything OK?” He looked genuinely concerned.
Eric nodded. “I just - I’m turning some things around,” he said. “Before the wedding. Doing some reconciling.”
“Ah,” Clarence said, and his smile was kind. “Good for you.”
“Thanks,” Eric said. “And - listen, can we reschedule the golfing on Friday?”
Clarence laughed. “I hadn’t even cleared my calendar.”
Next Part.
Fandom/Pairing: Entourage, Vince/E
Series: Yes; This accompanies another AU story, Best of Both Worlds; it's the final installment, and E's POV. Please read the other first, or this might not make that much sense.
Notes: Thanks to shoshannagold for her beta read!
Accept What You Cannot Change
Eric woke to the noise of the ocean. He groaned and reached out, expecting to feel sand or sleeping bag, trying to remember if they’d staggered out to the beach last night after drinking, but instead felt nothing but a wide expanse of soft bed and silk-smooth sheets. He opened his eyes: he was in bed. A huge bed, in a huge room. An unfamiliar room. He sat up and gasped. Where the fuck was he? Where the -
“Good morning!” Lloyd’s bright voice was unmistakable. The double doors at the far end of the room swung open and Lloyd - in a dark suit with a morning tie - strode in, carrying an espresso cup in one hand and a sheaf of newspapers in his other.
“Lloyd?” Eric gasped, and then looked at the rumpled bed next to him. He clutched the sheet a little tighter to his bare chest. “Uh - what the fuck?”
Lloyd stopped dead, still ten feet from the bed. His eyes went wide. “I’m sorry,” he said, ducking his head, “am I early? I didn’t - I’m so sorry, I would never wake you if -”
“Lloyd, stop,” Eric said. Whatever was going on, clearly it wasn’t Lloyd’s fault. This was clearly some kind of prank, the guys were messing with him. Or maybe - maybe he’d had more to drink last night than, well, than ever before. “I’m not - I didn’t mean you. I’m -” He shook his head. “It’s fine, I’m awake. What’s, uh, what’s going on?”
Lloyd gave him a quick, evaluative look, then stepped hesitantly forward. He handed Eric the espresso and paused, and Eric realized he was supposed to drink it. He did, fast, like a shot, and then handed the cup back, struggling not to make a face. He was a latte man. Lloyd spread the papers - Variety, the Hollywood Reporter, both the L.A. and New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and a few neighborhood papers that Eric couldn’t guess his interest in - out in a fan on the bed, expertly, apparently well practiced. Eric continued to gape at him, and Lloyd looked back, expectant and oddly humble. Something totally fucking weird was going on.
“Is this some kind of joke?” Eric asked.
Lloyd flinched. He reached out and straightened the L.A. Times so that it was even with the other papers. “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t -”
Eric rubbed his face. “Please stop apologizing,” he said, and Lloyd shut up instantly. OK, that was nice. Eric looked up. Maybe he wasn’t fucked up - maybe the world was fucked up. "Lloyd, if I tell you something, right now, do you promise not to freak out?”
“That’s what the confidentiality agreement says I swear.”
“Oh. OK,” Eric said. He paused. The espresso was already working; his hands felt a little jittery. At least his voice sounded right. “I’m, uh, I’m not where I’m supposed to be.”
Lloyd’s eyes went wide, again, and he drew a Blackberry from his pocket. “Sir, I rescheduled the UA meeting like I thought you said, I -”
“That’s not what I mean,” Eric said, then sighed. “OK. I think, maybe this will work better in a few minutes. I’m going to get up, take a shower, and meet you in the kitchen in, say, fifteen minutes. OK?”
“What should I tell him you’d like?”
“Who?”
“Andre,” Lloyd said.
Eric blinked. “Andre.”
“Chef Andre.”
There was a chef? Ari didn’t have a chef. Where the fuck was he? “Uh. Maybe, just a bagel?”
“In place of the usual or in addition?” Lloyd asked.
“Uh, whatever,” Eric said, “whatever’s easiest.”
Lloyd nodded. “Fifteen minutes in the kitchen.”
He turned and left the room with a militaristic spin that freaked Eric out a little. When the doors were closed, Eric climbed out of bed, grabbed a heavy robe hanging nearby, and looked around. This was the largest bedroom he’d ever been in, maybe ever seen, and it was also, perhaps, the least inviting. There were tall bookshelves along one wall with lines of antique-looking books and small clusters of awards; a flat-screen television took up most of another wall, with a sofa angled in front of it, before a coffee table with three neat stacks of script pages. A huge painting of wide boats on a green sea hung just behind the bed, which had matching green linens and looked like it was possibly two King-sized beds combined. Vince must be doing insanely well to afford us staying here, he thought, and then he realized where he was.
