Chapter Twenty-Three
When I arrived home for the holidays, my parents seemed especially pleased to see me. I think part of it was them congratulating me for gaining entry to the Princess School, but it was also partly because they were realising that I wasn’t actually going to be around for much longer. Once I’d graduated in a few short years, I’d be living away from them, so they were treating me extra-nicely. I even got taken on a special trip to a fancy restaurant to celebrate.
“So, are you looking forward to your friend Rarity visiting?” Mum asked when we were working our way through pudding.
I answered once I finish a mouthful of custard. “Yes, it’ll be fun,” I half-lied.
“Well, your father and I are looking forward to meeting her. She seems lovely.”
“Which one is Rarity?” Dad asked, looking puzzled.
“The other white pony.”
“Oh, of course.”
It was the first time in my seven years at Buckingham that any of my friends had come to my house. Living in such an isolated area meant that it was more convenient for me to go and visit them, although it was still a fairly rare occurrence. As such, as Rarity’s arrival grew closer, my parents began to fret more and more about how best to look after her. They started to get on my nerves, because I wanted to be left alone to worry about what I was going to say to her, and I didn’t want to be dragged around the shops looking for her favourite foods. I didn’t even know what her favourite foods were. I made sure to get plenty of biscuits, mainly for me to stress-eat.
The only thing that prevented me from going mad was being able to play the piano, which was the reversal of my usual attitude towards it. In all of my previous holidays I had worried myself sick about concerts and hated practicing. Now, with a more worrying concern coming up, I found myself practicing for hours on end. I improved rapidly and sometimes found myself playing through sections I had perfected just to listen to it. By the end of the first week of the holidays, there were only two tricky bits left. and I focused on them almost exclusively. The sooner I could play the entire thing through, the sooner that I would be able to relax.
Rarity arrived on the Monday afternoon. She’d had to come a long way on the train from Fly’s house in Plymhoof, so I made sure I went down to the railway station with my dad to greet her.
“Hello Cat!” she exclaimed, alighting the train carefully and placing her suitcase on the station platform beside her. I hugged her, taking in the scent of her perfume and her mane and feeling a sense of intense longing, cut short when she pulled away.
“Ah, you must be Cat’s father. A pleasure to meet you,” she added politely, shaking his hoof.
“The pleasure is mine. You must be tired, allow me,” Dad replied graciously, hefting her suitcase off the platform and heading for the taxi carriages. Rarity and I followed, anxious for a chance to catch up.
“Fly is well. I spent a lot of the week helping her with her studying, which I can’t say was the most fun thing, but I was glad I could help out,” Rarity explained. “Anyway, I have this week to relax.”
“That’s true. I only have to practice my piano a bit, if that’s okay.”
“Of course! I am just dying to hear it.”
I paused for a moment. “Um, I’d actually prefer if you didn’t…”
“Whyever is that, Cat?” Rarity asked, looking over at me.
“I just want to play it for the first time for an audience at the concert.”
My dad chuckled. “Don’t worry Rarity, she won’t let either me or her mum listen either.”
Part of the reason I especially didn’t want Rarity to hear it was because I was planning to play it to her at the concert; like Mr Bluejay had said, the point of learning the piece was to impress somepony, and that somepony was Rarity. At least, that was if I didn’t ruin our friendship with an ill-judged move sometime during the holidays.
Dad spent most of the journey back asking Rarity about her preferences; did she need a blanket on her bed, what did she like to eat, did she need anything special to be bought for her. Rarity was, as usual, very polite and aimed to create as little fuss as possible, with the exception of asking for a soft blanket.
“You’ll be sleeping on Cat’s bed. She’s agreed to sleep on the camp bed,” Dad informed my friend. “My wife has put fresh bedding on while we’ve been collecting you.”
“Oh Cat, that’s not necessary. I don’t mind the camp bed,” Rarity said quickly, but I could tell from her look that she was grateful, so I just blushed and shook my head.
“Is there anything in particular you’d like to do this week?” Dad asked, playing the role of annoying parent rather well.
