Scootaloo POV
The door clicked shut, but I continued to look at the door, believing that it was still open, that I was still looking at my dad. It was only when Miss Heartsong decided to speak up that I finally realized the door was long closed.
"Go to your room." She said forcefully, her tone cold and commanding, not even turning around to look at me. "Right now."
I grumbled an inaudible response and turned around, quickly but quietly heading for the staircase, walking it up without looking back. On my way up, I could feel the glare of Miss Heartsong on the back of my head.
She didn't like me. She didn't like any foal in her orphanage, but that was alright.
We didn't like her either.
Half-way up the stairs, I could hear her opening the door to her office and shutting it with a loud thump, a sound that echoed through the whole building. She was really angry.
But I knew she wasn't going to let all of that out on me. She couldn't, or else she'd have had a problem with the princesses.
I continued my way up the stairs, my saddle bags making climbing the stairs harder than usually, navigated through the large, dimly lit floor, and soon stood in front of that depressingly familiar-looking wooden door that had the number six carved in it. I lifted a hoof up and put it against the door, pausing curtly to take a deep breath before slowly pushing it open inwards.
The door creaked as I slowly opened it, a sound that made me wince. I didn't like that sound, it was even worse than the shrill sound of hooves scraping across a chalkboard. Just thinking about it sends shivers down my spine.
A small, cold breeze hit my face when I had the door fully opened. The window on the other side of the room was wide open, white curtains slightly moving in the breeze, the obvious source of the breeze.
The room itself was just like I remembered it. It was exactly like every other room in the orphanage; white, blue-dotted wallpaper that made it look way too chippy, a smell that reminded me of old books, the wooden floor beneath my hooves, a huge drawer that stood in the corner to my left, and, finally, the two single beds on each side of the room, both with matching nightstands beside them. I was fortunate enough I never had to share my bedroom with another pony, as there were more spare bedrooms than orphans in Miss Heartsong's orphanage.
Really, I was quite happy that I never had to share my room.
I closed the door behind me as quietly as possible, not wanting to disturb any of the other foals that were, probably, already asleep.
I headed straight for the bed to my right, the bed that didn't feel like it was mine anymore. Nothing in that room was mine, even though it was. Even though I spent most of my childhood in that room, slept in that very bed I was standing by, it didn't feel like home to me. No, my home was wherever my dad was, and he wasn't there.
I craned my neck to my right as far as I was able to in order to somehow get a hold of the right bag and pull the whole thing down from my back, but my neck was just a few millimeters too short. After a few more desperate tries to reach it, I gave up and, with a sigh, fell back on my haunches, looking down at the floor sadly.
"If Dad was here, he would help me..." I mumbled to myself, sniffling and rubbing my suddenly wet eyes with one of my hooves. Slightly curious on why my hoof was feeling so wet all of a sudden, I inspected it, seeing that the small tufts of fur around it were slightly damp.
I let my hoof back onto the ground, gazing at the wooden surface directly beneath my face, were a few drops of something watery accumulated themselves. A fluid that glistened in the light that shone through the window, a fluid in which I saw my own face.
Tears, the only logical thing that sprung to my mind.
I was crying, something that rarely happened, and every time it did happen, I felt downright ashamed. I admit it, there were times where even I couldn't help myself but cry a little, like when my daddy lay on the floor with all the blood around him, but Twilight, Applejack and even Rainbow were also crying! It's okay to cry when adults cry!
But there was no adult crying, only a small, not-so-tough foal. Why was I crying for seemingly no reason? Why was it so hard to just stop crying when there was no reason to cry? I was confused on what to feel, what to think. My mind was drowning in emotions, thoughts, memories, none of them even remotely positive.
I tried to get my thoughts away from all those things, distracting myself by trying to, once again, free myself of the saddle bag, magically succeeding after just two more desperate attempts that nearly gave me a cramp in the neck. Throwing that thing over my back with the help of Sweetie Belle earlier that day had been way easier than getting it off alone, I thought with a triumphal grin on my face.
But I was only able to distract myself from reality so long.
Alone. Daddy wasn't there with me.
