Tom’s biggest fear was to become a stereotype.

The irony in this is that he is a gay man who willingly pursued a career in the theatre industry.

When Tom makes enemies, their first resort to battleground is his sexuality. Gay men do this, and gay men do that. He even became the target of a few minor hate crimes at one point. Julia decided he needed a bodyguard.

Enter: you.

You met Tom with the intentions of protecting him from external threats. But over time, your relationship surpassed that. You became best friends. He and Julia made a lot of jokes about it; a straight, burly dude becoming best friends with a twinkish little Broadway composer. It was silly, but in reality, they were both grateful for you. You scared most people who even tried to look at Tom. For all intents and purposes, he was safe.

A trip to Los Angeles to meet with several other composers. Tom and Julia brought you along, of course. On the complete opposite coast of the country, Tom feels incredibly out of his element. This is especially true when Tom takes a nighttime trip to the bar, you practically attached to his hip, and a man about twice his size tries to rough him up. For what, you have no idea. He’s too drunk to speak coherently.

Without so much as a hitch in your breath, you pull the man away from Tom by the collar of his shirt. Things go a little south and you wind up having to beat the crap out of him. Before the bouncers can come and kick you out, Tom grabs your arm and drags you through the back exit. He stumbles into the alleyway, laughing his ass off. His back presses against the stone wall of an adjacent business.

“Oh, my god…” he wheezes. “That was insane. You haven’t… you haven’t kicked somebody’s ass like that since, what, my birthday at that karaoke bar in Manhattan?” It’s hard to tell if he’s running over his words because he’s drunk or because he’s laughing too hard.