“I wouldn’t mind at least one long walk in the countryside,” Rarity said after a pause. “We don’t really have rolling hills like this in Ponyville, unless you count the area around Froggy Bottom Bog, which is rather unpleasant.”
There was plenty of countryside around our house, and I was glad that my parents would be be too busy with work to accompany us.
“Well, here we are,” Dad announced when the taxi carriage pulled up outside our house. “Let me get your suitcase.”
With nothing to carry, Rarity and I were first to the house. I pushed open the door with a hoof and let Rarity inside to wipe her hooves.
“Mum? We’re back?” I shouted up the stairs before wiping my own hooves and turning to Rarity. “Come through to the kitchen for a minute, my mum will want to meet you.”
I made hot drinks while my dad carried the suitcase up to my bedroom and my mum finished whatever it was she was doing and came back downstairs.
“Ah, well you must be Rarity!” she enthused when she arrived. “It’s lovely to meet you after all this time. I don’t think a holiday has gone by without Cat talking about you.”
My face burned red as Rarity giggled.
“It’s nice to meet you too,” she replied politely.
“I’ve put a blanket on your bed, as per instructions. Is there anything else you’d like?” Mum asked, going straight back into her worrying mode.
“No, thank you. That’s fine.”
“Good! Well if you need anything, just ask Cat. I’ll have some tea as well,” she added, looking at me. I sighed and found another mug.
Once the tea had brewed, we headed up to my room. I had self-consciously tidied up before leaving to collect Rarity, which was the first time ever. Apart from dirty clothes I’d picked up from the floor, I’d also tidied away some of the more foalish touches that my room had from the days before Buckingham. I wondered whether to leave out the photo of Rarity, Miri, Fly and I that sat beside my bed, but I decided that I better had, otherwise Rarity might ask where it was.
“What a delightful room,” Rarity said, apparently truthfully. It did look a lot tidier than usual. “I love it. It’s much nicer than mine at home.”
I blushed again. “Well, it’s nothing much…”
We unpacked her stuff, which involved me giving over some of my wardrobe space to her clothes. She spent fifteen minutes going through every garment I owned, including the ones that no longer fitted. I told her I needed to sort them out, but she seemed to approve of my dress sense as a younger filly.
“What’s this?” she asked, finding a photo frame at the back of the wardrobe. I’d forgotten that it existed because it had been hidden for so long.
“I don’t know…” I said, craning my neck to see the photo. Rarity studied it for a moment and then showed it to me.
“Looks like it has you and Fly and Miri on it.”
The picture was of the three of us looking a lot younger, (Miri’s hair was undyed and Fly was much smaller than she was now), standing in a line in front of a door at Buckingham. Standing next to me was a pale blue pony with a white mane.
“Who is that?” Rarity asked, examining the photo again. “I don’t recognise her from school.”
“Oh wow, this brings back memories. The pony is Platinum Blonde, she and Miri were really good friends. She left after the first year because her parents moved to another country,” I explained. “Then we just had an empty space in our room until you arrived.”
“Ah, I see,” Rarity said, still looking at the picture. “You all look so young.”
“I think it’s our first day at Buckingham. We’re stood in front of our dorm room.”
I wanted to bury the photo back under clothes, partially because I looked so awkward and partially because I wasn’t sure if Rarity wanted to look at a photo of her predecessor at Buckingham, but she insisted on keeping it out.
“I need to memorise it for blackmailing Miri with,” she explained. “Anyway, it’s cute.”
I nodded and let her put it on my bedside table next to the more recent one that featured her.
“We should get a picture taken on our last day,” Rarity said thoughtfully. “Then we have something to remember it by.”
Thinking about the end of our time at Buckingham made me sad, and I think Rarity could tell, so she changed the subject.
“It’s weird to think that the three of you spent three years at Buckingham before meeting me, and even had a different roommate,” she said, reclining on the bed while I settled onto the camp bed, which was much less comfortable.
“It seems a long time ago,” I agreed. “I haven’t heard from Platinum since she left.”
