by Aiden Bates
He’s licking, sucking, biting, kissing, and soon enough gets too a place sensitive to tickles, which starts Lance giggling and trying to shove him away. Vinny pins his wrists and insists on finishing, smiling at Lance in hysterics in between each fresh, sweet tickling torment, and Vinny ends his task by blowing a big raspberry on Lance’s belly like he’s a big giant kid, which launches them into a tickle fight so rambunctious that only the grumbling of the baby stops them, in the hopes that they won’t wake up the little tyke.
“Hey, what do you want to do tomorrow? I’m on set for a little, will you come see me? You want to go to the beach after? I know some good food carts out there, or you know I was thinking, we could find an open mic and get back together on stage, right away, just make sure those funny muscles haven’t like, what’s the word? Atrophied and died.”
The guy who just blew raspberries on Lance’s belly at the end of sex, this is the guy who thinks he might not be funny anymore? That’s the most hilarious thing Lance has heard in weeks.
Part IV: Los Angeles
13. The Big Picture
The second Lance arrives, even with a kid in tow, all anybody can talk about is movies movies movies all day long.
Vinny’s finishing up the shooting of this movie—title finally decided to be Jet-Fueled Sharks—something about souped-up cars and the vicious guys he and Frankie are playing being shark-like near the ocean, something…Vinny doesn’t really know the logic behind it or care, he doesn’t really even want to see the movie when it’s all done. He just wants to do his job in a way that makes everyone else agree that he’s good at it, and move on with his life to the next bit of stardom. Lance shows Vinny the script he’s working on—he calls it Un-Expecting!—and swears it’ll be funny to everyone who doesn’t know how real the premise is. Vinny doesn’t question Lance, instead he queries his agent about it. Here’s a script, what do you think, any notes, anyone you know who would know what to do with it, etc. That’s about all the energy he has to spare for it after reading it, he’s got enough to do with the wrap-up filming, plus there’s a baby keeping him awake half the night now, and he’s already anxious to find out what gig he’ll land next.
The baby’s really not the worst of it all, except that the little tyke is so loud when he can’t sleep through the night. Vinny really likes to fall asleep against the pillows with one arm around junior and the other sipping a beer. He’s switched from gin to beer for these fatherly nights in with Lance. He makes Lance go out and buy comic books for the two of them—Vinny loves them more than the baby does so far, the baby would rather chew on the colors than listen to the stories, but Vinny won’t be seen buying the things, they’re too juvenile for his image. Lance just smirks like he’s happy that he’s the one who gets to see Vinny’s uncool side, his softer side. Whatever keeps him happy and buying all the embarrassing things, fine. Lance also plucks the baby out of his arms whenever he gets tired and starts snoozing in his cuddle. Lance says he can’t really sleep like that, it’s too easy to roll over onto the baby and suffocate him by accident. Still he lets Vinny be irresponsible about it, and puts both of them to bed properly each night.
So the agent takes Lance’s script, doesn’t really make any promises about it, but does start telling Vinny about the promotion itinerary he’ll have to do for Jet-Fueled Sharks before he’s free for his next job. “Each promotional thing is its own act, my boy. Think of every puff piece or photo op as a job interview for your next gig. When I say to the casting people, What about my boy Vinny Romano? I want to be able to point to how suave and well-trained you are in the business behind the business we call show, okay? I also what to call you Vince Roman instead, how do you feel about that? Vinny Romano’s got too much character, too specific a character, and you need to sound like you could be anybody.”
“Call me whatever you like,” Vinny tells the agent, “just call me back with gigs.”
“You’re a golden goose, buddy, Mr. Roman. I’ll make sure the director puts your name in the credits just like that, and on all the posters, it’s a whole new you!”
Vinny doesn’t mind the idea of acting when it comes to being himself out in public. The next question is, does Lance feel the same way, because the next time his agent calls Vinny, it’s two days before the cast party, the big celebration at the end of the actor’s work, but he’s not calling to give him that boxing coach corner shoulder rub, he’s calling to talk to Lance.
