Page 54 of Snow Storm

Claude kissed the back of his neck. “Let me be the judge.”

Harley’s finger hesitated as he hovered it over the screen, and then after a long beat, he hit Play.

The sound was mostly the dull roar of a chattering crowd. The video was obviously taken on someone’s phone, and it was a little shaky, but as it zoomed into focus, he saw Harley on a stage under bright lights. He looked uncomfortable, hunched into himself, his face twisted with nerves.

There was a voice off-screen, and it took Claude a second to make out what the person was saying.

“…it wasn’t kinky, but it definitely wasn’t vanilla or fade to black like you’d been writing before. Did you and your ex act out those scenes before you wrote them down so they’d be accurate?”

Claude’s ears began to buzz with fury. Theaudacity! He heard Harley’s mumbled response and saw the look of fear crossing his beloved’s face. He wanted to reach through the screen and punch the man who was speaking.

“Did he just say you had internalized homophobia because you wouldn’t talk about your sex life?” Claude growled.

Harley stiffened. “I…well. Just hang on. There’s more, and it…it gets worse..”

He wasn’t wrong. That video cut out, and it was spliced with another. Harley was in what looked like a hotel hallway with ugly red carpets and cream-colored walls. He was standing infront of a tall, beady-eyed man with slicked-back dark hair and a smirk on his face.

Harley looked terrified, and the man looked furious.

“I’m deadly serious. Get your fucking ass back in there, apologize to that man, describe your dick down to the freckles if that’s what he wants, and make this right. You’re nothing without all of this, Harley. Fix it.”

“Harley,” Claude breathed out. His chest hurt from the cruelty. Harley was stiff in his arms, and to make matters worse, the video kept going. The asshole who did this to him apparently wasn’t done.

“…And if you were half as talented as your ego, you wouldn’t need to do little signings like this to keep from going broke. You’re not important to this industry. You’re a sad little nobody who can’t even keep his broke-ass boyfriend interested in him. It’s no wonder why he left you. I should have fucked him when he came on to me.”

“Yeah, maybe you should have,” video-Harley said.

Then, he fulfilled all of Claude’s wishes and punched the man.

There was a gasp from the crowd, and Harley looked like he was in a fugue state. And then the video ended.

Stillness fell over the two of them, and then Harley’s fingers released the phone, and it clattered to the ground. Claude didn’t move. He wasn’t sure what to do. He wasn’t sure what Harley was expecting him to say.

“So, yeah,” Harley whispered.

Claude cleared his throat. “You shouldn’t have punched him.”

“I know. Fuck, Iknow. I know I’m?—”

“You should have given him a knee right to his balls.”

Harley’s jaw shut so hard Claude both felt and heard the click in his jaw. A beat of silence passed. Then another. Then Harley asked, “Uh, what?”

Claude turned Harley in his arms, arranging him with one leg over his hips, the other between his knees. He kept them in close enough that all he had to do was lean in an inch and they’d be kissing.

“He deserved the punch.”

“No one deserves that.”

“I’m not so sure I believe that. I saw the whole thing, mon âme. I heard every single word those monsters said to you. The man in the crowd was so wrong for what he asked. You are a person. You are an author, and no one has any right to know what happens in your personal life.”

“Ethan was pretty quick to remind me that the moment you achieve any kind of public fame, your right to privacy gets smaller.”

“He’s a liar,” Claude said, his voice both quiet and fierce. His heart was hurting so badly for this man. “And a sorry excuse for a human being.”

Harley closed his eyes and sagged against Claude. “I think I would have handled it better if it happened months ago. Or months from now. But my jackass ex just left, and it was the anniversary of my dad’s death and…and I don’t know. I didn’t even want to do that fucking signing, but Ethan said if I didn’t show up, I’d be in breach of contract. He promised me everyone would be vetted and that those questions were banned, but the mods weren’t paying attention, and they just…they just let this guy talk.”

“And then he yelled at you for enforcing the rules he agreed upon. He made you feel shame that you had no business feeling, and he got what any person should have gotten in that moment,” Claude said. He hoped he could run into Ethansomeday so he could give the man a proper encore. Cupping Harley’s face between his hands, Claude drew him in for a kiss. “But you were right,” he said when he pulled back. “That video does change everything.”

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