Necessary Love

by Zurock

Chapter 10: Asymmetry

The romp about town with the Cutie Mark Crusaders had temporarily satisfied both James and Poppy, each in different ways. Consequently, after they awoke from their nap, they quickly decided to spend what little remained of their Saturday inside of the library.

The friendly evening flowed along gracefully into pleasure. Much of it they spent around the kitchen table, snacks and soda ever ready, as they shared the tale of their day with Twilight and Spike. Most of the story was told from the breathless perspective of the easily excitable Drypony, but the man didn't shy away from helpfully plugging in missing details, reworking untidy portions to be more sensible, and happily adding his own commentary every now and again.

Certain more intimate details were either omitted or only vaguely alluded to; things regarding the man's failure to acknowledge the crusaders. For James' part they were dodged out of embarrassment; expunged from the recounted tale as, he felt, not truly necessary to what was important. But Poppy never even once thought of sharing them to begin with. She focused only on the absolute best of what their day had given them.

All in all they together told a proud tale; a tale of an adventure, at least of an everyday sort.

Twilight found it inspiring, and her eager awe was reinforced only more as she watched them work together to tell their story.

She could plainly she how incredibly moved the man was that the little filly had come all the way out to Ponyville just to spend some time with him. It was not a side of himself which he had openly showed to the unicorn or any of her friends. Poppy had the remarkable power to ignite something wonderful within him, solely by being who she was. In her normal life out at Heartwood and Hamestown the spirited filly was doubtlessly many dear things to many dear ponies, but here and now she was in a fashion intimately his. And he was hers, in a same but different sort of way.

Poppy was a pony whom he could without reserve pour his undiluted affection into; somepony to love and care about, above and beyond any of the barriers built from the complications and considerations that life was so very fond of introducing. He had no second thoughts about loving her, not for any reason: pride, fear, logic, nor risk. The choice to love her came from the most base part of himself which was critical and immortal. It was all so clear and simple: he could not be a complete individual – his truest self – without being able to give love.

Poppy was somewhere pure and perfect to channel that love.

Recognizing all those great thoughts, Twilight imagined that perhaps the friendship between man and Drypony wasn't unlike herself and her many beloved friends: any one of them would have been thinner and less duly-purposed in the true absence of the others. It wasn't just about receiving friendship, it was also about being able to give it. She, and all of them, had become something MORE by having each other to give themselves over to.

As for the man: after having been shredded apart by his trip through the universal membrane, severing him physically from every love of his old life, he had now in Ponyville been building back up the friends, acquaintances, and perhaps even family necessary for love. But he was still only at the beginning of that particular journey. So to have somepony come along who, like magic, was a perfect fit for his need to love?; was perfect to resuscitate his sometimes forgotten desire to live an ordinary life?; was a perfect blessing during a time in his life that had proven unfairly hard?

Well, how lucky and exceptional was that?

And as for the other half of the special and loving friendship: Twilight couldn't say for certain what had drawn Poppy to James, nor what continued to keep the Drypony so intimately attached to him. But what was known was that the river of love between them coursed equally strong in both directions despite how short a time had been needed to dig the channel. Perhaps that was merely who Poppy was; she had similarly powerful bonds with Broken Oak and Willow Wise, after all. For a foal it was often the most natural thing in the world to simply love another being because they were there and they COULD be loved. Had she somehow innately sensed that he had been in need of unfiltered affection?

With respect to Twilight herself: witnessing the sacred relationship didn't arouse the smallest hint of envy nor stir the faintest whiff of jealousy. Of course not; she was studied enough in friendship to hold herself above such a thing.

Absolutely.

Without a doubt.

So what if she had never been able to get the same blissful light to shine out of the man as Poppy had so effortlessly done? Had never caused him to so strongly express the same incorruptible love in so outwards a way? Had never so immediately eased any of his pain and filled him with such unbounded life? She was too smart to allow herself believe in ridiculous friendship competitions!

