Theo woke up several times in the middle of the night since his nightmare. He couldn't shake Brett from his thoughts. What he did to him. He was locked up. Why on earth was he this scared still? He looked at the clock on his phone. 4:51 am. It was too early. His next appointment wasn't for another six hours, and he needed to be well-rested for it. He laid there scrolling through his phone hoping reading would make him tired. It just made him more awake. The brightness of his phone wasn't the problem. It was the boring trash that became interesting out of nowhere. He sighed. I'll never fall asleep now anyway.

He got up and made some coffee. Theo wasn't really one to eat when he first woke up, but he could live on caffeine. He watched as the sun rose above the trees. Summer in California truly was a sight to behold, he thought. He checked his emails, showered and prepared for the day ahead. It would be a long one. Not only for the utter lack of sleep, but it was a Monday. The bar will have slowed down and so will his... other business after today. Not to a complete stop, but now there will be no excuses for taking an early exit for time purposes when he wanted to leave a conversation. Summer made his being a sex-worker almost halt completely. It's harder to keep up a facade when your wife wants a vacation on some lavish cruise to prove there are no issues with your marriage, if you're spending nights at a hotel with a stranger that people are visiting constantly.

Theo decided to do some grocery shopping while he waited for his appointment. It was finally after seven and most things had opened.

Liam woke up at about six that morning. No idea why. He didn't set his alarm that early. All he knew was that he couldn't fall back to sleep. He hated this. It wasn't that he wasn't a morning person, perse, but it was a fucking Monday, it was summer, it was California, it was the booze shift. He hated it. The weekends, he could handle. People getting drunk and passing out, it was normal. The people that stayed and vacationed for the whole week, that was something that drove his patience and customer service into the ground. These people were drunk all day and all night, partying, inviting people to the hotel without registering, and leaving the rooms completely trashed. Liam sighed. It's gonna be a long one for sure. With that thought, he started getting ready for work and looked for anything open that sells coffee at 7 am. He decided on a grocery store that had a built-in coffee shop.

What is he doing here? Liam spotted Theo at the coffee shop. He kicked himself mentally, because why else is he here. At this public place. In public. Where people go to publicly buy food and things of that nature. God why was he such an idiot? Theo felt someone's eyes on him, so he turned around, making Liam visibly tense. Liam didn't realize he'd actually been staring at that point until... He looks so different in the light- Liam shook his head and pushed away his thoughts. It was very noticeable. Theo raised an eyebrow at him. Great. Now he was forced to cover it.

He raised his hand in a weak wave. "Yo, what's up?" Liam bit his cheek because what a lame ass thing to say...

Theo didn't seem to mind, though. "Just getting some caffeine and some groceries for the week." Liam let out a half-laugh at that. Mostly because he was nervous.

"What?"

"Nothing. I just- didn't take you as a morning person. Or really, an any type of day type of person. Yet here you are buying groceries at seven-thirty in the morning." Theo's face was half-amused and half an expression that basically read 'you have got to be kidding me'.

"That's why you should never judge a book by its cover, Liam" Theo took a sip of his coffee, starting to walk away, when Liam said "Yeah. You look different in the daylight." What? The fuck? Does that even mean? Liam's eyes widened and took his leave, disregarding whether Theo had any response. Theo chose to ignore it and kept walking. He didn't want to stay in there any longer than he absolutely had to.

Liam, on the other hand was mortified. He immediately called Mason and told him about the encounter.

"What exactly did you say again?" Mason was definitely going to ride this wave of embarrassment until Liam died and then, he would probably put those words on his tombstone.

"Mase please for the love of god do not make me repeat it. I already had to leave because the guy scares me. Something stupid like that-"

"Liam. You didn't even tell me in the first place! Calm down! I just want the full context so I can be sure of the extent to which I need to make fun of you" Mason could feel the eyeroll and glare through the phone, but persisted anyway, "besides, it might not even be that bad. I mean the guy is a bartender and a stripper. I guarantee he has heard worse than that." Liam didn't feel better with that thought. He was kind of offended. Liam didn't want to be compared to those disgusting creeps that Theo had to put up with.

"Mason, it was just- I walked up to him and said what's up, you know, like a fuckin' idiot-"

"Why are you an idiot for asking him what's up?"

"Because it was like I was expecting to not run into him outside of the bar?" Liam said as if it was the most obvious answer, and he didn't see how Mason didn't get it.

"That's literally a normal question and a normal feeling. Remember when we used to see teachers outside of school? At first it was weird, and we realized they, too, have fuckin' lives" Mason tried to reassure him without provoking him further.

"I guess-"

"Great so then what happened"

"Mason please!" Liam's arguing skills were subpar at best in comparison to Mason. He begrudgingly continued "Well, then he proceeded to tell me he was getting coffee and groceries-"

"Still don't see how that plays into what you told me-"

"Well, if you would shut up and let me finish-" he paused "am I on speaker? Is Corey there again?!"

To this, Corey responds back "Hey Liam! Don't worry, I'm sure whatever you said or did, Theo probably didn't take it seriously. He would have confronted you about it then and there."

"See? Corey is his best friend so he would know. You have nothing to worry about!"

"Also, the guy's not as scary as he seems. He's just got a lot of baggage, so he acts tough about it." Liam wondered what other baggage Theo may have, besides what he was already told. It was hard to believe someone could deal with so much, and they could go about their day as if it were just normal shit. Like spilling coffee on your shirt was the same inconvenience it would be if he wasn't a prostitute.

"So. Now you can continue your story so I can make fun of you"

"Yeah, sorry I have to get to work."

Mason looked at the time. Liam had wasted time, seemingly intentionally. "You are so not off the hook Dunbar!"

Liam went through his shift pretty normally; other than the few times he'd cringed when he thought about his encounter with Theo that morning.

Hayden rolled into the hotel that afternoon asking if anyone knew when Liam's shift ended. Liam looked at her and he stopped breathing.