Two Weeks Prior to the Gala
It was the most amazing incredible tremendous super-fun wonderful terrifically humongous news Pinkie Pie had ever received.
So of course she had to throw a party to celebrate. And it had been a particularly wild bash, with nearly everypony from Ponyville crammed in the front of the Cakes’ bakery, even spilling out into the street when the bakery filled, at the suggestion of a highly inebriated Mayor Mare.
Banners hung between every rafter. Balloons were tied to every surface. Hastily erected tables and marquees were set up outside to cater for the overflow. A dance floor—that had inexplicably appeared from nowhere—was filled with ponies (and one draconequus) dancing to the beats of DJ-P0n3.
And the streamers. Everywhere. Everywhere!
It was the most amazing “Hooray Twilight Asked Me To Plan The Grand Galloping Gala” party she had ever hosted. Ever!
Everypony had already left, heading towards their respective beds (or in some cases, to somepony else’s bed, after a night of drinking and frivolity). Her best friends had stayed behind to help clean up the streets, something Mayor Mare had made a proviso if Pinkie Pie was to use the public space for her bash. Although considering how much the Mayor had drunk that night, one had to wonder if she would be in any condition to protest anyway.
Pinkie was certain that Big Mac would tell her all about it tomorrow… or Derpy would, depending on if she came for her morning muffins before the farmer delivered the day’s apples.
Pinkie Pie had finished clearing away the decorations and party sundries that had accumulated in the street when the party spilled outside. She only had to clear away the inside of the bakery, then she could finally get to bed.
“D-did you need a hoof?”
Pinkie Pie jumped, gasping at a voice in the dark.
“O-oh… Hi, Shoeshine!” Pinkie responded with cheer. “I thought you left already.”
“N-no, I wanted to see if you needed any help,” the light blue earth pony replied, shaking her head.
“Awww, that’s so nice!” Pinkie Pie giggled. “I don’t normally have guests staying back to help with the clean-up.”
“I… I just like it when you invite me to your parties. It’s nice, sometimes I just feel like I’m part of the background,” Shoeshine admitted, a blush creeping up her face. “So, yeah… I just want to be able to show my thanks.”
“Awww!” Pinkie Pie darted across the room, pulling Shoeshine into a hug. “No pony should ever feel like they’re just a background pony. You’re always special to somepony, and you’re special to me! But then everypony is special to me except for donkeys who aren’t ponies but they are special to me still oh and zebras like Zecora and maybe griffins but then I’ve only ever met one griffin, and she was…”
Shoeshine blushed. Pinkie said she was special. Of course, Pinkie Pie being Pinkie Pie, she had rambled on about some nonsense, but Shoeshine didn’t care. Pinkie Pie was talking to her. And… hugging her.
It was… nice.
At least, it was, until Shoeshine felt something pull on the edge of her mane. She let her gaze move from Pinkie Pie by looking down to find the source of the irritation.
Pinkie Pie’s hoof, still around Shoeshine’s neck, was perhaps the most cracked, chipped, poorly maintained hoof she had ever seen. She gasped loudly.
“I know, right? I was saying to Rainbow Dash…”
Thankful that Pinkie Pie did not recognise the true reason she had gasped, Shoeshine breathed a sigh of relief.
It was her special talent, the care and maintenance of a well-groomed hoof. She was not one for fancy hooficures, like those hoity-toity spa twins. No! Hers were the ministrations of the working-class hoof. Stallions and mares of a more practical nature would visit her little stall, where she would file down any cracks or chips. She would carefully scrape clean any dirt caught in cracks, or gathered about the frog. And she was handy with a hammer, should anypony be in need of a good farrier.
Never, in all of her long years working with hooves—the hooves of farmers, quarry workers, travelling merchants, and other ponies who worked constantly on their hooves—had she seen a specimen so desperately in need of maintenance. Of a good filing. Cleaning.
It was almost… obscene.
Shoeshine couldn’t help but glance at Pinkie’s other forehoof.
She held her breath. It was worse.
It was so very… very… dirty.
“And so I said, oatmeal are you cra… wait, I already used that one.”
“So…” Shoeshine squeaked. “Sh-shall we get started?”
“Okie dokie lokie!”
Pinkie Pie removed her forearm from around Shoeshine’s neck, and placed it back on the ground. It landed on a small streamer of crêpe paper. It made the most satisfying crunch sound underhoof, and Shoeshine felt a cool shudder travel up the length of her spine.
True to her word, Shoeshine helped the party pony with her clean-up. They had started by pulling the streamers down from wherever they hung, a difficult process given that the two of them were earth ponies. How Pinkie Pie had hung them without the use of magic was beyond her, but that just added to the enigma that was Pinkie Pie.
Shoeshine desperately tried to ignore it, but every hooffall was echoed with that delightfully pleasant sounding crunch.
Every crushed crêpe corpse crunched under keratin echoed throughout the room, causing her to bite her lower lip.
The crêpe paper deserved it. It was dirty, disgusting detritus, and she was desperate to see the debris’ deserved destruction.
And that such dirty hooves were the ones meting out said punishment felt right.
Celestia, is it just me or is getting warm in here? Shoeshine thought to herself.
“D-d-did you want a hoof with the balloons?” Shoeshine stammered, desperately trying to keep her mind from the strange places it was going.
“Sure! That would be superific!”
