Butterflies

Author's note: Well, I have to thank my best prereader inoeitall AGAIN for helping me write this chapter. This is my first chapter with more than 2,000 words. Congratulations to me!

"Oh my.... its quite hard...."

"Yeah, well... stress builds up...."

"I can see that.... Let's see........ Does this feel good?"

“Oh yeah.....”

“Um... I haven’t done this in a long time.... So forgive me if I’m a bit rusty....”

“It’s fine... It feels wonderful, Fluttershy...”

She giggled softly, “I’m glad you like it.... Eep!!”

There was a soft thud. “Fluttershy?! You okay?”

“Y-yes... I’m fine... Thank you.... Let’s try this again...”

“Alright... Upsy-daisy.”

The yellow mare blushed. “Um... Do you think jumping on it might help....? The bears seem to like it a lot....”

“You do that to BEARS?! Wow! You sure do have guts!”

She blushed harder. “Y-yes but only because they’re in the same situation you are....”

“You mean with you on top of them?”

She blushed harder still. “Y-yes... B-but only because... they were hurting... like you are...”

“Yeah.... So, about that jump...?”

“Oh! S-sorry... Alright.... One..... Two..... Three!” At this, Fluttershy jumped, using her wings to lift her a little more than her legs could and then dropped. Marcus’ back let out a bunch of nasty sounding pops and cracks as Fluttershy’s hooves connected and her weight fell on him.

“Oof! Ohhh, yeah..... Much better....”

Fluttershy smiled and crawled off of Marcus, landing softly on the floor, leaving her guest relaxing on her sofa.

“Wow, Fluttershy... That felt amazing...”

“Glad I could help...” Fluttershy smiled and walked upstairs then came back down with a pillow between her teeth. “Um... Do you think you could tell me about yourself...? If... If you want to, of course...”

“Sure, I wouldn’t mind.” At this, Fluttershy smiled and laid the pillow on the floor and flopped down onto it.

Marcus smiled at her and began his story.

“Well, I come from a place called Earth. It is a... I guess you could say it’s a good place to live, except for all the crime, violence, drugs, alcohol, and overall horrible people. Yeah, I’d say it’s a swell place to live.” The sarcasm practically dripped from Marcus’ words as he said this. He sighed and continued his story. “Where do I start...? I guess I can start from my childhood: I’ve had a pretty good life, although there has been a lot of shit to happen to me.... like, when i was about seven, my father beat me with a table leg... don’t ask... And then, when I was nine my parents got a divorce, forcing me to testify against my father. For the next... oh... roughly three years, things weren’t all that great, but they weren’t bad, either. When I was eleven, my mother found a new husband... well, almost husband.... We were going to all go on a vacation to a waterpark where he planned to propose... Roughly a week before we planned to leave.... and three days after my birthday.... I came home from school to find him dead in their bedroom.... I cried.... Harder than I ever had before....” At this point in his story, Marcus had tears streaming down his face. He tried his hardest to hide it from Fluttershy. “And then... shortly afterwards, I made a really good friend.... we started dating and life was amazing. We dated for almost five years; we broke up when I was fifteen.... I had found out she was sleeping with another guy... Needless to say, I cried again.... Then the next year, my mother found another boyfriend.... we were all happy until I found myself here.... I’m seventeen now, and I’m alone for the first time in my life...”

Marcus sighed and looked back at Fluttershy. She just stared up at him, eyes a bit wider than usual. Her eyes started to water a bit after she saw him looking at her.

“Oh, geez, Fluttershy, please don’t cry...”

“I-I can’t h-help it...” She hiccuped softly as the tears rolled down her cheeks.

“Fluttershy....” Marcus reached down and gently picked her up. She was a bit nervous, more so than usual, but pressed her face against his chest, crying still. ”I’m okay, Fluttershy... please don’t cry....” His own tears had increased at seeing his favorite pony cry. He continued to hold her close to him until his stomach growled in her ear.

“Oh.. um... a-are you hungry...?”

“No, not really.” His stomach decided to protest this statement by releasing another low rumble.

