A Night In Galaxy House

Set in the Safe Haven universe

Author’s Note: 
This story is set in an original sci-fi universe I’ve developed for a full-length novel (Safe Haven — Hades & Persephone, but gay and in space!) that I’m currently querying. These characters would headline the second book in the universe, and this piece serves as their meet-cute backstory.

The setting is humanity’s space-faring future, after environmental collapse forced the evacuation of Earth and scattered humans across interplanetary settlements and space stations.

On names: In this future, “virtues” have replaced traditional given names. You’ll see characters called Peace or Earnest, for example — intentional choices, not misspellings.

Star had two simple rules for how he lived his life. 

Number one: Only rely on himself. 

Any mistake he had gotten himself into, he could get himself out of. It was self-confidence and self-deprecating in equal measure. A belief in his ability to persevere and his ability to fuck it up. And, most importantly, an acknowledgement that he could have friends, he could have colleagues, and he could even have allies… but no one was ever, ever coming to save him other than himself. 

Number two: Don’t fall in love with your client. 

That wasn’t exactly his rule, but rather a rule to live by for all the hosts of Galaxy House. One taught them as soon as they arrived, seasoned hosts to the knee-shaking newbies. Sing-songed teasingly in corridors when one of their own got too in their feelings about one of their paying customers. Whispered in private mantras. Said like a death sentence by Madam Celestial when she had to ruthlessly cut off a fling gone too far.

He could mark the exact night on the calendar that he began to break both of his rules.

Star had been leaning at the backmost bar of Galaxy House -- his place of work, his place of residence, glorious den of sin and indulgence in which he was one of the things to be indulged in -- in a pose that looked effortless but was in fact deliberately designed to emphasize the lithe lines of his body. 

He preferred the back bar because he liked to survey the milling, hungry crowds before picking his prize for the night, and because the Happy, the five-foot nothing bartender with buzzcut platinum hair whose attitude did not match her name, was his favorite. Straightforward, efficient, and never too chatty with the clientele. She left the chatting for Star and the other hosts of Galaxy House to spin their weaving work.

“Dry night?” Happy monotoned, wiping down the counter. 

“The night’s just beginning,” Star sing-songed back. In personalities, they did not match, but they still spoke the same language. 

It was just about then, in his surveying, that Star first spotted the soon-to-be architect of his destruction. The one that would crack the carefully walled place that he kept his heart. At the time, he was just a set of coveralls. For that was the only feature Star could make out of him, standing some distance away by the private elevators, talking to none other than Madam Celestial, the manageress of their premiere entertainment house. 

Statuesque, draped in layers of gossamer black, and with a down-her-nose stare that could make you feel like an ant about to be squashed, she was an intimidating person to talk to. An intimidating person to approach. An intimidating person to even catch a wisp of attention from. In a way that was some folks' exact fetish. 

It was with that force-of-the-universe presence that she kept her host and bartenders and security guards in line. More importantly, how she kept the clients in line. 

She and Coveralls were just chatting away. Star squinted in the dim mood-lighting, trying to decipher more. Which is exactly why he didn’t see danger approaching. 

“A-hole incoming,” Happy said, nodding toward the front of the club.
Straightening his jacket as he made his way through the security gates was Star’s personal thorn-in-side regular: Genteel Rodham. 

Usually, in their line of work, the term “regular” was a good thing. The hard work had already been done. The fish was on the hook. It was regular visits. Regular income. Regularity in knowing what to expect. All fine and dandy if the regular in question was at least moderately likable. At least moderately tolerable. At least moderately sufferable. 

Genteel Rodham was none of the three. Genteel Rodham had never broken any rules or caused any harm, but he was an expert at being slimy and vile all the way up to the line, but never crossing it. 

While distracted, Coveralls had been dismissed by Madam Celestial and was now heading their way. Star pushed up from his posed slouch at the bar, preparing to approach the one escape route immediately available to him. 

“You’re not the same type,” Happy said. Meaning Madam Celestial and himself.

“I’m everyone’s type,” Star threw back over his shoulder, as much a pep talk to himself then as a brag.

He planted himself directly in Coveralls path. “Hey, handsome, can you help me out?” 

Coveralls came to a shuttered-stepped halt. 

Confronted with Coveralls face-to-face, he wasn’t exactly what Star expected. Given his attention to Madam Celestial, Star expected someone older, but they seemed about the same age. Next to Madam Celestial, most people looked short, but Star and Coveralls were pretty much matched in height, of which Star was not lacking, although Coveralls was built with more heft. 
And his face -- where Star's was long and angular, his was softer, rounder. A face made for a life less harsh than this one. And staring at him with wide eyes -- a shade of brown like the depths of a cave worth getting lost in… if he had the time. 

