Fic: People Come Around, Entourage, Vince/Eric, 1/6
Title: People Come Around, AKA The Turtle Manifesto.
Author: fourteencandles
Spoilers: Through season 3, I guess.
Summary: A year in the life and observation of Turtle.
Length: 40,000 words. In six parts (one per two months)
Series: Yes, this follows If We Were Anybody, Get it Together, and What It's Like. It starts just after the last one. Part of the Here's Us Together series.
Notes: Whoa, it's long. And it's TURTLE!! Huge thanks to shoshannagold for beta-reading and cheering and brainstorming along the way. Any mistakes within are mine.
Disclaimer: I don't own them and I don't intend to make any money from them.
JANUARY: Fifteen Years
Park Place kills at the box office over Christmas, so when they get back from Austria, Vince buys a new house, bigger than the current place, smaller than the original, but still nice. E sells his condo and the three of them move in on a Sunday. This time, they hire movers, which makes Turtle particularly happy. He chooses the last room on the second floor and is surprised when E doesn’t object, even though it’s the second nicest of the suites. Instead, E takes the first room, next to the stairs, which is small but still has its own bath. “What, you want to be able to hear my alarm clock going off?” he asks when Turtle makes a comment about the room’s size, and Turtle lets it go. E’s always been a little weird.
They celebrate the new digs by going out to a new club, and they hire a driver so that Turtle can drink, too. Vince gets them in VIP and Turtle spends half the evening chatting up a blonde who manages to tear her eyes away from Vince only after two champagne martinis. It helps that Vince isn’t paying her any attention. He nurses his drinks - only has two, as far as Turtle sees, which is two more than he was drinking for a while, after his weird rehab thing - and talks mostly to E. At the end of the night, they all go home empty-handed. E’s just off a breakup, and it’s no surprise to Turtle to head home alone or to see Drama going solo, but for Vince to strike out is messed up.
“Tough night, huh bro?” Drama says in the limo.
Vince is sitting in the back, E next to him, while Turtle and Drama face them. He doesn’t look at all concerned as he shrugs. “I had a good time. What, Johnny, you didn’t?”
“A fine time,” Drama says.
“Just you ain’t the people I’d most like to be riding home with, you know?” Turtle says, and Vince laughs.
“Well, I can’t think of a better crowd,” he says, throwing his arm along the back of the seat.
Drama stays over in the spare room next to Turtle’s, and in the morning he cooks them all a big breakfast. Vince is the last to the table, still in his robe and shorts, while E is already dressed for work. “I’ll see you at Ari’s,” he says, sliding past Vince. He stops in the doorway and says, “And Turtle, don’t forget to call about the pool, all right?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he says, and waits until he hears the door close. “Jesus, that guy, we just moved in and he’s already on me.”
“You did agree,” Vince says, in his usual amiable voice. “You had to know he’d stick to that.”
Turtle rolls his eyes. He agreed, in a moment of weakness, to return to his salaried position as the house manager, because E said it would make Turtle’s increased allowance tax deductible. What Turtle hadn’t realized was that the job came with actual drag responsibilities.
“It’s like he’s my fucking mom, sometimes, though,” Turtle says, and Vince shakes his head.
“He’s fucking your mom?” Drama says. “Well, at least I got there first.”
“Yeah, didn’t I see yours on the boulevard last night?”
“Hey!” both brothers say, and Turtle gets a pancake in the face.
He spends most of the morning reading questions out of a Trivial Pursuit TV edition for Drama, helping him prepare for his New Hollywood Squares audition, and then they drive Vince to Ari’s office just before lunch.
E’s already waiting, and he gives Turtle a sharp look and glances at his watch when they roll in. “Not even two minutes,” Turtle says. “Haven’t you heard of fashionably late?”
“Have you heard of professionally on time?” E asks. He pushes Vince into Ari’s office before Turtle can appeal for help.
After the meeting, Vince rides with E to lunch, and then they have to go meet some producer so Turtle spends the rest of the afternoon with Drama and the trivia cards. He gets bored after a while and suggests they move their review session to a bar, which suits Drama just fine. They find a place with good draught specials and take a table in the corner, and a few college girls studying at the next table eventually join them for a full round of the game. Drama talks non-stop about his audition, and Turtle settles into a comfortable eye-rolling routine with one of the girls. For the second game, they switch up the teams so the girl, Cathy, comes to sit next to him. They stay until the place closes down, and though the girls refuse their offer of a nightcap, Cathy does give Turtle her number. He drops Drama off, then drives back home, feeling pretty pleased with himself.