This was the what-if.
“Ha,” he whispered, looking around. This was what Vince could have had, if he’d listened to Eric all those years ago. Eric felt a warm swell of pride and laughed to himself. Wait until he found the bastard.
The bathroom was just as palatial and spare - gleaming white and green marble tiles, a bathtub large enough to sail in, a shower with twelve heads, two benches, and eight different kinds of shampoo in elegant dispensers, and a mirror that showed he was definitely not Ari. After a shower and a shave - with an honest-to-God pearl-inlaid razor - Eric walked back into the bedroom and realized he had no idea what to wear. Well, couldn’t be that hard to figure out, he thought, and soon stumbled into a room, maybe the size of his bedroom in the normal house, full of shirts, slacks, and expensive shoes. He picked a green T-shirt and a white button-down to go over it, going with the room’s theme, and a pair of gray slacks under that. No label. Tailor-made. Nice.
By the time he made it to the kitchen, it had probably been twenty minutes, maybe longer. Lloyd looked panicked. “What is it?” Eric asked, concerned.
“I thought I’d misheard,” Lloyd said. “I thought -”
“Lloyd, take it easy, all right?” Eric said, patting his shoulder, and Lloyd gaped at him. Eric started to ask what that was about when he noticed the plate of food sitting on the butcher’s block just behind Lloyd.
A single biscuit with sausage gravy sat next to a perfectly poached egg; two half-dollar pancakes shared space with a small round of hashbrowns; and a bagel, with a perfectly even layer of cream-cheese with real blueberries smashed in, sat on the next plate over.
“Holy shit,” Eric said. Even the juice - which looked to be fresh-squeezed pomegranate - was artfully displayed, with an orange slice cut into the shape of a flower clipped on the rim.
“Is it OK? I didn’t know about the blueberry cream cheese, but they only had frozen strawberries.”
“This looks amazing.” Eric sat in front of it, and Lloyd hovered. He glanced up. “Do you want some?”
“No,” Lloyd said, too quickly.
Eric took a deep breath. “Let’s, before I get to this, let’s talk, Lloyd, OK? Have a seat.”
To his surprise, after Lloyd sat down, he started to cry. “I knew it, I knew this was coming,” he said. “I’m so sorry, E - I mean, Eric, Mr. Murphy, I did everything the best I could, I know it wasn’t always good enough -”
“Lloyd!” Eric reached out and squeezed his shoulder. “Jesus, I’m not firing you.”
“You’re not?”
“No! You’re - Lloyd, you’re an amazing - whatever it is you are,” he said, and Lloyd smiled through his tears. “Seriously. No. I wanted - I was going to tell you something, remember?”
“Oh. Yes. Of course.” Lloyd reached for his Blackberry, and Eric flinched. “No notes?” Lloyd said, and Eric shook his head.
“You won’t need them,” he said.
He told Lloyd the whole story, from the elevator ride to waking up in the monstrous bed. “So I need to know what’s going on,” Eric said. “You know? This is a whole new life for me.”
Lloyd’s brow furrowed. “Is this - some kind of movie you’re pitching?”
“No, Lloyd, it’s real life,” Eric said. “And why would I be pitching a movie? Where is Vince, anyway?”
“At the gym until 9:10,” Lloyd said, almost like a recording. “He’s probably just finishing the weight room, should I -”
“No, no, it’s fine.” Eric picked up his fork. “You’re sure you don’t want some of this?”
“I’m allergic,” Lloyd said, looking at the food, and Eric looked down, too.
“To eggs?”
“To egg substitue,” Lloyd said, and when Eric flinched Lloyd gasped. “Oh my God, you really are a body-switched Eric!”
“You got that from the eggs?”
Lloyd twirled the plate and pointed at each item. “Vegan gravy over low-carb biscuit; organic hashbrowns cooked in grapeseed oil with no salt; poached fake egg; mango spears with cinnamon, very good for your heart; and flax-seed pancakes with no syrup.”
Eric tapped the bagel. “This?”
“Whole grain, locally grown, with toasted oatmeal. The cream cheese was handmade by Andre, all organic, with fat-free milk.”
“Jesus.”
“Your blood pressure was a little high a year ago, that’s when you hired Andre.”
Eric took a bite of the bagel, which was really quite delicious. “When did I hire you?”
“Four years ago.”
“And I still make you cry?”
Lloyd shrugged. “You’re demanding,” he said. “But you’re brilliant.”
“Me?” Lloyd stared at him. “Lloyd, what am I brilliant at?”
“You’re only the most sought-after director in Hollywood!”