“I bet she looks different now,” Rarity added, gazing at the picture.
“I think Miri keeps in touch with her occasionally. They got along really well in the first year, pretty much as well as Fly and I did,” I reminisced. “Miri was really upset when she left.”
Rarity nodded. “I can imagine.”
Noticing her expression, I snapped out of my memories, which were putting me in a sad mood anyway.
“Well, the silver lining is that you got to move into our room. If Platinum had stayed, I have no idea who you might have been with,” I said, shrugging.
“Very true. I’m glad I ended up with you ponies,” Rarity replied simply, smiling. I smiled back; it was contagious.
“Do you want anything to eat?” I asked. “I’ve got some biscuits somewhere if you want one with your tea.”
“Why not?” the other unicorn replied with a slight giggle. “I am on holiday, after all.”
By leaving Rarity to read magazines for an hour each day, I was able to get in my piano practice. Rarity’s presence was actually making me worse, but I did make limited progress. It wasn’t helped by the fact that my parents were being over-helpful and kept interrupting with irritating questions, and on Thursday I gave up early.
“Do you want to go for that walk?” I asked Rarity when I returned. She looked up from the magazine with an enthusiastic expression, so I found a scarf that would help to keep me warm outside. Rarity chose to wear a thick shawl which was fastened with a brooch of a ladybird. It looked really nice, and I was surprised that she hadn’t worn it before.
There was a beck that ran behind our house, so I decided that it might be fun to follow it and see where it went. Rarity agreed and we set off, agreeing to be back in time for tea.
I had been able to restrain myself throughout Rarity’s visit to that point. Admittedly, repeated hugs and being around her so much was returning me to the state I had last experienced after our rain-soaked walk in Mareis, and on occasion she caught me staring into her eyes (or, more embarrassingly, at her tail), but overall I was holding up. Rarity started talking about Buckingham once we’d located the stream and I hoped that it would take my mind off how pretty she looked.
“Do you have any plans for this summer?” Rarity asked, looking over at me.
I paused in thought. “Not really. Probably just keep practicing the piano. What about you?”
“Well, I’ll probably try and put together the bits I need to buy the boutique in Ponyville and then move in, as well as spending time with Sweetie. Although once I’ve moved back to Ponyville, I’ll be able to see my little sister every day.” She smiled at the thought and I felt another wave of emotion unrelated to her sister.
“You’ll have to bring her next time you come here for a visit,” I joked, half-hoping she would.
Rarity giggled slightly. “That would be nice, wouldn’t it…”
We walked a little further, weaving through some sparse trees which lived in the valley. The hills around my house were neither steep or very tall, but they met in a valley through which the stream ran. It was an easier walk than climbing any of the hills, and the ground was usually flat. Plus, it gave a nice view, the stream making the only sound in the valley other than our voices. Some might call the location romantic, but I was keeping those thoughts firmly silenced.
“Do you think you’ll visit Fly when she’s in Oxmare?” Rarity asked, admiring a cloud.
“Hmm? Why do you ask?” I replied, keeping my eyes on the ground so I could avoid a boggy puddle.
“I asked Fly the same thing. I think you two should stay in touch.”
It was an awkward question. I was sure that I’d stay in touch with Fly, since she was my best friend, but it was a fair distance from Princess School to Oxmare and she was going to be busy with her academic work. Plus, during the holidays she’d be in Plymhoof, which was even further away.
“We will. I think we’ll probably write to each other,” I explained. “Visits might be harder, but I’m sure we could do it once or twice a year.”
“That’s good. I think it would be a shame if you didn’t, after all this time,” Rarity told me.
“What about you and Miri?”
It was obvious that Rarity was upset about this and I regretted asking.
“Well, it’s difficult to fly here for just a visit. We’ll write, but with the boutique, I don’t know when I’ll have the bits to get back and see everypony,” she said, the note of sadness in her voice making me desperate to hug her.
“Miri will be okay. She’ll still have Fly and I, plus new friends from university,” I said, trying to reassure Rarity. “And we’ll definitely all come to see your boutique. No way we’d miss that.”