Arnie’s waiting at the front door when he gets in, so Turtle takes him out the back the way and lets him do his business while he finishes a joint. He sits on the deck, feeling nicely mellow, enjoying the dark quiet around their new place. The pool gurgles below and he glances up at E’s room, realizing he hasn’t called to get the chlorine guy in yet. He’ll have to do it tomorrow.
Arnie brings a bone up and starts slobbering on his knee, and Turtle says, “All right, fella, time to call it a night.” He lets them both in the back way, locks up, closes Arnie into the downstairs bathroom that’s his usual home, and goes to check the front door again. E will have him for breakfast if he forgets to set the alarm. Then he grabs a bottle of water and starts for the stairs. Before he gets to the hall, though, he hears Vince’s bedroom door open, and he peeks around the kitchen door to see who’s coming out. If it’s a girl, she’ll be hot, and Turtle isn’t above catching a glimpse of Vince’s action to get himself through the night.
What he sees instead is E, in just his boxer shorts, easing Vince’s bedroom door closed like he’s afraid to wake anyone. Turtle presses back against the kitchen wall and holds perfectly still until he hears E’s footsteps start on the stairs, and then he still waits a few more minutes before he goes up to bed himself. In his room, he sits on the bed and tries to think of a reason that E would be in Vince’s room, half-naked, in the middle of the night, and he’s only thought of two by the time he falls asleep.
The next morning, he eliminates one possibility with a simple question. “You bring a girl home last night?”
“Nah,” Vince says, stretching. “We came right back after that meeting. It was exhausting.”
“Yeah, the whole two words you said must have really taken it out of you,” E says, settling across from Vince and handing him a cup of coffee. He’s smiling.
Turtle tries to keep his face blank. “So what’d you do?”
Vince shrugs. “Watched some TV. I took a swim and went to bed pretty early.”
“I read,” E says.
“Wow, you guys are lame.” Drama slides a plate of waffles onto the table.
“Yeah, what’d you do that was so exciting?”
“We had a stimulating evening of Trivial Pursuit with some very thoughtful, scholarly young women.”
“Scholarly?”
“Like naughty librarian hot,” Turtle says. “And I got a number.”
“Yeah?” E asks.
“Yeah,” Turtle says. He looks right at E. “Fact, we liked them so much, we were out till almost - what time did we get home, Drama?”
“Must’ve been around 3 for you.”
“Yeah, three, that sounds about right.”
E doesn’t take the bait, though. “That’s great, guys,” he says. He turns toward Vince. “Listen, I’m going to get those things over to Shauna, then you’ve got that photo thing at 11, all right?”
“Sounds good. You coming back to pick me up?”
E glances at his watch. “I’ll call,” he says. As he gets up, he puts his hand on Vince’s shoulder.
It’s nothing, it’s just what any of them might do, squeezing around in their little dining nook. But it feels like confirmation to Turtle, particularly when he watches Vince watch E leave the kitchen. He looks down at his waffle before Vince can catch him staring, and decides he needs to figure this out, quick.
Over the next two days, he sees just about everything he needs to see. They go out that night, and while Vince does get out and dance for a while, he again leaves the club sober and empty-handed and doesn’t look disappointed. Neither, Turtle notices, does E. The next night, they stay in to watch movies and get baked - Turtle actually cancels plans with Drama to stay at the house - and Vince and E sit on the couch, next to each other but not too close, with Vince’s arm stretched out along the back. A few times, Turtle thinks he sees Vince’s fingers rub E’s neck, but they’re totally separate whenever Turtle turns their direction.
There’s no one else in the house that night, but when Vince comes to breakfast the next morning, he has a mouth-shaped bruise above his collarbone, and both he and E are again in excellent moods.
“How’d you get that?” Turtle asks, pointing to the bruise.
“Weight machine,” Vince says without blinking. He changes shirts, to something with a closer collar, before they leave the house.
That night, Vince has a costuming session downtown that runs late, so Turtle and E wait outside in the suburban. E sits in the back and taps on his Blackberry, and Turtle scans through his new CD until he finds a song he likes. “If you’re watching porn on that thing, hand it over,” he says.
“I’m scheduling myself for eardrum replacement surgery, after this racket,” E says. “Jesus, can you turn it down?”
Turtle rolls his eyes and leans around the seat to look back at E. “When exactly did you become an old woman, E?”