Sure, it might have made more sense for them to clean the streamers off the ground before moving onto the balloons, but Pinkie Pie was the master of nonsense. Well, except for Discord—but she only ever saw him around Ponyville on days ending with ‘Y’.
Pinkie pulled a suitcase out from underneath a table. “I’ll deflate the balloons, and you can fold them,” she said.
Shoeshine went wide-eyed. Pinkie actually recycled her balloons? Though it made sense, given the number of parties that Pinkie threw, that the mare would learn to be a little more frugal. And it might have explained the few balloons sporting the words “Happy Birthday Twilight Sparkle” that were dotted around the room.
They worked in tandem, Pinkie Pie bouncing up and snatching a balloon between her teeth, untying and deflating the balloons before landing again, while Shoeshine folded the balloons and stuffed them in the suitcase. Every bounce brought with it ribbon-wrecking retaliation.
“Oooo, are we having a breathing contest?” Pinkie Pie asked. She huffed air in and out, faster and faster as she continued her bouncing motion. Impressively, Pinkie’s speed in grabbing and deflating balloons matched the heightened tempo of her own breathing.
Crunch crunch crunch.
The sound was exquisite! It was a symphony to Shoeshine’s ears… like a warm breath on the nape of her neck, or a delicate hoof tracing up her spine. Then, as suddenly as it had started, the music stopped.
“All done!” Pinkie Pie called out, as she deflated the last balloon. She turned back to look at Shoeshine, finding the mare covered with unfolded balloons, a look of frustration on her face. Pinkie Pie pawed at the ground pensively. “I’m sorry, was I not supposed to win?”
Shoeshine had done everything she could to delay it, but it was finally time to end it. What she would give to have this night go on forever. But it couldn’t. They both had to work the next day, and already she was feeling exhausted. Frustrated beyond understanding, but very, very exhausted.
“You take that side of the room, and I’ll take this side,” Pinkie Pie called out, tossing a broom towards Shoeshine. “Sweep the streamers into the middle, and we can put them in the bag.”
A trash bag sat in the center of the room. The final humiliation for those disgusting streamers. It was right that they should be discarded so callously… but not yet. She didn’t want to see them disposed of…
Not yet.
Pinkie Pie was slowing down, something that Shoeshine had never thought possible, but it was two-thirty in the morning, and even sugar-fueled party dynamos had to sleep, she guessed. The party mare slowly swept the ribbons from her side of the room towards the center. Strangely, though… every time she turned her back, the section she had completed was covered with streamers again. Maybe she was just getting tired, sleepier than she had thought. Shoeshine had already finished her side of the room, and was panting heavily; she’d obviously worked hard to make sure her side of the room was done. That made Pinkie Pie smile. Shoeshine was so nice.
Crunch crunch crunch.
Pinkie looked behind her. The section she had just finished—she was certain she had just finished—was covered again. “Hmmm,” Pinkie hummed as she examined her broom. “There must be holes in this, because it keeps leaving streamers behind.”
Shoeshine coughed, then gave a strangled chuckle.
“O~~~~~~~r,” Pinkie said, drawing out the ‘r’, “maybe it’s the streamers.” She lowered herself to eye-level with the streamers.
“I’m onto you, buddy!” She growled, poking the streamer with a hoof. It crunched at her, practically admitting its guilt. Behind her, Shoeshine let out a soft whimper. Pinkie Pie diligently swept the remaining streamers, working backwards so that she wouldn’t turn her back on the traitorous crêpe.
Soon, the two of them had managed to wrangle them into the bag. “There!” Pinkie yawned. “All done.” The garbage bag was overflowing with streamers. All Pinkie had to do was throw them in the trash and see Shoeshine off, then she could jump straight into bed. She was looking forward to its warm, cozy, fluffy-wuffy, snuggly softness.
Even Pinkie Pies need sleep.
“You should… compact those… streamers down,” Shoeshine told Pinkie, breathing exceptionally heavily. “A good party… planner… should always… be… environmentally conscientious.”
That had to be the craziest party rule Pinkie had ever heard, and she had heard them all. She had even invented a few of them. But Shoeshine was right. Mr Cake didn’t like it when Pinkie filled his trash cans with her party leftovers. So she jumped high into the air, diving into the bag of streamers, crushing and crunching them as flat as she could make them. Pinkie noticed Shoeshine yelping a little, and slowed, not wanting to frighten her friend.
“No… don’t stop… don’t… slow… down…” Shoeshine huffed. “So… close.”
A thought occurred to Pinkie as she brought the final hoof down: it might not have been the streamers who were being trixie-wixie after all.
The silence of the night air was shattered by a moan loud enough to rival the Royal Canterlot Big-O. Mayor Mare shot up from her sleeping position.
“What in Equestria was that?” she asked the once again quiet night.
“That,” a deep rumbling voice beside her said, “is th’ sound of a mare well-pleased. Ah remember hearin’ a few o’ them earlier mahself…”
A wing draped itself across the mayor’s back, and the long mane drifted before her nose. It smelled of baked goods and blueberries. Warm breath tickled her neck as a mare nuzzled her neck. “I thought you were all tuckered out. Do we have to help you to sleep again?”
Mayor Mare chuckled, and laid back down, sandwiched between the large earth pony stallion, and his petite pegasus marefriend. She let out a yawn, and allowed herself to go back to sleep.
“Good night, my little love muffins,” the pegasus whispered, before they all drifted back to sleep.