My face fell as reality hit me. That's the reason why I was crying, I realized. Even thinking about spending the night all alone, alone in that orphanage, away from daddy, was making me feel sad again.
Until I remembered that I wasn't totally alone.
I turned around, opened the left pocket and pulled a small, two-legged cloth doll out of it. It kinda looked like a furless ape, which managed to make me chuckle internally, but, of course, it wasn't.
Two arms, two legs, short, brown mane on top of its head, wearing those unnecessary clothes, bigger than any pony I'd ever seen; it was my daddy, or at least resembled him in some way.
It was Sweetie Belle who came up with the idea of making a doll after I told her about the problems dad was having, and how sad I was feeling. She said that I'd feel better if I had something to cuddle with, something that reminded me of him.
At first, I thought nothing of her idea. I wasn't overly excited about the idea of cuddling with a doll, especially since it was a doll, something only small fillies would cuddle with, but I gave her idea a chance. I said that we could make one, just to test her theory, under the condition that she wasn't going to tell anyone. Not Apple Bloom, not Rainbow Dash, no pony, and especially not daddy!
I was scared that he'd think I was a little filly, which I wasn't anymore.
So, after I got her to Pinkie Promise (no pony breaks a Pinkie Promise!) me that she wasn't going to tell anyone, we set to work. Sweetie managed to grab some of her sister's fabrics and sewing kit while I distracted her. Asking Rarity was completely out of the question since that would've only made her suspicious.
I carefully sat little daddy onto the edge of my bed, looking him over. I had to admit that Sweetie Belle and I really did a good job. It took us the whole afternoon, but even his small, button-like eyes had the correct color, and I briefly wondered if maybe this was our special talent. A quick apprehensive inspection of my flank told me that it, fortunately and unfortunately, wasn't.
I jumped up on the rather hard, quite uncomfortable bed and laid myself down on my back, pulling the to my chest and quickly coiling myself around it as if my life depended on it. A soft whimper escaped my mouth as I nuzzled into the doll, eyes tightly closed as I tried to imagine that it wasn't an object I was cuddling with, but my real dad.
I tried to imagine that the hard surface I was lying on was his chest. I tried to imagine his rhythmic heartbeat that managed to lull me into sleep every so often. The calming sound of his beating heart that assured me that he was well, alive, and there for me whenever I needed him.
I tried to imagine his arms draped over my back as he would sometimes do in his sleep, how secure I felt every time he did. I tried to imagine his fingers running through my fur, how comfortable and relaxing it felt.
Nothing was working, though, no matter how hard I tried. It just wasn't the same. No, everything it did was only make matters worse.
It wasn't him, it was a doll. A doll that looked like him, but just a doll.
Instead of feeling happy and secure, I felt lonely, afraid, conflicted and incredibly sad. I started doubting everything, and with each passing second, these doubts got worse. Was everything really going to work out? Was he really going to be my dad, or was everything going to fall apart, just like last time?
No! Nothing was going to fall apart, not again! He promised me that everything was going to work out, that he'd never leave me. He promised it, and I knew he was going to hold onto his promise.
...Was he really, though? Why wasn't he looking for another way to adopt me, if he really wanted to have me as his daughter? Surely there must've been something that he could've done. He knew the princesses, for Celestia's sake!
'No, bad Scootaloo!' I thought, mentally slapping myself as the reality of my own thoughts hit me. 'He risked his life for you, he loves you! He's never going to leave you!'
I rolled over onto my back, staring up at the ceiling and releasing a sad, long-drawn sigh. He wasn't going to leave me willingly, never, I was sure of that, but yet, I wasn't too sure if he'd do it unwillingly. Maybe something was going to happen to him, something bad?
Knowing my luck, something was definitely going to happen.
My eyes trailed from the ceiling over to my right side where I left the doll behind, coming to a halt on it. In the blink of an eye, the doll was back in my chest, back in the proximity of my body. It wasn't my dad, but at least it was something that remembered me of him, that, as I squeezed both of my eyes shut, somehow radiated that same warmth his body did.
It wasn't my dad, but I was going to see him in the morning, and the first thing I was going to do is see if I could coax him into redeeming that one last hug.
Not the kiss, though, because kisses are...
Bleugh.