Fancy Meeting You Here! {Hunter/Hookie & Macy}

People generally knew better than to chase after him. There was somethiing about a certain brand of imposing personality that gave most people the clue that he was no good. It was like a human instinct or something to stay away from the drug dealers that screwed you over, unless you wanted to be found as a bloated, disfigured body floating in the bay. This little blonde idiot seemed to be utterly lacking those instincts, as she ran back to him, growling like an angry bear. He was not in the mood to deal with this bullshit, and whether or not it was on a busy side street, he was not willing to continue with the charade much longer. As she pulled his sleeve, it was the last straw. He whipped around, prepared to smack her to the ground and continue walking when he saw that face. . . Those eyes. . . That perfectly familiar face that haunted his dreams so often.

Hunter generally made it a rule that once he had had his way with a certain girl, he was done with her. There were no take-backsies, so breaking those rules. He moved on and made sure to cut off all contact with that stupid whore(well, generally whore was the PERFECT word to describe them. It was, after all, the job description of about half his conquests) and if he felt generous enough to refrain from killing them altogether, it was only because he was almost positive that they would have no way of finding him. he wasn't exactly a publicly listed figure. There were no social networking sites for him, no phone book listings, no home address or cell phone number someone could hypothetically stalk. He was for the most part utterly off the map, and he was usually rather good at disappearing into the shadows. It made for a perfectly symbiotic relationship between Hunter and the Captain within him. The Captain was all for living life to the fullest and taking advantage of every saucy wench he could get his hands on, while Hunter for the most part wanted to make sure the name of the little boy from Cape Cod was never found and held responsible for the things that he did.

With this is mind, he had no intention of ever seeing that blonde girl he had grown up with again. Familiar faces were never a good sign, unless they were there to buy some of his product. It was like seeing a ghost, someone from another life suddenly dropping back in on him. Macy. The first and only girl that he had ever felt something a bit more for. The first one that he had been with. The one who had always been there for him, always just a few steps behind him, always trying to make sure that he was alright when he was just another troubled youth in a town full of preppy, perfect teenagers.

His mouth wide open, he continued to stare at her, trying to fathom just how this could have happened. It was crazy. He should never have met her again. She should have stayed back in perfect Cape Cod. She shouldn't have seen him like this, so horrible. So despicable. He wished that she could continue to remember him as that boy that simply dropped off the map after his mom died. That boy that was otherwise fine, a bit dark and brooding, but certainly not up to anything TOO illegal. Instead, she had to see the darker side of him. The murderer and the drug dealer. She had to see who he really was.

"Macy...oh....God, no. I - I've been around! I just.... I didn't think you'd be here. What are you doing here? I thought you were still in Cape Cod! When did you get to New York?" He gaped at her unapologetically, still having trouble taking it in. What did this mean? What did this mean for HIM? Could he still be the vile monster of the night when the girl he had spent his childhood with was in the city, watching out for him again?

For perhaps the first time in what felt like ages, it wasn't Hook in total control. The shock of seeing his childhood friend was enough to make Hunter, the REAL Hunter, choose to do something other than just passively co-exist inside his own mind. He was the one at the reigns, at least for a moment, while all the memories of life in Cape Cod, life before his mother had died came flooding back to him.

This really was Macy. HIS Macy. The one that he had always taken for granted. The one that he had always just assumed would be there, right beside him forever and ever. The last person he had seen before leaving Cape Cod forever. The girl that he was with the night his mom died.

God, he hadn't thought about her in ages, which was really something that was gnawing at him right now. How had he allowed himself to forget about her? How could he have let the Captain push the memories of her out of his head and just carry on wheeling and dealing like nothing had ever happened? It was like for the past few years he had been living with all his memories suppressed, not worrying about how pathetic he must have been as a creepy little emo kid living in a rich and glamorous neighborhood. Sure, the Captain had brought a sense of confidence that Hunter had never been able to experience before, but now Hunter wasn't too sure if it was a fair trade-off to lose his sense of self just in order to feel more empowered.

Of course, he couldn't waste time worrying about feeling sorry for himself just yet. Here she was, the girl that he had spent his entire childhood with. He couldn't exactly break down into a blubbering mess of tears over how much he had missed her. She would wonder what the fuck exactly was going on, and he would CERTAINLY ruin any shred of a reputation he had earned for himself here in the city. Things like that had a way of making themselves known to the underground community. Good gossip spread like cancer among criminals.