And what would have even been the point of such petty jealousy? She believed beyond question that the man cared deeply about her and her friends. The proof was all the sincere effort he had put into befriending them! He did love them! There was nothing to fight with Poppy over!

Okay, SURE, the love he showed the filly WAS so much more loud and glaring, but quiet love was just as heartfelt and just as good! Twilight herself had hardly expressed her fullest affections for her own friends except in very special moments where it had felt right.

Besides, there were elements to her friendship with James that Poppy DIDN'T share! Like the thick complexity; the depths they delved together into philosophy, history, ethics, and anything else they could sink their teeth into! That was pretty great, right? And Poppy didn't get any of that!

So... maybe... MAYBE... in only the most fleeting and fanciful thoughts... in the idlest whims of her imagination... MAYBE only there did Twilight pretend that she would have liked to have exchanged places with Poppy, solely so that she could have released such unburdened happiness in the man whenever it would have pleased her. But never—NEVER—would she have really wanted to have sacrificed all the more intricate things that were hers uniquely to share with James.

Never. Of course not.

Secure in herself, Twilight enjoyed the evening without regret.

Mostly.

One rudimentary regret which she did have was that she had been unable find the chance to speak with the man in private about Pinkie Pie. Poppy was too ever-present, and it would have been unacceptable to have intruded the Drypony's special story time.

The first to retire to bed were unsurprisingly Twilight and Spike. Their own respective days had been adventures themselves and they jumped swiftly to sleep once the story was over and the sun was gone.

James and Poppy had more wakeful energy because of their earlier nap, and so for a few short hours into the night the man quietly helped his young friend explore the library lit softly by candlelight. The late night excursion through the dim glow was no trip out into the wilds of Ponyville, but good company and vibrant imagination made up the difference. At the very least the library's respectable collection of books was far above and beyond anything Hamestown had, and that was enough of a hook to keep the hungry filly engaged for awhile. But before too long the night's yawn also grasped them and they retired to the man's bed without waking the others.

Saturday departed, Sunday came, they rose late, and they were off again into the busy bustling of a weekend Ponyville, bearing with them the best wishes of Twilight and Spike. For the new outing they bravely sought to engage in some adventurous (if perhaps less eventful) exploring of their own. And less eventfully adventurous was indeed how it went. So much so that their absence from the library was short and they returned by the early afternoon. Regardless of such a quick result, Poppy's magnificent smile called their excursion an unequivocal success.

In the slow currents of that Sunday afternoon Twilight finally had her opportunity for privacy with the man.

Spike had somehow seized the attention of the voracious Poppy and was leading her on his own guided tour of the library, teaching the spongy filly about how the bookshelves were organized and helping her to pick out some books which she might have liked to borrow when she would eventually have to depart. Meanwhile James spent his brief release from the ever-whirling amusement park ride of a filly in the kitchen, finding respite doing mundane chores. It was while he was wiping down the table with a wet rag that the unicorn approached him.

"Here," she offered, snatching the rag from him with her magic, "I'll take care of it. Why don't you sit down and take a few minutes to catch your breath?"

"I'm holding up perfectly fine!" he mockingly protested, giving a bouncing laugh as he sat down at the table anyway. He easy squat into was slow and tired, and he didn't try to hide it. "You know, I have endurance. I can jog for miles. Or I used to be able to anyway; haven't tried in a long while."

"I'm sure you're in great shape for your age but that doesn't mean you can keep up with a pony like Poppy!" she prodded him right back. She focused on the rag as she swept it in small circles over the tabletop. Lowering her voice, she told him more seriously, "Besides... I'd... like to talk to you about something for a little bit. If that's alright?"

"Hm?" Projecting no obvious signs of anything amiss, he eased back in his chair and openly invited, "Sure. What's on your mind?"

As Twilight weighed her options the rag drove itself about on autopilot, becoming somewhat sloppy. She felt pretty strongly that, while Pinkie Pie's trouble was a very serious issue that should be addressed immediately, perhaps a building towards it smoothly might have gone over better with the man. The sudden, slight indecision clung to her for a split second and she had to shake it loose.

