In all my life, I have never felt so alone.
I stare up at the ceiling of the small room, my eyes still wet with tears and my heart still heavy in my chest. So many thoughts, so many emotions are stirring through my head, jumbling together in a big ball of questions that circulates through my mind. Never had I meant for things to be like this. The pain that I have caused my friends … it seems unforgivable. A single thought suddenly races through my head, replaying over and over before I solidly recognize what it is:
I am alone.
Hot tears begin to cloud my vision, but I force myself to hold them in.
I won’t cry, I tell myself. I must be strong.
But a single drop escapes my left eye as I roll over onto my side, fore-legs wrapped tightly around my midsection. I try not to think, just hoping that maybe - somehow - I could go back in time and change my own actions. But ultimately, I know I can’t; I must move on, keep going.
A rock forms in the pit of my stomach as I think about what happened. I had lied, broken a promise to those who love me, and now I am on my own. I hadn’t really meant anything by it. I just didn’t want my friends to worry about me. It’s my job to make ponies happy, and that couldn’t happen if they saw that I myself was devoid of that feeling of life and joy. If they were worried about me, then there would be no smiles. It’s not as if I could have helped it, this is what happens when I get sad. It’s like there’s this part of me, longing to be free: I could only hold back so long before it broke out. So I kept up the act. I pretended I was just fine, even though I was fighting with myself on the inside.
Even so, every charade must come to an end, as did mine. My friends began to see through my disguise, and they discovered my lack of joy. They saw into my dark side. And in that moment, they knew that I had lied. I question now if they really love me. The anger that flashed through each of their eyes made their disappointment apparent, and forced me to realize how much the tale that I told had hurt. I said myself that breaking a promise is the fastest way to lose a friend. And I broke a promise, a promise that I made saying that I would be honest about my feelings. Now I am a hypocrite.
How will they ever trust me again? I ask myself. Wiping away the tear, I stand and walk over to an elaborate mirror, beautifully framed, hanging on a wall on the other side of the room. Slowly sliding my eyes to my reflection, I meet my own gaze coolly.
I am a mess. My mane lies completely flat, hanging past my shoulders in thick, pink locks. Any sign of my trademark mass of messy curls had vanished with my happiness. What little makeup I had been wearing had long since been rubbed off haphazardly, shaping black smears of mascara into a gruesome mask that framed my eyes. They were very nearly bloodshot from crying earlier, and were looked downright pitiful due to my attempts to hold back the second wave of tears. The light of internal joy that normally kept my eyes aglow had completely vanished. I stand slumped over, as if I even my own body would refuse to give me support in my moment of sorrow.
I’m miserable. I’ve lost my friends, and it feels like some piece of me is gone. It feels as if I have been let down, but I know that’s not true. I only let them down, as well as myself, and now I must pay the price. It’s tearing me up inside now. I just couldn’t have been sure that my friends would ever be able to understand, which was the real reason I hid my true feelings from them.
Crazy, they would say. She’s completely insane. And then they would go away, leaving me alone. It’s just that sometimes, the darkness emerges from within me; it plays off of my emotions and preys off of my heartache. But it becomes so much worse when I am all alone…..and that’s why I never told them about this beast inside of me. Because if they saw me like this: broken, afraid, alone, they would leave me.
They still found out, though. And now I truly am alone. My greatest fear has come to life, and now it will firmly rule over me.
I look up and lock gazes with my reflection again. She stares back, eyes unblinking. Very slowly, her lips turn into a slight grin. My heart stops in cold fear. She’s mocking me, I realize.
Oh, look at you, poor filly, I hear her voice say in my head. Her voice is dripping with amusement and sarcasm. Broken, lost, alone. But you always knew you would end up this way, didn’t you?
She takes a step forward, approaching me boldly. We are separated only by the thin layer of glass between my reality and hers.
You are a disgrace to your family. You will never fit in. All you are is a liar, and you will never be loved.
As that haunting voice increases in intensity, I fall onto the floor, clenching my eyes shut and covering my ears in an attempt to block out the voice. Every fear is exposed now, and I thought about that moment when my friends walked away. Of Fluttershy’s tears, of Twilight’s face filled with anger and resentment, of Applejack’s distrust. Of every one of their broken hearts.
You did this to them, my reflection’s voice told me. It’s all your fault.
But then I remembered. I remembered the times that I spent with my friends. Everytime that I made them laugh, that I made them smile. Those times that we were together, and I just knew that I was loved. And that special bond of friendship that we had together: that was what truly made me whole.
NO. This is NOT who I am. The moment that I realize this, I feel something spark within me; not that awful being that was trying to crawl out, but instead a fiery passion filled with pure joy and happiness desperate to be set free. It was my Element, I realize; the spirit of Joy flooding through me and restoring life. It was a special sort of magic that I could feel flooding through every piece of my being.
I am not a liar.
My actions do not make me who I am.
I am not worthless, and I refuse to let those things define me.
They will not control me.
I am Laughter, I am Joy, and THAT is my true destiny.
My eyes open. Her voice continues to chant, pointing out every flaw and exposing every regret. But I am no longer afraid, because I know who I am. For one last time, I lock eyes with my reflection. She freezes, realization dawning in her icy-blue eyes.
“Some days, like today, will be dark and lonely,” I say, now stepping confidently up to the mirror. For a moment, I think I see something flicker in those eyes - terror. “But I choose not to let that control me. Now, you will never control me again.” With that, I slam my hoof into the glass. Time seems to slow down as I watch every part of her living presence shatter into a million fragments. With her death, the death of my darker self, goes every fear, every sorrow, every pain. Shards of glass fall to ground at my feet.
I begin to laugh, a sweet wholehearted sound that welcomingly meets my ears, because now I am free. No longer will fear control me.
I. Am. Alive.
My friends need me. I smile at that, a very wide smile, to the point where I am practically beaming, because I now know that my friends need me and they will always want me and love me, no matter what. I run out the door, feeling my hair spring back into its proper format.
I’m coming, I thought.
And I love you, too.