“I -- uh -- I…”

A nervous one. Easily flustered. How had he survived just standing in Madam Celestial’s approximate orbit? Star didn’t have time for patience. One side glance spied Madam Celestial had stopped to speak with Genteel, always accommodating the big spenders, but those cursory greetings wouldn’t last long. 

“Because I could really use someone to buy me a drink…” He touched Coveralls chest lightly, teasing, wrist clearing bearing the bracelet if there was any question of who and what he was, and what a drink entailed. He stepped closer in a way that was more than friendly. “Please.” It twisted the word with all its dangerous promises. 

Not his best work, but he hadn’t had a clue how to personalize the proposition, but a single drink of the lowest bar of entry. He wasn’t begging him to buy out the night. This was a drip-drop of a gateway drug to soliciting a sex worker. 

“Star!”

Not exactly breaking a rule, but still breaking something. This was a place made for low voices and whispers, not yells across the field. And while Star may not have been bought out, he was still engaged. 

Genteel walked right up to them. Interrupting? He cared not. 

“I’m with another client right now,” Star said shortly. Which would have been enough to deter any other sensible regular if they had even made it this far. But talk about sliming right up to the line. 

“Your bracelet’s not orange.”     

Indeed, the embedded light sensor was glowing up-for-grabs green. 

Coveralls’ eyes flicked from Star to Genteel back to Star. They had gone from wide-eyed to knowing. So lay before them a fork in the road of destiny. Because if Coveralls had gotten offended at this point that he was being used as a deterrent and walked off, Star would have forgotten his gentle, deep-welling eyes, everything about him other than the internal shame of a plan failed and a night ruined. But because he did what he did -- a simple, kind, intuitive thing -- it was the start of a supernova. 

“Actually,” Coveralls said, straight to Genteel’s sneering face. “I was just buying Star a drink.”

Happy, bless her, had Star’s usual queued up. Ice clinked in the glass as she set it on the bartop behind them. “I apologize for the confusion,” she said. “I should have set up the tab first. Sir, I’ll need your scan.”     

Coveralls stepped aside to attend to the business of paying, leaving Star and the object of his revulsion alone for a hovering second. 

“You’re picking deckhands over me now?” Genteel said. 

“All paying clients are welcome in the constellation of Galaxy House’s pleasures,” Star said, repeating the company line. 

Unmoved, Genteel said, “See you in twenty minutes.” Then he dragged his hand the full intimate length of Star’s arm, something much too presumptuous considering he hadn’t paid for it. Goosebumps raised under the lace sleeve. “I’ll be waiting.” 

He stepped away now. Star gave himself time for one settling breath before slipping back into his persona -- pleasant, flirty, and absolutely charmed by the person standing in front of him, whoever that person may be.

He found slipping into this persona as easy as he had slipped into tonight’s outfit of skintight pants and a lace shirt that showed everything underneath. That is, sometimes it took a little shimmying, but it always got on eventually. 

He joined Coveralls at the bar. “You are my absolute hero.” He leaned in another practiced pose. His pose from earlier was meant to be admired from afar. This pose, a little more coiled, a little more intimate, was meant to draw eyes to the details. The expanse of his neck, the flush of his lips, what peaked exactly under the revealing lace shirt. Coveralls looked. And immediately flushed up the neck. How precious.  

“What’s your name, hero?”

“Um, Earnest.” 

“I like that. It seems right. You seem rather… stalwart.” 

He huffed. “I thought Earnest was a bad name. Now I’m thankful that my moms didn’t name me Stalwart.” 

Star laughed with him. Always laugh with the client. 

“Tap in,” Happy interrupted dryly.

Star reached over the bar and tapped his bracelet against the scanner Happy held out. The green light turned mute orange.

“What is that?” Earnest asked. 

“This?” Star held up his wrist and gave it a little shake. “Is this your first time?”

“I’m not actually --”

“Oh, don’t be embarrassed. There’s no judgment in Galaxy House. Plus, the newbies are my favorite.” As he said it, he placed a glancing touch on his chest, just a quick drag of fingertips. There and then gone. Earnest’s gaze had dipped to follow the movement. 

Star lowered his voice, an easy little trick to drag people in closer. “I love teaching them everything.” 

“See, this drink…” He picked it up and took a minute sip. “It’s not actually a drink. It’s just tonic and synth-lime. Here --” He held it out for Earnest, who obediently accepted it. Their fingers brushed on the transfer.

It was an intimate thing to share a drink. Something you only did with family, the closest friends, lovers. Two mouths sharing the same thing. It was a kiss by proxy. 

Earnest took a sip as if expecting to be tricked, then said, “This is very expensive tonic water.”

“Because you’re not buying a drink.” Star accepted the glass back. “You’re buying my time.” He set the glass aside on the bar and held up his wrist again. “Orange means taken.”