“Just because -“
“I mean, seriously, you’re about as much fun as my grandma, and you were at her funeral,” Turtle says. “You got that thing glued to your hand 24/7. Remember when you were a real person? Remember when you were cool, E?”
E sets down his Blackberry. “You know what? At least I do my job, Turtle. At least I do the stuff I’m supposed to do to make things work for Vince. Unlike you, at least I’m fucking earning my money.”
“Yeah, is that what they’re calling it these days?” he says. “You think if I was fucking Vince, I’d get to order you around?”
E flinches. “What did you just say?”
“That’s right,” Turtle says, pressing his advantage, which he never has over E. “I know all about you guys. I saw you the other night.” E sits back and rubs his face. “You can deny it, whatever, man, but I saw what I saw.” He turns back to face forward in the car, but keeps an eye on E in the rearview mirror. “You know it’s a mistake, right?”
“Goddammit, Turtle,” E starts, shaking his head, so Turtle talks over him.
“I’m just saying, I’ve known you both my whole life, and this is one very bad idea. I give it two months, tops, before Vince gets bored, you get your damn heart broken again, and life is hell for us all.”
Vince opens the door before E can respond, and he slides into the passenger’s seat. He looks from E to Turtle and back. “What?”
E clears his throat. His glare could almost melt the rearview mirror, before he turns to Vince. “Nothing. How’d it go?”
“All right,” Vince says, shrugging. He turns to face E, and Turtle has no choice but to start the car and get moving. “You wouldn’t believe the outfit, E. It’s sick.”
The next day, Turtle gets the guy in to clean the pool, watches him do the work, test the chemicals, all of that. After he’s done, Turtle stays outside, because he’s afraid of being caught alone with E. They didn’t talk about it at all after they got home, and Turtle isn’t even sure that Vince knows he knows yet. Then again, there’s a lot of stuff between E and Vince that Turtle wouldn’t have guessed before this week.
Around noon, Vince comes out and sits in the lounge chair next to him. Turtle doesn’t look over, but does accept the joint when Vince passes it.
“Fifteen years,” Vince says, and then Turtle does look over.
“What’s that?”
“That’s how long me and E have been, well, me and E,” Vince says. He’s looking straight ahead, at the pool. “Since high school.”
“Fuck you,” Turtle says, and Vince shakes his head. It takes Turtle a second to catch his breath. “Seriously, all this time?”
Vince takes the joint back, draws in a long breath of it, then exhales. “Off and on,” he says.
“And right now, what, you’re on?”
Vince shrugs. “We’re trying something new.”
“Spell it out,” Turtle says, almost coughing as he blows out smoke.
Vince nods, holding the joint in his hand but not toking. “We’re trying it, not just fucking around.”
Turtle takes the joint and another drag. “So that’s why no girls, recently?”
“Yeah.”
Turtle stubs out the joint on the glass table. Vince is still looking at the pool, so Turtle looks, too. “Lemme guess,” he says. “E wanted more, huh?”
Vince shrugs, then after a moment, says, “Actually, I did.” Turtle looks over, and Vince meets his eye. His smile is a little sheepish. “After he broke up with Gillian, I kind of, uh, I wanted more,” he says. He looks back at the house, and so Turtle does, too. E is sitting on deck rail, talking on his cell phone, his back to them. Turtle looks at Vince looking at E, and his stomach turns, a nervous twist. Vince looks back at him. “You OK with this?”
It’s Turtle’s turn to shrug. He’s known these guys his whole life, and he has no idea how this has happened. “I’ll get used to it,” he says, after a minute. “It’s just - weird, you know?”
“I guess,” Vince says. His voice is quiet. “It doesn’t seem that weird, though. I mean, it’s E.”
He looks back up at the house, and waves, and Turtle looks up to see E waving back. A minute later, he’s down next to them, standing to the side of Vince’s chair.
“Are we cool?” he asks.
Vince looks at Turtle, and Turtle looks from him to E and then back. “We’re cool,” he says, and E nods and then so does Vince. When Vince stands up, he stands close to E, and his hand rests on E’s hip just for a second while he tells him something in a low voice. Turtle looks away.
“The pool looks good, Turtle,” E says after a minute. He looks over, again, and Vince is heading back to the house. E is looking down at him with his usual hard business eyes, but there’s a twitch at the edge of his mouth.
“Yeah, thanks,” Turtle says. He shades his eyes, but keeps looking up. “I still think it’s a bad idea,” he says.
E sighs. “Probably,” he says, his arms crossed. “But it’s the only one we’ve got.”
