Unwanted

by Apple Blumpkin

Chapter 1 - Diamond Tiara / Apple Bloom

"Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word 'happy' would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness." - Carl Jung

Chapter 1

Diamond Tiara laid in her impressive four post princess sized bed. She had her eyes closed, and her breathing was slow and steady. She was completely still, asleep to any observer.

Diamond Tiara wished she could sleep. She was having yet another restless night. Everything was too quiet. However, her house was almost always quiet. Her father was gone on another important business trip. The hired help had all gone home, and the butler was asleep in the servant's quarters that were detached from the actual home. Her mother hadn’t been there since she was a filly... Diamond Tiara was alone in an empty house; Diamond Tiara felt empty.

Giving a small sigh of frustration, Diamond knew from experience that sleep just was not an option in the near future. Hopping out of bed and turning the lights on, Diamond headed over to a dresser and took out the pills that Silver Spoon given her to help with fatigue, Popping an extra for safe measure, as their effectiveness had seemed to drop off recently.

With nothing better to do, Diamond then spent several minutes staring off aimlessly into her dresser mirror. Nights like these were all too common for Diamond, and unfortunately, she knew just what would make her feel better. Taking out her straight razor, Diamond held it in her hoof almost reverently. She had stolen it from her father. He had several so she doubted he even knew it was missing, and if he did notice, he would probably think that the hired help had nicked it. It was a fine thing. Slim with a silver handle. Gently unfolding the razor, Diamond cradled the handle and galvanized steel blade, one in each respective hoof. Diamond Tiara held a certain likeness for the razor; she held in some regard. Of course Diamond had not named the razor or anything else equally silly, but it was still important.

Bringing the razor against her front leg, Diamond Tiara let the sharp edge slowly glide across her offered leg. With a hair of pressure over gravity, the blade went past her fur and lightly and cleanly sliced into her skin. A small, short moan of relief escaped Diamonds in reply of her action. Diamond feelt no pleasure from the act, but the sight of her own blood and the sting of the cut made the numbness recede, even if only temporarily.

Diamond feels the life rush back to her. When she did this, she wasn’t trying to kill herself, quite the opposite really; at least, that is what Diamond always told herself. As Diamond lightly cut into herself again, all of her troubles seemed to fade to the background. The sight of blood brought Diamond into the present, and the pain, while not exactly being pleasant, was reassuring. Comforting.

Deep down Tiara knew it couldn’t continue like this. Her little hobby didn’t really solve her problems; it just provided a momentary respite. Things would get worse and worse, just as they had slowly been doing up to this point. With a slight shake of her head, Diamond Tiara quickly banished such foreboding thoughts. It was better to just enjoy what relief you could find for now.

A third thin red line opened up on her leg. Diamond Tiara leans back in her chair. The euphoric release of endorphins throughout her body, mixed with the buzz of Silver Spoons attention deficit medication kicking in, was finally doing the trick.

Diamond was always careful not to cut too deep. Her natural pink coat hid the small razor thin cuts well. Only if someone touched her leg would they notice the bumps that the scar tissue made. Nopony would ever need to know. Diamond Tiara knew how to keep a secret. It was a family trait; you had to be good at hiding your skeletons. Diamond Tiara was always told to keep shameful things to herself, and she listened well.

Some would probably say that Diamond was crying out for help. It was possible, Diamond reasoned, but not likely. Diamond has been crying out for help for so long that she knew better than to expect a response. She wasn’t a stupid filly; she knew what everypony thought of her. No matter what she did it was always just excused as the behavior of a spoiled brat, typical princess bitchiness, and because of who her father was, she always got away with it.

With a physical show of effort, Diamond Tiara forced all her dark thoughts away. Now isn’t the time to think about family, friends, or life in general. Taking note of the light was shined in from her balcony door, Diamond Tiara realized it was nearly morning, and she would need to go to school soon. But first, Diamond would enjoy the sunrise. It was a small pleasure in Diamonds life, and one of the few upsides to her insomnia. On her way to her balcony Diamond reaches into her daily satchel bag and takes out her cigarettes. Curled up on an outdoor chair, Diamond enjoyed both the sunrise and her cigarette. The smoke filling her lungs along with the morning's cool crisp air.