“And green means…?”

“Open for business.”

“So why the drink? The fake drink?”

“It’s been that way for as long as I’ve been here and longer. I think it’s because a lot of folks are more comfortable with the acts of seduction if they think everyone involved is a little bit tipsy. Or maybe it’s the pretense people like. It feels more familiar. I mean, would you have been so accommodating if I grabbed you by the lapels and said ‘buy my time’?”

“You didn’t grab me by the lapels.”

“Sure…” He rolled his wrist in the air. “But I was hardly graceful.” 

“You were --” But he shook his head, and didn’t say. “That guy is staring at us.”

Star glanced over his shoulder to confirm the burning stare he could feel. Genteel staked out lonesome at a table with a deadset glare. 

He grabbed his drink and Earnest’s hand. “Let’s go somewhere more private.” 

There was nowhere completely private on the main floor of Galaxy House. Privacy had to be paid for. But it was designed with its low mood lighting, its circuitous layout, and its little alcoves to create the illusion of privacy.

Star found them a tucked-away spot around a one-sided booth seat, which was the perfect excuse to sit flush together. And shadowed with pseudo-privacy as the spotlight of the performance area was focused on an aerialist suspended in a ring, twisting languid curves and arches while dressed in sparkles. 

“She’s depicting the birth of the Milky Way galaxy,” Star whispered into Earnest’s ear, voice low because Star, of course, was a respectful audience. The aerialist stretched long. “All the smaller galaxies that combined until we got the spiral humans used to call home, until we had to flee and hope to find new homes among the stars.”

“I can’t tell if you’re joking or being serious.”

“That’s what it means to me. And isn’t art in the eye of the beholder?”

“That’s beauty.” 

“What’s beautiful?”

“No, the saying is, ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder.’”

“Yes, and I had been trying to dig for a compliment. But maybe I’m not your type. I did grab you by the lapels.”

“You didn’t actually grab me by the lapels. And you have to know you’re good-looking. You’re -- You’re stunning.”

Although he had prodded and teased his way there, not for his own ego but a way he found could help break the tension with
shyer clients, he found himself taken aback by the adjective. ‘Beautiful’ won’t have been shocking because he had practically been begging for it. Sexy, hot, pretty, handsome, attractive… all familiar. 

But stunning.

His prolonged silence drove nerves into the air.

“Was that too much? I’m s--”

Star cut off the apology with light fingers pressed to Earnest’s mouth, and as his Adam’s apple moved up and down in a gulp. 

“Never apologize for a compliment.” 

Star decided to stop torturing him and removed his fingers, only to replace it by touching the side of his cheek exactly where she had seen a dimple appear once or twice tonight. “You’re pretty cute too.”

Earnest made a little noise like he didn’t believe it. But he wasn’t the one of the two of them that had to beg for a compliment tonight, so maybe he should. 

His eyes skirted over Star’s shoulder. “He’s followed us.” 

Star turned to look and then swore something coarse that didn’t fit his effervescent persona. 

“What’s his problem?” Earnest asked. 

“I think his problem is that he knows I don’t like him, and he gets off on it.” Again, too raw. Bring that smile back in place. Pitch that voice for flirtation. “But forget about him. It’s about you and me right now.” Lean in. Lay it on thick. “Tell me something about you.”

“You’re blinking.”

“What?”

“You’re --” He nodded downward. “Blinking.”

His bracelet. Indeed, the orange light was going on and off. 

“It’s a warning,” Star explained. “That our time’s almost up.”

“So anyone could get your next drink?”

​“Yes.”

“...Including me?” 

Star led him to the closest bar -- not Happy’s, regrettably -- and while Earnest managed the payments, slipped aside to talk to the nearby bouncer on balcony duty. Peace, his name was, and surely he kept it by sheer size and biceps. 

“I know it’s usually premiere access,” Star said in a quick hush. “But could you make an exception for me this time? I’m trying to hook a new client. That’ll be more than the loss in the long run.”

“Can’t do,” Peace said from over his crossed arms, which had to be as much of a pose to impress as Star’s series of sleazy leans were. Everything in Galaxy House was a crafted performance, even the muscle. “Boss lady is cutting down on exceptions.”

Star shifted the weight between his feet and his tactics. “The thing is… there’s this other client who’s been hounding us.

Without some dedicated private time --”

“If he’s interfering with another client’s paid time, we can have him escorted off the property.”

Star sighed. Genteel would never get kicked out on a technicality. 

“Look, he’s following. He’s staring. He’s not breaking the rules, exactly, but he’s annoying the hell out of us.”

“Are you talking about Rodham?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Yeah. And he’s right there.” Peace just jutted a chin to where the man and the menace had strolled in around the corner.