“Alright, you, it’s time to eat.” She was trying to be forceful, but the look on her face still showed she was extremely nervous.

Marcus smiled at her. “Alright... um.. I don’t want to be a burden so, let me cook...”

“Are you sure...? What do humans eat, anyway...?”

“Well, we eat... huh.... We’re omnivores, so we can eat meat and fruits and veggies.... So, whatever’s convenient for you, I guess.”

“Y-you... eat... m-meat..?”

“Well, sometimes.... Some humans try to live off of just fruits and vegetables. But they usually end up looking like twigs, themselves.”

“Oh... um... well... I don’t know what I can make that you might like... um....”

“How about eggs?”

“I guess I could.... Even though eggs are usually for breakfast.”

“Oh man, tell that to my stepdad.... He eats eggs so friggen much, it’s not funny.... He usually makes a sandwich with them.”

“Oh! Could.. could you show me how he does it...? That sounds interesting....”

“Sure thing! But first thing’s first! I need you to point me in the direction of the kitchen and where I can obtain a few eggs.”

She smiled and pointed to a door off to her right. “You can get the eggs from the chickens outside... Be careful, though...”

“Alright... You’ll have to point me towards the kitchen when I come back.”

“That’s fine.”

Marcus smiled and walked out the door into Fluttershy’s animal pen. He walked over to the chicken coop and stepped behind it, there was no door to reach in and grab the eggs.

“Crap...”

He walked to the front and poked his head inside, most of the chickens were sitting on their eggs, and a few were sleeping. In the very back, there was one nest with three eggs in it that was unoccupied.

“Figures...” Marcus crawled into the chicken coop and carefully made his way to the back, making sure not to disturb the chickens. He reached the nest in the back without so much as a nudge to the chickens that were staring at him with beady eyes. He started to get nervous as he reached out to the nest, taking the eggs. He started trying to back out of the coop but ended up kicking a couple chickens. They began to cluck angrily at him as he tried to back out and find solid ground again.

“Sorry!” He continued to accidentally kick them, some started flying around inside the coop, flying at Marcus and pecking and scratching at his arms and face. “Ah!! Stop that!! Son of a- FUCK THAT HURT!!” He began scrambling, trying to get out of the coop. At this point, Fluttershy stepped into the open doorway to see what was wrong and saw the chicken coop shaking violently and some very obscene words coming from it.

“Oh, um... Be careful.... Don’t hurt each other...”

It took a few minutes, but Marcus finally forced his way out of the chicken coop, landing on his feet and turning around quickly. He ran as fast as he could towards the open door, eggs in hand. Behind him, dozens of angry chickens flew out of the coop after him.

“Get back inside, Fluttershy!” He dove for the open door and slammed it shut behind him, the chickens began scratching and throwing themselves at the door, trying to get to the man who had disturbed them.

He stood there, panting, his back against the door. His arms and face were covered in scratches and small wounds. His clothes were torn and tattered and there was hay and feathers in his hair and clothes, as well.

“Oh my... Are you okay..?”

“Yeah... But I’m not going back in that chicken coop.... EVER.”

Fluttershy smiled and started walking towards another doorway. Marcus followed and found himself in her kitchen. It was pretty basic, sink, table, stove, fridge, and cabinets.

“So, the first thing you do is get a pan and some oil.” Marcus dug around for a little before finding his supplies: a frying pan, some vegetable oil, and a spatula. “You don’t want to warm up the oil for this or you’ll get the whites too crispy.” He poured some oil into the pan and set it on a burner. He then cracked the eggs and dropped them into the pan. “And now, we play the waiting game.” He leaned up against the counter and watched the three eggs start to pop and sizzle in the pan. “I usually break the yolks for this, but I don’t know how you like it, I hope you don’t mind”

“No, not at all...”

“Alrighty, then.” He reached over with the spatula and pressed the corner into the yolks a few times. They flattened out and he flipped the eggs shortly afterwards. He grabbed a few slices of bread from one of the cabinets and made two sandwiches when the eggs were cooked all the way through.

“Easiest thing I know how to cook.”

“That’s interesting...” She walked over and sniffed the second sandwich he had made.