"So!" she perked up, choosing a convenient distraction, "I noticed that you read your letter from Princess Celestia!"

James nodded.

"You know," the unicorn hinted scarcely, "I've never really asked you before about the letters that you share with her."

"Aside from just yesterday," he teased, reminding her.

She floated the damp rag over to the sink and wrung her mild frustration out through it. Where subtlety had failed, directness would have to make due.

"What I mean is," she erased her posturing and questioned him straight, "I'm understandably curious. You told me that they're nothing incredibly important but... I'd like to hear about them anyway. Anything interesting in this latest letter?"

He thought for a moment.

It wasn't that he had any nervousness about sharing the details with Twilight; far from it, in fact. The letters' literal content held nothing of intimate personal importance. What truly slowed him was that yesterday when he had tried to explain to his friend all about what his exchanges with the Princess meant to him and Twilight had not been able to grasp his meaning. Or maybe perhaps he had not been able to have explained himself sufficiently. Nothing gave him hope that a similar effort today would have worked out any differently.

Irregardless, he held nothing back.

"I guess that depends on what you think is interesting. I mean, in the last letter that I sent to her, in addition to just replying to her even more previous letter, I wrote about some of the stuff I've been doing with you all, and what I thought about it."

Friendship reports!, Twilight immediately thought to herself. Of course! Just as she had earlier guessed!

But James' sentences chiseled away at her conclusion, each word chipping another pebble free.

"You know... like I wrote what I thought about Rarity slaving away over those special winter dresses of hers for these past few weeks. I just don't get her zeal for that sort of thing at all. That dressmaking and fine needlework just makes the tips of my fingers burn when I try it, and it's the most mind-numbingly boring work ever."

A sudden, sore guilt seeped into him and he lowered his eyes. Very quietly he tacked on, "I'm glad to get the chance to help her, though. Really, I am."

"That's what you reported to the Princess?" the unicorn incredulously asked him. She tried to set the table rag back at its resting place but it flopped over the faucet in a disorderly fashion.

Turning a thin eye to her odd choice of verb ('reported'?), he continued, "Anyway... the Princess wrote back to me that she never really managed to pick up any interest or skill in sewing either. But I already knew that, of course. You know, from that stupid tablecloth robe she made for me?" His 'gift' from the Princess only sat around in a drawer now, drawn out to be worn for sleep exclusively. "She wrote that it was the first try—I mean, obviously she was kind of joking with this—that it was the first try she had given tailoring in ages and nope, still no good at it. She also said that she really admires the ponies who can do it well. She loves some of the stuff she's seen which Rarity's made."

He shrugged a shoulder. Was this what Twilight really wanted to hear? It certainly didn't seem so; not according to her hollow stare.

Having precious little else to try, he only continued on, "She left me some advice that she said she found useful for slogging through boring tasks: try to keep your mind squarely focused on the bigger picture so you can understand what the small things you are doing really mean. She said that's how she endures a lot of the formalities she has to put up with."

And upon reflection, surely her strategy had worked for her: over a thousand years in her position of service to all ponies and she was still going strong. Maybe her nugget of wisdom could have eased the painfully long hours of stitching at Carousel Boutique if he were to have always kept in mind that he was doing it to compensate Rarity for her generosity. He endured every Tuesday in that sweatshop because he owed so much to the seamstress.

None of what James had shared seemed all that relevant to Twilight. Work habits, dress opinions, mental endurance advice; what CONTEXT allowed for such an exchange? Moreover, the casualness of his attitude towards the Princess disturbed her. WHY was he so brazen when dealing with the most royal of all ponies? He wasn't exactly the type to believe that he could get away with so disrespectful an approach to a superior, but by the color of the Princess's responses (as he had described anyway) she was quite comfortable with his attitude.

He had said before that she wasn't THE PRINCESS to him...