FEBRUARY: He’s Not the Only One
After that, things return pretty much to normal. Vince still doesn’t take girls home, but Turtle figures that frees up a few more for him. E still bitches about things not getting done around the house, but Vince doesn’t always take his side. And the two of them still act the same as always, so much so that Turtle starts to think it’s a little weird, maybe he’s made it up. Then they have a few beers, one night, and Drama leaves because he’s got an early call. Vince walks him out, and when he comes back, he lays down on the couch and puts his head in E’s lap.
Turtle watches E’s hand hover, mid-air, and sees E looking at him. Vince glances over. “This all right?” he asks.
“Yeah,” he says, quickly. “I mean, I know now. You guys don’t have to work so hard to keep up the act.”
“Yeah?” Vince says, and Turtle sees the hope and gratitude in his eyes and feels bad.
“You know, don’t start humping each other’s legs in front of me, but yeah,” he says.
E laughs. His hand lands on Vince’s shoulder. “Damn, and I was really hoping to get my hump on.”
It’s not too weird, Turtle tells himself, although it is, especially when he looks over and sees E rubbing Vince’s neck, his fingers underneath the collar of Vince’s T-shirt.
The next morning, E comes out of Vince’s room just as Turtle’s hitting the last stair. He’s wearing boxers and a T-shirt, and his hair is still sleep-rumpled. Turtle looks at E, then at the kitchen. “Does Drama know?” he asks, very quietly.
E shakes his head and yawns. “He’s filming all day,” he says.
“Shouldn’t you tell him?” he asks, seeing Vince padding down the hallway. Vince has on his robe, cinched at the waist.
“The fewer people who know, the better,” E says, just as Vince reaches them. He smiles sleepily at Turtle, doesn’t touch E, and ducks into the kitchen. Turtle follows.
“I’m just saying, it’s kind of whack, your own brother doesn’t know,” Turtle says, taking down a mug while E reaches for the coffee.
“Johnny knows,” Vince says from the table.
E turns, the coffee filter-pod still in his hand. “What? Since when?”
“A few years ago,” Vince says. “When we were at Tahoe, I think. At least, I think he knows. We had this weird talk about, like, gay rights and Actors’ Equity and stuff.”
“That doesn’t mean he knows,” E says. His grip on the coffee pod threatens to tear it open, and Turtle reaches over to save it.
Vince looks over. “He also said he wouldn’t tell Ma,” he says, and Turtle watches E flinch. “What, he’s cool with it.”
Turtle shakes his head and turns on the coffeemaker. It gurgles to life and he looks around for the sweetener. “Man, I can’t believe he knew and he didn’t tell me,” he says. E pulls a bag of bagels out of the pantry and drops three into the toaster. Turtle turns. “I can’t believe you guys didn’t tell me.”
Vince frowns. E seems to be concentrating very intently on the toaster. “We weren’t sure how you’d take it,” Vince says. “And besides, it was always pretty, ah, casual, before this.”
Turtle turns back to the brewing. He knows exactly what Vince’s definition of a casual relationship looks like, and it’s a very different definition than E’s. He wonders whose definition of serious they’re trying out.
When the coffee is finished, he pours three cups and carries them over to the table, where E spreads out their bagels and a tub of cream cheese. “So how long’s ‘this’ been going on?” Turtle asks, making air quotes.
E glances at Vince. “Two months?”
“Since you and Gillian broke up.”
“So closer to three,” E says. “Which means we’ve survived your prediction, Turtle.”
Vince looks up from his bagel. “Three months?”
“Two.” Turtle shrugs. “I didn’t know you had a history,” he says, and concentrates on his own breakfast.
The next day, he mentions it to Drama while they’re driving over to a meeting at Ari’s, Vince and E ahead in E’s car. “You knew about this?” he says.
“Eh,” Drama says. “I accidentally overheard them one night when we were camping out at Tahoe.”
“Overheard them… having sex?” Turtle says. “Wait, don’t answer that, I don’t want to think about it.”
“What’s the big deal?” Drama says. “I mean, Jesus, I thought E was a fairy the first time I met him, and he’s still a fucking cool guy.”
“E’s not the only one,” Turtle says. “He’s fucking your brother.”
Drama just shrugs. “More girls for us,” he says. “You know, in a way, I kind of envy them. I mean, a guy with a guy, that’s gotta be almost perfect. You want sex, he wants sex - no headaches, no periods, no waiting.”
Turtle has a hard time keeping his eyes on the road. When he manages to get his mouth closed again, he says, “Drama, let’s never talk about this again,” and turns up the radio.