Always arriving delayed. More pretense of innocence in the face of potential accusations of wrongdoing, perhaps. Or, like a predator playing with its prey. 

“I had cut him off from drinking one time last year, and he tried to get me fired,” Peace said. “I’ll make a spite exception this time.” 
 
#

“I didn’t realize this was up here.” 

“That’s the appeal. To observe without being observed yourself.” Star thought there was a fetish name for that, but couldn’t think of it.

Fingers grazed the railing as they walked the perimeter, peering down at the main floor below, where the night was starting to come alive with activity. Behind them were velvet-cushioned coaches, a billiards table sitting unused, and -- a little down -- a chaise currently occupied by two women necking. 

“Look, your friend’s trying to follow us up.”

They both watched in silence as a confrontation unfolded between Genteel and Peace. Star could imagine Genteel’s multi-level assault: entitlement, then bribes, then threats. But spite was stronger than bravery, it turned out, for after a squabbling few moments where Peace held steadfast, Genteel was turned away and actually went. 
Star released a breath he hadn’t realized was being held. 

“You alright?” Earnest's hand lifted as if to squeeze Star on the shoulder. He felt the shift of the man standing beside him, the movement of air, the hovering warmth of his touch, but when Star closed his eyes, it disappeared before any contact was made. When he opened them again, Earnest’s hand was gripped hard on the railing.

Star turned to him and put on a smile. “Forget about him. It’s about you and me, right now.”

“You said that before.” It wasn’t an accusation, but it flustered Star as if it were. It wasn’t good when clients saw under the act.

Not when you weren’t intentionally letting them. Like the fake drinks. Star always told them about the fake drinks, as if revealing this one secret, the rest of it seemed more real. 

“I guess I’m off my game tonight,” Star said. “First, I grabbed you by the lapels, and now I’m repeating myself.”

“You didn’t -- You’re not going to let that go, are you?”

“Of course not. It’s the beginning of our meet-cute. I’m never going to tell it differently.” 

On the floor below, Nova -- one of Star’s fellow hosts and hall neighbor -- dazzling in a dress of sequins, swooped in and nabbed the retreating Genteel by the arm. Was she sent to the rescue? Or nabbing the opportunity?

“You think he’s going to leave you alone now?” 

“If Nova has her way. She likes them rich.”

“And you don’t?” It hit with a hint of skepticism. 

“Not his kind of rich.”

“What kind of rich is that?”

It wasn’t against the rules exactly, but it was against the best practice. The guidance of their field. Don’t talk about your other clients with your current client. Make them feel like it is all about themselves. But sometimes, if you were as good at this as Star was, you could twist it the way you needed. 

“The kind that thinks the rest of us are a subservient species for not being born with money.”

“... I know the type.”

Of course he did. Mr. Coveralls was a working class man. Star was, too, really, even if his career had a veneer of glamour. They were on the same side of this one. 

#

“I can’t believe you were born here on the space station,” Star said as they were curled together on one of the couches. Well, Star was curled, knees drawn up on the cushion, one arm propped up on the low back as he leaned in close and cozy. Earnest was sitting upright, both feet planted on the floor in an admirable demonstration of proper posture. But at least something of his shoulders had relaxed in the minutes they had spent chatting. “You seem too…” 

Nice? Innocent? They were accurate, but not flirty enough. Not the things men liked to be called on a date night. 

“Stalwart?” Earnest proposed. 

“That’s it,” Star said with a laugh, even though it wasn’t exactly it. It would be weeks before Star came up with the right words. Not innocent, but untainted by the forces around them. Money-hungry, power-hungry, desperate, and ready for distraction.

But, Star would suppose, the sample size of his experience working and living at Galaxy House may have been a bit skewed. 

“I blame my moms,” Earnest said fondly. “They were idealist types. It didn’t always make life easier. In fact, it rarely did. But they kind of instilled a sense in me that even though it was harder, it didn’t mean it wasn’t worth it. 

“That’s beautiful,” Star said, and meant it. He wasn’t even digging for a compliment this time. 

“I’m guessing you immigrated here?” Earnest asked. It was an easy stat to assume. Most of the population had. There was always a boom of incomers once settlers founded somewhere livable in the known galaxies. 

“A few years ago,” Star replied vaguely. The details weren’t all that pretty. From the corner of his eye, he saw his bracelet flashing again. “Darn, right in the middle of a good conversation, too.”

He watched as Earnest hesitated, watched the gears moving, watched him make his own decision with Star pressed up against his side, perhaps persuading in the subtlest of gestures. 

“Maybe… I could buy one more drink?”

“Or… you could buy the whole night? We could go to my private room and continue…” He crawled fingers up his arm. “Getting to know each other

“I, um, I--” There was that hesitance. That innocence. Like he hadn’t walked into an entertainment house with the intent to be entertained. 