The need for Hunter to retain his cool was enough of a leeway for The Captain to step back into control, all business and suave natured. "Oh God, babe, no. The day you settle down and start whipping out babies will be the day I keel over and die." His laughing along with her immediately stopped when she grabbed his hands. He didn't particularly know what to do in such a situation. it wasn't often that he had women grabbing for ust his hands. Normally they were headed for - well, other parts of his body. The hands seemed like a bad sign. It was like they were part of some teary-eyed scene from a Jane Austen novel.

"Well, doll, you know it was the bitchiness that always did it for me," he said, returning the eyebrow raise. "Those little barbie look-a-likes were never exactly my style."

As his hands were shook like he was being greeted by an overly strung out Walmart employee, Hunter licked his lips, trying to think of a suitable answer. "What, you can't figure out why i'm here? Me? In the city of possibilities and opportunity? This was one of my first stops since leaving Cape Cod, and even though I've been doing a bit of traveling around and such, I guess I just had to come back. How could I resist the call of the Greatest City on Earth?" He laughed, knowing that it was far from a suitable answer. "How about you? Any particular reason for coming to NYC while on the run from your family?"

Right, well. The Captain couldn't afford to let everything get away from him again. he couldn't afford to let the past come bubbling up like a tidal wave of emotion. He couldn't afford to worry about how the last time the two of them had stood so close, the last time they had touched, the last time they had gazed into each other's eyes was the last night that he spent happy in Cape Cod. No. The Captain had to retain a strict regimen inside the mind that he had commandeered. It was for the best for both of them, really. The Captain couldn't afford to lose any customers because of some little wench that had miraculously managed to stumble into his path again, and Hunter... well, The Captain was sure that poor little boy wouldn't want the beautiful young lass he had worked himself all up in a tizzy over to see him acting, well, less than masculine.

He bit his lip, nodding slightly as she teased him about his transformation. Well, she was right, of course. There was no denying that he was utterly different than that small time, over all pretty worthless high school student. Now he was a man. A RESPECTED man. A man who had taken more lives than he bothered to remember, and a man who could supply just about anything anyone wanted in order to add a little more excitement to their overall mundane and boring lives. In The Captain's esteemed opinion, that little grunt of a boy was changed for the better thanks to his kind intervention. Before The captain had stepped in, that little brute would never have dreamt of getting out of that blasted prison, and now here he was, out and about, meeting all SORTS of new people and catching quite a bit of tail for himself. Without The Captain at his side, giving him the strength to deal with people without a thought about consequences or morality, that little runt would have been caught in a spiral of jail time and release, only to be jailed again for reverting to drug abusing habits. Without The Captain at the helm, he would be a spineless little addict, just like the rest.

"I guess you could say that I've changed, well, more than a bit." He ran a hand through his hair, always fastidiously keeping himself looking presentable. "You do like it though, don't you? Scrawny has never been a particularly attractive word used to describe someone."

He raised his eyebrows at her at the suggestion that they go somewhere a little quieter. Sure, she was just asking that he follow her back to her flat, but the sex-crazed teenager that was the true hunter leapt on that suggestion like a rabidly horny hare. The memories of that last night in Cape Cod made it seem like all the more appealing a suggestion.

He bowed slightly and then gestured widely in the direction she had motioned earlier. "It would be my pleasure to hang out somewhere with the great Macy Gentle. Besides, I want to see exactly what kind of a flat you've managed to pick up for yourself." He shot her a grin, a grin that he hadn't had the opportunity to use in years. A grin that in a past life, a life of high school and secret sessions of smoking out behind the gym and just hours of talking and planning. A grin that had always been and always would be reserved for Macy Gentle.

He still couldn't get over the fact that this was the real Macy. His Macy. The Macy that he had grown up with, and laughed with and cried with. This was the Macy that he had gotten caught smoking in the halls after school with, and who for that one glamorous night seemed like she was the only girl in the entire world that Hunter could ever look at.

But then....