What did that mean?

Purely to try and recenter her thoughts somewhere with a better foothold, she asked, "What about me? Have you written to her about me?"

James immediately sat up in his chair and peered into Twilight.

"Is THAT what this is about?"

She realized too late how neurotic her question had sounded.

"N-No! I'm not worried about-... I mean, I'm just-... just curious. I'm trying to understand... why... you-..."

She had to shake her head again, as if it might dislodge the incorrect thoughts.

"This isn't about me, like that. I swear."

He leveled a scrutinizing gaze back at her, partially wary of feeding her bad habits. But she glimmered with honest light; sunshine piercing through the cloud cover on an overcast day. She was at that moment the struggling student seeking to understand, not the struggling pony cowering in self-doubt.

"There wasn't much about you specifically in this last exchange, but I have written about you before," he explained, letting a half-sigh slip past his half-smile. Briefly he had to throw his glance aside in order to ease the act of complimenting her directly, but he was hardly ashamed to admit, "You know... mentioning how smart and selfless you are. And how enjoyable it is to have somepony – a friend – to talk to about so many interesting things. And I've told her about some of the stuff we've discussed and the thoughts you've had that have surprised me. Things like that."

The praise caught the unicorn off guard, drawing a faded blush out of her. It didn't help her at all to discover what she had been seeking to know, but the gentle reinforcement felt refreshingly good and it further encouraged her curiosity.

"... And...?"

"Hehe, AND the Princess certainly wasn't surprised to hear it," James relayed to her. "In fact she had a lot of great praise of her own to share."

Then something devilish crept up in him; a secret thought that spread delight over the entirety of his face. However he only stated tauntingly, "Among some other things which she told me."

"... What?" Twilight inquired, drawn in. She could sense how harmless his sneaking around was, but that didn't keep back the tickles of discomfort.

"Well, she told me this story...," he began, squeezing every last drop of pleasure he could from Twilight's reactions. Lazily his eyes rolled around the room, he drummed his palm slowly against the tabletop while swishing his tongue across the front of his teeth; he did anything to add torturous delays to his recounting. "... It was a story about how, once... some time ago, but not all that long past... she had this particular student of hers. Very talented and gifted young filly. Hardworking. Studious to a fault. Sound familiar?"

He wobbled his insufferable eyebrows at the unicorn.

Obviously he was referring to Twilight herself, but she didn't have the foggiest clue what he could possibly have been referring-...

Wait.

WAIT!

"And... one day...," he carried on, twisting the knife, "... well, one day the Princess was tremendously surprised to find that her incredibly dedicated student was NOT where she was supposed to have been: studying her lessons. So the Princess went looking for her and... eventually, hehe... eventually the Princess found her – CAUGHT her, even – hidden away..."

He rose slightly out of his chair, leaning more and more on the table, absolutely uplifted by how Twilight's swelling dread all but confirmed the spectacularly hilarious story.

"... inside of a thin broom closest WITH A COLT!"

Tendrils of embarrassment choked Twilight and she drowned in red as her eyes receded in humiliated terror. Her forehooves came up and crashed against the tabletop as she bent forward in panicked protest, and she fought for her dignity, "T-T-That wasn't w-what happened! I m-mean, it W-WAS but it w-wasn't what it l-looked like!"

James exploded with laughter. When he had originally read the tale in one of the Princess's letters it had been no more than an endearing story; a bundle of loving and amusing memory delivered by a caring matron; something quick which had given him a smile. But seeing the story verified by the unicorn's squirming turned it entirely into something so delicious.

"Pulling boys into the closet for makeouts in the dark? Why Twilight, I never knew you had it in you!" he teased between his chortles. Then something about the thought quietly stunned him, and he dialed down his laughter immediately. He mulled, "Didn't know anypony had it in them."

Twilight barely heard him, too caught up in saving her own reputation.

"N-No! That's n-not what-! It was an accident!" she pleaded.

