The first thing Leo did every morning in his suite at the Beverly Hills Hotel was read the trades. He sat in a plush robe, a room service coffee that cost more than his old apartment's daily rent steaming beside him, and absorbed the news. Not the front page, but the box office charts in Variety.
Chainsaw had been open for seven days. Its total domestic gross was a staggering $45.86 million.
Leo folded the magazine and looked out the panoramic window at the sprawling estates of Beverly Hills below. Green lawns, turquoise pools, and terracotta roofs dotted the landscape. He felt a primal, acquisitive urge. He wanted a piece of it. Not just a hotel suite he was renting with an advance from New Line, but a permanent foothold. He knew a financial crisis or two was on the horizon in the coming decades; that's when he'd buy, at the bottom of the market. For now, this view was just fuel for his ambition. The staggering success of his first film wasn't an endpoint; it was merely the opening move in a much larger game. His phone had been ringing off the hook—other studios, desperate for a meeting. But Rick was playing gatekeeper, letting the buzz build to a fever pitch. Leo knew his next project wouldn't be for a mere $1.3 million.
Before he could conquer the future, however, he had one last piece of the past to discard. He had to go back to school.
Walking through the USC campus felt like visiting a foreign country. The bright-eyed students hurrying to class, their anxieties focused on midterms and graduation, seemed impossibly young. A year ago, he was one of them. Now, he felt a thousand years old. The concerns of this place—grades, student loans, campus gossip—were no longer his. He was playing in a different league, against seasoned killers who measured success in nine-figure opening weekends.
His reputation preceded him. As he crossed the main quad, a girl with a bright smile intercepted him, pressing a folded piece of paper into his hand. "I just think your film is brilliant," she said, her eyes wide with admiration before she scurried off. He glanced at the note: a name, a phone number, and a dorm room. It was the third one he'd received in ten minutes. Leo sighed. This was the most straightforward, capitalist part of success, but these star-struck college students weren't what he was interested in.
"Leo?"
He turned. Pera stood there, looking hesitant and stripped of her usual icy confidence. The smirking executive's son was nowhere in sight.
"I heard about your movie," she said, her voice soft. "It's incredible. Everyone is talking about it."
"Thank you," Leo replied, his tone polite but distant.
"Leo, I… I made a mistake," she stammered, taking a step closer. "Chad—he lied to me. There was no movie role for me. It was all a lie to get… well, you know. I ended it. Can we… can we go back? To how things were?"
Leo looked at her, at the practiced vulnerability in her eyes. The old Leo, the 23-year-old kid, might have been swayed. But Arthur Vance, the 52-year-old cynic inside him, felt nothing but a cold, weary sense of finality. He had no romantic feelings for her, only an academic distaste for the betrayal she represented.
"Pera," he said, his voice quiet but firm. "When a mirror breaks, you can try to glue the pieces back together, but you'll always see the cracks." He gave her a sad, final smile. "We're done. I wish you the best."
He walked away without looking back, leaving her standing alone in the middle of the quad. The last ghost of his predecessor's life had been exorcised.
That evening, the world had shifted entirely. Leo stood in his hotel suite, adjusting the cuff links on a Tom Ford suit that felt less like clothing and more like armor. A knock at the door revealed not a hotel staffer, but Michael Ovitz himself.
"Ready to meet your new peer group, Leo?" the CAA president asked, his eyes glinting with amusement.
They met Robert Shaye in the lobby, and the three of them—the boy-king director, the super-agent, and the studio head—rode in a silent, air-conditioned town car to a sprawling manor nestled deep in the hills. The party was an overwhelming assault on the senses. A live jazz band played on a marble terrace, the air smelled of night-blooming jasmine and expensive cigars, and the crowd was a constellation of faces Leo recognized from magazine covers and movie screens.
Ovitz put a hand on Leo's shoulder. "Enjoy yourself," he said, his voice a low conspiratorial murmur. "Mingle. If you see an actress you admire, introduce yourself. Tell them you directed Chainsaw. Believe me, they'll be more proactive than you think." With a parting smile, Ovitz melted into the crowd to do business.
Shaye appeared at his elbow moments later, a glass of champagne in hand. "Quite the scene, isn't it? Leo, about your share of the profits…"
"I trust you'll have your finance department wire it as soon as the numbers are finalized," Leo said smoothly, taking a sip from his own glass.
"Of course, of course," Shaye said. "And your next project? I hope you'll give New Line the first look."
"I have an idea forming," Leo replied, "But I'll need to write a full proposal. And on the next one, I intend to co-invest."
Shaye's eyes sharpened. The subtext was clear: Pay me what you owe me, and I'll use my own money to take a bigger piece of the next pie. He was no longer just talent-for-hire.
"An ambitious plan," Shaye said with a respectful nod. "Well, under the same conditions, I hope we'll be your first choice."
"Of course," Leo lied with a charming smile.
Shaye, understanding the game perfectly, clapped him on the shoulder and moved on to talk to a well-known producer. Leo was left alone for a moment, standing on the edge of the glittering chaos. This was the real Hollywood. A jungle of power, money, and flesh, veiled in glamour. And for the first time, he wasn't looking at it as an outsider. He was one of the predators.