Eric didn’t have time to respond to that, because Vince suddenly walked into the kitchen. Lloyd gasped, and Eric nearly had the same reaction. Vince looked - well, he looked angry, but he also looked beautiful. Actually fucking beautiful. Eric had lived with the guy for ten years, lived next to him forever before that, and he knew Vince had his moments. Vince had a great face and a great metabolism, but he’d always been pretty casual about his body. He worked out when he had to, he bulked up or trimmed down for movies, and on the set, on the screen, he was, sometimes, exactly as hot as everyone thought he was. At home, he was usually a different creature, laying around in dirty jeans, brushing his hair at the last minute, loathe to shave, just casual about everything.
This was a different Vince. The Vince standing in front of him was wearing flat, tailored black slacks and a silky green shirt; his hair, in loose dark waves just at chin-length, looked silky and possibly freshly, expertly styled; his eyes were brighter than usual, and Eric suspected contacts; his fingernails were manicured, and Eric saw a gold band on his left hand. His face was just thin enough that his cheekbones seemed higher than usual, and his arms were clearly muscular under the fine material.
He looked like a movie star. More than that: he looked like a grown up. And he looked fucking hot. This was Vince at his best - this was his full physical potential, Eric realized, and it was all he could do not to let his mouth drop open.
But Vince was more than just physically hot: he looked, Eric saw, mad as hell. “What the fuck, Eric?” he said.
Eric coughed. “What the fuck what?” Eric picked up his glass, and that’s when he saw it - the ring on his own finger. How did he miss it up until now? He was married? Vince was married?
Vince was glaring at him like they were about to get in a fist fight. He tipped his head, including Lloyd in the glare, and Lloyd squeaked. Eric understood, because he didn’t want to be caught in the middle of whatever was about to come, either. “It’s OK,” Eric said, and Lloyd nodded and practically hurtled out of the room. Worse came to worse, he’d just tell Vince the truth.
“Trent,” Vince said.
Eric couldn’t think of any Trents. He took a sip of his juice, and waited for more information. He’d eat the whole plate one tiny bite at a time if he had to, to avoid having to say anything.
“Trent, my bodyguard,” Vince snarled. That was a tone Eric had really only heard a few times. Vince was furious. Eric cut a wedge of pancake and chewed it very slowly. It was dry, tasted kind of nutty. Vince recrossed his arms. “You’re just not going to say anything?”
Eric swallowed. “What do you want me to say?” Please, tell me, he thought.
“I want - what does it matter what I want?” Vince asked. “Apparently nothing, right? Apparently.”
“Just tell me what you’re talking about,” Eric said.
“He told me about your little meetings.” Vince was practically thrumming with anger - his fingers were drumming on his arms. They both had rings. Matching rings. Eric blinked and looked up. He remembered the big bedroom, the big closets. Made for two. Made for them. Oh, yes, Eric thought, fighting back a grin. Vince, this hot perfect Vince, and this beautiful house, and - yes.
“Pay attention!” Vince said, slamming his hands on the table. “I know you have eighty seven thousand meetings to get to, I know you’ve got all your plans, but for one minute, Eric, engage with me, here. Pretend you fucking care that I’m upset, that I’m trying to tell you something.”
“What?” Eric said. “I’m - I swear I’m listening. I was just - I’m sorry. Distracted.”
“Not distracted. Avoiding,” Vince said. “You don’t want to talk about the fact that you’re paying someone to spy on me.” He took a few steps closer. “Spying, Eric! How does it even work - does he get extra if he tells you some juicy detail? Is this why you were so pissed about my lunch with Jess last week, because he told you some fucking lie about it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Eric said, honestly, spreading his hands.
“Oh, fuck you,” Vince said. “This shit is sick, Eric. If someone else was doing this, you know what would happen? You know what we’d do, we’d fucking call the cops. You’re stalking me,” he said, and Eric heard something under the anger that was worse - he heard desperation, and maybe a little fear.
“I’m not,” Eric said. “I don’t - I didn’t mean -”
“Whatever,” Vince said. Eric slid off his chair and put out a hand, just to stop Vince from rushing past him, but Vince flinched away from him, knocking into the cabinets, and then walked back out the way he’d come.
Lloyd tiptoed in a second later, while Eric was still standing with his arm out. “Oh dear,” he said, and Eric looked over at him.
“What the fuck was that?” he whispered.
“You’ve been spying on him,” Lloyd said.
Eric sat down again. “Maybe you should start at the top.”
So then he got the full story. He’d come to L.A. when Vince had, fifteen years ago, and he’d worked catering somewhere and managed to push Vince’s audition tape into the right hands. From there, he’d sculpted Vince’s career in a way similar to how Ari had run things: commercials, then small parts in films, then a commercial success not unlike Head On. That was where the stories changed. Eric had still found Queens Boulevard, but there was no Billy.
