The Stranger: Chapter 2

The Stranger

Chapter 2

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“That was incredible!” Sara exclaimed, as the music and the car stopped at the same moment. “The sheer variety of emotions, that chase music at the end with the galloping gait, and those cellos! You know who would get a real kick out of hearing this?” She looked over at Jeff, and only then noted the disconcerted look on his face. “Is something wrong?”

“You hate Classical music,” he explained.

“Well...!” Sara replied, gesturing wildly with her arms as she fumbled for an explanation. “I guess I could take it or leave it. I like all kinds of music, actually.”

“No you—you know what, just forget it,” Jeff said, interrupting himself. He got out of the car, and then walked around the vehicle to let out Sara. She struggled to her feet with a bit more flailing, her brother watching helplessly.

She found herself beside a seedy strip mall. Half of the shops were abandoned, with boards to cover their shattered windows, and from the poor state of the furnishings in the remaining shops, it looked like the rest of them would soon suffer a similar fate. The largest remaining establishment was called Smile Chinese All You Can Eat. Through the windows of the restaurant, Sara could see a couple sitting at a booth and eating soup. They seemed exceptionally happy about their meals, like soup alone had brought meaning to their hum-drum lives.

Sara followed Jeff’s lead as he approached the restaurant. Just outside the entrance was a coin-operated motorized riding equine made of fiberglass, with a nearby speaker playing the exact same chase music she had just finished praising a few moments earlier. She noted with obvious embarrassment the presence of a saddle and bridle carved into the plastic pony. “‘Kiddie ride’?” she quoted the sign under the coin slot in growing outrage. “You publicly humiliate goats as well?” Jeff failed to hear this outburst, as he had already passed beyond the doors into the restaurant. “Have you no shame?!” Sara addressed the fake animal in no uncertain terms, before reluctantly turning to join her brother.

# # #

The inside of Smile Chinese mostly consisted of one open floor space, ringed with booths, and filled with a buffet bar and a few tables. A low bench separated this space from the entrance and from a man standing behind a cash register. The two “customers” from earlier were on their way to the kitchen, their job of attracting potential patrons into the empty restaurant at an end.

“Welcome to Smile Chinese. I am Lu Qing, the proprietor,” the man said with a desperate little smile as he pressed some buttons on the register, before looking up. “How many will there be in your...oh! Mr. and Miss Scribner! And, the way you are dressed...is it the anniversary?” The man frowned in dismay as he figured this last part out.

“Yes,” Jeff said somberly as he presented a credit card. “Party of three, of course.”

“Of course,” Mr. Qing echoed, ringing up the order and returning the card. “I’ll take you to your usual table.”

Sara looked around in vain for any sign of a third party, before giving up and following the two men to an undistinguished table with two chairs at one end of the restaurant. Mr. Qing removed a chair and place setting from a neighboring table and moved them into place. Jeff pulled out a chair for Sara, and then once he had seated her, sat down opposite her.

“A diet Coke for me,” Jeff instructed Mr. Qing. “A diet Dr Pepper,” he added, pointing at the empty chair. “And...a water, Sara?”

Sara had just figured out the best place to put her purse beside the table when she heard herself being addressed. “Uh...sure,” she said, “water’s fine for me. Be sure to get me a straw—I don’t want to spend all night having to lift the glass with my...” She stopped herself, and looked over at her hand. “...Hand. Uh, never mind. I can do without.”

“The drinks always come with straws, Madame,” Mr. Qing said with a raised eyebrow. “And Miss Marie, as I recall, couldn’t drink without...”

Jeff gave the server an unforgiving look.

“...Yes,” the man said in a small voice as he visibly wilted. “Well, I’ll get those drinks right now.” He retreated for the kitchen as fast as he possibly could.

Sara gave the empty chair another quiet look.

“Sara, why don’t you go ahead and get your food. I’ll go after you come back.”

“Um...OK,” Sara said as she slowly rose to her feet.

Jeff watched as Sara slowly and with some uncertainly made her way to the buffet. She picked up a plate and was about to put one of the sauced chicken entrees on it when she suddenly stopped herself in what appeared to be horror. She then slowly circled the entire buffet, twice, before finally settling for a very few selections to put on her plate.