Star’s bracelet continued to blink -- a wonderful external pressure that meant Star could be the patient and understanding one while the cruel forces of time and technology pressed the man beside him for a decision. 

But since Genteel Rodham had walked through the security gates, nothing had gone smoothly for Star tonight -- so why had he expected something different and easy now? Another potential interruption from a potential problem of a person -- Madam Celestial appearing up the far stairs, pursuing the exclusive balcony floor as a good manageress does. 

“Oh, gods --” Star said, involuntarily, and did grab Earnest by the lapel this time and dragged him down to hide below the back of the couch.

“Wha--?” he began to squawk, but Star planted a hand over his mouth.   

“We’re not supposed to be here, exactly.” Star peeked carefully over the back of the couch to see that Madam Celestial was distracted by a smudge of dirt on the balcony railing that did not meet her exacting approval. 

“We’re not? Why?” Earnest asked, but at least in a whisper. 

Because it was for clients who had paid quite a bit of money on the floor in an evening and only with the company of a host, and Star had ditched a typically high-roller to break all the rules, but it was all too much to explain.

“Because they’re cutting down on exceptions.” His desperate gaze found an escape route --  a solo door to the staff stairs that he wasn’t supposed to take a client through. But already a rule or three had been bent. What’s one more?

“Come on,” Star said, grip still steady on the front of Earnest’s coveralls. He was a sturdy enough looking guy who certainly could resist Star’s tugging and yanking if he had wanted. But he seemed satisfied to indulge Star’s whims. Had been satisfying them all night. Perhaps not all hope was lost for a regular client to be made of him yet. 

Motion sensor lights flickered on as they stumbled through the door, stale and luminous. The cement steps and bare walls were the ugly backside of all the red and lush, carpet and couches, velvet and warm lighting. 

“Staff stairs,” Start said. “This is the exclusive behind the scenes tour of Galaxy House. For only the most V’s of the VIPs.”

“Would it help to say I believed you?”

“Yes, let’s go.”

It probably wasn’t strictly necessary to run down the stairs. There was no sign anyone was following, but the energy of sneaking around was intoxicating -- and even Star had found himself tipsy on it. Panted breaths were laced with giggles. His bracelet blinked and blinked. 

At the bottom of the flight, he pushed through a door that spilled them out on the casino floor. His toe caught on the edge of the doorframe and tripped into Earnest, who caught him with his steady self. 

“Are you alright?” he asked. 

Star clung to Earnest’s arm as he tried to steady himself. He tested his weight on his injured leg, but it went wonky under him.

“Did you twist an ankle, or something?” Earnest asked. 

“Or something.” Star balanced his weight back on his one good leg. “I think I yanked something in my -- in my prosthetic. The ankle, I think.” He shot a daring look at Earnest’s face. “That doesn’t freak you out, does it?”

“Of course not.”

“It does for some people.” It might have been the most vulnerable and true thing he had said all night.

He tried his weight again, as the seconds of reprieve leaning on Earnest would have led to its magic repair, but it went wonky again. He swore. 

“It’s not my field of expertise or anything,” Earnest said. “But I’m good at fixing things. If you would like, I could take a look. See if it’s a minor repair.” 

Nearby at a craps table, a group cheered as some dice rolled in their favor. 

“That’s sweet,” Star said, distracted. “But these aren’t exactly the type of pants that can be rolled up a few inches.” They were that skin tight. His brain was filtering through his options. Calling it a night, obviously. Getting booked with a tech. Budgeting out what it would cost him. He’d be at a loss for the night, plus the repair. His whole life was a war with mathematics. “And it’s not something I’m comfortable doing on the floor anyway.”

His bracelet went green. 

Genteel had stopped haunting his steps, so it wasn’t like he swooped in then. That would have been a more bitter end to this already bitter ending. But at the moment, neither Star nor Earnest had any obligation left to the other. Yet, Earnest held Star for balance. Yet, Star leaned. 

“You said something earlier about a private room?” 

#

Earnest’s touch was gentle. Star couldn’t feel it, exactly. He could feel that he wasn’t yanking his prosthetic around from where it was still connected at the knee. But he couldn’t exactly feel where his fingers were touching, careful and tender like there really was bruised flesh beneath his hands. But if he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine it, and it sent a tingle down his spine. 

They had been a slow and quiet half hour at it. When they had arrived at the room, Star had stripped down, trading out his skin-tight club wear for a robe that was flowy on the top and showed a lot of leg on the bottom. 

Had Earnest gone all red? Yes. Had Star found it endearing? Also, yes. 

But the shyness and nerves seemed to evaporate when Earnest went to work. He pulled up a schematic of the prosthetic model on his phone and muttered away to himself as he examined this and that. 

