Lennie is still smiling about the ranch they will be moving into but Curley thinks that he is laughing at him so he attempts to fight Lennie. Lennie is held defenseless for the first couple of hits because he was to frightened to defend himself. In the text it says” Lennie looked helplessly at George, and then he got up and started to retreat. Curley was balanced and poised. He slashed at Lennie with his left fist, and then smashed down his nose with a right”[steinbeck 62-63]. You can infer from this that Curley thought that Lennie wasn't going to fight back because if he did he was going to get fired. After this part Lennie fights back by catching Curley's fist and squeezing it and ending up breaking his hand. Overall, Curley has the most significant source of power on the ranch because he is the boss's son, and if anyone does anything bad to him he can potentially get them