She brightened a little and gave me a small hug, which I returned. After that, we walked with our tails together, something which filled me with a great deal of happiness. I didn’t say anything, though.
After that, I just told her funny stories of things that had happened at Buckingham before she arrived. There had been a legendary fifth year called Crystal Shores who’d caused all kinds of trouble for the teachers (and amusement for the other fillies) before she’d settled down to work in the sixth year. I told Rarity as many of the stories as I could remember and she giggled at them all. Miri had managed to get herself into a number of colt-related sticky situations over the years too, and it was fun picking the worst of them. Her first experiment with make-up had been disastrous and she’d refused to go out of the bathroom for hours, although she’d seen the funny side later on.
“Platinum and Miri used to try and sneak into events for the older fillies, and at one of the dances they got caught and were marched back to our room, but escaped custody and reappeared in the hall. They were eventually brought back to the room by four teachers and our room was guarded for the rest of the night,” I recalled with a laugh. “Fly was worried that we were going to get into trouble, but we never heard any more about it.”
Rarity giggled behind her shawl. “Miri is so weird sometimes.”
“Tell me about it. She went through a phase when she was obsessed with banana-flavoured food, and so we spent six months eating nothing but banana biscuits and foam banana sweets. I was sick of them by the end.”
We stopped by a big rock and sat on it, tired of walking. The stream disappeared into some bushes before long and it seemed as good a place as any to rest before turning around.
“It’s getting quite cloudy,” Rarity observed. “Might rain before long.”
“It’s okay, I brought an umbrella,” I replied, patting my saddlebag. “You’re lucky to have weather ponies in Equestria.”
“Oh yes, they do a good job keeping the skies clear most of the time. You get advanced warning of rain, so you can shelter indoors all day,” she explained. “It took a while for me to get used to the random weather over here.”
I don’t know what it was that kept drawing me to stare at her. Maybe it was the way that her neck looked while she looked upwards at the ominous clouds, or just the way she’d done her mane that day, in a wavy variation on her usual style. Whatever it was, I couldn’t look away and I felt a burst of nerves every time she looked in my direction.
“Do I have something on my face?” she eventually asked, cautiously, a hoof rising to brush whatever it was away.
“Oh, no,” I replied, turning red. “Well, I mean, yes, you do have an eyelash.”
“Can you get it? I’ll probably just brush it into my eye or something silly.”
My heart was pounding as I leant towards her. My magic was too clumsy to levitate it away, but it was impossible with hooves, so I carefully pushed it away with the point of my horn.
“There you go,” I replied, in an inexplicable whisper.
Rarity didn’t reply, just looked at me. I could feel the same feelings I’d had in that alley in Mareis, waiting to go back to the museum, only this time they seemed stronger. I ground my hoof into my side to try and endure it, but it was too much and I knew it. The moment had come and I couldn’t avoid it.
“Rarity… I…” I started, my thoughts going into panic stations. I had no idea what to say.
“Hm?” she asked, blinking and unconsciously setting off all kinds of nice feelings inside me.
“I… it’s just…” Stuttering, I couldn’t manage to get anything out. She kept looking at me, and I wondered when the last time I’d breathed was.
“I’m…”
“Oh my, did you feel that?” she said suddenly, looking away with a slight blush. “I felt a raindrop.”
Her tone was rushed and I felt a sting of rejection, my eyes drawn up to the sky. She was right; the heavens were about to open so I fumbled with my bag to find the umbrella.
We walked back in the rain, sheltered by the umbrella. The moment had gone, and the intense feelings had been replaced by a slight sadness. Rarity was stood right next to me, close enough to touch, but I felt a little distant, as if I was never going to be close to her.
“We have a lake behind our house in Ponyville,” Rarity said, her eyes fixed straight ahead. “But it’s not as scenic as this.”
“Oh, huh. Must be nice to have a lake,” I replied.
“My father likes to fish in it during the afternoon. It’s quite peaceful,” she added, giving me a glance but nothing more.