To Part 2.
Author: fourteencandles
Spoilers: Through season 3, I guess.
Summary: A year in the life and observation of Turtle.
Length: 40,000 words. In six parts (one per two months)
Series: Yes, this follows If We Were Anybody, Get it Together, and What It's Like. It starts just after the last one. Part of the Here's Us Together series.
Notes: Whoa, it's long. And it's TURTLE!! Huge thanks to shoshannagold for beta-reading and cheering and brainstorming along the way. Any mistakes within are mine.
Disclaimer: I don't own them and I don't intend to make any money from them.
JANUARY: Fifteen Years
Park Place kills at the box office over Christmas, so when they get back from Austria, Vince buys a new house, bigger than the current place, smaller than the original, but still nice. E sells his condo and the three of them move in on a Sunday. This time, they hire movers, which makes Turtle particularly happy. He chooses the last room on the second floor and is surprised when E doesn’t object, even though it’s the second nicest of the suites. Instead, E takes the first room, next to the stairs, which is small but still has its own bath. “What, you want to be able to hear my alarm clock going off?” he asks when Turtle makes a comment about the room’s size, and Turtle lets it go. E’s always been a little weird.
They celebrate the new digs by going out to a new club, and they hire a driver so that Turtle can drink, too. Vince gets them in VIP and Turtle spends half the evening chatting up a blonde who manages to tear her eyes away from Vince only after two champagne martinis. It helps that Vince isn’t paying her any attention. He nurses his drinks - only has two, as far as Turtle sees, which is two more than he was drinking for a while, after his weird rehab thing - and talks mostly to E. At the end of the night, they all go home empty-handed. E’s just off a breakup, and it’s no surprise to Turtle to head home alone or to see Drama going solo, but for Vince to strike out is messed up.
“Tough night, huh bro?” Drama says in the limo.
Vince is sitting in the back, E next to him, while Turtle and Drama face them. He doesn’t look at all concerned as he shrugs. “I had a good time. What, Johnny, you didn’t?”
“A fine time,” Drama says.
“Just you ain’t the people I’d most like to be riding home with, you know?” Turtle says, and Vince laughs.
“Well, I can’t think of a better crowd,” he says, throwing his arm along the back of the seat.
Drama stays over in the spare room next to Turtle’s, and in the morning he cooks them all a big breakfast. Vince is the last to the table, still in his robe and shorts, while E is already dressed for work. “I’ll see you at Ari’s,” he says, sliding past Vince. He stops in the doorway and says, “And Turtle, don’t forget to call about the pool, all right?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he says, and waits until he hears the door close. “Jesus, that guy, we just moved in and he’s already on me.”
“You did agree,” Vince says, in his usual amiable voice. “You had to know he’d stick to that.”
Turtle rolls his eyes. He agreed, in a moment of weakness, to return to his salaried position as the house manager, because E said it would make Turtle’s increased allowance tax deductible. What Turtle hadn’t realized was that the job came with actual drag responsibilities.
“It’s like he’s my fucking mom, sometimes, though,” Turtle says, and Vince shakes his head.
“He’s fucking your mom?” Drama says. “Well, at least I got there first.”
“Yeah, didn’t I see yours on the boulevard last night?”
“Hey!” both brothers say, and Turtle gets a pancake in the face.
He spends most of the morning reading questions out of a Trivial Pursuit TV edition for Drama, helping him prepare for his New Hollywood Squares audition, and then they drive Vince to Ari’s office just before lunch.
E’s already waiting, and he gives Turtle a sharp look and glances at his watch when they roll in. “Not even two minutes,” Turtle says. “Haven’t you heard of fashionably late?”
“Have you heard of professionally on time?” E asks. He pushes Vince into Ari’s office before Turtle can appeal for help.
After the meeting, Vince rides with E to lunch, and then they have to go meet some producer so Turtle spends the rest of the afternoon with Drama and the trivia cards. He gets bored after a while and suggests they move their review session to a bar, which suits Drama just fine. They find a place with good draught specials and take a table in the corner, and a few college girls studying at the next table eventually join them for a full round of the game. Drama talks non-stop about his audition, and Turtle settles into a comfortable eye-rolling routine with one of the girls. For the second game, they switch up the teams so the girl, Cathy, comes to sit next to him. They stay until the place closes down, and though the girls refuse their offer of a nightcap, Cathy does give Turtle her number. He drops Drama off, then drives back home, feeling pretty pleased with himself.