“Wait, no Billy Walsh?” Eric asked, and Lloyd frowned.
“Your cat?”
Eric rubbed his head. “We have a cat named Billy Walsh?”
Lloyd nodded. “After some crazy guy you met at a party. It’s a pretty ugly cat.”
“I’ll bet,” Eric said, shaking his head. “Go on.”
Entrenched in Hollywood culture and tired of taking shit from their agent, Vince and Eric had produced Queens Boulevard themselves, and Eric, having endured seven years of sitting on set with Vince, directed it. It killed at Sundance, and by the time they left there, they were both stars - and they were outed, thanks to a celebratory kiss at one of the panel discussions.
Lloyd led Eric into the den to complete the story, and Eric gasped. There were two Oscars gleaming on the bookshelves, next to a Golden Globe; there was also a picture of them from the front of Vanity Fair, Vince’s chin resting on Eric’s shoulder, their arms tangled together over Eric’s chest, the headline: The New Power Couple. The pictures on the wall showed Eric and Vince with any number of other famous people, even, in one shot, with a presidential candidate. “Jesus,” Eric said.
“You’re very sought-after,” Lloyd said, standing primly by the door.
Eric took a seat on a leather couch. He couldn’t really believe he was famous yet, so he focused on the stuff that seemed most important. “What’s the story with Vince?”
“You’ve been paying his bodyguard, Trent, to report to you on what he’s doing.”
“Why?” Lloyd shrugged, and Eric said, “This is no time to be delicate, Lloyd.”
“You think he’s cheating on you,” Lloyd said.
“Is he?”
“I doubt it,” Lloyd said. “Trent hasn’t seen anything.”
“I’m pretty hard on him, huh?”
Lloyd shrugged. “You have your ups and downs.”
Eric closed his eyes. “He seemed pretty fucking angry. And it kind of sounds like he has the right.” Lloyd didn’t say anything; when Eric opened his eyes again, Lloyd was looking tastefully away. That answered that; this was all his - well, this Eric’s fault. He cleared his throat. “What about the guys?” Lloyd looked confused. “Turtle, Drama.”
“Last I heard, Turtle was working at the Nike Store,” Lloyd said.
Eric laughed. “Turtle, working?”
“He’s pretty broke, with the lawsuit,” Lloyd said. When Eric glanced across, Lloyd said, “Sorry, I forgot. You’re suing him. The papers were filed earlier this year.”
“Sue - I’m suing Turtle?”
“He took thousands of dollars of merchandise intended for you and Vince and sold it for his own personal gain,” Lloyd said. “He cheapened your image.”
“Was that in the court filing?” Lloyd nodded. “Jesus fucking Christ. I’m a real asshole, huh? Where’s Drama? I’m maybe stalking Vince, his brother’d have something to say about it.”
Lloyd frowned. “Half brother. You had a test administered, before -” He paused and looked away.
“Oh, what, Lloyd? Cut the dramatics, can you?”
“He’s missing. Just up and left, three years ago.” Lloyd looked sideways again. “There are rumors of suicide.”
Eric felt light-headed. Drama had run away, maybe killed himself? Drama wasn’t Vince’s brother? “He - because I -” Eric tried to choke out.
Lloyd shrugged. “He’d also recently been fired from his TV show.” Eric looked up, and Lloyd blinked. “You might have had something to do with it.”
“Jesus,” Eric whispered. “Oh, Jesus.”
“Are you all right?”
“No,” he said, “no, I’m - I’m evil, here. I’m worse than Ari.” He rubbed his face. “Why is Vince still with me?”
“I’ve always assumed the sex was amazing,” Lloyd said, and Eric groaned. “Plus you can really be very charming.”
“Sure.” Eric sat back. He felt like he might throw up, or like he might need to throw something. He closed his eyes and prayed: Let the world go back to normal. When he opened his eyes, he saw only Lloyd in front of him. Even that felt like too much of an audience. “Listen, can you, uh, whatever I have today, can I get out of it? I mean - I don’t think I’m up to -”
“I can do that,” Lloyd said. He glanced at his watch. “I should do that now.”
“Good,” Eric said. “I need a minute.”
After Lloyd left, Eric looked around the room. It was full of these trophies, these signs of success, and everything within made him sick. What the fuck, he thought. How had they gotten here? How had - he swallowed, seeing the smile on Vince’s face in the framed photo. Well, OK, he thought. He’d seen movies like this - Groundhog Day came to mind - where the character had to make some major shift, come to some realization, set certain things right - before he could move on. Eric was going to do exactly that: set things right, as fast as he fucking could. He’d be flying blind in this Eric’s life, but with Lloyd’s help, he could probably get things figured out.