*******

Apple Bloom looked off into the distance and noticed the sun began to peek above the horizon. Being a farm pony Apple Bloom was quite used to early mornings. Pausing in her work, Apple Bloom took a moment to admire Celestia’s sun in all its magnificence. Taking a quick look around her family’s orchard, Apple Bloom gave a satisfied nod to a job well done. She had been helping her big sis out by checking this section of the orchard for sick trees, and finding none, it was time to get ready for school.

After a quick shower and checking to make sure her homework was in her school satchel, Apple Bloom was ready to go. The walk to school was made short by the amazing day. A cool spring breeze prevailed despite the closeness of summer. In a few short weeks summer break would start. Apple Bloom could hardly wait; she and her friends would finally have the time to really devote to finding their cutie marks.

Apple Bloom gave a small sigh, her lack of cutie mark had always been a depressing issue, but it had been weighing on her particularly heavily lately. It made her feel better that her two best friends, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, were still blank flanks too. It was an odd feeling to be so happy that her two friends were in the same boat as her. Apple Bloom knew that she should want her two friends to get their cutie marks, but if Apple Bloom was honest with herself, her friend getting their marks before her was a major fear for Apple Bloom. If she was honest with herself, she would realize how selfish and shallow those feelings were. However, Apple Bloom wasn’t completely honest with herself, opting to just not think about it.

Because of her 'early to rise' sleeping habit, Apple Bloom was used to being the first one to arrive at the school house. Recently, Diamond Tiara had been increasingly beating her. Today was no different. Seeing Diamond Tiara sitting in her chair brought Apple Bloom out of her introspective thoughts. Apple Bloom didn’t know or care for the reasons for the change in Diamond Tiara’s usual arrival time, so Apple Bloom did what she usually did in these cases and ignored Diamond’s presence. Taking her assigned seat next to Diamond Tiara, Apple Bloom quietly occupied herself with digging through her satchel.

Apple Bloom was pleasantly surprised that Diamond Tiara didn’t take advantage of the current teacher free situation. The unusual occurrence prompted Apple Bloom to take a wary glance over at her school bully.

Diamond Tiara did not even seem aware that Apple Bloom had entered the room. Diamond Tiara’s hollow sleep deprived eyes were fixed forward staring yards beyond where the wall was. Apple Bloom was slightly unnerved by the uncomfortable notion of sharing a room with someone who didn’t know you were there. Suppressing a smirk for the miserable condition her bully seemed to be in, Apple Bloom interrupted the silence with a quick and sharp cough. Diamond Tiara’s eyes dilated as they were brought back to focusing on reality. Slowly turning toward the invading noise, Diamond Tiara gave a scoff of irritated recognition.

“Morning Blank Flank, what a pleasure to see you,” Diamond Tiara’s greeting dripping with sarcasm.

Coming from Diamond Tiara, the insult barely registered to Apple Bloom.

“Mornin’, Diamond,” Apple Bloom returned while rolling her eyes. Seeing as everything was back to normal, Apple Bloom took out her homework to double check her answers before class started.

“Damn, that is last night's homework isn’t it?” Diamond Tiara’s question sounding more like a statement, “I completely forgot about that.”

Apple Bloom gave Diamond Tiara a quick look then went back to her double checking.

“Hey, there is still time before Cheerilee gets here. Let me copy your answers,” Diamond Tiara demanded.

“Umm, yeah, no, that ain’t happenin,” replied an annoyed Apple Bloom.

“Shut up and give it here!” Diamond Tiara yelled as she reaches across to grab the papers off Apple Bloom desk, but Apple Bloom was quick enough to grab Diamond’s leg before she could pull the papers back to her. As soon as Apple Bloom made contact with Diamond Tiara’s leg she instantly dropped the homework and recoiled in pain. Apple Bloom could only stare at Diamond Tiara in confusion.

“Waa? Ya ok?” Apple Bloom asked on reflex.

“Of course I am OK,” Diamond Tiara quickly asserted, “Just keep your stupid dirt farming hooves off me.” Even for Diamond Tiara the insult was surprisingly venomous, but Apple Bloom was a strong filly and could take and give worse.

“Now I have to go and wash you off me,” continued Diamond Tiara while holding her leg.