“I knew what I saw in that mirror was a bad sign,” she said as she sat down. Jeff immediately got up with only the slightest sign of impatience, and started filling his own plate up.

She noticed that Mr. Qing must have served their drinks while she was gone. Both Jeff and “Marie’s” drinks had bendy straws in them—Jeff’s straw was still straight, while Marie’s straw had been bent towards the chair. It was riding rather high in the glass, thanks to the carbonation of the soda.

Beside her plate, Sara noticed a fork...and a paper-wrapped pair of chopsticks. Sara picked up the chopsticks and laughed. “I can barely pick these things up, and you expect me to eat with them?” she asked in an amused tone.

She heard a very slight sound, and looked up to see that Marie’s straw had fallen out of the glass and onto the floor. In an instant, Mr. Qing was beside the table.

“Oh, dear!” he exclaimed as he picked up the straw. “I’ll get a replacement out right away!” He then scurried back to the kitchen.

With a roll of her eyes, Sara unwrapped her unused straw and put it into the soda. She then picked up her fork and attempted to spear a piece of broccoli. The object managed to slide away with every attempt. “Oh, come on!” she exclaimed.

“Having some trouble?” Jeff asked with a smirk as he sat down. He unwrapped his set of chopsticks and effortlessly picked up some noodles to eat.

“Now hold on, I’m a lot better than this normally,” Sara complained, twiddling her fork in anger between the fingers of one hand. “As a matter of fact...” Her voice faded as she looked over in awe at the hand holding the fork. “Hmm...”

Closing her eyes, Sara took the fork and unerringly speared several pieces of food in succession before opening those eyes once more. “Interesting...”

“Aw, now you made me forget about the toast,” Jeff said with a pout. He then rose to his feet, his drink held aloft.

Seeing this, Sara quickly matched his movements.

“A toast,” Jeff said in a quiet and cold voice. “To having the good fortune to leave this world before your dreams are dashed.”

Sara blinked, watching him with pursed lips.

“Because let’s face it,” Jeff continued, “our dreams are pretty well dead and gone. I was supposed to be a doctor by this point. A researching doctor on the Space Shuttle, finding the cure to cancer at zero-G. And you were supposed to be writing for...well, we didn’t really know it existed at the time, but it was pretty much Pixar, wasn’t it?” Jeff’s lip twisted in bitterness. “And where are we now? Stuck in a worthless apartment in a corrupt city, with no avenues for escape. I tell programmers who don’t want to hear it how rotten their programs are, and you design websites for people who steal the credit for themselves. So let’s have it then: A toast, to checking out of Life with some shred of your self-respect intact.” He thrust his drink forward, and a very reluctant Sara clinked her glass against it before taking a sip.

“So,” Jeff said as he regained his seat, his anger mostly dissipated, “how was your day?”

“Oh!” Sara said, her hand rubbing the back of her neck. “Ah, not much to say, really. How was yours?”

“There’s a big presentation tomorrow for the stockholders. Mr. Agnew is going to trot out all of our achievements in the past quarter.”

Sara smiled. “Well, surely they’ll be discussing some of your accomplishments, then?”

“No of course not,” Jeff said, instantly back in his funk. “Officially, TeachWare Corp. doesn’t have Quality Assurance, because that implies that our programmers ever produce anything other than perfect code. No, I’ll be doing my job in a back room far from the public eye, just like every other stockholder meeting.”

“Well, that’s not fair!” Sara responded quickly. “You should get a job somewhere else.”

“Yeah, I probably should,” Jeff said, looking away. “It’s just that...I’d have to go to job interviews, and sell myself to strangers, and pretend I’m actually somebody worth hiring....Could you please change the subject? Ask me about something, anything, that doesn’t relate to work.”

“Well...alright,” Sara said with the hint of a cruel smirk. “How about you tell me about...the ponies.”

“The ponies?” Jeff said, looking at her at shock. “How did you know about my Aracuan Bird account? It’s less than a week old.”

“Wait...are we talking about the same ponies?”