And, at the very least, he knew where to begin.
Vince was in their bedroom, pulling clothes from one of the closets. Eric stopped just inside the door.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I’m leaving,” Vince said. The shirt he was holding shook just a little in his hand.
Eric nodded. “Where are you going?”
“New York,” Vince said. “I’ll stay in the apartment.” He threw the shirt onto the bed and crossed his arms again. “Say something, Eric.”
“You should,” Eric said. “Leave me, I mean.” Vince blinked. “I’m an asshole.”
Vince smirked. “That isn’t going to work,” he said, and turned back to the closet.
“I don’t - I’m not trying to talk you out of it,” Eric said, sitting on the bed. He picked up a shirt and started folding it. “Things are pretty bad, huh?”
“Whose fault is that?” Vince said from inside the closet.
“Mine,” Eric said. He closed his eyes, tried to imagine what the thing to say would be. What would this Eric not give? The truth. “I’m jealous. I’m greedy. I’m controlling,” he said.
Vince walked out and leaned on the doorjamb. “Go on,” he said.
Eric looked down. “I’m mean,” he said. “Cruel, even. To you. To everyone.” Vince didn’t say anything. “I do love you, though.”
He was surprised when Vince sat next to him. “That’s never been our problem,” he said softly, and then he said Eric’s name. Eric had the feeling that something very bad was coming. Why did Vince keep calling him Eric, anyway?
“Vince,” he said. He reached out and put his hands over Vince’s. It felt awkward, but it was exactly what he would have done if he was having this conversation with his girlfriend, and Vince didn’t pull away. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what?”
Eric understood this was a test, and he knew, instantly, there was no way he could pass. “For the stuff with Trent. That was fucked up, and I will never do that again.” Vince didn’t move. There was more, he was sure, so much more to be sorry for, but he didn’t know enough yet. “Shit, Vince, I’m sorry for everything,” he said. He was surprised when Vince reached out and drew his face up. Vince was looking at him with very little hope but a painful amount of earnestness.
“I don’t understand how we got here,” he said.
“Me either,” Eric said. He swallowed, surprised to find he was close to tears. “Is there any way, you think, that we could - not be here?”
Vince frowned. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t think so.”
“What about - counseling?” Eric asked.
Vince flinched. “Now you want to go to counseling? I asked you two years ago, you remember what you said?”
Eric shook his head.
“You said you’d rather be dead than pay someone to tell you how to live with me.” Vince drew back. “You said if I felt the need to flap my jaw, I could just suck you off more often.”
“Jesus,” Eric said, and he covered his own face. “Holy fuck, I’m a bastard.”
“That’s news,” Vince said.
“Stay here.” Vince started to talk, but Eric talked over him. “Stay in the house. I’ll go, uh, I’ll leave. OK?” Vince looked surprised, and Eric kept talking while he had the advantage. “Let’s at least be in the same town.”
“Eric,” Vince said, but he sounded tired, not angry.
“Just stay,” Eric said. “I’m going to fix this.”
Vince shook his head, but he said OK. Eric sensed that this was the limit, that he couldn’t push Vince for anything else, so he stood. He touched Vince’s face, but Vince kept looking down. “I’ll go,” he said, and walked out of the bedroom, closing the door carefully behind him.
Lloyd was waiting in the living room. “I need a place to stay,” Eric said.
“The suite at the Beverly Hilton?”
“No,” Eric said, glancing back down the hall. “Somewhere quiet. Somewhere no one will see me. And - clear up what I’ve got this week, OK? I need to focus on this.”
“This?”
Eric blinked. “He’s leaving me.”
Lloyd snapped out his phone. “I’ll order the flowers. New car? He liked that Porsche last month from -”
“No,” Eric said. “Lloyd. This isn’t just a fight. This is - I’m going to fix this. I’m going to turn this around. For real. No buying him anything, no trying to smooth it over.”
Lloyd slowly tucked away his cell phone. “So - what do you want to do first?”
Eric sighed. “Take me to Turtle.” Lloyd nodded. “And get my lawyer on the phone.”
“Which one?”
By the time they reached the Nike Store, Lloyd had given him a complete briefing on the Turtle situation and Eric had everything worked out. Maybe he wasn’t a Hollywood Superstar in his usual world, but he knew how to get stuff done on the fly, and here, he didn’t even have to drop Vince’s name to make people jump. They stopped at a Kinkos en route and took over the fax machine, then emerged with a folder full of papers that Eric carried into the Nike Store.
