Simon didn't know what to say to that. He had vague notions about the 'big city' he had never actually seen. That there was a place there for misfits. That there were opportunities. He didn't dare to tell Hurley, for he knew Hurley would mock them. He looked down at his shirt and other belongings. "Not yer business," he muttered, without looking at the man.

“Not my business!” he laughed, as though Simon were a child refusing to admit he spilled the milk. “Look at this boy!” he called over his shoulder. “I -” he stomped a hard part of Simon’s backpack, like a man scuffing out the embers of a fire, “made” stomp “you.”

Oh, the things he made him do, his little ant scurrying for morsels. There was pride in his voice. Victory.

The fishermen stood up. Simon glanced at them, wishing they would stay out. Wishing they would leave and never tell anyone what they had seen or heard. It was bad enough to have Chris insult and humiliate him in private. This was too much. He suddenly reached out and pulled the bag out of Chris's hands. "Get lost!" Still he dared not stoop down to grab his things

Unsurprisingly, Chris did not get lost.

No. Instead, he stepped toe to toe with Simon. Grabbed the strap of his backpack, using it to yank Simon toward him. He stooped to murmur at his ear.

“I could bend you over that bar, Simon. Fuck you right here, in front of all your little friends. And no one would do a damned thing to stop me.”

He leaned up, gloating.

“Not even you,” he said at room volume.

Meanwhile, Zechariah was setting the table for two on account of having dismissed the housekeeper early for some privacy. Were the ocean blue bed sheets too much of a statement? Nah.

Oh! He was happier than he ever could have imagined! He was lost before Simon.

Simon was yanked forward. When Mr. Hurley spoke, he let go of the bag so that he could put some distance between them. The image was all too vivid and real before his mind's eye and it made him feel humiliated and assaulted already. Wasn't that just how it was? Wasn't that all he was good for? To be used and stepped on.

No. He had to remember that he was going away. Chase his dreams! To love and be loved! To be happy!

Those dreams felt unreal whenever he was in Hurley's presence, like actual pleasant dreams he struggled to remember at all after waking up on a dreary morning. Those eyes - the quiet rage in those cold eyes in a handsome face; they turned pleasant dreams to nightmares.

He clenched his fists. His thumb brushed the outline of the skaning knife in his pocket that Rose had given him. He wouldn't let Hurley trample on him this time.

He had to gather his things and go! Now! "Find someone else," he grunted. Then he stooped down quickly to gather whatever Hurley didn't hold underfoot.

He looked down to the bag now abandoned in his hand, and slung it over his shoulder with a cocky look.

Chris knew nothing of the life Simon had saved and packed for, but he did know this: Simon had nothing on his own. No prospects; nothing but his abysmal smelling fisher life and his brutish, simple man’s accent. He wouldn’t have bothered with him otherwise.

Which meant he had other clients, most likely. This bothered him as much as other men sitting in chairs he’d sat in.

Now if one of those clients had gone and stolen that human chair from him, however …

“What,” he scoffed, “like your boyfriend, again? At least he looks good with a few tears down his face.”

Simon stopped and lifted his horrified face to Hurley. That couldn't be. Zech would never... No. No, of course, he wouldn't. Zech had money. But... Hurley knew... He couldn't think clearly. This comment unsettled him more than any prior insult or degradation had done.

They were two different world - the world of Mr. Hurley, and the world of Zech. And there were two Simons to inhabit them. Simon survived, could bury his shame, could hope, could feel some happiness, because there were two. And he was about to shed one and live only in Zech's world. Yet suddenly one bled into the other and and stained everything it touched.

He rose. "As if," he said, his voice betraying that he was in fact disturbed by that comment. "You disgust him."

He meant to insult Hurley, to make him feel but a bit of the insecurity other people felt around him. And in its pursuit of that aim, his disoriented mind could not see what he had given away.

Was it victory that Simon saw? That flicker over pale eyes? That snide, unflappable smile under the furrow of his brow?

Chris disgusted this man, whoever he was. That was an awful lot closer than someone who passed him by on the same shady brothel treks. A Carrington? A family client? A lawyer?

He let out a huff of a laugh, as though surprised Simon took that long to catch on to some in-joke.

“Why else do you think I fuck him?” he mused, nonchalantly shaking the bag in hand to listen for anything that sounded breakable. “For his good looks?”

If it was that, definitely not John.

“For his artistry?”

If he looked a little queasy, that was probably Darius – his own damned work of art, the nervous, attention-starved thing.

“You should see the places I’ve had him,” he laughed, eyes narrowing. “The things I’ve made him eat.”

No one was fussier than Zack, after all.

Chris chucked the bag hard behind him, stepping forward like a wolf with a rabbit in his sights.

“You know why he keeps crawling back to me, whore?” he smiled with teeth, grabbing Simon’s collar. “Because you’re not enough for him. You’ll never be enough. Even disgusting me,” he chuckled, but oh he’d make them all pay for that one later, “is better than just a dead fish in bed.”

"Art-?" he stopped himself. Zech knew much more about art and literature than Simon. Simon liked it when he tried to educate him and explained why something was good. He liked it when Zech read to him - a different kind of literature than the little stories in the weeklies his sisters borrowed from their friends and read to the family in the evenings. He especially liked it when Zech read work that suggested there were more people like them, and they loved the way he wanted to love Zech. Such glimpses seemed to lift above himself and made him aspire to be so much more, so much better, so much happier - before he left Zech's place and fell back to that other, dark world where such lofty ideals could hardly even shine through the clouds of boredom, futility, and isolation, let alone touch the ground.

Yes, Zech knew art, but he would not share it with Hurley like he shared it with Simon. Hurley understood nothing about such things. Hurley inhabited this dark world. No, whoever he had in mind, it was not Zech. Simon relaxed a little. That other world was still unspoiled, and Zech was still ignorant of this one and Simon's secrets.

He would have stepped back further, but his calf was pressed against the bench. Hurley's suggestions disgusted him, but Simon was certain he was lying. "He's too good for you. He doesn't need you."

He needed to go. Dared he push past Hurley, never mind his bag?