Star sat on the edge of his bed, and Earnest kneeled at his feet, and that also felt somehow significant. 

After this dedicated while, Earnest lowered Star’s prosthetic back to the floor. “I think I got it all back aligned.” He pushed up from the floor to standing. “If you want to give it a test.” And he offered a hand for Star to take. It was the first time tonight he had initiated contact. 

Star took it, letting himself enjoy the gentlemanly gesture, easing up standing and easing his weight back onto the prosthetic to test it.

“It seems right.” Star let go of Earnest’s hand to try out his full weight. 

“Give it a few steps to check.”

Star did as instructed, first a little tentative, but by the time he reached the end of his small apartment and turned around, with a little jaunt to his step that was him slipping his persona back on yet again.

“My hero for the third time tonight.” He touched Earnest’s chest just above the logo patch on his coveralls, and he didn’t immediately freeze or flush. An improvement. 

“I’m just doing what anyone who could would do.”

“No. Anyone wouldn’t.”

This was the problem with kind and generous people -- they thought they were normal. They thought that everyone was like them. That everyone moved through existence extending helping hands and gentleness. They didn’t realize that for the rest of the known galaxies, meeting someone like them was like walking through a shift in gravity. 

Star slid his arms over Earnest’s shoulders and around his neck. “And I have the rest of the night to say thank you.” And just as
Star tried to pull closer, Earnest pulled away.  Star’s arms fell easily off his shoulders at his retreat. Star flirted, seduced, invited, and encouraged, but never, ever forced. 

“There’s no need for… that.”

“But you paid for the night.” 

“We just needed to get some privacy for …” he motioned down at Star’s leg. 

“You paid for the night so you could fix my leg for free?”

“It sounds ridiculous when you say it like that.”

It was ridiculous, but Star didn’t say it. “Even if that is the case, hero.” It felt like grit teeth saying it this time. He sat on the bed and leaned back on his hands, another pose. Did his robe ride higher up his thighs? Purposefully, yes. “You and I still have the night. Might as well make it worth it, for both of us.”

“No, thank you.”

Star’s fingers curled in the sheets.

“I’m not really here for that,” Earnest continued to say. 

“You’ve made it pretty far into the night to not really be here for that,” Star said it more sharply than he intended. He shouldn’t have said it at all. But perhaps this swinging back and forth between Earnest’s frankly earnest actions and his rejections had put in him a rare space of damaged vulnerability. 

He usually didn’t let clients get to him like this, which was a lie, really, if he was brave enough to admit. Because he let Genteel get to him in all the wrong ways, and now this man in front of him was getting to him in all the others. 

“You’re right. I should -- I should go.”

Star pushed up from the bed and plunged towards the door to block his way. “No, no, that’s not what I mean.” 

It would be pretty bad for him to have a client pay for the night and leave less than an hour later. The type of thing that would be clocked and Madam Celestial followed up on, and everything from this whole night would unravel.

And then, what? Get moved to the shitty day shift, where the client flow was slow and cheap and sad out-of-workers, and the rest of his regulars moved onto the night shifters, who were available when they were? He’d be paying off his debt forever. 

Star pretended to tilt off balance. “Actually, I don’t think my leg’s right. Could you check it over again?”

“Sure,” Earnest said, but the ruse was thin, and he was being kind not to call Star on it.

He was meticulous in his second check. More meticulous than he needed to be when there was nothing wrong to right, and they both knew it. Something strange, like guilt, started to gnaw at Star from deep in the gut. Something else, too, like he was misunderstanding something greatly, but he couldn’t figure out that one enough to name it.  

“I’ll tell you why I hate that guy so much. Genteel Rodham,” Star said. Earnest glanced from his -- pretend -- work briefly, and then back to it. “And it’s not because he’s a rich asshole. This industry thrives off rich assholes. It’s how he treats my leg. Like he’s repulsed by it. But also like it’s a fetish of his. Like, he’s turned on by how he’s grossed out? I kind of wish he would pick one or the other.”

“Or he could act normal about it.”

“You’re one of those idealists, aren’t you?”

“My roommate’s little sister, she lives with us. I’m like an uncle to her, or something. She has a prosthetic arm. People either stare or they refuse to look, and don’t realize that both are rude. You can acknowledge that a person different than you exists without gawking. It’s not that hard.”

Oh, how it twisted painfully, the way Cupid’s arrow landed. How it stung to have someone before you that you could love, but never could have.

“So that’s why you know a thing or two about fixing them?” 

Earnest rocked back on his heels. “You caught me.”

But that wasn’t it. Star was still missing something. 

“Am I not your type?” he asked rather bluntly. 

