Perfect Harmony

The early morning light filtered in through the lightweight cotton curtains and onto the bed where Trevor Oxlar was sleeping fitfully. As more light cast down across his face, his eyes fluttered, trying to pull him out of his sleep. It took him three tries, but he finally managed to keep his eyes open and look around the bedroom. Seeing the shambles of what he could see brought everything back to him.

Trevor sat up, his head pounding. He had finally kicked out his cheating boyfriend that night, but it hadn't gone well. Paul Grayson had eventually left, but not until he had destroyed most of what was in the apartment. Trevor didn't have the energy in him to fix it right then, knowing it would probably take hours to clean up.

Instead, he got up and packed a bag of just his essentials, like clothes, important papers, and the things that meant something to him that weren't ruined. Then he got the bag and blankets packed into his car before he sent a message to his agent asking if he could get a cleaning crew sent to the apartment. Anything inside could be thrown out if it was broken.

Naomi Oxlar was waiting outside by the time Trevor showed up, looking at her adopted son with such a concerned expression. She took in the bruises and his long curly blonde hair that had been cut in jagged, uneven lines in the front.

"I'll kill him," she said as Trevor walked up the walkway toward her front door.

"It's not worth a murder charge," Trevor told her. He put his bag down and then threw his arms around her. He towered over his aunt now but it still felt safest here in her arms.

When they broke apart, she helped him get his stuff inside and to his old room before she called her hair stylist to see if she could come and give him a haircut. Trevor was now on a TV show that was a musical and his face would be recognized if he went out. This wasn't the type of press he wanted. Luckily she was happy to come over after she was done in the salon.

Trevor looked at himself in the mirror after he showered once his haircut was done, just taking in his appearance. He had lost weight recently, making it so his muscle tone had gone down. He didn't hate what he saw but he did look too thin for his five foot seven frame. His pale skin showed off the bruises he wore right then well, causing Trevor to frown. A good portion of his back and arms had tattoos on them now, but his eyes were drawn to the purple and blue bruises around them.

His curly blonde hair, which had been down to his shoulders, was now cut into a fade on the sides and back while leaving the top styled into an asymmetrical cut that left it longer and went down to a point toward his right eye. It felt so much lighter, but he knew his director wouldn't be thrilled. Trevor had times in the show when he would play a drag queen character that was secondary to his main one, and this would mean they couldn't use his real hair anymore.

He got into his aunt Naomi's cabinets and found some of her hair dye and got to work. By the time his second shower was done, and the water was running cool, his curls on top were dyed into a natural light red that looked great with his light skin color. It made his warm brown eyes pop and take on a slightly more reddish brown look to them.

Naomi came up behind him and smiled at her son. "That color really suits you. It makes your eyes look cinnamon colored."

"Thanks, mom," Trevor replied with a tired smile in the mirror before he turned to look at his adoptive mom. She had taken him in when he was almost sixteen after things blew up at home and he had spent a year and a half on the streets trying to survive. She was his mom's sister, but had always loved him like he was her own and she fought hard to get him under her care. "As soon as the condo is cleaned and the locks are changed, I'll get out of your hair. I just can't be there right now."

Naomi waved her hand at that. "You aren't in my hair. In fact, if you'd rather sell that condo because of the bad memories, you can bring the rest of your stuff and stay until you find a new place. I love having you home, baby."

That actually didn't sound like a horrible idea. He still had to work with Paul because he was one of his co-stars, but getting a new start in a new home would probably relieve a lot of his stress about Paul just showing up, as well as remembering things that had happened in that condo. Her logic was on point, as always.

In the end, he took her up on that and had a moving company help him pack everything up and put it in storage, then he brought all of his clothes and such back to his mom's while he put the condo up on the market. He knew living there would put a damper on his dating life, but he honestly wasn't sure he wanted to right then. Paul had done a number on him and he wanted to focus on his career and therapy.

