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Reed wafted it away, taking all the pins and needles shot at him like Jon's private voodoo doll. He wasn't that kind of whipping boy, but Jon's point of view was intriguing regardless of the fact that Jon needed to seriously cut loose.

"What dignity could I possibly have, Jon? I don't have anything to prove to anyone," he shrugged, adjusting the bowtie that made him look more and more like a ring master than a bartender as he inspected it on a reflective surface coming off a patio table. "What makes you assume a lover or two would be a disease? Did someone burn you bad and you want to forget? Hell, Jon, I got plenty of liquid prescriptions for things like that. It's what I do! I make people forget for a little while. What kind of job do you have that twists your vision that way?"

Reed watched the flood try to drown him, but he at least knew how to swim. Coming from a family of three mismatched half-brothers, he rolled with it. He kept wondering what kind of life Jon must've had to make him act the way he did. Was he abused on a daily basis? His ears were perked and interested, he folded his arms over his broad chest as he listened.

"You're some kind of artist, then?" Reed wasn't well-versed in the ways of advertising and promotional assistants. "A make-up arist? What? Dealing with an actor that's a primadonna? It's a job, sir. It's just something you do to squirrel away your funds on your way to something else. There must be something you're working for."

Reed felt sympathy more than intimidation. If Jon punched him in the face, Reed would simply place an ice pack on his face and probably say something like "I can see you have a problem." Perhaps it was from enduring so many fights with his half-brothers. Something in hiim never let things like that get in the way from what he wanted. It was probably horrendously foolish, but what else was there to do than to aim for the stars when you came from the bottom of the barrel.

Reed was common, he wasn't born into money or the imagined burdens the wealthy placed on themselves on top of real life's standard set of burdens. Reed could see that getting under Jon's skin (or his sheets) would be a fantastic challenge.

And Jon hadn't exactly been screaming "Get out of my face!" or anything. That was almost like a "yes", wasn't it?

"Sorry," Reed replied. "Why don't you just quit and do something else, then? I mean, you're not getting any kind of kicks doing it. Is the pay so good you're willing (if you'll excuse the phrase, sir) to bend over and grab your ankles for it?"

Reed did his best not to laugh back at him, but the smile was pushing and shoving across his face by hook or by crook. His chest started shaking as a laugh decide it'd be a real lark to crawl up his throat and out his mouth. In moments, he was laughing so hard he gave a bow.

Reed pulled out a vest pocket watch and looked the time over. He had about three more minutes of sweet freedom until his chains were tugged back behind the bar downstairs.

"In about three minutes, I'm going to have to sir you again, anyway," Reed laughed. "In your condition, Jon, if you took a swing you might go sailing over the side. Will you be staying up here or going back downstairs? I could get Fletch to serve you some more Paint Remover, if you'd care."

Reed rolled his shoulders back and stretched his arms up high, staring at the sky momentarily. How he craved the lazy life of a man whose only concern was only making some daisy look like a bouquet of roses for money. That seemed like a little fun and he supposed the sex from rubbing elbows with the social elite would only be the icing on the decadent cake. But he neither possessed the skilled needed to do or the means to get started in that line of business to begin with. Reed reckoned there were probably strange and obscure college courses taken for things like marketing and public... public... what the hell did Jon call it again? Spokesperson?

"So you're someone else's poster child?" Reed looked confused for a moment. "Why isn't this Blaine guy doing all his own whoring? If he can't whore the thing himself then something just doesn't seem right with that picture."

He wanted to ask if "living with him" implied a relationship. Because there were relationships where you wanted to strangle the life out of your partner but the tender moments were so good you forgave them over and over in a strange little daily circle.

Reed listened, adjusting his bowtie and giving himself another once over before he readied himself to head back into the downstairs room and back behind the counter. He would be stuck for another two or three hours.

"You're not hiding very well," he noted. "If you wanted to be somewhere where no one cared who you were, you should not have picked Augustine. It's slow, but it's not going to stay that way. The people who own a majority of these buildings and property keep inviting and promoting it like mad to the wealthiest tourists and businessmen as much as humanly possible. It's not going to remain podunk for long. In fact, I may be out of a job soon at this rate. The pay's good, but not so good that they'll allow a guy like me to stick around, if you catch my drift."

It was for the most part true. They would not stand for hiring worthless gutter trash off the street and coating them in gold dust to please the wealthy eye for long. Sooner or later, the pauper would have to pay for his own gold dust to apply onto himself. Rent was going up after another year and he still hadn't had enough money to even consider saving it.

"None of this is necessary," Reed leaned into Jon's ear and said softly. "Take it from me, sweet thing, if I had the money I'd take us all away from this glittering slice of hell."

With that, he wandered downstairs back to his place behind the counter. His game face back on, he began slathering new customers with compliments and suggested them drinks for the night. He would be stuck there for another three or four hours, he did his best not to feel the weight of it pressing on him. He'd have to endure night after night if he wanted to get the bill's paid.

"Maybe I should take a day off," he muttered to himself, shoving money into a cash register.

"When, stupid? We've been undermanned for three months," a co-worker muttered back.

Both of them laughed.

Arjun was, of course, on the phone complaining to some friends. All he could do at this point was complain from a distance, though several of his friends gave him promises of visiting and throwing lavish parties. Some suggested the possibility of selling narcotics to the locals with loose morals and a lot of money to burn.

"Don't be an idiot," he hissed back. "They drugs they take are prescribed and if I got THAT on my record so soon, the old man would cut off funds, for sure. No... we can't get that ambitious without a nest egg first. I think gambling is the way to go."

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Reed was bored again, despite more people popping in and out of the place for dancing and, of course, more booze. He wondered after Jon and if he'd made any kind of impression. Reed found his own escape in visions of an island getaway and raising baby parrots on the side. Little spawns of Wally didn't sound like such a bad thing. At least then one of them would have a fulfilling sex life.

The DJ Kent came around on his break, treating his current girlfriend to something non-alcoholic, on account of her being only nineteen. He ordered something with more of a tooth on it for himself. Reed served them as he did nearly every night when this time Kent noticed Reed a little more thoughtfully.

"How come you never change?" he said philosophically over his Screwdriver.

"This uniform is washed," Reed teased. Kent's girlfriend gave a little giggle from over her Shirley Temple.

"Seriously," Kent waved it off. "You never change, and you've only been around a few months. You're too young to be a fixture, I know you. You're out for a good time in those few instances when you ain't workin'. I mean, here you are acting like you're the old man himself when the old man hasn't been working for years now."

"Bills gotta be paid," Reed gave a shrug. "It's not like me or Wade have any hobbies."

Wade, the other bartender, shot him a look.

"Shut up, I'm your pimp," Wade replied.