Lance takes the call and stands there with his mouth slack and hanging open, just nodding away like he’s not fully aware that the person on the other end of the line can’t see him. Vinny starts mugging with the tyke, looking at Lance and looking at the kid like, Can you believe this guy? Loopy fucking guy, isn’t he? And the baby seems to agree or at least tries to play along, he knows Vinny’s up to something, even if he has no concept of what.
When Lance hangs up the phone, it’s only after he says simply, “Deal.” Then he stares around at Vinny like he’s just been hit by a mallet in a cartoon, dazed and starry-eyed.
“You’re not the only one in the movie business anymore, pally,” Lance says. “Your agent found somebody who wants to buy my script, and apparently he’s my agent too now, he’s going to make sure you and me get the parts, the leads.”
“Wowee,” Vinny says without much noise, since he doesn’t want to startle the little guy and Lance isn’t excited yet, just stunned. “Hey, I know how we’ll celebrate, baby, come here.” Vinny would go to him but he’s a couch for the baby right now, stretched out on the bed. Lance comes and lies down with them, his head on Vinny’s upper chest, putting the full weight of a family literally on his shoulder. “Will you be my date to the cast party this weekend?”
Lance grins and starts to nod, and nod and nod too fast and too much, like he’s crazy, getting silly with it. “As long as you’ll be my date when it’s my turn,” he says. Vinny agrees to that.
The cast party isn’t anywhere near as grand as it feels to Vinny. It’s still an indie movie, and the party too is on an indie budget, but it feels like the first day of the rest of his life. They leave little Paul at the house of one of the camera operators, who got a trusted babysitter for her two kids that Vinny and Lance chip in on, and they’re talking about babies half the time while Vinny is swanning around feeling like a hero, like he’s won an Emmy, an Oscar, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
He and Frankie sit like kings in a corner booth with the director, everybody’s congratulating everyone, and after he’s three martinis into his night, Vinny’s feeling so bold and free he follows Lance into the bathroom because he’s dying to get his hands all over him, just like this, dirty and secret and adult. Not that the baby isn’t a fun little guy, but it’s already pretty intoxicating to feel reckless again.
Lance is finishing at a urinal when Vinny comes up behind him and clamps a hand over his mouth, dragging him into a stall.
“Hey, fella, I’m not that kind of woman!” Lance says, which makes Vinny giggle and spin him around and pin him to the wall of the stall.
“Drop your pants,” Vinny says. “Do it now.”
“Why you gotta be so rough?” Lance asks, batting his eyelashes and talking in the most lascivious voice his has as he unbuttons.
“Down around your ankles with those, so you can’t run away,” Vinny says, his eyes feasting on Lance as he shimmies his pants to the floor because his shoulders are still pinned to the wall by Vinny’s hands. “Lift up your shirt so I can get a good look at your cock, and cover your head with it. You don’t get to look at me.”
Lance obeys. His cock is coming up too, eager to say hello it seems. Gotta love this guy, he really likes to take it.
“Fucking play with yourself, go on,” Vinny says, taking one hand back so he can jerk himself while he watches Lance do it. Between having him take orders like a trained monkey and the thrill of knowing that at any moment someone else could walk into the bathroom makes his cock achingly hard. He feels like he ca
n hardly breathe, it’s so intense. “You like this?” he whispers. “You like touching yourself while another man watches you, yeah? Bare-assed in a fucking bathroom, huh?”
“I love it,” Lance whimpers from under the covering of his shirt.
“Oh, you love it? That’s pretty fucked up, baby. What about this, do you love this? Turn around bend over the fucking toilet, put your hands on the back wall.” Lance does this. “Spread your legs as wide as you can with your goddamn pants around your ankles, do it.” Lance does, and Vinny starts to nose the head of his cock up against Lance’s hole. “I’m gonna fuck the cum out of you, do you hear me, you little slut? And I don’t want you to make a mess, you got that? No sprinkles on the seat or you’ll be licking it clean.” Vinny doesn’t really mean that, but just like when they play-act on stage or start in with the boy-girl flirting routine, the point isn’t to be literal, it’s to create a show.