Turtle was helping a teenaged boy try on shoes while the boy’s mother fretted over the cost. Eric watched them from the end of the aisle, saw that Turtle was really working to be kind even though the mother was becoming increasingly negative and the kid was getting whiny.
“I’m not paying a hundred and fifty dollars just so you can not make the basketball team again,” the mother said, and Eric stepped forward.
“Aw, great,” Turtle said, shaking his head and gathering crumpled stuffing paper into a shoe box.
“Who’re you?” the woman asked.
“He’s no one,” Turtle said, and Eric stepped forward.
“I’m in management,” Eric said. “This is my assistant, Lloyd.”
“Hello,” Lloyd said.
“I really need to borrow this guy for a second,” Eric said, and Turtle rolled his eyes.
The woman crossed her arms. “We were here first.”
Eric nodded. “You let me borrow him, I’ll pay for your shoes. Whatever you want. Lloyd, could you help her out?”
The woman blinked, then grabbed her son by the arm. “Come on,” she said, and Lloyd led them to the front counter.
Turtle closed the shoe box. “Real slick,” he said. “Buying some new friends?”
“Is there somewhere we could talk?”
“Like court?”
Eric sighed. “Give me five minutes,” he said. “I’m not fucking with you. Five minutes and I’ll make this all go away.”
Turtle picked up the box and tilted his head, and Eric followed him across the store, back into the storeroom. “So talk,” Turtle said. “But there are cameras around, you should know, in case you’re pulling some freaky trick. My lawyer said I shouldn’t come anywhere near you.”
Eric nodded. He slid the folder across the countertop to Turtle. “You can run these by him, then, if you want.”
“What is it?”
“It’s the end. It cancels the whole thing and says you’re not liable for anything you ever acquired. Plus it admits your damage claims and returns all of your lawyer’s fees.”
Turtle gaped at him for a second, then frowned. “What, this is your idea of a joke, right?”
“No joke,” Eric said. He flipped the folder open. “I already signed. Get them signed and send it over when you can.”
Turtle looked at the papers, seemed to actually read a page. Eric glanced around the storeroom, which was stacked with shoes and smelled like wet cardboard, musty. He’d spent half his life teasing Turtle about being a lazy asshole, but Jesus, he didn’t want him ending up here, 30-something and working retail. “I don’t get it,” Turtle said, finally.
“I’m an ass,” Eric said. “I’ve been an ass. I’ve been - pretty fucking terrible. This should stop. It’s ridiculous.” He spread his hands out on the counter. “I’m turning things around, and this is - it felt like the place to start.”
The folder was still between them. Turtle flipped to the back page, which was actually just a check, enough to get a car and a down payment on a decent place to live. Lloyd had confirmed that Eric could easily afford it. “That’s yours,” Eric said. “No matter whether you sign or not. We’re - we were best friends, man, our fortune should have always been yours.”
Turtle swallowed. “This is - I don’t know what to say. Do you, like, are you dying or something? Is something wrong with Vince?”
“No,” Eric said. “I mean - things are bad with us, but I’m working on that, too. In fact - I know you probably can’t ever, like, forgive me, but if you can see your way to letting things slide with him, you should. He could probably use a friend, you know?”
“Yeah,” Turtle said. He shook his head. “I don’t know what to say, E.”
“Don’t say thank you,” Eric said. “I don’t think I could fucking take it. Just, uh, run them by your guy, get stuff notarized, and call me - or Lloyd, if you don’t want -” He stopped, because he felt weirdly choked up at the idea that Turtle wouldn’t want to talk to him. “I can let you get back to work,” he said, stepping backwards.
Walking out of the store, he didn’t exactly feel better. If anything, seeing Turtle at work had driven home what a fucking bastard he’d been in this fucked up version of L.A. Lloyd was waiting outside, and he drove Eric to an upscale tourist hotel. The whole way there, he talked about business, about the projects Eric was currently involved in - the production shingle he and Vince shared was, apparently, a very big deal - and the movie he was supposed to start shooting in the fall. Eric tried to pay attention, but nothing Lloyd was saying seemed to make sense. He wasn’t really famous. He couldn’t be. That was Vince’s deal.
Eric told Lloyd they’d pick up again tomorrow, turning down his offer to get some dinner sent over. “I’m pretty sure I can find the delivery menus myself, but thanks,” he said. He squeezed Lloyd’s shoulder. “Remind me tomorrow, whatever you’re making, you need a serious raise.”