“Yeah, I made you one, too”

“You didn’t have to...”

“Yeah, but I wanted to.”

“Thank you... Marcus...”

“Anytime.”

She took the plate between her teeth and walked over to the table. She put the plate down, crawled into a chair and started eating. Marcus was still over by the stove seasoning his sandwich with salt, pepper, and any spicy powder he could find.

Marcus sat down beside her when she was about halfway through her sandwich.

“How is it?”

She finished what she was chewing and smiled at him. “It’s very nice, thank you.”

Marcus smiled back and proceeded to eat his lunch.

~~~~~~~~~~

The two of them sat at the table, plates empty and bellies full. The sandwiches were surprisingly filling. Fluttershy eventually got up and stretched her wings. She walked over to the door then turned back to look at Marcus. “Um... I have to go into town for a little... I hope that’s okay...”

“Sure, gotta do what you gotta do. Just be careful.”

She blushed a little and nodded. She turned around and walked out the door, leaving Marcus alone in her cottage.

“So! Alone in Fluttershy’s house.... What to do...? I could go snooping? Nah, that’s rude... I could help with her chores? Too lazy....” At this point, Marcus heard a soft tapping. He looked around and saw Angel Bunny standing on the table, tapping his foot. He pointed towards the front door and then to his eyes then at Marcus. He hopped off the table shortly afterwards and disappeared. Marcus had no idea where the little critter could have run off to.

“That was..... interesting....” He shook his head and started to wander around her cottage for a little bit. He found the bathroom, kitchen, living room, and what looked like a guest bedroom on the first floor. He decided to go up the stairs to look around. He found an aviary, another bathroom, and another bedroom. He assumed this one to be Fluttershy’s because it had green and flowery decorations. The bedspread was green with some pink flowers on it. The drapes were green, and even the walls were green. There were a few animal care supplies scattered here and there.

He smiled at it and closed the door, walking back down the stairs. “What can I do to help the poor thing...?” He sighed and hung his head. He flopped back down on the couch.

~~~~~~~~~~

Marcus must have fallen asleep, because when he looked up again, it was nearly dark. He sat up and yawned. He wandered around the house again, wondering if Fluttershy had come back yet. Apparently not, she was nowhere to be seen.

As soon as he had figured that she wasn’t back yet, the front door opened and a quiet voice called out: “Marcus...? Are you still here...?”

“Yeah, I’m still here, I hope that’s not any trouble.”

“No, no trouble at all....”

Marcus walked into the living room again, to see Fluttershy struggling a little with some bags of feed and a bucket of apples. He rushed over and grabbed as much as he could, throwing the two bags of feed over his shoulder and grabbing the bucket with the other arm.

Fluttershy blushed a little and looked up at him. “Th-thank you... Please don’t hurt yourself...”

“Don’t you worry about it, I got it.” He smiled at her as his arm started to hurt from the bags of feed.

“Um... C-can you put them by the back door...?”

“Yeah... One sec...” He walked, somewhat quickly, towards the back door and nearly dropped everything on the way. He gently placed everything down, the apple first then the two bags.

“Ow... Guess I need to start working out again...”

Fluttershy walked in behind him and looked up at him. “Thank you again... You really didn’t have to help...”

“Nope. Had to help you for being so nice to me today. Oh crap, I should probably head out, I’m sure you’re tired and don’t need me hanging around.”

Marcus turned around and headed for the front door. He had his hand on the doorknob when Fluttershy called out to him. “Wait...”

There was a short silence as Fluttershy walked a few feet towards him and looked up.

“You... you said you were a-alone...?”

“Yeah... Why?”

“Um... y-you can... stay here... i-if you want...” She blushed profusely and looked up at him from under her mane.

“I.. uh... Fluttershy, I couldn’t...”

“No, no, I insist... I can’t let you go out at this time of night without a place to stay.”

“Well.... alright....” Marcus smiled and got on his knees, wrapping the yellow pegasus in a hug. She hesitantly returned the gesture, wrapping her hooves around him.

Maybe things won’t be so bad, after all.