Reprogrammed (Hunter Angst)

A Broken Frame, The Blood on My Hands

The glass still sat innocently on the bathroom floor as the morning sun rose. Dust particles wafted through the air, riding on sunbeams. Hunter paced around outside the door to the bathroom, willing himself to go in. Downstairs, Darius was approaching wakefulness, if only just.

Hunter had not slept all night. Instead, he'd spent much of it spaced out, dissociated after his second panic attack of the week. One couldn't exactly call that 'rest'.

"Hunter?" The young boy heard a groggy voice call from downstairs. He tensed a little bit more, and started picking at the skin around his fingers to try to vent his anxiety. He kept fucking up, all the time . Darius was probably pissed that he had to stay awake to pull Hunter out of his dumb panic attack. Slowly, and without a verbal answer, the sixteen year old forced his legs to walk down the stairs. Internally, he ran over his apology speech.

I'm sorry for breaking your picture frame, and for waking you up, and causing you stress. I'll start moving my things out after I clean up the broken glass. Thank you for allowing me to stay with you for these past few nights. I promise I'll pay you back for the scroll and anything else you've bought for me. Sorry again .

He reached the bottom of the stairs. Magenta eyes met emerald green ones, and Hunter prepared himself to speak.

"Hey, want breakfast? I was thinking we could see if that little place in Bonesborough is still open, the one that sells those delicious griffin egg sandwiches?"

Hunter sucked in a breath. Was this some kind of trick? Wasn't Darius supposed to be like... seething with anger? Hunter had made a mess of his bathroom and scared the living daylights out of the older man in his little fit.

"Um... Y-you're not... mad? At me?" Hunter carefully asked. Darius huffed, and smiled a little.

"I kinda knew you'd say that. No, kiddo. I'm not mad at you. And I'm not gonna kick you out either, so if you've been up packing your stuff, you can unpack it when you get home. We need to talk about what happened, but I want us both to worry about it later. For now, breakfast. I'm starving ."

Hunter listened carefully to Darius's words. A tiny bit of tension left his body, and he blushed a little. Ugh, stupid. Why did I think he was going to kick me out... How did he know I was packing my stuff?!

The boy chose not to vocalize these thoughts, and instead started slipping his shoes on. Darius smiled at him, and followed suit.

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As it turned out, the breakfast place in Bonesborough had just reopened. Darius was stoked to read the "grand re-opening" sign on the front. They were swiftly sat at a table outside the restaurant, on the patio.

"I always go for any of the sandwiches that have the pepper scream cheese, you should get one of those if you like spicy stuff." Darius prompted, gesturing to a few of the sandwiches on the menu.

"Y'know, in the human realm they just call it cream cheese."