He took the briefcase and bag that Lloyd or someone under Lloyd (could it be possible that his assistant had an assistant?) had packed for him and went up to his room, which was actually a suite and not the plain affair he was expecting. He knew he should open the briefcase, set up the computer that was inside, look over the spreadsheets Lloyd had provided to figure out exactly what he did and what he made, but he was exhausted. He threw everything into the corner, grabbed a beer from the minifridge, and turned on the television. What he really wanted to do was call Vince, get him over here, and just somehow get a do-over. Clearly, this bizarro bastard Eric would need to start from absolute fucking scratch - would possibly need some kind of lobotomy - if things were going to work out, and he couldn’t think of any way to do that. He wasn’t sure that brain-damaging himself would fix things, or, well, he thought he might try it.
He’d have to pump Lloyd for more information tomorrow.
For now, he finished his beer, then drained a tiny bottle of Jack out of the same mini-bar, and fell asleep in the hotel bed, missing home.
He woke up early and called for room service, then for Lloyd. He took a shower and, after that, took a hard look at himself. This was not the body he had in his own world. If Vince was at his peak physical potential here, so, it seemed, was Eric: his chest was well-defined, his arms and legs were hard and scultped. Experimentally, he dropped and started counting push-ups; when Lloyd arrived, he was just counting off 124, and had only just broken a sweat.
“Do you want me to keep your appointment with the trainer for today?” Lloyd asked, holding his Palm Pilot at the ready.
Eric stood and pulled on a T-shirt. “I don’t know. How weird is it if I cancel?”
“You cancel things all the time,” he said. “Business comes up.”
Eric nodded. “Cancel, then,” he said. “Let’s talk about this business stuff.”
He’d had a look at some of the papers over breakfast, so when Lloyd started talking about the in-process projects again, Eric knew them by name. He tried not to be surprised by the names of his collaborators, but really, he was: the elite directors and producers of Hollywood were apparently his inner business circle. As offended as he was by the majority of this life, he understood, a little, how this Eric could be impressed and enamored and protective of it all.
“So I’m a hotshot,” Eric said, and Lloyd nodded.
“You won the -”
“Lloyd, I get that the résumé is impressive,” Eric said tiredly. “But right now I’m more worried about fixing this stuff with Vince.” Lloyd nodded, slowly. “So, let’s get some basics. What’s our arrangement?”
“Arrangement? Oh. Well, you’ve had a civil union for five years, and you’re supposed to be re-married this fall. You’ve been planning the wedding for the past few months.”
“Wedding, really?” Lloyd nodded. “And now he’s leaving me.”
“Oh, that happens,” Lloyd said dismissively. “It’s a volatile relationship. But he doesn’t really have anywhere to go.”
“What do you mean? He’s - I looked at that stuff, he’s made some seriously successful movies in the past few years.” No mention of Aquaman or Medellin, Eric had noticed, but a lot of big-money box office hits with big awards attached. Vince’s dreams had pretty much come true: he’d worked with DeNiro and was starting a job with Clint Eastwood in the fall.
“Most of that has gone into your joint investments, which you control.” Lloyd shrugged. “You’re very good with money.”
Eric could hear himself making exactly that case to Vince, in either world. “So - let me get this straight. The house we live in, that’s - “
“Yours,” Lloyd said.
“Really?”
“And the apartment in New York, and the flat in London.” Lloyd pocketed his Palm and crossed his hands on the table. “I think the cabin at Aspen is in his name, but that’s because you never go there.”
Eric felt a headache starting. This was worse than he’d thought. A wedding coming up and everything already settled into his name - poor Vince didn’t stand a chance. “Do we have a financial guy? Someone I trust - no, someone who’s trustworthy?”
Lloyd nodded. “Clarence,” he said. “He’s your personal attorney and financial planner.”
“Get him,” Eric said. “Have him clear his afternoon.”
“What are you -”
Eric shrugged. “I’m going to get started on fixing this,” he said. “Hey, can you get me the wedding plans, too?”
“Absolutely.”
So after lunch in the suite - which Eric finally persuaded Lloyd to eat with him, even though this Eric apparently always ate alone - Lloyd drove them over to Eric’s offices, because it would be very out of the ordinary for him to meet anyone at a mid-level hotel. Eric had expected an office similar to the one he had with Vince now, maybe a little nicer. Instead, what he had was the entire top floor in a very upscale building, comparable to Ari’s MGA digs. He took Lloyd’s advice and pretended to be on his phone as he walked through, which saved him from any awkward encounters, and they walked past at least a dozen cubicles where people either looked up or looked busy as Eric passed. His office was an impressively large chrome-and-glass affair in the corner; next to his was a door with Vince’s name on it, he noticed, though Lloyd confirmed that he never used it.
The office was very neat, almost spartan, with no displayed awards or posters. Eric’s desk had two flat-screen monitors, a very expensive-looking leather chair behind it, and a telephone that looked like it could launch the space shuttle. Christ, Eric thought, I’m Ari on speed. He took a tentative seat at the desk, and Lloyd sat facing him. Eric realized at once that there was a slight angle in the floor and a little height added to the chair: he would be looking down at anyone who sat across from him.