“I’ve told you before. You’re stunning. You don’t need to dig for more compliments.” It should’ve been a line. It should have been said with a move. But he had just stated it. 

“Someone else at home?”

“Just my absolutely platonic roommate and my sort of niece.”

“You like to talk then?” It wasn’t unheard of in the business -- the clients who were more interested in getting heard than getting laid. 

“Yeah. I mean, I’m not some great conversationalist or anything…”

“I think you’re plenty good at it.” Star patted the mattress beside him. “No me making moves. Just talking. Tell me about your niece.”

Tentatively, Earnest sat down next to Star, and when Star didn’t immediately jump him, eased up. He talked. About his sort of niece. About his roommate, who was part best friend, part brother, part fellow dreamer. About said dream. Not grunt maintenance work around the space station that left his engineering background very untapped. But inventions. Innovations.

Ways to make the known galaxies better, more livable, for the humans doing their best to live there. So passionate, Star could almost find himself believing in the dream alongside him. 

As if the space station itself wasn’t the end of his dream. The destination he found himself in escape. Maybe he had forgotten there was more to life than just getting by. Maybe he never had the chance to learn it. 

“I don’t usually tell people all that,” Earnest said. “When I do, they usually act like I’m being too foolish or pretentious or something.”

“We need the dreamers,” Star replied. If no one ever dreamed humans could live among the stars, where would they be now?
Somewhere along the way in their chat, they both relaxed flat on their backs, diagonally across the mattress, staring at the ceiling rather than each other. Maybe it was that little bit of separation, but still the same thing that made Star bold enough for the next part. 

“Sage.”

“What’s that?”

“Something I don’t usually tell people. My real name. Sage.” They weren’t all really called all these wonderfully matchy-matchy names like Star, and Nova, and Celestial at a Galaxy House; that was all part of the performance art of it. “Star is just… someone I pretend to be.”

“Is it hard?” he asked. “This? Pretending?”

“I’ve had worse jobs. I’ve had jobs where I’ve lost a leg.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Sage.”

“Thanks. It’s been nice to meet you as well, Earnest.” 

The moment inspired a few specks of laughter, and then a lapse into silence that wasn’t uncomfortable, as it was loaded. 
Earnest checked the time. “It’s later than I thought. I talked for a long time.”

“Turns out you are a good conversationalist after all.”

“I don’t know if my one-sided yapping counts.” A sigh. “I should get going.” 

“...You’re still lying down.”

“I’ll get up in a minute.”

And that’s how they fell asleep. 

#

Sage preferred lazy mornings. Alarms you shut off five times in a row. No rushing to get ready when you finally did make it out of bed. Just shuffling around, yawning with a cup of strong tea, and not pulling yourself together for at least an hour of muddling about first. 

Needless to say, he did not appreciate the panicked energy Earnest woke him up in the morning. 

He felt the slumping shift in the mattress as someone climbed off fast. “Oh gods, what time is it?”

Sage squinted his eyes open and lifted his bracelet into view. Still green. No blinking. No problem. Why weren’t they still sleeping? “We’ve got plenty of time,” he slurred, and dropped the arm over his eyes. 

“I didn’t come home last night.”

Sage lifted the arm. “I thought you said you didn’t have anyone at home?”

“Except for a roommate and a niece… who likes bedtime stories!”

The energy was really getting too much. Sage pushed up to a seated position, but no less groggy for it. “You told them you were going out, right?”

“I messaged I was staying late for work, but…” Earnest was scrolling and typing and backspacing on his phone, hands too fidgety to get whatever message he needed to send off, off. 

“Late at work,” Sage repeated. If he hadn’t been too sleepy, he would’ve rolled his eyes. “Oldest excuse in the book.”

“It’s true. I was only here to fix the oxygen ISRU.”

Like a star collapsing on itself, everything came to Sage like a revelation. The coveralls and the fix-it knowledge and his hesitancies and…

“Dammit,” Earnest swore at his phone. “Battery died.”

Sage was still stuck a few seconds ago. “Can you repeat yourself? You were here, like at Galaxy House, here, to fix the --”

“ISRU? That was the grunt work I was complaining about last night. Do you have a charger I could borrow? I just need them to know I’m alive.”

“That’s why you were talking to Madam Celestial.” All contractors went through the active floor manager, and it happened to be here during their most important shift -- the evenings. 

“She’s a bit intimidating, isn’t she?” 

“A bit,” Sage repeated hollowly. “But, wait, what about our normal tech, Le -- something.”

“Lenient?” 

“Yes!”

Earnest cringed. “They were in a transport accident. I’m taking over the contact while he’s in medical.”

“But -- the logo.” He pointed to the company patch on Earnest’s chest. “It’s different.”