Arnie’s waiting at the front door when he gets in, so Turtle takes him out the back the way and lets him do his business while he finishes a joint. He sits on the deck, feeling nicely mellow, enjoying the dark quiet around their new place. The pool gurgles below and he glances up at E’s room, realizing he hasn’t called to get the chlorine guy in yet. He’ll have to do it tomorrow.
Arnie brings a bone up and starts slobbering on his knee, and Turtle says, “All right, fella, time to call it a night.” He lets them both in the back way, locks up, closes Arnie into the downstairs bathroom that’s his usual home, and goes to check the front door again. E will have him for breakfast if he forgets to set the alarm. Then he grabs a bottle of water and starts for the stairs. Before he gets to the hall, though, he hears Vince’s bedroom door open, and he peeks around the kitchen door to see who’s coming out. If it’s a girl, she’ll be hot, and Turtle isn’t above catching a glimpse of Vince’s action to get himself through the night.
What he sees instead is E, in just his boxer shorts, easing Vince’s bedroom door closed like he’s afraid to wake anyone. Turtle presses back against the kitchen wall and holds perfectly still until he hears E’s footsteps start on the stairs, and then he still waits a few more minutes before he goes up to bed himself. In his room, he sits on the bed and tries to think of a reason that E would be in Vince’s room, half-naked, in the middle of the night, and he’s only thought of two by the time he falls asleep.
The next morning, he eliminates one possibility with a simple question. “You bring a girl home last night?”
“Nah,” Vince says, stretching. “We came right back after that meeting. It was exhausting.”
“Yeah, the whole two words you said must have really taken it out of you,” E says, settling across from Vince and handing him a cup of coffee. He’s smiling.
Turtle tries to keep his face blank. “So what’d you do?”
Vince shrugs. “Watched some TV. I took a swim and went to bed pretty early.”
“I read,” E says.
“Wow, you guys are lame.” Drama slides a plate of waffles onto the table.
“Yeah, what’d you do that was so exciting?”
“We had a stimulating evening of Trivial Pursuit with some very thoughtful, scholarly young women.”
“Scholarly?”
“Like naughty librarian hot,” Turtle says. “And I got a number.”
“Yeah?” E asks.
“Yeah,” Turtle says. He looks right at E. “Fact, we liked them so much, we were out till almost - what time did we get home, Drama?”
“Must’ve been around 3 for you.”
“Yeah, three, that sounds about right.”
E doesn’t take the bait, though. “That’s great, guys,” he says. He turns toward Vince. “Listen, I’m going to get those things over to Shauna, then you’ve got that photo thing at 11, all right?”
“Sounds good. You coming back to pick me up?”
E glances at his watch. “I’ll call,” he says. As he gets up, he puts his hand on Vince’s shoulder.
It’s nothing, it’s just what any of them might do, squeezing around in their little dining nook. But it feels like confirmation to Turtle, particularly when he watches Vince watch E leave the kitchen. He looks down at his waffle before Vince can catch him staring, and decides he needs to figure this out, quick.
Over the next two days, he sees just about everything he needs to see. They go out that night, and while Vince does get out and dance for a while, he again leaves the club sober and empty-handed and doesn’t look disappointed. Neither, Turtle notices, does E. The next night, they stay in to watch movies and get baked - Turtle actually cancels plans with Drama to stay at the house - and Vince and E sit on the couch, next to each other but not too close, with Vince’s arm stretched out along the back. A few times, Turtle thinks he sees Vince’s fingers rub E’s neck, but they’re totally separate whenever Turtle turns their direction.
There’s no one else in the house that night, but when Vince comes to breakfast the next morning, he has a mouth-shaped bruise above his collarbone, and both he and E are again in excellent moods.
“How’d you get that?” Turtle asks, pointing to the bruise.
“Weight machine,” Vince says without blinking. He changes shirts, to something with a closer collar, before they leave the house.
That night, Vince has a costuming session downtown that runs late, so Turtle and E wait outside in the suburban. E sits in the back and taps on his Blackberry, and Turtle scans through his new CD until he finds a song he likes. “If you’re watching porn on that thing, hand it over,” he says.
“I’m scheduling myself for eardrum replacement surgery, after this racket,” E says. “Jesus, can you turn it down?”
Turtle rolls his eyes and leans around the seat to look back at E. “When exactly did you become an old woman, E?”
“Just because -“
“I mean, seriously, you’re about as much fun as my grandma, and you were at her funeral,” Turtle says. “You got that thing glued to your hand 24/7. Remember when you were a real person? Remember when you were cool, E?”