“The My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic show,” Jeff replied to Sara’s question. “Just finished its first season. I have so many ideas for fanfiction to write.”

“Wait,” said Sara, holding up one finger. “Wait, wait, wait. ‘Show’? ‘Fanfiction’? Is this anything like that one story Pinkie wrote, where everything Rainbow Dash wrote started coming true?”

“Oooh! That’s a good concept!” Jeff exclaimed.

Unnoticed by anybody else in the room, Mr. Qing entered from the kitchen, a paper-wrapped straw delicately held in one hand.

“You should definitely write that,” Jeff continued, “before anybody else does. My stuff’s not actually as good as that. I had the idea for the ultimate My Little Pony story, one that would make any other fanfiction utterly redundant and once and for all spell out who Pinkie Pie truly is, but it turns out that somebody already wrote Cup—”

Jeff failed to finish that sentence, because he suddenly found the lapels of his suit, and the body attached to it, suspended by Sara’s strong hands. “If you finish that sentence, I swear to God I will disembowel you with my fork,” she snarled as she shook him.

“Joke...joke!” Jeff wheezed.

“Not...funny,” Sara hissed. She blinked, and a look of utter horror replaced the rage on her face. She opened her hands, and Jeff fell to the floor.

Mr. Qing looked down at the straw he had accidentally crushed in his terror. “A new straw for Miss Marie!” he announced, turning with military precision before quick marching back for the kitchen.

Sara looked down at her hands. “I completely forgot that I’m not alone in here,” she said to nobody in particular. “I am so sorry, Jeff. I didn’t mean to...uh, touch you like that. And manhandle, but I suppose the touching part is worse.”

“It’s OK,” Jeff said, getting up and sitting down, “there was no skin involved, so we’re OK. And that was an incredibly tasteless joke, so I’m sorry.”

Sara sat down herself, looking out the window with a distant expression. “So they’re just stories here? And what kind of stories were you going to write?”

“Oh, I had something planned for Trixie, but I don’t think very much of it. I’m pinning my hopes in that DJ pony instead, unlikely as that sounds.”

Sara’s head whipped around. “What?”

“That cameo character from ‘Suited for Success’,” Jeff explained. “I’ve got a theory that she’s blind, although so far the majority of the fan writers disagree with me. So I guess that interpretation of her will be unique to me.”

“What?” This was said quieter than before.

“I figure she sees herself as some sort of freak of nature in a perfect Equestria where nopony else in the history of ever has ever been disabled like her. So she tries to hide it behind those glasses of hers. But Twilight and her friends help get her out of her shell.”

“What?” This one was little more than a whisper. Sara herself looked like she was shrinking into her seat.

“Much against her will, Vinyl Scratch finds herself at the center of a titanic war to settle the fate of Equestria, and in the end, after facing innumerable obstacles and overcoming her own self-doubt...”

“Yes? Yes?”

“She fails utterly.”

“What?!”

“Yup, Equestria falls, and all of the ponies die or are enslaved, and it’s all because of an innocent screw-up by Vinyl Scratch.”

“What?!” Sara screeched. “Why?” she asked, desperately grasping her hands together in prayer.

“Well why not?” Jeff asked with a superior smile. “It would be the best surprise ending ever, and a perfect rebuke against all of the authors trying to make background ponies or their own OC’s the main characters instead of the ponies that deserve the spotlight.”

Unnoticed by the siblings, Mr. Qing slowly slid a huge box full of straws onto the table, and then returned to the security of the kitchen.

“But...but isn’t that way over the top?” Sara pleaded, thinking desperately. “I mean...I mean...it just falls right into another writer’s trap, doesn’t it?”

“What are you talking about?” Jeff asked.

“Well, it’s awfully angsty, isn’t it?” Sara responded. “That’s what Rainbow Dash does in her stories if she thinks her audience isn’t emotionally invested enough—throw meaningless tragedy at the audience, in the vain hope that forced tears make for engaged readers. Why can’t you subvert expectations twice over, by making Vinyl Scratch save the world instead of doom it. Or...say have Twilight Sparkle do it, since like that’s her destiny or something. Trust me, I do not mind.”