There was an overwhelming feeling that I’d gone too far and I’d messed up. Conversation didn’t flow as freely as it had before, and I was kicking myself for giving in to temptation and ruining our friendship. She was probably thinking all kinds of things about me, mainly that I was putting her in an awkward position and that she’d like to get back to school as soon as possible. I didn’t blame her, I just blamed myself. Cat the idiot strikes again. We only had a little over a month left together before Rarity left, and I’d managed to make it awkward and weird. I should never have given into the feelings, I should have kept my mind off them and just thought of Rarity as a friend like she is.
We were going back to Buckingham on Saturday, and time passed quickly until then. Rarity went back to acting normal, and things seemed to be fixed. I was glad that I hadn’t completely freaked her out, but there was definitely something different about the way she looked at me. Before, she’d met my longing stares with a smile, but now she just blushed and looked away, as if I was an embarrassment to her. The train ride back to Buckingham passed with her telling me about the upcoming summer fashions and pointing stuff out in magazines, but it was far from the excited discussion I had envisioned us having. After all, it was the last time we’d get to be together until we had Miri and Fly panicking about exams around us again.
“Thank you for having me over the holidays,” Rarity said to me as we walked up the drive to the school, suitcases floating along behind. “I’ve had a really great time.”
“Me too,” I replied, meaning it. It had certainly been better than moping around in my room, thinking about her and missing my school friends.
“Ready?” she asked, a hoof on the door.
I giggled. “As I’ll ever be.”
And with that, she opened the door and we strolled inside, back to the frenzied studying of our friends and the excitement of Buckingham. I had a lot to tell Fly.
We entered May without any fanfare, and exams got started. The first week of May was a study period, with no lessons but occasional study sessions. I made the most of the free time by lying in and reading a lot during the day, and then helping Fly with her studies during the afternoon. I was almost as keen as she was for the exams to be over, so that I could have a break from reading endless flashcards. I felt that I’d memorised far too much useless information about books than I’d ever need just from helping her. Miri was in a similar state and absorbed all of Rarity’s time.
My piano lessons continued, although it was mostly Mr Bluejay listening to my progress. He was impressed with how much I had done during the holidays and encouraged me to get in plenty of practice so that I’d be perfect for the concert.
“I can guarantee that everypony will be blown away if you get this exactly right,” he promised. “I know I will.”
The nerves about the concert were starting to kick in, especially because I had to help the younger fillies in the band. They were going to play right at the start of the concert, and I’d have to get up and conduct for them.
However, they were definitely improving. We’d mastered the first piece, and I made them play it at the start and end of every practice session (which were now twice a week, with an extra hour for the beginners). The second piece was probably going to be ready by the time the concert came around, excepting the occasional mistake due to nerves.
Serenade was still admiring me as much as ever, and kept asking questions about music.
“You’ll learn that in your music lessons in the next few years,” I kept telling her, pleased that the music teacher had at least one enthusiastic pony to help. “Just keep practicing, that’s what’s important for now.”
After one of our band practices, she asked me to help her with a piece she’d been learning for her trumpet lessons. It seemed simple to me, but she was struggling with the tempo, so I played it on the piano for her and helped her with each note she was finding difficult. We made a lot of progress in fifteen minutes, which seemed to cement my status as some kind of genius musician in her mind. I left with a weird feeling that she’d been testing me to see how good I really was, despite the fact that I knew next to nothing about playing the trumpet. I wanted to tell Fly, but she was too busy re-reading books ready for her exams, which were only a few days away.
Once exams started, the stress levels went to the top of the scale. The only time I’d known everypony to be this worried was during our fifth-year exams, but even they seemed to pale in comparison. Fly seemed to literally do nothing except studying and occasionally eating, and I thought I heard Miri crying in the middle of the night once when I got up to get a drink. She stopped the moment I moved, but I was sure that the stress was getting to her. I told Rarity about this and she promised to keep Miri from frying her brains. I was immensely relieved that I didn’t have to worry about anything.