He was right that his director was going to be pissed with him for not warning him, but when he pointed out to him that they could use wigs a lot easier now, that calmed him down. Trevor could feel Paul's eyes on him when he was having that conversation with the director, sure that Trevor would tell him why he had to cut his hair, but he didn't. He just told him he felt like a change and it was good for his mental health, plus he had no more split ends anymore.

Once he walked away from the director, two of his co-stars pulled him aside to one of the makeup rooms and shut the door. Keri Hart looked at Trevor for a moment, her hands on her hips, before she said, "What happened?"

Trevor let out a sigh and sat down on one of the makeup chairs and told her and Neal Yeats about his breakup with Paul.

"He cheated?" Neal asked in shock. "You two get so much press together, especially because your characters are together on the show."

"More than once," Trevor admitted. "I've lost count how many times he's stepped out to be honest. At one point I just didn't want to admit it was as bad as it was. So long as I didn't see the evidence, I was okay ignoring it. But this last time I found him with two men in our bed..."

Neal and Keri were completely speechless as they stared at Trevor in shock. He told them about how he had kicked the two men out, and then he told Paul that he needed to pack his shit and get out because Trevor owned the condo. It was then that everything went to hell. Paul begged and pleaded, promising to change, and when that didn't work it turned to anger. Paul destroyed so many of Trevor's important and nostalgic items before he turned his anger on Trevor and attacked him.

In the end, Trevor had hit his alarm system to call the police, and Paul finally packed a bunch of his clothes and got out. When Trevor went back to direct the movers to pack things up, he had the rest of Paul's things packed up and delivered to his mom's house.

"What does that mean for the show?" Neal asked.

Trevor shrugged his shoulders. "I have no idea. Maybe the writers can cause some drama for the characters, but for now, I'll just act my heart out on camera and then ignore him off camera."

"We'll help you!" Keri cried and put her arm around Trevor. He smiled at her thankfully, glad to have some people on his side here. Neal came up and turned it into a group hug and Trevor laughed before he hugged them back.

Once the bruising had mostly gone away, Trevor came onto the set wearing black skinny jeans, black Chuck Taylors, and a pink crop top with a cat on it, back to his normal look that he had been hiding under hoodies and long sleeved t-shirts lately. They were just getting into recording their songs for the next season after rehearsing them and their lines for a few weeks, so Trevor had his signature black eyeliner and some natural light brown eyeshadow.

They were just getting into rehearsals and recordings now, so the set crew was trying to get everything set up. They had to learn their choreography, stage movements, and dances and then get them down to practice on the set. Once they got into set practicing, everything in the set and with props needed to go smoothly.

Apparently, Trevor was the only person on set who seemed to think so, however, as he looked around and the usual swarm of stage hands were nowhere to be seen. Even at this stage of the production, the prop masters and stage designers should have been hard at work prepping for the first day of shooting. Trevor shot Keri a questioning glance but she gave him a shrug, so he turned to try and figure out if everything was okay by heading to where the prop and set department was.

When they found the Prop Master's office, they also found all the hands. They were milling around outside the office, watching through the window as three people argued loudly inside. One of them was Paul. The sight set Trevor's jaw clenching, as Paul was in peak Angry Paul in there as he yelled at their lead set designer.

Keri scrunched up her nose like she had smelled a rotting turd on the floor. "Oh look at that, Paul is like a giant, angry baby."

"Nah, babies are cute," Trevor replied with a grimace. "Paul is...scary."

Just then, Paul said something and accentuated it by sweeping a medium sized glass trophy off the desk. It shattered on the floor and all of the conversation both inside and the buzz of low murmurs outside of the office stopped. Paul at least had the good sense to realize he had fucked up, but it didn't change much once their head set designer told the director that she quit just before she stormed out of the office and off the set. She didn't even bother to take anything with her.

Some of the low buzz started back up when she disappeared through the large overhead door into the bright light of the lot. From what Trevor could make out, the glass trophy had been her lifetime achievement award from a long and illustrious career. Their director looked at Paul like he was planning all the different ways he could murder him nice and slow.