“Well, I dunno...” Jeff said, scratching his head. Noticing the box for the first time, he took out a couple of straws and unwrapped them, then stuck the end of one straw into the other. He started unwrapping and adding more straws into an evolving sculpture. “Everybody loves tragedy.”

“And nobody likes being stabbed in the belly by an unnecessarily bleak ending,” Sara countered. “Will you at least consider my alternatives?”

Jeff rolled his eyes. “All right,” he said, his focus centered on his straws. “And you should definitely consider writing up that Rainbow Dash fanfiction idea. Although I suppose you’ll have to invent something for her to obsess about first. Or even hint at why a pony who keeps teasing Twilight Sparkle for being a ‘bookworm’ would ever take up writing for fun. By the way, are you getting any dessert?”

As Sara looked over at the soft serve machine, her stomach audibly gurgled, causing her to clutch it in some small amount of pain. “Ah, no, I don’t think so. You go ahead—I’ll be right back.” She got up, and stumbled towards the restrooms. After pondering the pictographs on the two doors, she finally entered the ladies’ room.

# # #

“Oh my...oh my...oh my...” Sara gasped repeatedly as she gripped the sides of the sink in both hands and hyperventilated, letting out all the emotion she had been holding back over the last few minutes. Finally she closed her eyes and slowly forced her breathing back to normal.

“Do you think this is funny?” she snarled, looking up at the ceiling. “Did you think that just because I stared down one of our creators before that it would be fun to make it even more personal? What am I supposed to do here?”

Sara’s stomach gurgled painfully once more, and she looked with reluctance over at the toilet in the open stall beside her.

“Ohhh,” she groaned. “What did I do to deserve this?”

She emerged from the stall a few minutes later, her face the color of wax. “Please,” she begged the ceiling as she desperately scrubbed her hands with soap and hot water. “Please, when it comes time to determine what I remember and what I forget from this experience, please let this be one of the things I forget. I never, ever want to know this much about this species.” She rubbed absently at one hip with her hand.

Just then, Sara heard the sound of an indistinct shout from outside the restroom door, coupled with something heavy being thrown to the ground.

# # #

Sara rushed onto the restaurant floor, to see Jeff fighting off three employees that were trying to keep him from assaulting a shocked Mr. Qing. The dinner table they had been sitting at was on its side, and one of the glasses had clearly been broken, yet Marie’s glass was sitting undisturbed on the floor nearby, with an elaborate straw sculpture of a crane resting in it.

“You have no right!” Jeff screamed. “How could you even suggest such a thing, you heartless monster?!”

“Jeff!” Sara exclaimed. “What is the meaning of this? You are causing a scene!”

Jeff froze, and then looked over at Sara with a helpless expression. “Forget it,” he said, slumping into the employees’ arms. “Go ahead and send me to jail.”

“Mr. Scribner,” Lu Qing said sternly, “you will leave my establishment. But I will not press charges, and assuming you regain your temper, I will not ban you from the premises.” He looked over at Sara, adding, “And I advise you to keep a better eye on him. As for the damages...”

Jeff pulled about two hundred dollars in twenty dollar bills out of his wallet and dropped it on a nearby table. “Here,” he said in a leaden voice, before turning and walking to the nearest exit. “Ow!” he yelped as his contact with the door handle resulted in an electric shock.

“What happened?” Sara asked incredulously.

“I have no idea,” Mr. Qing said with a bewildered shake of his head. “I merely suggested that on this occasion he deserved to treat himself.”

# # #

Sara emerged into the parking lot from Smile Chinese. After a moment to orient herself, she made her way over to the parked car that Jeff was sitting within. After pawing the passenger door handle for a few moments, she finally got it open. As soon as she had sat down, Jeff started up the car and drove out into street traffic.

Back at the fiberglass horse, a little girl in a green dress was riding merrily, until the music stopped playing and the horse stopped moving. “Again!” she squealed in delight. “Again!”

Beside her her handler, a young redhead in a pink taffeta dress, pulled a quarter out of her small purse and put it into the slot. Her eyes were fixed on the retreating car, a disapproving frown on her face.