Lance sighs as Vinny finds the right angle and slides halfway up his ass with one thick push. With each thrust Vinny gains more and more space, more and more slickness in which to move. He grabs Lance by the back of the neck and presses his still-covered face against the wall. He keeps talking too, quietly so he can hear someone coming in and shush it if he must, but he hopes at the rate they’re going they’ll finish before they’re interrupted.
“Do you like getting your asshole stuffed like this, baby?” Vinny all but whispers. “You like having a guy plow your insides? You like to spread your cheeks so your little puckering hole opens up for some cock to come drill it.” Lance starts whimpering an assent with every breath and every fuck that forces its way inside of him. “You’re not supposed to like this, you cunt boy. You’re not supposed to want a man to use your hole like a toilet for his fucking jizz. You open up your backdoor little butthole to be a fucking cum dumpster, huh? You get impaled and violated and then inseminated in your asshole’s bitch womb and you like it, don’t you? You like that you’re a receptacle for semen, you want to be filled with it. You want it dripping out of you and drooling down your thigh like a leak. I’ll do it to you again after that, baby. I’ll flip you over and fuck your hole wider and shred your tender insides with my hard, fat cock, baby.”
Vinny’s whispered filth is fading quieter and quieter, he’s almost there and planning to pull out, spray his cum up Lance’s spine and then wipe him clean with toilet paper, letting the tenderness come through at last. Or maybe he’ll keep it dirty a little bit longer, and throw him down on his bare knees and fuck his face and cum down his throat, that would be the next best thing if he can’t always plant his seed where he wants it to be, deep inside of Lance’s guts, he can feed it to him.
“Good job pleasing me, baby. Now how do you want to take it? You want me to scrape it off your back or do you want to fucking eat it?”
Vinny never gets his answer. Just as he’s finishing the question the bathroom door flies open and in comes Frankie loud and boisterous. He launches himself over the partition to look down in the stall saying, “What, did you fall in, guys, you taking a bath in here?” He gets a pretty good eyeful of what’s taking them so long just as Vinny is so close to orgasm that the jolt of fear he feels makes it happen before he can think or hide or plan for any of it. His heart feels like it’s going to burst as he looks up into Frankie’s eyes and watches the smile on his face die, then looks down and sees just what kind of a scene they’re presenting here. Frankie can clearly see the neck of Vinny’s dick and where the rest of it is. He can see Lance coming out from under his T-shirt like a turtle peeking out of a shell. He looks Lance square in the eye—those two have hardly even met—and then turns back to Vinny like he’s caught Vinny stealing from him, like he’s been so hurt and never even saw it coming. He shakes his head like he’s trying to clear it, like maybe he’s misunderstood something, but Vinny and Lance separate in a hurry, and Lance start putting back on his clothes, and after that Frankie drops out of sight and leaves the bathroom slowly, like something’s over, like there’s just been a surprise break-up.
Vinny doesn’t know if he’s more terrified or sad. What if Frankie tells people? Or what if he doesn’t tell but he can’t even look at Vinny ever again? They’ve got a whole season of promotion to do together, they’ll both be at the movie premiere at Sundance and then at Cannes, and they were practically best friends until just a few seconds ago.
Vinny looks at Lance, feeling helpless and wanting comfort, but Lance looks worried too.
“Aw, jeez, baby…I didn’t pull out!” Vinny says, and a new wave of pain and fear washes over him. He feels like he’s going to be sick. He leans towards the toilet where indeed Lance’s cum is floating in the water like a river of pearl through liquid glass, and Vinny wonders if he’s about to blow chunks all over it, burying what was such a fun, sexy moment in his life a minute ago.
“Hey, c’mere Paulie,” Lance says, reaching out to pull Vinny into a hug. Instead of puking, Vinny starts crying. He didn’t know he was going to burst into tears like a big ol’ baby. “What happened happened, there was no planning for that. C’mere, look at me. We’re about to sell my script, if I’m…ya know, pregnant again, now’s as good a time as any, that’s the joke of the whole movie, right? I’ll just pretend I’m wearing the prosthetic belly all the time, be a big damn method-acting diva about it, and then we’ll have another little squirt around. How about a girl this time, little Paulina? Let’s have ten kids and name them all Paulie names, what d’ya say? Really fuck up their lives, it’ll be fun!”
