From Russell, With Love

by lunabrony

The Mare Who Loved Me

Even Filthy Rich had to admit, his daughter had improved drastically over the last several days. Since bringing home Russell, however temporarily, Diamond had softened. She wasn't perfect, nopony was, but she longer carried such a significant aura of superiority. The young monkey, who called herself Minka, had taken up a temporary residence over at the pawn shop, where she had demonstrated a remarkable skill for pointing out forged paintings.

Diamond sat with Russell on her back, near the window on the second floor landing of her expansive home. The two had enjoyed a few games while it rained outside, and sat facing one another across a plastic board. Russell threw dice across the board, and moved a small metal unicorn.

"Aha!" Diamond announced. "I own Carousel Boutique, you owe me fifty bits!"

The hedgehog gave her a strange look. "Do you even know what you'd do if you owned a dress shop? You can't exactly work a needle," he offered.

"Obviously," Diamond said. "I'd hire other ponies to do it for me, and I'd take care of the important things. But I wouldn't own a dress shop in the first place, that's like a carnivore owning a salad stand. Anyway, you owe me. Pay up." She said the last bit with a bit too much confidence, as if she'd said it many times before.

Russell rolled his eyes, but slid several plastic bit replicas across the board.

"What do you want to do after this? We could go get some new clothes and then walk up and down the street by the marketplace and show them off."

"That's not nice, Diamond."

"I know, but I want new clothes. I have so many I don't wear, could I at least donate some of them?" She asked. "That is the right word, isn't it? Do-nate? I've never done that before." Honestly, the thought of simply giving away her things was a terrifying concept, but she had honestly been trying to improve herself. One step at a time, anyway. "Maybe we could go next week!"

Russell smiled. "That's a great idea. You should do that." He said. Then frowned. "But I'm afraid I won't be here next week."

"What? Why?"

"I told you from the start, Minka and I are due back at the pet shop. This was a sort of exchange program, and now that you've got your head on straight, there's no reason to stay here. Others need us. Besides, we live there, not here." He explained gently.

"I don't want you to go, though!" Diamond said. Russell sighed again.

"I have to. In a few minutes, in fact."

"But our game..."

"I didn't want to tell you and upset you. I'd love to stay longer, but there's a very small window that allows me to get back home. It only comes around once or twice a week."

"So you'll come visit?" Diamond asked.

"Sure, why wouldn't I? Who knows. Maybe the others will as well." Russell hugged her leg. "And don't start acting up again, I'll know." He headed for the door.

"It was nice meeting you, Diamond Tiara. You'll always be the mare who loved me." He disappeared out the door. Although Diamond tried to follow him, she just couldn't bring herself to move. Her legs felt like concrete.

"Love you too, Russell."

Author's Note:

A sincere apology to my followers for what you just tried to read.

Okay, author admission. This is possibly the worst ending ever. My own fault for that, really. This initially started just as a one chapter short story, and people liked it, so I wrote another. People liked that one, so I wrote another one. By this last chapter, I just honestly had no idea what else to do. At all. It just lost all sense of fun for me, and I knew I needed an ending so I can move onto my next story.

I apologize for the weak writing, weak story, weak everything, really. It just needed an ending. My drive for this is gone, my inspiration for this is gone, it happens. Eh, what are you gonna do. Gotta make coal before you can make diamonds.

Comments

[paintsplatter12]

The ending is all right. This is fanfiction, it's not like I'm expecting high-class entertainment. Just a cute story about ponies, and what this is. Bravo.

[MagerBlutooth]

You're walking down a narrow cobblestone road. On your way, you happen upon a fork that can take you down one of two paths. One path leads to a rigid war zone of uniformity and scrutiny that can only be found in the dreams of hardened criminals and people that own manual pencil sharpeners. The other leads to a benign, exuberant field overflowing with rainbows, talking animals, and community service, where the color black only exists to accentuate brighter colors. It's a situation that many a man would run screaming from in terror, for what manner of man could discern which of these two paths is truly the most horrifying?

It seems, however, that to a certain pink mare, this decision is beyond simple. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that she lives in the latter to begin with that makes it so. Nevertheless, it seems we have a Diamond story here with the key theme revolving around responsibility. Diamond has none, so she gets chained to a pet with the threat of military school holding the shackle in place. Over time, the shackle becomes a leash, and Diamond is merely holding it as her pet pulls her forward into a mindset bearing a little more maturity.

While I'm not actually familiar with The Littlest Pet Shop beyond the title of the show and the fact that Russell is a hedgehog, I can pick up on Russell's personality without actually having seen it myself. I find it interesting that he and Diamond initially have a Fred Flinstone-Great Gazoo sort of relationship, exchanging quips even though only one side is interested in the relationship. With the way she's forced to take care of the pet entirely by herself, it's almost like she's the only one who can see him until Silver gets involved.

I would say that the strongest part about this story is the setup. Diamond's given a reason to have the pet, and her disinterest in responsibility and general immaturity clearly show that she'd have difficulty owning one. Still, the constant threat of military school looming in the background gives her reason to try, though it's unlikely she'll genuinely improve her behavior through that alone.

And that's where the story's biggest flaw lies. Diamond's characterization at the beginning presents her as completely self-centered and condescending, caring for nothing but her own agenda. As the story goes on, that characterization slips away as she starts wanting to be more generous and responsible. Only, what caused this change? There was no discernible moment that made her change her ways. It was as if simply owning Russell made her want to be responsible. There's not even really any defining moments to explain why she changed her mind about Russell. Him getting lost at the movies could have served at that moment, but she was already showing signs of attachment before that without any explained purpose.

When it comes to portraying relationships, it's important to have 'moments' that establish changes in the relationship and show a connection between the two and the evolution of their friendship. These moments can take the form of heartfelt discussions, arduous tasks, distressing crises, or even a series of simple slice of life moments. Friendships are precious metals forged by time and experience. The more the characters go through together, the stronger their relationship seems to the reader.

Though you've pronounced this story a dead horse, I could see benefits to editing if nothing other than the ability to practice your editing. I spotted several missing words, and punctuation/capitalization errors you could fix. If you really want to improve your writing, though, I'd suggest looking into fixing your telling over showing. Several of the characters and scenes were a bit too open book.

I'd call this story a pie crust with no filling. The crust is good on its own, but it lacks the soul that gives it a strong flavor, and it comes off a bit dry. Still, if you could add that filling, it could really be something I'd call delectable.

Make the most!

[Themaskedferret]

Kudos for recognizing when thing didn't work for you. This story was cute and I think it did do better as a one shot, it felt too rushed to have a lot of impact.

That all said you did do some stuff really well. Diamond felt very well charcterized as did Silver and Filthy. Russell was also very cute and appealing and Minka was hilarious. Bravo.

[Sparkletop Rainbows]

This story is pretty good overall. It could use a little work, but it was written well.