"You would do well to get out of my sight, Grayson, or you may very well find yourself out of a job," the director growled. "And don't think I won't tell every other director how difficult you are to work with."

Paul left the office but stopped in front of Trevor and Keri, giving him one of his customary "I'm not worried" looks that Trevor didn't buy this time. "Women. They're just so emotional about silly things like that."

"You want to try that again?" Keri cried and started to move toward Paul before Trevor stopped her. "Oh don't protect him now, Lars!"

"I'm not," Trevor replied. "He's trying to get a rise out of you and it's not worth it."

Keri grunted in response and moved behind Trevor. Paul gave Trevor a pleading look, as if begging for him to see his side in this, but Trevor just shook his head and motioned towards the hallway as a way to tell him to get lost.

"You're angry now, but you always get over it eventually," Paul told him before he walked past Trevor, bumping his shoulder on his way. Keri went to lunge for him again but Trevor was faster, grabbing her around the waist and pulling her back before she could get her nails into his arm.

"Hakim!" their director, Rodney, called out, catching everyone's attention again.

The crowd of hands parted in a circle around a deeply tanned, tall and thin man with dark curly hair and a well manicured beard. He had the same look of being perpetually harangued as the rest of the hands as he made reluctant eye contact with Rodney. "Here," he responded.

Rodney gave a nod to acknowledge him and then gruffly said, "Congratulations, you've been promoted. Someone get staff in here to clean this and then get back to rehearsals. I expect everything to run smoothly."

With that, Rodney strode off, considering the matter settled for now. There were murmured congratulations through the tech crew. Keri stepped up to congratulate him and said, "Trev, Neal, and I will try to offset the bullshit Paul tries to pull, I promise. Well, Neal and I mostly."

Hakim thanked them absent-mindedly but sincerely, clearly fixated on rounding everyone up while regretting all the life choices that led him to this place. Three people were already in the office, tripping over each other to get it cleaned up. Keri and Trevor left them to their work, wanting to go back over their side of things before they practiced.

Trevor had been staring at Hakim while Keri pulled him away, memories playing through his mind as they walked away. The man didn't seem to notice Trevor doing so, and eventually he had to turn away to not fall over his own feet while Keri led him away. Later, he went to look at their crew list and found the name Aleksander Hakim, which made him positive this was who he thought it was.

Their rehearsal day went well with some small hiccups while they figured everything out. Trevor had to step in a few times to stop Paul from getting angry about a wrongly placed prop or tripping over a chair, but other than that they did well.

Trevor almost always wore compression shorts with loose shorts over those for rehearsals, whether they were in the dance room or on the set before dress rehearsal. It made it easier to put on his compression braces for his knee and ankle. He had been attacked in college for a gay bashing towards one of his best friends, and a baseball bat had been taken to his knee and ankle. He'd had replacements done on both of them so he could dance again, but he almost always used the braces for extra stability.

The crew knew what the braces were for, as he had been asked time and again why he wore them only on one leg, and many had seen the scars when he took them off. Trevor sat down after rehearsal to pull them off and put some ice patches on them before he drove home. Neal and Keri gave him high fives as they left for the day.

Once he got back home, he went into his aunt's spare room where she kept all of what she had always called her mementos. It meant any awards they had gotten, photos, scrap books, and more. He pulled out one of the lower drawers and sat down to look through them. She always kept the older ones down there, because those were harder to look through since they had sadder memories for Trevor. He normally didn't go through them, but he wanted to check something.

It took about two hours of digging, but he finally found what he had been looking for. It was a package of photos he had taken in middle school. It was before his father had put him in the hospital for the final time when Trevor ran away and disappeared on the streets for a year and a half, thinking the police wouldn't help him once again.

In the photos was a twelve year old of obvious middle eastern descent. Him and Trevor were sitting with each other and posing for the photo that another friend had taken. He was a lot younger, but it was definitely their new lead set designer. Trevor didn't know how he didn't realize it before, but he knew he had been busy with rehearsals, filming, and his now ex.