At last she exerted some control over herself, expelling a groan of immeasurable depth. She sat back down and paused herself, counting her breaths.

Still flushed across her cheeks, she elaborated sternly, "I was in Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns to study magic and because of that I often worked with students from the Advanced Magics Institute of Canterlot. This one student from the AMIC was having real trouble with his teleportation spell and I was just trying to help him out! We landed and got trapped in a broom closet when something with his spell went terribly wrong."

"Or terribly RIGHT!" croaked the man, livening up again. "Depends on how you look at it! You say 'accident', but maybe HE did it on purpose? It was his one-way ticket to snog city!"

"No!" Twilight maintained. Her strength returned steadily and her agitation leaked away. Still somewhat off-kilter, but showing much more firmness, she asserted, "We didn't DO anything! We got stuck and sat there in a tangle until Princess Celestia finally found us and got us out."

Light chuckles continued to bounce out of James' throat, but he finally pulled back. The space left open by his fading frivolity was filled in by happy curiosity.

"So...," he wondered, "... even though it was an accident that you got trapped in a tight closet with that guy for awhile... you STILL didn't make use of the opportunity to just get a little bit of smooching in ANYWAY?"

"Ew, no!" she spat, whipping her head back and forth. "Why would I have kissed him? It was cramped, and uncomfortable, and awkward, and stuffy. I barely knew him. And I didn't even like him!" She fumbled at the possibly-insulting interpretation of her words, trying to correct herself, "I mean-... not that I thought he-... I didn't... dislike-" Again her head swung about negatively and then she pointed a solid hoof at her tormentor. "You know what I meant! And I was quite happy having forgotten about that whole embarrassing scenario so thank you very much for bringing it up and reminding me!"

"You're welcome," he released her, amused but still bowing in simple apology. He laughed to himself for a few otherwise vacant moments as she continued to lightly fume.

The unicorn's feelings of embarrassment ebbed away (as did her desire to pick up the soggy table rag and slap him with it), and as it went it became easier to sympathize with his perspective. He saw only yesterday's mortification as transformed into today's entertainment. She'd be guilty of poking him in the same way under different circumstances. A small smile built back up on her and she relaxed.

As if to help her along James suddenly adopted a very straightforward and soft presentation, and he said, "There was a lot of love in the way the Princess wrote the story, you know? You get the sense she's proud." He nodded slowly and assuredly, but then he flinched and hastily clarified, "N-Not proud of what happened, with the closet and the theoretical smooching and everything. I mean she's proud to be your teacher."

Twilight little remaining defensive ego turned into bashful happiness. Sometimes Princess Celestia's direct praise had felt undeserved, but hearing it from a third party one step removed from the Princess herself had an extra kick of validation.

Soothed and upbeat, she falsely lamented, "Proud enough to only share the humiliating stories about me, huh?"

"Heh, like I said," the man replied, "she had A LOT of praise. The embarrassing stories are just more fun to remember."

Then, in further concession for the mild if friendly discomfort he had caused her, he offered, "You know, if you ever had the chance to sit down and talk with MY mom you wouldn't have to trick anything out of her. She'd fall all over herself to share every embarrassing story about me she had. You'd hit the mother lode; pun intended, I guess."

The thought greatly delighted the unicorn. She had already heard many stories of his past, but always from HIS perspective; no doubt he had spared himself grief wherever he could have or had embellished the details which had best ennobled him. Hopefully one day they'd be close enough that she could get him to erase the adjustments and divulge the fun, uncomfortable truths.

It was only fair, of course!

In the meantime, she felt that she had finally warmed things up enough. It was nearly time for Pinkie Pie.

Lightly Twilight ribbed the man, "So maybe you're mother would tell me more about all the trouble you get into from not being so diligent with your mail?"

"Oh, you noticed that did you?" James replied with a glance away and a sour turn of his mouth.

"You hardly have the right to pout!" she giggled at him.