Vinny almost laughs, kind of coughs up half of one. Lance’s hair is all stuck up from being mussed by his shirt, and Vinny reaches over to start combing it back into place. If he’s going to have a bad day, at least he has his baby with him. He’s more likely to get through it without wanting to die at least.
“Frankie, though…he’s practically the first friend I’ve ever had, it’s been all fuck buddies before now, and then you, but never just a friend, baby,” Vinny says, getting sad again. “He looked at me like I’d let him down, you saw that, right? All the respect right out the window. He might hate me by the time I see him again, I wouldn’t be surprised if he spit on me.”
“Pally, he probably just can’t believe we didn’t tell him we were more than partners,” Lance suggests, wrapping his arms around Vinny’s head and hugging it to his chest, just his head. It probably looks stupid but it feels comforting, like he’s blocking out the whole world, protecting Vinny’s mind.
“You think that’s all it was, really? You don’t think he thinks what we were doing was disgusting?”
“Oh, Paulie,” Lance whispers directly into Vinny’s ear, telling him a secret. “You’re the one who thinks it’s disgusting. Part of you, and I know it’s not all of you, but there’s a part of you that believes what you say when you talk all that dirty talk, you know that? It’s what makes it so hot, I’m not saying you’ve got to change or anything, but that’s in you, pally, and don’t go thinking it’s what everybody thinks. I bet Frankie’s just wondering why his best friend never told him anything about himself, he probably feels like he doesn’t even know you right now. You play every hand you get close to the vest, even with me. You’re used to lying to everyone, you don’t want to talk about where you come from, you don’t want to seem weak by telling anyone how you feel, and you hurt yourself more than anyone else with that stuff. You’re doing it right now.”
Vinny nods. Lance might be pretty right, but Vinny still can’t believe him. Part of him truly believes that Frankie’s rushing to a hot shower right now to scrub every touch and hug they’ve shared off of him, like Vinny’s some secret pervert. That part of him doesn’t want to be touched anymore for fear of contaminating others, and that part wins when he starts to pull away from Lance’s grasp.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here, please, I can’t party anymore.”
Lance nods, tells Vinny to sneak out the back and go home. Lance will make the excuses, Lance will pick up the baby, Lance will me
et him back at the apartment and help him forget all this as best he can. Vinny can sleep through to tomorrow and they’ll see if maybe they can’t explain some things to Frankie, set them all right again. That all sounds good to Vinny, he really wants to feel taken care of right now, but Lance isn’t enough to be everything to him, not on a night like this one. So on his way home he stops by a liquor store, feels like a crumb-bum out of some noir film—suit all crumpled and hair messed up, tie hanging loose and weaving and stumbling towards a bottle of hooch—but he still goes for it. He won’t be able to sleep without dosing himself to sleep, anesthetizing himself to his own memories. Hell, he kind of hopes he can drink so much he wipes out the memory of Frankie’s face and that feeling of cold terror gripping his heart. He’s going to down the whole bottle before Lance even gets home, just chug it in the hopes that he’ll be passed out and stupefied and not have to think about this night until the light of day. This was his party, and now it’s all his nightmare come true, and it’s not fair. It’s not fair, and it’s no fun, and he can’t even feel like the victim here, because he messed up Lance’s night too by getting off inside of him. How worried must he be right now? Why can’t things ever just get good and stay that way, why is that life? Up and down and over and out and over again. Why, why?
14. Dramatic Irony
Lance doesn’t want to get too involved in the Vinny and Frankie show if he can avoid it. First, because they’re both kind of tough guys and wouldn’t respond well to someone coming in to friendship-mediate between them. What they should do is just punch it out, and if Lance sees a way to get them both into a nice boxing match he knows for sure that by the end of the third round they’d be hugging each other, all this emotional stuff forgotten, but neither one of them asks for help, and Lance has his own concerns.