“I just have to be okay with the fact that he might tell me to fuck off,” I said abruptly an hour later as Charlie came back with an eighteen-foot Italian sub in one hand and two bags of chips in the other.
“Have you billed any time today?”
“Like, an eighth of an hour.”
“So, no.”
“I’m mentally preparing myself to pass on the chance of a lifetime. He might tell me to pound sand.”
“You can’t do that and be a functional Big Law associate at the same time?”
“Could you?”
“Hell, no.”
My phone rang and I nearly jumped out of my skin.
“Hey, Andie,” I said, trying to sound composed.
“Did you talk to Eddie yet?”
I wondered if he had already updated her on the Texas Hold’em ruling.
“I’m going to do it from the car.”
“Are you nervous?”
I chuckled. “Um, yeah. I have no idea what he’s going to say.”
“Don’t forget to tell him how much I want you to do this.” She paused. “And look, no matter how the meeting goes, I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I think I want to plead guilty. Like—sooner, rather than later. I have to start planning out the rest of my life. Will you float the pleading thing by Eddie, make sure he still thinks it’s a good idea?”
In a perfect world, I wanted to be able to go to bat for Andie. But there were actually reasons for her to settle—time, money, unpredictability. Her case wasn’t a slam dunk, even if we didn’t think a jury would find her guilty. I also understood wanting to move on with her life. No matter what she decided, there was no pretending that the case hadn’t changed her life forever, in both good ways and bad. It had already changed mine.
An hour later, Eddie was waiting in the car when I got in.
“I hope you weren’t waiting long,” I said as I rushed into the back seat.
He smiled without looking up from his phone. “My twelve o’clock finished early, and I took the chance to catch up on things. I could sit here for another hour doing this.” It looked like he was editing a legal brief from his iPhone. “Bummer about the Texas Hold’em case, huh?”
I was physically incapable of holding it in. “George Brenner wants to adapt Andie’s life into a movie.”
He looked up. “TheGeorge Brenner?”
I nodded.
“How did that happen?”
I took a deep breath. “Someone at the publisher—his old college friend, actually—sent him the manuscript, and he sparked to the story.”
He shook his head. “This has been a fun one, huh?”
I laughed nervously. “There’s more. He asked me to consult for him on the script. To answer questions about the indictment and negotiating with the prosecutors, things like that.”
He shot me the same incredulous look as when I said George Brenner wanted to write Andie’s movie.
“That’s not something most lawyers get asked to do,” he said in an indecipherable tone as he looked back at his phone.
I held my breath and wondered if the conversation, along with my once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, was over.