He smirked; she was right of course. Her counterattack had hardly been a needling of the same degree which he had just pierced her. Thankfully she didn't know about his failure with the Crusaders; a far more ghastly failure on his part. He'd rather have her disappointed with his mail than with that.

"Yeah," he said, "I know. And I've made some mistakes before that turned out much worse than being trapped in a closet, that's for sure."

"Well, it's a sign of good character that you admit it," she responded.

She held her breath for a instant.

There he was before her, obviously reflecting on himself. And here she was, ready. They were both comfortable.

The moment felt right.

Pushing some of the flecks of anxiety down her throat, Twilight stiffened and requested, "I have something a little more important I want to ask you."

"Yeah?" Not a hint of suspicion was within him.

In her own mind she silently reminded herself that she wasn't trying to solve Pinkie Pie's problem; she was only trying to gather data.

"How have your Thursdays with Pinkie Pie been going?" she approached the subject obliquely but without any stains of deception.

His face shrugged.

"Fine."

It was the most undecorated answer she ever remembered him giving.

Ordinary. Regular. Unremarkable. Burned so completely bone-dry of anything but an everyday casualness. A stock reply ground to form by its millions of repeated uses.

It was nothing in his mind.

There was nothing.

His Thursdays had been no more than Thursdays.

"Are you... sure?" Twilight dug a smidgen further, disconcerted.

James felt mutually surprised by her enlarged reaction.

"Yeah. Why?"

"... Pinkie Pie came by yesterday," the unicorn admitted cautiously. "She was... upset about the way you two have been getting along."

Not even the most infinitesimal drop of recognition came out of him; not the faintest shadow of a clue passed over him. He adjusted his sitting, his chair scratching loudly as it shifted under him, and a host of nothingness drifted behind his eyes.

"Really?" he at last responded, full of undesirable doubt.

"Yes, really!" she immediately retorted, flabbergasted by how diametrically opposite his attitude was compared to how Pinkie Pie's had been.

Quickly she bit her lip in remorse of her fast outcry. This wasn't about laying blame and she truly didn't want to imagine that he was at fault; it was just so impossible to accept that he knew nothing about it. It wasn't easy for something to get under the skin of the unflappable Pinkie Pie, and the man... well... Applejack had said it fairly well: he wasn't dishonest but he also wasn't always transparent. So between the two of them SOMETHING was getting lost, and it would have been an incorrect approach to have assumed James was the antagonist; to have assumed he MUST be in the wrong somehow.

This was about teamwork and friendship.

She nodded her head and gave a glance in apology, and thankfully he understood how unintended her harshness had been. He nodded back.

Twilight was still hopeful for answers, and so she told him, "Pinkie was incredibly distraught. It's rare to see her so upset, and she very specifically mentioned that it was because she felt like she wasn't able to get along with you. I was as surprised to hear it as you apparently are right now. So, I have to ask... you haven't noticed anything odd during your days with her, have you? What exactly have you two been doing together?"

"No, nothing," James shook his head, answering her first question. "Or nothing outside of what I would have expected anyway. I mean, it's pretty much only ever been a bunch of baking at Sugarcube Corner and helping her throw parties for ponies around town, when she doesn't want to play silly games. That's all we've ever done. And she's always been very...," he rolled an exasperated hand through the air, "... Pinkie Pie about it all."

"What exactly do you mean by THAT?" the unicorn asked, unsatisfied with how few useful details he had given.

"You know...," he started to answer, rocking his body indecisively. There were hardly real terms with which to describe that impossible pink pony. After a painful delay where his throat seemed parched for words he finally got going, "Always so giggly and happy, and smiling. And bouncing. And singing. And dancing. And bright. And fun-loving. And high-voiced. And crazy."

Twilight's stare was unmoving. The truth be told, she would have an equally hard time choosing perfect words to describe the essence of Pinkie Pie, but his snippets certainly sounded like the usual party pony she knew. And likewise they sounded nothing like the anguished pony that had come to her door yesterday.