E sets down his Blackberry. “You know what? At least I do my job, Turtle. At least I do the stuff I’m supposed to do to make things work for Vince. Unlike you, at least I’m fucking earning my money.”
“Yeah, is that what they’re calling it these days?” he says. “You think if I was fucking Vince, I’d get to order you around?”
E flinches. “What did you just say?”
“That’s right,” Turtle says, pressing his advantage, which he never has over E. “I know all about you guys. I saw you the other night.” E sits back and rubs his face. “You can deny it, whatever, man, but I saw what I saw.” He turns back to face forward in the car, but keeps an eye on E in the rearview mirror. “You know it’s a mistake, right?”
“Goddammit, Turtle,” E starts, shaking his head, so Turtle talks over him.
“I’m just saying, I’ve known you both my whole life, and this is one very bad idea. I give it two months, tops, before Vince gets bored, you get your damn heart broken again, and life is hell for us all.”
Vince opens the door before E can respond, and he slides into the passenger’s seat. He looks from E to Turtle and back. “What?”
E clears his throat. His glare could almost melt the rearview mirror, before he turns to Vince. “Nothing. How’d it go?”
“All right,” Vince says, shrugging. He turns to face E, and Turtle has no choice but to start the car and get moving. “You wouldn’t believe the outfit, E. It’s sick.”
The next day, Turtle gets the guy in to clean the pool, watches him do the work, test the chemicals, all of that. After he’s done, Turtle stays outside, because he’s afraid of being caught alone with E. They didn’t talk about it at all after they got home, and Turtle isn’t even sure that Vince knows he knows yet. Then again, there’s a lot of stuff between E and Vince that Turtle wouldn’t have guessed before this week.
Around noon, Vince comes out and sits in the lounge chair next to him. Turtle doesn’t look over, but does accept the joint when Vince passes it.
“Fifteen years,” Vince says, and then Turtle does look over.
“What’s that?”
“That’s how long me and E have been, well, me and E,” Vince says. He’s looking straight ahead, at the pool. “Since high school.”
“Fuck you,” Turtle says, and Vince shakes his head. It takes Turtle a second to catch his breath. “Seriously, all this time?”
Vince takes the joint back, draws in a long breath of it, then exhales. “Off and on,” he says.
“And right now, what, you’re on?”
Vince shrugs. “We’re trying something new.”
“Spell it out,” Turtle says, almost coughing as he blows out smoke.
Vince nods, holding the joint in his hand but not toking. “We’re trying it, not just fucking around.”
Turtle takes the joint and another drag. “So that’s why no girls, recently?”
“Yeah.”
Turtle stubs out the joint on the glass table. Vince is still looking at the pool, so Turtle looks, too. “Lemme guess,” he says. “E wanted more, huh?”
Vince shrugs, then after a moment, says, “Actually, I did.” Turtle looks over, and Vince meets his eye. His smile is a little sheepish. “After he broke up with Gillian, I kind of, uh, I wanted more,” he says. He looks back at the house, and so Turtle does, too. E is sitting on deck rail, talking on his cell phone, his back to them. Turtle looks at Vince looking at E, and his stomach turns, a nervous twist. Vince looks back at him. “You OK with this?”
It’s Turtle’s turn to shrug. He’s known these guys his whole life, and he has no idea how this has happened. “I’ll get used to it,” he says, after a minute. “It’s just - weird, you know?”
“I guess,” Vince says. His voice is quiet. “It doesn’t seem that weird, though. I mean, it’s E.”
He looks back up at the house, and waves, and Turtle looks up to see E waving back. A minute later, he’s down next to them, standing to the side of Vince’s chair.
“Are we cool?” he asks.
Vince looks at Turtle, and Turtle looks from him to E and then back. “We’re cool,” he says, and E nods and then so does Vince. When Vince stands up, he stands close to E, and his hand rests on E’s hip just for a second while he tells him something in a low voice. Turtle looks away.
“The pool looks good, Turtle,” E says after a minute. He looks over, again, and Vince is heading back to the house. E is looking down at him with his usual hard business eyes, but there’s a twitch at the edge of his mouth.
“Yeah, thanks,” Turtle says. He shades his eyes, but keeps looking up. “I still think it’s a bad idea,” he says.
E sighs. “Probably,” he says, his arms crossed. “But it’s the only one we’ve got.”