“So this is where the magic happens, huh?” he asked, resting his hands carefully on the desktop.
The phone buzzed, and Lloyd rolled his eyes. “Let me go turn everything off,” he said. “I told Tracy no calls!”
He jumped up and raced out, and Eric was alone, suddenly, in his big empty office. He swiveled to take in his view of [Sunset], then turned back, eyes glancing from blank wall to blank space. It was all so impersonal. So - businesslike. So empty. He pulled on the top drawer and found only a collection of expensive fountain pens. The first side drawer had a stapler and other office supplies. In the one just beneath that, Eric found a stack of papers, a ledger, and, beneath all of that, a headshot of Vince. It had to be at least ten years old - it looked like it might have been a picture Vince had taken in New York, even - and in it, he didn’t even look that great. Not compared to how he looked now, not by a long shot. Eric pulled it out and set it on the desktop, noticing now that it was in a thin plastic protective sleeve and, also, that it was signed:
To E,
Always.
V
Eric smoothed his fingers over the plastic. Vince must have signed this just before they’d come out here together. No wonder this Eric wanted it close. It was the first time Eric really felt a connection to this world, because this picture of Vince - young, vulnerable, eager - was one that he would have treasured, too.
Lloyd reappeared with coffee and Clarence, a tall, tanned lawyer in an expensive suit.
“Hey, E, I didn’t expect to hear from you until Friday to cancel our golf date,” he said, holding out his hand.
Eric turned the picture over before he stood to shake hands. “Well, I had some things to run by you,” he said.
“More things like yesterday?”
Eric cut a glance at Lloyd, who nodded briefly. This was the guy who’d dealt with the Turtle mess, then. “Similar,” Eric said.
“Never a dull moment with you, huh?”
“Oh, I try. You want some coffee?” Eric fell easily into a little jocular back and forth about business and life, the kind of guy stuff he was used to faking with people even back in his own L.A. Clearly this guy was someone that, like Lloyd said, this Eric was comfortable with. Eric hoped that would bode well.
He and Clarence took seats at the small conference table in the corner. Lloyd returned with coffee for them both, then looked at Eric uncertainly. Eric said, “I hope it’s OK if Lloyd sticks around. I just want him to take some notes.”
“Of course,” Clarence said. “So I’m guessing this is all business?”
“Well, maybe more personal than business,” Eric said. “I want to talk about making some changes.”
Clarence pulled a legal pad from his briefcase. “OK. What kind of changes?”
“Changes having to do with Vince.”
Clarence raised an eyebrow. “Tell me.”
“I want to make sure he’s taken care of,” Eric said. “I want to make sure that no matter what, he leaves me or I leave him, everything gets split. Everything. No shelters, nothing hidden. He gets the house if he wants it, he gets controlling interest in the company -
“That’s more than half,” Clarence said, and Eric shrugged.
“Taken care of,” Eric said.
Clarence leaned forward. “E,” he said slowly, “if this is the type of conversation that I think it might be - I mean, if you’re planning, uh, if you know that something may -”
“Nothing’s gonna happen to me,” Eric said. “I’m not suicidal, I’m not fleeing the country, I’m not going to prison. I’m probably not even getting divorced. I just want - I want everything I own, every document I file, every scrap of every thing you can think of, I want that all to say that Vincent Chase is my partner, fifty-fifty. And I want to know that he’ll be taken care of if anything happens to us. I want you to make it iron-clad, so that after today, it’d be damn near impossible for me to change my mind, and I want you to do it as soon as possible.”
Clarence shifted. He looked surprised, uncomfortable. “What you’re talking about then, I think, is a total shift of assets. Moving things into his name, giving him control of certain areas.”
“Yeah,” Eric said. God, yes, Vince needed some kind of control here. “That sounds great.”
“We can do that,” he said. “It’s going to take some time, of course.”
“How much time?”
Clarence frowned. “I can have some papers for you by the end of the week.”
“Good,” Eric said. “That’s good. Call me as soon as it’s done - the sooner the better.”
He stood, and so did Clarence; Eric was surprised when Clarence reached over and dropped a hand on his shoulder. “E,” he said, “is everything OK?” He looked genuinely concerned.
Eric nodded. “I just - I’m turning some things around,” he said. “Before the wedding. Doing some reconciling.”
“Ah,” Clarence said, and his smile was kind. “Good for you.”
“Thanks,” Eric said. “And - listen, can we reschedule the golfing on Friday?”
Clarence laughed. “I hadn’t even cleared my calendar.”
Next Part.