Like a shivering haze, the noise of many ponies filled the streets of Canterlot. Derpy trotted through the street, ponies on both sides, walking past stalls and ornate buildings, seeing pure-white flowers behind the glass of a flower shop. The air smelled of various perfumes mixing together into one chemical, overwhelming combination, one that set Derpy on edge and made her unusually aware of her nose. She wanted to be out of Canterlot as soon as possible, but this was a special letter. Rarity had personally entrusted Derpy with it. Derpy might not have known the mare well, or even liked her, for Rarity’s fussiness and artificiality put Derpy on edge, but she was glad to be entrusted with something important. She, the spaced out mailmare, the maladjusted klutz, was trusted with an important letter by a genuine fashion icon. It grounded her, gave Derpy a feeling she considered sophisticated, a feeling like water, subtle, neutral, but not unpleasant. And so she trotted, on the ground, despite preferring the more isolated sky above, because Rarity specifically mentioned she didn’t want the letter damaged, and Derpy had a habit of ruining letters with the most bizarre mid-air fiascos.
Derpy felt the grip on her heart loosen when she exited the busy street, and got to a small, simple, but well maintained stone bridge, arching over an orderly, brilliant-blue canal. She couldn’t resist stopping to look down at the water, seeing her own reflection in the slightly undulating stream. Seeing her always misaligned eyes. Her stupid face, the face everyone else saw. She knew that everyone noticed. There was no way they didn’t. Derpy had never seen anyone else with eyes like hers, or any other adult mare with her level of incompetence. Yet as she stared at the waves, the rhythm imprinted itself into her mind. She was sucked into her own image, into the water, until they faded, her mind dissociating from the sight before her. To Derpy, the only way to make the world bearable was to allow it to fade away. To supplant its being with her own. A slightly warm, fuzzy feeling grew in her mind like a balloon filling with air. There was nothing but her now. Nothing but her and a few amusing thoughts, like thoughts of the Daring Do books she would read once she got home, and the teddy bear she would hug, and the sweet, warm muffins she would eat, muffins with fluffy insides and a chewy crust.
“Hey, isn’t that Derpy?!”
Like glass her reverie shattered, instant pain from its shards stabbing into Derpy’s chest. She didn’t want to turn around. She was scared of what she would see there. She felt the eyes of whatever mare called for her bore into her neck. The grip around her throat tightened as she heard the amplified, sharp sounds of hooves on stone approaching her.
“Derpy?”
A hoof touched her back. She almost flew away, wanting to shoot into the sky.. But she had a letter to deliver. She had to stay cool. Derpy turned around, and was met with the large, round eyes of a mint-green unicorn mare.
“Spacing out again?” The mare said with a playful tone.
It was Lyra Heartstrings. Derpy remembered her. Not because she was friends with Lyra, or even liked her. Because Lyra was good at playing the harp. Derpy remembered and envied ponies like Lyra, ponies who were truly good at something. And she envied too Lyra’s friendly, confident, and slightly challenging expression. That unwavering smile, which in an instant could go to either a caring or cheeky mode.
“Uh, hello, Lyra!” Derpy said with a nervous smile.
Lyra snickered. “You never change. What brings you to Canterlot?”
Derpy wanted to ask Lyra what brought HER to pester her, but she did not have the courage. Plus, Derpy did not like it when other ponies felt bad. She knew Lyra meant no harm and was a good pony, and she felt shame well up inside her, a thick fluid that dragged her body down.
“Just delivering a letter for Rarity” Derpy muttered, her eyes cast down.
“Rarity? That prissy pony? I didn’t think you hung out with ponies like her!”
“Well, you know, a good mailmare makes deliveries no matter what…” Derpy said without the confidence she had intended.
Lyra snickered again. “At least you’re not lacking in dedication! Anyway, I have to get my harp touched up, so I’ll go ahead. Bye!”
And just like that, Lyra left, Derpy feeling stranded in her wake. Why had Lyra talked to her? What did she mean when she said Derpy wasn’t lacking in dedication? Was she lacking in something else? Derpy thought she knew the answer. She was lacking competency of any kind. She was a sorry mailmare. She was shit at her one job. That is what Lyra meant. To Lyra, it was just a joke. Of course it was. Of course to anypony else it would be. Derpy was just the silly, klutzy mailmare who couldn’t do anything. Somepony others could look at and realise it could always be worse. These feelings clung together, a ball of tightly wound black string deep within Derpy. One she couldn’t get out no matter what she did. Derpy looked at the receding form of Lyra, who merged into the crowd of the busy street Derpy came from. She knew Lyra didn’t feel the discomfort she did when Lyra trotted through that crowd, and wasn't filled with discomfort when inhaling that awful smell.