He sat back and looked through the rest of the photos, smiling faintly at some of the memories. It made him wonder if Alex had recognized Trevor, though he had a different last name now, and his stage name was different from both. Alex had been his first kiss and first love, among other things, and despite his dad freaking out on him for being gay, Trevor wouldn't let his parents spoil that memory.

He chewed on his lips as he took the photos of them together and put them in an envelope that he then slipped into his work bag. He wasn't sure what he was going to do with this, but wanted them nearby for now.

Trevor left it alone for the first week, as Alex seemed a little frazzled as he settled into his new job. Alex was tasked with boxing up the old designer's things, and he was surprised to walk in at the end of week two to see a new Lifetime Achievement Award for the old designer on the desk with a note.

"Turns out, being famous helps you get things you ask for. Paul will never apologize, but the rest of the cast adored Tia, so I'm glad I could get another one engraved," the note said, with Trevor Lars written at the bottom.

Alex wrapped it carefully, including the note with the award in the felt-lined wooden box the original award had been delivered in. One of the bonuses to working daily with propmakers was the custom gear that just sort of... showed up. He screwed the lid back on the box and put it in the pile of boxes being hand-delivered to Tia later that day. Alex sat down and penned a succinct but heartfelt note to Trevor Lars, thanking him for the replacement award while very politically avoiding saying anything at all about how it had gotten broken.

After sending the note off to Trevor's trailer, Alex promptly forgot all about the matter as he focused his attention on the latest complaint among his employees - the schedule. Managing the availability of a crew of propmakers and stage crew of various disciplines while also ensuring that enough of the skilled staffers were on set to make it possible to accomplish enough to actually move the production along. By the time he finished ironing out the schedule and publishing it to the app the entire crew used and posted printouts in the appropriate places, it was long past dark. Alex was turning off lights in the prop department when he spotted the thank you note he had written to Lars on the corner of his desk with a small pink post-it telling him that Trevor's trailer had been locked and he had spent the entire day working in a cramped, apologetic script.

Sighing gently to himself, Alex picked up the unsealed envelope and switched off the lights in his office. He carried the note with him toward the area where the actors' trailers were parked. They were supposed to call the trailers "dressing rooms" like this place was an old-timey theater but most of the crew called it the Stables. Alex intended to just tuck the note in the outer door so Trevor would find it in the morning but the lights were still on in his trailer. Alex knocked tentatively, calling out "Mr. Lars? Are you still in there?"

Alex heard a groan from through the door as Trevor pulled himself up off the couch where he had been sitting to look over what they were doing the next day. The inner door opened and Trevor motioned to Alex to come in before he hobbled back over to the couch and sat down again, this time with the script to the side.

Alex held out the note uncomfortably, unsure about being in an actor's trailer so far after hours. Particularly an actor whose latest relationship ended as violently as the rumors said it had and whose very jealous ex was still on set every day.

Trevor took it from Alex and read it with a smile. "Glad to be able to help. You didn't have to hand deliver the note though, even if I appreciate it."

Alex shuffled a little, his cheeks coloring a little. Why did he feel so timid around this actor? "I, uh... didn't intend to. I sent it to you earlier today and forgot about it, but apparently my runner couldn't find you and decided to leave it on my desk. I didn't know you'd still be here, I was going to just leave it in your door," Alex told him, his usual bluntly honest manner of speaking sparking memories in Trevor.

Trevor couldn't help but smile fondly at the memories. Trevor had thought about Alex quite a bit since he disappeared. His aunt hadn't lived in the same neighborhood, having always lived about an hour from where his parents had, so he had never been able to go back and let Alex know what happened to him. He wanted so badly to jump up and tell Alex who he was excitedly, but he could see how uncomfortable Alex seemed to be.

"Yeah, Rodney had me running all over the place today," Trevor finally said as he glanced over at the counter near the fridge where he had put the photos in their little photo sleeve before looking back at Alex. "I think I still have six layers of makeup on me. If you're freaking out because you don't want Paul to find a man in my trailer with me, he went home earlier."