In fact, my own exams seemed to come as something of a surprise. I hadn’t been in exam-mode at all, so when I found myself sat at a wooden desk in the hall, a pencil lying on the desk in front of me, it was if I’d been abducted by aliens.
“Your English paper starts now. You have two hours.”
I surprised myself. I’d absorbed a lot from Fly’s flashcards and managed to get answers for nearly everything, although there was an essay question that I hadn’t revised and had no idea about. After two hours, I was sure I’d probably not failed.
“How did you find it?” I asked Fly as we left. English was her key exam, and she needed a top mark.
“It’s okay. We’ll see,” Fly replied, sighing. “Now I just have to focus on everything else.”
I strolled through the music exam without any studying, forgetting a couple of key terms but answering everything else. Midway through the exam I was suddenly paranoid that I might have missed something, and Princess School might actually have wanted me to do well in my exams. It wasn’t easy to suppress but I managed, reminding myself every five minutes that I was going to Princess School no matter what because of my excellent audition.
Finally I had a go at French, forgetting nearly everything and answering barely any of the questions properly. Grammar seemed impossible, so I just ignored it and wrote down whatever sounded natural in my head.
And with that, the exams were over. I spent a couple of days helping Fly with revision for her final exam, and then we were free, with an entire week to kill before term ended.
Of course, I found myself suddenly overburdened with responsibilities for the concert. The band began coming up with all kinds of obscure problems; a whole load of clarinets were ‘stolen’ for two days before they turned up in a music room, under a pile of books. Only Serenade seemed confident for the concert, and I suspected that I was because her trust in me was absolute.
“Okay everypony, this is our last practice,” I told them on Friday evening. “The concert is tomorrow, so make sure you get plenty of sleep.”
“You can play both pieces perfectly, all of you. Remember, if you do make a mistake, just find your place and carry on. It doesn’t matter.” My words didn’t seem to be all that reassuring, and most of the ponies in the band still wore worried expressions. I was sure that I’d have exactly the same expression tomorrow, so I left it at that and just made them go through both songs for the last time before the big day. They played them perfectly, to my surprise, so I gave them all a hoof-bump as they left.
“Make sure you’re ready! Bring your music and your instrument!” I said as they left. Once everything was tidy, there was only one thing left to do.
Mr Bluejay listened to me play through the entire piece. I’d worked out the kinks and, apart from a couple of mistakes which I managed to correct, I could play it just fine.
“Sounds fantastic,” he said, beaming with pride. “I’ll be sat in the audience tomorrow waiting for the performance.”
“Do you think I could come here to practice tomorrow morning?” I asked, anxious to play it mistake-free. Whatever had happened between Rarity and I, I still wanted to play it perfectly for her.
“I’m sure that’d be fine. Just make sure you help out the band, they’re counting on you to lead them,” Mr Bluejay said, putting away his clipboard.
“I will,” I said, relaxing a little and looking forward to sinking into bed when I got back to the room.
“Anyway, since this is the last time we’ll have a practice session, I’d just like to thank you for being an excellent student,” the stallion continued, smiling. “I think you’ll shine at Princess School and I fully expect to be seeing you on stage in concert in front of royalty someday.”
I blushed and shook my head.
“Just make sure you remember me so I can get free tickets,” he added with a smirk.
I got up and shook his hoof. “Thank you for teaching me.”
“My pleasure. Now, if you go and play that piece perfectly, that’s thanks enough for me. I’ll take all the credit.”
Feeling happy, I went back to the room. All of the leaving ceremonies were going to be held tomorrow, which was technically my ‘last day at Buckingham’. My parents were coming down on Sunday to pick up my stuff and take me away from Buckingham forever; instead of getting our exam results at school, they were going to post them to us. Rarity was leaving on Saturday night, and because it was so far to go from my house, I would be the last one at school, with Miri and Fly leaving before me with their parents. I was glad that I could play in the concert at the end, which I hoped my friends would enjoy (except Miri, who I knew would find it boring). The sadness about leaving school wasn’t as strong as my nerves for the concert, which was a relief.