Derpy violently shook her head, like a wet dog. There was no time for this. The letter wouldn’t deliver itself. It was time to shape up and just do it. Over the bridge she went, both the bridge beneath her hooves and the bridge in her mind. She entered the narrow, coiling streets of the older part of Canterlot, said by some to have been built before even the Princesses took their throne, although such theories are built on shaky grounds. Here, instead of tourists and shoppers, their shrill voices a rumbling in the air, the filthy rich walked the streets. The ponies Rarity wanted to emulate so badly, but would never truly be, with their small, downright deformed dogs and their ornate dresses wonderfully lacking in self-awareness. Now, Derpy herself wasn’t too aware Rarity was simply desperately trying to attain that status, but she was acutely aware there was something desperate about her. Still, Rarity was liked by Ponyville, and so, that somehow meant delivering her letter meant something. Derpy didn’t know exactly why. She just felt like it worked that way.
Derpy kept her head low as she trotted. She was close. Just a little longer and she’d be done. But as she knew from experience, accidents did not care for timing. She kept one hoof pressed against her bag, squishing it shut, but making sure not to press too tightly as to avoid creasing the letter contained within. Quickly, like a soldier sticking their head out of the trench to observe enemy lines, Derpy looked up from the ground, and saw a signpost looming over her, covered in a smooth layer of white paint, one maintained every day by dutiful and underappreciated painter-ponies, for the residents of Equestria’s most elite neighbourhood could not accept anything but perfection. Princess Street. She saw it right there, on one of the signpost’s arms of destiny. But she couldn’t hurry. She had to be careful, oh so careful, every step of the way, as painful, disorientating, and monotonous as it was.
Her heart was gripped tightly as she walked past the small, ancient houses, each with a name engraved on the side, not the name of the resident, but of the house itself. Each was architecturally unique, an artwork in its own right. Derpy stopped when she saw the number her brain was readied to respond to, neurons firing instantly and adrenaline pumping through her. Thirty-two. Fancypants’ house. This was it. She trotted up the polished marble stairs leading up to the door, her dirty hooves leaving obvious, horseshoe-shaped stains. There was no doorbell. She knocked on the large door, making sure not to knock too loudly. Because naturally, she did everything too loudly, too clumsily, without care. She felt like her knocks echoed through the wood itself. Kept secret within it. But that illusion did not last as the door opened. It did not slow down for her, did not allow for drama. Just like that, Derpy was faced with the mythical Fancypants, standing right before her, looking down at her with a slightly confused, inquiring look. Calm, collected. A true aristocrat in a sense the other elites of Canterlot could only imitate.
Derpy was paralyzed. Should she speak first? Or deliver the letter first? What would she say? She hadn’t prepared well enough.
“Uhm- uhhh…” Derpy stammered.
Stupid. She could not even hide her fear. Fancypants smiled subtly, and spoke in his harmonious, polished voice.
“Well now, no need to be so afraid, I won’t bite. There must be a reason you knocked on my door, yes?” he said without a hint of reproach.
“I, uh… D-delivery! Delivering a letter!” Derpy stammered out.
“Ah, is that so? Letters aren’t usually delivered at this time, how strange.”
“It’s from Rarity.” Derpy said stiffly.
“Oh, wonderful!”
Fancypants paused. Shit. Derpy now arrived at the conundrum. How to hand over the letter. She couldn’t hand it over with her mouth. Getting her dirty slobber on it would be an instant and total failure. And she could not possibly ask Fancypants to fish it out himself. Time to do or die. Like a fishing pole, Derpy lowered her wing into her bag, and tilted the bag carefully, to allow the letter to slide onto her wing. She took out her wing, her catch resting atop it, and presented it to Fancypants, like a cat proudly showing off a dead mouse. Fancypants stared at it. He plucked it from her wing with his mouth.
“Deliwering lewwers always is a hawsle, iwn’t it?” He said with the letter still in his mouth, getting his aristocratic slobber all over it.
A balloon popped in Derpy’s chest. She felt herself deflate. Both stress and hope died. Instead of energy, there was now nothing.
“Weww, thank you fow youw sewvice.” Fancypants said with the letter still in his mouth, before closing the door.
Derpy was left alone. There was no one else left in Princess Street. Only the now far away murmur of ponies. Only a hollow world and a yawning silence. And yet. And yet Derpy felt relieved. Of course it didn’t mean anything. Of course she delivered this letter for nothing. Nothing but the faint appreciation of a mare she didn’t really like. But maybe that was fine. She would go home. She would indulge in those warm muffins, like she was wrapping herself in a sugary blanket. She would hug her teddy bear, and with a warm beverage she would read some Daring Do, and forget, for just a moment, the rough, intruding world around her. She spread her wings and flew. Into the open air, where only unjudging birds and the occasional pegasus flew.