this neutral won't last (Hunter)

"It probably is the bad idea but let's be honest it could be worse, plus are you telling me I rented out the popcorn factory for nothing?" she said as she looked at her hands. "Yeah I guess that is new but it seems to wash off which is good so come on let's go, it is only a few blocks away and no one else is going to be there." He seemed to like his peace and quiet but she was not sure. "You Hunter can not convince me that you'd ever turn down popcorn?"

It had taken her a while but the kid in him, she felt that kid was screaming, not for attention but for understanding. "I got your note," she said. "Well I got a note and I was thinking, choices right? You made a choice with me and not leaving me to die so my choice for the day is just to get and sit in an empty place and eat way too much popcorn. It would be nice if you joined me but you don't have to." She did not want to fuss. "I don't know Hunter your letter leads me to believe that good or bad, somewhere inside of you wants to be different."

She sighed. "It's not an easy road it's not a place where you and I might even get along well but it is a choice Hunter. I don't want to raise Echo by myself but at this point I have to but maybe after this, it won't feel like I have to as much." Her daughter was always going to take priority. "I have been busy trying to wrap my head around family, around our family but the truth is that we are not a family, we don't know each other well enough to be that but I do know you keep talking about popcorn so maybe we start there."

Hunter Quinzell

It seemed she would be going in alone and that was fine but her heart it broke her heart but his magic held it together something that she could feel now. All the time she did not think about the ultimate choice, share. What we choose to share with people when words are not enough is overlooked so much and here in this rain they stood and she felt the paint on her hands burning as she carefully looked at him. The "H's" on her hands had a small burning sensation to them like too much contact of something similar but she still kept her hands there because he seemed to need it. "Hunter you are in so much pain," she said. "You have so much anger and you have no idea how to work through it but that is not your fault. All your childhood memories the bad ones, you don't have to live in those and you do not have to let them define you, you can be better."

Barely seeing him cry broke her spirit because s he was used to seeing him be so strong and so dominant that to see him like this was new so she pulled him. "We're going and we're just going to sit there because sometimes you need that, sometimes I need that and if we stand out in this rain any longer we will get sick." She laughed about that as she carefully pulled him around two and a half blocks and through the door, making sure to lock it behind her but damn it how did popcorn smell so good. "Okay," she said as she grabbed a few napkins to finish cleaning her hands. "Hunter the truth is your tears, secret between me and you, this emotonal journey that you are on, you don't have to do it alone because I figure it out."

He had so much hidden about him but this piece she knew within her heart that she had it right as she leaned over the counter and pulled out the jump rope. "I have been researching Hunter," she said. "Even with your son with Sadie which is a whole different issue, I figured it out." She put it over her shoulder. "Did you know that Dutch Settlers brought trading goods to New Amsterdam or as we call it now New York City?" She had been to New York without knowing and if that did not prove that they belonged together then what else proof was there. "Kids there when they arrived where doing this and Hunter if a settler can see it and it be fine, then you can settle on Ashford, raise your kids, and be fine."

That was not all however. "However it is also a mental game because you have to learn to coordinate with someone and you have to be in sync and we have not been but Hunter, we can be. We can be in such a motion that what we do and how we raise our daughter echoes generations but you have to work with me. I don't want to change you much, I just want to unconfuse you and show you how to do this, like the song. You said it yourself Hunter, you wanted to paint but without a brush you turned to music and now I can stand here and tell you that you can have both, you just have to trust in what we made." Let their daughter be enough to bridge this gap.

Hunter Quinzell

She did not expect that type of reaction at all and to watch him destroy the popcorn machines? What in the hell did they ever do and more than that she got scared, more scared than she had ever been with him. "It is not stupid Hunter, someone trying their best to get to know you is not stupid. It is a part of life," she said as she raised her own voice at him because enough was enough. It did not help that she could feel his seal around her heart starting to unwrap because she was that angry.

She screamed when he put his hands on her and threw her into the popcorn machine as her arm landed against the glass and she felt the bone shatter but her anger at the moment was too much as she looked at him. "That the best you got Hunter," she said as she reached back and looked at him. "Surely you can do better than that," she said as she ran at him and tackled him and then hit him right across his face. "You are going to stop hitting me," she said as she punched him across the face again and paint began to go everywhere. "You are a bitch and it is time that you got your ass beat like one," she said as she stood up. She threw paint everywhere against the windows but it was not going to matter as she grabbed him and threw him through the door. "You wanted out, get the fuck out then." Painted glass splattered everywhere and popcorn flew as she felt her hands burning but she was done being nice to him and getting shit in return. "Get out of my face and take your stupid jump rope with you," she said as she threw it in his face. "Grow the fuck up already," she screamed.

Hunter Quinzell

Violent was the only language that they knew as she got a cold chill down her spine as he stood up. She was frozen in a few minutes of how nice it had been just not that long ago and now it was a mess but she had seen him hesitate for a second which gave her hope as she did not move from being surprised about the glitch and then she watched the butterfly formation and then felt it in her mouth. It was choking her as she felt it crawl down her throat and she stared at him as she threw up, wing pieces and dark black liquid going everywhere.

Her heart shattered as she felt the magic unwrap from around it and her tears flowed again as the tears went around her hands and she still cried. "Just leave me alone," she said as she crawled back inside the broken factory. "Just leave me alone Hunter, it's very obvious you hate me." Realization sucked but nothing was going to always be pretty as she turned and crawled through another door. She wanted nothing to do with him as she heard the door close and she crawled up into a seat and leaned her head back.

Performance art though. She closed her eyes and the room around her began to change, an empty stage and just a light and delicate sound that comforted her as she opened her eyes and carefully made her way down to the stage and sat there once she had tucked her legs under herself. "So tired of performing for a love that does not exist." The sounds got a little louder but still comforting. "I wish he loved me," she said as the stage dimmed all except for in the center.

Hunter Quinzell

She felt the rope go around her and she felt the ground even harder as she was pulled towards him. "You threw me," she said. "You are abusive Hunter," she said as her voice shook and this by no means was good for her at all. She shook when he licked her face and even more so when his voice went through her ears but she could not move because he had her tied with his stupid rope and so close. Her breathing was going erratic as she was trying to focus in order to keep it together before she lost it on him again because unlike him she did not want to be that person.

The rocking was nauseating her as she turned her head towards him and she closed her eyes still trying to think. "No you don't Hunter, you love a version of what you think I am and that is not enough," she said as she grabbed his mouth with her teeth and bit down hard. She wanted to let go but she knew that she had to draw blood in order to even phase him as she clinched down against his lip with her teeth and pulled hard. "Just let me go," she said between her clinched teeth still on his mouth, but this was not a kiss of love, no this was pain coming to the surface.

Hunter Quinzell

A choice. It was not necessarily a good choice but a choice as the last bits of the butterfly, she chose to throw back into his mouth with her blood. Exhausted as she felt him stop fighting her so she stopped and looked at him. They were both very fucked individuals this much true as she moved away from him. This was the stillest that she had seen Hunter ever as she tried to stand but failed but still remained to stay away from him in silence.

This was nothing that no one could know about as she turned away from him now. All she wanted was popcorn and this was what she got for her efforts, how did that work. She carefully got up and slowly, very slowly made her way past him and seen younger him passed out. That could not be good but she ignored it for now as she went and found herself some white cheddar popcorn and fixed her some in a bag and then made her way back in and slowly began to eat it. The salt burned slowly but she was not saying anything to him at all, for she had felt it too, she had lost a part of herself to him again.

Hunter Quinzell