Apple Bloom could only watch as Diamond Tiara left the room in a hurry. Apple Bloom collected her homework off the ground where it had somehow fallen and went back to checking her answers. The class slowly filled up and Apple Bloom put the bizarre confrontation behind her as her friends proved to be an excellent distraction. By the time Diamond came back into class just before the bell rang and took her seat, Apple Bloom had completely forgotten about the incident.

The school day passed without too much ado. When Cheerilee picked up the homework, Apple Bloom noticed that Diamond Tiara had her head down and was looking away but thought little of it. It was toward the end of the day when Cheerilee decided to seriously complicate Apple Bloom’s life.

“Now, as you are all very much aware, summer break starts in two weeks. You will be partnered up for your summer project. Over the next week you should decide what your summer project will be and confirm with me for approval.” A collective groan was the general reply of the entire class. The last thing that the little filly and colts wanted to think about was doing work over their summer. Cheerilee began to name off partners for their project. Last year Apple Bloom had partnered with Archer on their project, and truth be told, it wasn’t that bad of an assignment just time consuming. Apple Bloom waited patiently for her name to be called. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle were paired up and Apple Bloom felt an uncomfortable twinge of jealousy that they we going to work on something without her.

“... and last but certainly not least,” Cheerilee’s sing song voice hummed, “Apple Bloom and Diamond Tiara …” Cheerilee’s lips continued moving but Apple Bloom stopped hearing her words. This couldn’t be happening. Apple Bloom and Diamond Tiara turned slowly to look at each other.

“Horseapples,” both fillies mumbled to themselves.

Author's Note:

Published - 28th Aug 2012
Proofread - 10th Jun 2013 ^_^

Comments

[redactedandredacted]

After chapter one: (Yeah I'm gonna do this for all of them, ya said ya wanted feedback and you're gettin it!)

Okay. So basically I love it. Whenever I see a bitchy character I always want to know why they're that way, what makes them tick. You've created a background that makes such beautiful and perfect sense, I'm basically gonna pretend it's canon from now on. I think that having her smoke is a little over the top, but it's certainly not unthinkable.

Now, your dialogue could use some work in places. There are some places where you've awkwardly decided to avoid a contraction, like:

“Damn, that is last night's homework isn’t it?”

“Now I have to go and wash you off me.”

“Of course I am OK,”

Notice that they're all Diamond's lines, if you're doing that on purpose to try and make her sound more formal or something, it's not really working. She's still just a kid, and those should all be contracted into "that's", "I've got", and "I'm", respectively.

Also,

“Waa? Ya ok?”

I think "waa" is a weird expletive to use.

That's all that stood out though, the rest is great. Your emotional prose in particular is phenomenal.

ON TO THE NEXT CHAPTER.

[Dusty Sage]

DT into self-harm? Who knew?

This is just enough off-kilter to demand I read the whole thing.

[DaughterScrewball]

So the tensing is terrible and like Reasonandrhyme. Noted, the speaking sometimes sounds weird. That being said, everything else is pretty good. Liked and tracked

[moguera]

My critique, pick a tense and stay with it. Switching between past and present tense like that is just plain sloppy.

[FlutterWonder13]

I love it!

[Brony2893]

"shit"?
I'm not really sure I see them saying something that.
Something similar and with the same meaning...but, it just seemed a bit off in my opinion.

[ButtEater9]

This has potential, but there are a few issues:
-you switch between past and present tense way too often. You should never do that when writing, and if the premise didn't intrigue me so, I'd quit reading.
-having Diamond smoke is a bit unrealistic, but that's just my opinion.
-I find it hard to imagine either of them swearing.

The first is the only issue that really bugs me, but I'm still going to continue on to the other chapters.

[TheGreatEater]

1199551

To the author. I'd take this into consideration since I have the same problem. Especially your action words. Either a story is written in the past or in the present.

[Fervidor]

Not a bad start. You might want to cut down on the names a bit, though. It's kinda all: "Apple Bloom this and then Apple Bloom that." It's okay to write "she" once in a while.

[Ruxify]

So I put this on my to-read list many months ago, and now I'm finally reading it. Don't know why I took so long, seeming as Diamond-Bloom is my favorite ship.

Anyway, I liked it, but the smoking thing put a huge dent on my opinion of this story. Still gonna read it though.