“Lenient was a stickler about textile waste and wouldn’t change out to the new uniform.” He held up his phone. “A charger? Please?” Earnest requested again. Sage waved vaguely at a wireless port on the end table. 

Earnest set it up and hovered over it, waiting for the percentage of charge to eke up enough for him to turn it back on and get out one desperate message. 

Sage raked his fingers through his hair. “I can’t believe I grabbed the air guy by the lapels.”

“You didn’t grab me by the lapels,” Earnest said. “And I’m sorry to disappoint.”    

Sage sprang up from the bed. “No, I feel guilty.” He started to pace. “You were a contractor here doing your job, and I made you spend a bunch of money on me.” It was Sage’s job to get people to spend a lot of money on him and in Galaxy House in general, but it was different when the person came through the doors of an entertainment house to be entertained. 

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Well, I am worried about it. Maybe if we talked to Madam Celestial, we could get you a re--”

Earnest grabbed him, softly, by the upper arms, stopping his frantic energy. “Really. Don’t worry about it… I knew what I was doing.”

“And what were you doing?”

“Helping someone.” 

Sage could’ve sworn he felt the air shift, as if the percentage of oxygen in the room had gone up. 

“It was clear that guy was bothering you,” Earnest continued. “What kind of person would I be if I just walked away from that?” 

A normal person, Sage wanted to say, but rather just held his breath. 

“And then he followed us. And then there was your leg. And then…”

Sage had been watching Earnest all night, trying to understand and unravel him. So of course he was watching him now, up close, as his cheeks went red and his words stumbled. Shy, again, after all this? He so adorably went easily shy. 

“Then what?” Sage asked in a whisper that was so careful. 

“I -- I just really liked talking to you, I guess.”

It was with a magnetic force beyond his own capabilities that had him leaning in with no motive beyond his own human
nature. Just in time for Earnest to turn to check his phone. 

Sage took the moment of reprieve while Earnest sent his message to realign himself. To tug his thin robe a little tighter across his chest. 

There was a thin line of difference between the two scenarios: the one Sage had believed before this morning and the one he knew now to be true. Because it was all the same, in either scenario, this man had helped him avoid Genteel, fixed his leg, hadn’t touched him, and was soft-spoken and endearing. But in the former, if he had been a man who had come to Galaxy House with intent -- perhaps new, perhaps shy, and perhaps needing the push, the excuses, the plausible deniability of being a nice guy -- but still ultimately paying for “Star” it was one thing. 

But that he did it just because, just to be kind, and at personal cost and inconvenience… it became something other. 
It made Sage something other as well. For the former, he was the master of his craft, the seducer and manipulator who was able to draw in the most nervous of newbies and make a night’s profit off of him. But in truth, he had spent the whole night rescued over and over again.

Which was not only not who he was or how he had ever been treated, but it was against his rules. Rely on no one else. But he had relied on Earnest all night. His bracelet began to blink.

“Sent,” Earnest muttered, tucked the phone away in his pocket, and raised his attention again to Sage. He had all rights to flee. Leave now to deal with his problems back at home. Rinse away the trials of his good deed that went on too long and get back to his hardworking life. Except… he didn’t treat Sage like something easy to dismiss. 

“I guess we’ll see each other around sometime. Hopefully my repair holds up, but there’s always the quarterly service checks and -- oh, you’re blinking.” 

Sage looked at his wrist. Blink, blink, blink. “It’s almost over,” he said. “I’ll be able to stop pretending. And you’ll have to leave, or security will drag you out.”

Earnest’s eyes went a little wide, and he turned to the door. “I’ll go now if it’s a problem --”
Sage grabbed him by the lapel. Really did this time. “Wait. Please.”    

Earnest froze. Not from the force of it, but the surprise.    

Blink. Blink. Blink. Green.

“Time’s up,” Sage said. “I’m not pretending anymore.” He stepped in close; Ernest didn’t retreat. Sage leaned in and pressed a simple kiss, short and tender, to the corner of his mouth. “Thank you. For everything.”  

They linger in the moment, warm and fuzzy but fleeting. Once he got tipsy enough on it, Sage rocked back on his heels. “But you really better get going. I wasn’t joking about security.”

Earnest scrambled to get himself together and out the door. Sage leaned against the doorway to watch him go. Endearing as he yawned away the heavy morning, double-tapped the elevator button unnecessarily, fiddling with the flickering wall lamp as he waited, and left it in a few moments shining steadily. 

Sage was left with disguising a dangerous grin, eye-wrinkling and unposed, as the other hosts peeked out of hallway doors to usher their clients along or to snoop on what -- and who -- their neighbors had been doing. 

“Don’t,” Star said to himself as Earnest raised a hand in a little wave before the elevator doors closed. “Don’t do it.” Don’t break your rules.

But he would. 

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