FEBRUARY: He’s Not the Only One
After that, things return pretty much to normal. Vince still doesn’t take girls home, but Turtle figures that frees up a few more for him. E still bitches about things not getting done around the house, but Vince doesn’t always take his side. And the two of them still act the same as always, so much so that Turtle starts to think it’s a little weird, maybe he’s made it up. Then they have a few beers, one night, and Drama leaves because he’s got an early call. Vince walks him out, and when he comes back, he lays down on the couch and puts his head in E’s lap.
Turtle watches E’s hand hover, mid-air, and sees E looking at him. Vince glances over. “This all right?” he asks.
“Yeah,” he says, quickly. “I mean, I know now. You guys don’t have to work so hard to keep up the act.”
“Yeah?” Vince says, and Turtle sees the hope and gratitude in his eyes and feels bad.
“You know, don’t start humping each other’s legs in front of me, but yeah,” he says.
E laughs. His hand lands on Vince’s shoulder. “Damn, and I was really hoping to get my hump on.”
It’s not too weird, Turtle tells himself, although it is, especially when he looks over and sees E rubbing Vince’s neck, his fingers underneath the collar of Vince’s T-shirt.
The next morning, E comes out of Vince’s room just as Turtle’s hitting the last stair. He’s wearing boxers and a T-shirt, and his hair is still sleep-rumpled. Turtle looks at E, then at the kitchen. “Does Drama know?” he asks, very quietly.
E shakes his head and yawns. “He’s filming all day,” he says.
“Shouldn’t you tell him?” he asks, seeing Vince padding down the hallway. Vince has on his robe, cinched at the waist.
“The fewer people who know, the better,” E says, just as Vince reaches them. He smiles sleepily at Turtle, doesn’t touch E, and ducks into the kitchen. Turtle follows.
“I’m just saying, it’s kind of whack, your own brother doesn’t know,” Turtle says, taking down a mug while E reaches for the coffee.
“Johnny knows,” Vince says from the table.
E turns, the coffee filter-pod still in his hand. “What? Since when?”
“A few years ago,” Vince says. “When we were at Tahoe, I think. At least, I think he knows. We had this weird talk about, like, gay rights and Actors’ Equity and stuff.”
“That doesn’t mean he knows,” E says. His grip on the coffee pod threatens to tear it open, and Turtle reaches over to save it.
Vince looks over. “He also said he wouldn’t tell Ma,” he says, and Turtle watches E flinch. “What, he’s cool with it.”
Turtle shakes his head and turns on the coffeemaker. It gurgles to life and he looks around for the sweetener. “Man, I can’t believe he knew and he didn’t tell me,” he says. E pulls a bag of bagels out of the pantry and drops three into the toaster. Turtle turns. “I can’t believe you guys didn’t tell me.”
Vince frowns. E seems to be concentrating very intently on the toaster. “We weren’t sure how you’d take it,” Vince says. “And besides, it was always pretty, ah, casual, before this.”
Turtle turns back to the brewing. He knows exactly what Vince’s definition of a casual relationship looks like, and it’s a very different definition than E’s. He wonders whose definition of serious they’re trying out.
When the coffee is finished, he pours three cups and carries them over to the table, where E spreads out their bagels and a tub of cream cheese. “So how long’s ‘this’ been going on?” Turtle asks, making air quotes.
E glances at Vince. “Two months?”
“Since you and Gillian broke up.”
“So closer to three,” E says. “Which means we’ve survived your prediction, Turtle.”
Vince looks up from his bagel. “Three months?”
“Two.” Turtle shrugs. “I didn’t know you had a history,” he says, and concentrates on his own breakfast.
The next day, he mentions it to Drama while they’re driving over to a meeting at Ari’s, Vince and E ahead in E’s car. “You knew about this?” he says.
“Eh,” Drama says. “I accidentally overheard them one night when we were camping out at Tahoe.”
“Overheard them… having sex?” Turtle says. “Wait, don’t answer that, I don’t want to think about it.”
“What’s the big deal?” Drama says. “I mean, Jesus, I thought E was a fairy the first time I met him, and he’s still a fucking cool guy.”
“E’s not the only one,” Turtle says. “He’s fucking your brother.”
Drama just shrugs. “More girls for us,” he says. “You know, in a way, I kind of envy them. I mean, a guy with a guy, that’s gotta be almost perfect. You want sex, he wants sex - no headaches, no periods, no waiting.”
Turtle has a hard time keeping his eyes on the road. When he manages to get his mouth closed again, he says, “Drama, let’s never talk about this again,” and turns up the radio.
To Part 2.