//------------------------------// // Perspective // Story: Better off without me // by SunnyBreeze //------------------------------// Zephyr found himself waiting in what now felt like a familiar scene. To his left, he could hear mothers chit-chatting about their foals. But he stared straight forwards, as if looking through the walls and into space. He had been through so much. What would he tell Dr. Horse? “Zephyr Breeze,” came a familiar voice. Zephyr had become much more familiar with Dr. Horse now. He didn’t mind sharing his secrets. It’s not as if it could be any worse than what he had already revealed. “How have you been?” Dr. Horse asked. Zephyr knew what he meant this time, and didn’t hesitate to come forward with the truth. “Okay, there was an incident where I thought that I wanted to die, so I threw out all my stuff. It wasn’t a big deal though, because I let Mom keep most of it just in case I changed my mind”. “Good”, Dr. Hooves said and nodded. Zephyr was surprised, it was as if Dr. Horse didn’t care about Zephyr personally anymore. Not that that offended him in any way, it was just strange at what seemed like a change in behaviour of his doctor. Dr. Hooves elaborated, “I’m glad to hear that you didn’t just break it up and throw it in the trash immediately, it shows that you’re thinking about the future”. “What do you plan to do after you finish your mane styling course?”. “I haven’t decided yet,” replied Zephyr. “I’m trying to keep my options open, Rarity thinks that I could be a hit in Manehattan, but to tell the truth, I think I’d rather try to get a position helping out on the Apple farm.” “Good,” noded Dr. Horse, “ponies who are seriously considering suicide usually wouldn’t think that far ahead. They usually don’t think beyond their planned suicide.” Zephyr gave a silent nod of acknowledgement, uncertain whether Dr. Horse’s logic was sound, but relieved not to be interrogated any further. “I’ll be moving to a different clinic soon, at the start of the next moon,” Dr. Horse announced. “It’s a smaller clinic near the edge of the Everfree Forest”. Zephyr smiled. “I’m satisfied with your progress, but let’s have one final meeting before the next moon starts”. Zephyr could have probably found Dr. Horse’s new clinic, but he got the feeling that Dr. Horse didn’t want Zephyr following him there. Zephyr knew that there were lots of possible reasons that Dr. Horse was needed at Everfree, but wondered whether the stress of dealing with patients like himself might have been part of the reason he decided to move. Zephyr’s mom kept hinting that he should talk to Fluttershy. Knowing his mom, it was probably something minor. However, he couldn’t help but be a bit curious. Today was one of the rare occasions that Fluttershy had decided to come over by herself without bringing one of her friends. Zephyr peeked over at Fluttershy sitting in the living room, and fantasized about going up to her and telling her everything. He started walking towards her, but sweat started forming on his brow. He turned, drank a cup of water from the kitchen tap, and walked outside to his zen garden, uh, Mom’s garden. Come on Zeph. Is this really the relationship that you want with your sis? To keep these things unsaid for eternity? What kind of world do you want to create? What kind of relationship do you want? You don’t have to be shy just because your parents are. You, and you alone, have the power to change this. Zephyr felt his heartbeat rise. An adrenaline rush. But what for? Smart body. His subconscious must have known what he was about to do. He figured that he may as well make the most of his current high before the adrenaline wore off. Zephyr approached Fluttershy and nervously attempted to elicit a conversation from her, “Um Fluttershy, I’ve been meaning to ask, you know before you left home how you used to get really sad and curl up into a ball?” Fluttershy gave a "mhmm" and a gentle nod. “It's anxiety, it happens when I'm really worried or afraid of something, which used to be quite often,” she explained. "It started when I was younger. I tried talking to Dash about it, but she didn't really take mental health seriously at the time, and thought it could be cured with a pep talk. Mom convinced me to talk to a doctor about it. Since meeting Twilight and the others, I can talk to them about it now as well, and Dash is more accepting now." "How did Mom and Dad react?" asked Zephyr "I didn't tell them everything..." Fluttershy hesitantly elaborated. "I told my doctor that I wished I'd catch swamp fever and turn into a tree. I'd like to be a tree, you know, surrounded by nature without all the stress. My doctor kind of freaked out and made Rainbow Dash promise to fly me to the mental health wing of the hospital. A psychologist helped diagnose the issue, and mentioned that mental illnesses often run in families. Mom and Dad probably have anxiety too, but I didn’t tell them that because it would probably only make them more anxious." Zephyr wasn't quite sure what to say. "Um, are you okay?" asked Fluttershy. "Yeah, my doctor kind of freaked out about something too, but I'm fine. Thanks for checking sis." Zephyr was catching the train to Canterlot to try out for a temporary position in the royal gaurd, something about defending a secret passage, which was sure to make Rainbow Dash proud if he got in. But then the suicidal thoughts were back. “Ugh, not again!” Zephyr thought to himself, “I just want some bucking stability”.  Zephyr was sick of reasoning about this kind of thing emotionally. It was draining. He just wanted a simple logical answer, “yes”, or “no”. What was his criteria? There was only one criterion that he really cared about, and that was his value to Equestrian society. Zephyr took out a piece of paper and picked up a pencil in his mouth, and began to sketch a diagram, placing “value beyond replacement” on his y-axis. Of course, there was no way that he could quantify that, at least not without a lot of calculations, but he could make a rough estimate of relative values in arbitrary units. On the x-axis, he placed time in years since he was born, from 0 through to 40 (not that many ponies other than alicorns lived that long but Granny Smith had demonstrated it was possible). His time as an inexperienced manestyling intern would be another two years. He would be nothing but a drain on society for this time period. But when he plotted it to scale, it was just a small blip on his plot, and nothing compared to the immense resources that had already been placed in him by his parents and teachers over the last 15 years of his life. Going into the future, he could see that the best was still ahead, and that he still had many years to repay his debt to society. Why hadn’t he plotted this before? It was so obvious now that living was the correct decision. Nearly all the investment capital had been paid, and the dividends were coming soon. He shuddered at the thought that just a few moons ago he had placed all that at risk by prematurely terminating everything now.