James went on, fading further into strange descriptors, "Uh... blue eyes sparkling with laughter. Um... cotton candy mane seems to take on a life of its own. Uh... randomly singing songs that shower sunshine across everypony she passes. She's been like that; that kind of 'Pinkie-Pie' Pinkie Pie."

"Really?" was Twilight's disappointed reply.

How... inconceivable: two sides of a two-pony story, both so opposed in every way. It was disheartening as well: if these meager results were all that SHE could get, what would happen if Pinkie Pie were to confront him?

The unicorn moaned, "She's been nothing but her usual perky self for you?"

"Yeah," the man acknowledged. "I don't know that I've ever seen her unhappy in all the time that I've been here. She's so unbelievably loaded with positive energy that I wouldn't think it was possible for her to be sad."

"Her optimism seems invincible sometimes," Twilight acknowledged, "but she's a pony like any other, with her own worries and fears."

Fears and worries that he had never seen apparently.

But... hadn't Pinkie Pie mentioned that she had approached him about her troubles, albeit indirectly? So, her quirky messages hadn't penetrated. Maybe he had been honestly confused by her unorthodox attempts at communication. It would have made sense as a reason why the pink pony would have sought Twilight's specific intervention; Twilight COULD communicate with him.

She intentionally hummed aloud, "Pinkie may be afraid to talk to you about the matter herself, which is why you might not have seen much and she came to me about it instead."

"Really?" he dubiously croaked. He snorted with dark sarcasm, "Pinkie Pie? Afraid to speak her mind?"

"I know, I know," Twilight said, "but she can be like that when something deeply bothers her. She DOES have her insecurities."

A moment of hushed thought came upon her and she lingered her gaze upon the soft bends of light painted over the silky tablecloth.

"Despite all her silliness though," she picked herself up and conveyed sincerely, "she is strong and can handle facing her fears. James... could you please talk to her yourself about all this?"

The man's initial response was less than reassuring. He pulled back slightly, his posture doing not a thing to show his doubt diminished.

"Please," Twilight requested, emphasizing hard her concern. "She's definitely suffering from something and she needs to speak to you about it. Promise me that you'll talk with her when you get a chance?"

Seeing his friend's tremendous worry displayed so openly, this time he accepted honestly. He planted a solemn hand on the table.

"Alright. I promise."

"Thank you."

Her words were reassured and comforted.

But why didn't she feel that way inside?

Their exchange finished just in time; Poppy's brilliant voice suddenly came calling from elsewhere in the library. Peppered with excitement and squeaking giggles, she absolutely had to have James come see all these books that Spike had shown her, and surely she wanted to ramble on to him about all that she had discovered during her guided tour.

Charmed immediately by the filly's spell, he rose out of his seat while an unstoppable smile of anticipation took over him. He started off with a single step but then stopped and gave Twilight a small bow farewell before he dashed away out of the kitchen.

After he had departed the unicorn also rose from her seat and plodded over to the sink. She sighed as she fixed the poorly placed rag so that it laid properly over the faucet.

Two parties; two dramatically different accounts.

Alright...

That was possible, especially when it was between a pony as unpredictable as Pinkie Pie and a man who was still lost and finding his place like James. Friendship and honesty had the power still to uncover healthy truths; they just needed to talk.

But something more vexed Twilight, painfully. It vexed her that, after having heard both sides of the story, she had found them unequal in weight. It vexed her that in her gut her scales had tipped.

It vexed her that somewhere inside she intrinsically and inexplicably felt like she trusted Pinkie Pie's words over James'.

Why?

The tape recorder in her memory played back, scratchy and indistinct:

"You are my friend. I'm... actually kind of proud of it."

"Friendship... I don't have a friendship with him, Twilight..."

"With me he's not... genuine."

"Beanstalk, he-... well... he isn't a DISHONEST fellow... But..."

Comments

[Truthseeker]

Alright, I'm all caught up. More please? I can't help it, when I find something which sparks my interest, I dive in.