//------------------------------//
// Second 
// Story: How to Disappear Completely 
// by shortskirtsandexplosions 
//------------------------------//

	"This second girl you met must have meant a lot to you," Soarin' said.

"Only because she didn't try," Flash exhaled.  "In fact—although she wore her heart on her sleeve—it was obvious to me that it was in a different place altogether."

"I'm guessing that didn't stop you from making the first move."

Flash bit the corner of his lip.  "I didn't... make a move.  That is, not really."  He stared into the mountains, smiling listlessly.  "I just couldn't.  Any sudden action... any impulse... and—I swear—it would just break her."

"As delicate as they come, huh?"

"No, not really.  It's more like..."  Flash fidgeted.  "...I didn't really know how to go about doing it.  And... and I didn't want to mess things up for her... like things were screwed up for me."

"You were past your first marefriend at that point?"

"Definitely.  Although..."  Flash rubbed the back of his neck.  "Our breakup didn't happen overnight.  We just... gradually starting seeing each other less.  She'd stop calling me.  And... uhm..."

Soarin' was silent.

"I just... figured... that she had lost interest.  Or... more appropriately... I was no longer of use to her."  Flash took a deep breath.  "And I felt so relieved by that... and then I felt bad for feeling relieved... and then I felt bad for feeling bad over being relieved.  Because..."  He looked over at the other stallion.  "Being with her was no bed of roses."

"I figured as much."

"I stayed with her as long as I did because I felt that it was the best I could ever get... and that something that I couldn't taste, touch, smell, or feel was somehow right.  I was just... too stupid to realize how stupid I was."

"I'm sure we've all been there, dude."

Flash shook his head.  "Not like this."  His eyes shut.  "There was more to her than I ever could have imagined... more to who and what she was... where she came from... what she was capable of..."

"Yeesh.  You make it sound like she was an evil monster in disguise or something."

Flash chuckled... perhaps a bit longer than he intended to.  When he opened his eyes once more, he was smiling bitterly.  The tone of his voice changed as well as the topic.  "Without her, I was so... lost.  It was like I had been whisked away to some crazy desolate wasteland and I couldn't find my way back.  But then... when she showed up..."

Soarin' smirked.  "Miss Second, I presume..."

Flash nodded.  "I no longer cared if I was lost.  After all, I had been 'found' before... and we both know how that turned out.  But with this girl?"  He sighed warmly.  "I thought... here was my chance to find someone myself.  Here was my chance to show someone else what it meant to be happy... to be appreciated... to be loved."  As a cold wind blew, he hugged himself and leaned back against the rocky landscape.  "Here was my chance to show someone all of the wonderful things that I was never shown... simply for the sheer beauty and inspiration that they bring to this world."

"That's... a lot to put on a pony," Soarin' said.

Flash nodded.  "I know.  And yet... it meant a lot to me.  Because from the first moment that I saw her... from the first moment that feeling in my heart was kindled... I felt something so precious and so warm that I wanted to protect it and worship it with every fiber of my being."

A few silent seconds permeated the moment.

Soarin' gazed at him anxiously.  "What happened?"

Flash's ears drooped hard.  "Nothing."

Soarin' raised an eyebrow.  "Nothing?"

Flash nodded... exhaled... and produced:  "Nothing."

Silence.

Flash eventually continued:  "She vanished... only to come back once in a full moon.  Literally.  And... she made no attempt to contact me.  She made no attempt to look at me.  She didn't even write... say my name... ask where I had been.  She just... stopped existing... and because of that, I started wondering if maybe my feelings for her should never have existed in the first place."

"I hate to break it to ya, bro," Soarin' said.  "But it sounds like she didn't put as much stock in you as you did in her."

Flash winced.

Soarin' cocked his head to the side.  "Unless... she gave you signals that—"

"It doesn't matter what she did... or said... or implied," Flash muttered.  "You're right.  I did put too much stock in it.  When she was around me, she wasn't swooning.  She was just... innocent... and full of life.  It was me who saw signals where there weren't any."  He looked at Soarin'.  "It was I who placed her on a pedestal that she didn't even know existed."

"Still, you could—perhaps—put some of the blame on her," Soarin' said.  "If nothing else, mares do love stringing us guys along."

"No."

"Not at all?"

Flash shook.  "Because I've known the problem all along."

"And what's that?"

"Being in love with her wasn't what was so important to me," Flash confessed.  The skies above High Paw turned clearer in their naked blueness.  "It was merely the idea of being in love."  He hung his head.  "And I fell for that hard."