Since then, Hunter had been running. He'd been running as fast as he could, in any direction that was open to him. He'd been running from Macy and from his mother's grave, and from the fake pity and sympathy from those plastic upscale socialites back home. He'd been trying desperately to get as far away from it all as possible. He'd run into the back alleys and the dark underground scenes, straight into a prison cell where finally he met the man who would allow him to run from his very memories themselves.

But now... it seemed like all that running was for nothing. Macy was back. She was talking with him, and he was walking with her back to her apartment where they would catch up with a quick smoke and talk and laugh and reminisce. It would be like all those years of him dealing drugs, and killing, and living without a single ounce of moral fiber had never happened. It would be like the two of them had never left Cape Cod, and they had just carried on, acting like they had as those young, immature high schoolers who tried pathetically to rebel against the strict rules of order in the uptight society they lived in.

But.... what would that mean for The Captain? He thrived on the fact that Hunter had been running. He was the vehicle for Hunter's terrified fleeing, and his ability to ignore the entire series of events that had brought The Captain to the forefront of Hunter's brain had been exactly what had made him so appealing. Now though, even just for the few minutes that they had been talking together again, Hunter - the REAL Hunter - could feel The Captain starting to ebb and lose his once complete control. It wasn't a feeling that Hunter liked. He wanted that sense of security, that feeling of total control in any situation. He didn't want to go back to being alone inside his own head.

He supposed that it was a good thing though, at least just for a little bit. He needed to talk to Macy. He needed to, and he supposed that it would be best if his words weren't being filtered by some kind of supernatural spirit from a children's book. It would be best if they came from the heart, no matter how gay that sounded.

"Jeez, Mace, do you really think that I care about how stale it is?" His voice had lost that tinge of cool that always went hand in hand with whatever The Captain was saying. It was back to sounding just like the high schooler had talked. "I still can't believe that we just ran into each other! This is just... this is just so crazy!" He laughed at her, as the conversation started to feel more natural to him. It had been a rough start. Regaining control of a body made for a bit of an awkward conversation. "Now where'd you say this apartment of yours was? I want to know exactly where the infamous Macy Gentle will be staying during her stint in New York, just in case I feel the need to drop by." He winked and nudged her a bit with his arm as they walked. It was an overly childish thing to do, and probably seemed strange in his quite adult body, but to the Hunter who was still stuck in that teenage personality, it seemed like something two best friends ought to do.

A trip down memory lane was where he was headed if he walkd into that apartment with Macy. It would be a trip down memory lane and a conversation where she would ask about where he'd REALLY been that whole time, and she would just keep asking until she got an answer. She would try to sneak about it and bring it up in conversation a million different ways and she would throw a fit when she didn't get the answers she was looking for. She would tell him he wasn't being honest with her, and she would bring up their childhoods together as evidence of his treachery. He knew exactly how this would happen. It all came to him in what was a moment of perfect clarity.

The only way that he could see to get out of this would be to leave. To leave now and pretend like he hadn't ever seen her again. It had been a nice way to see her, just to remember that he hadn't always been this monstrous man that sold drugs to whoever asked for them, but he had already adapted to that lifestyle. He couldn't go back now if he wanted to, and he couldn't let her find out about it. What would she think of him if he knew that he just worked to get people - KIDS - addicted to literally anything under the sun? She would hate him. he knew that she would. She would think that he was a disgusting excuse for a human being and she would yell and scream at him. He would much rather that she kept her pristine memories of him. That she remembered him as that guy she had hung out with throughout her childhood who had then mysteriously vanished. It was much better than the alternative.

He feigned a laugh at her warning about the types of people that hung around the apartment. Funny to think it, but he was pretty sure he had dealt to someone here before. Now that he thought about how Macy could have run into him while he was in the act....it just made him feel dirty, to be honest.

He patted his pocket and suddenly begin to act as freaked out as possible, patting other pockets and all over himself. "Shit, did you see me drop my phone? I can't find it. Fuck, it couldn't have gone far, right? I'll just go run back and see if I can grab it. It won't take long, promise."

He got ready to go, but he couldn't get past the bottom step without taking one more look at her. If this was the last time he would see her, then he wanted to make sure he remembered it. The perfect curl of her hair, the vibrant outfit she had on, the way she looked so confused at him. "Promise, I'll see you soon. I'll be right back." He grinned at her, pausing for a second longer on the step.