7DSJ: Downtempo

by Shinzakura


March 25, AM: Tea Leaf Dancers

The first thing I feel is the light around me, caressing my naked body. It feels like a soft focus, glistening against the gleaming silver of my choker and the bangles I’m wearing.

I’m in a forest glen. I know this glen a thousand times over. I’ve had picnics with my friends in this glen. I’ve partied in this glen. I…I made out with Atlas in this glen, and we started to find our way towards adulthood in this place.

I shake the images from my mind. This is supposed to be a happy place for me, a joyful place, filled with far more joyful moments than bittersweet ones. I can’t let them steal that from me. I won’t let them steal that from me!


And just like that, I feel two arms snake around my waist and warm breath against the nape of my neck. A tender kiss, and a caress of my neck. I know that perfume, it is my ambrosia. I turn and stare into those gorgeous eyes, looking at me and only me.

I feel desire coming on, but this is pure, this is elemental…. It feels…right.

I open my mouth to speak to perfection, but it’s immediately closed, as two tender lips collide with my own, tongues probing. But the sensation doesn’t last long as those lips travel elsewhere, tracing patterns across my body, fingers dancing along my skin. It feels like bliss, like nirvana, like the greatest ice cream cake in the world times eleventy infinities.

The name of this eternal beauty is on the tip of my tongue, ready to be spoken, ready to be beseeched, to plead my emotions and offer my womanhood. And yet I cannot speak, as if it would spoil the moment for eternity.

Pressure is building from within me. Wanting to flow out and to take in at once. Wanting to give and take, push and pull and let nature take its course. I briefly wonder if my other is from Venus or Mars. It doesn’t matter to me. Whatever it is, they’re all right tonight.

I look and see those gorgeous cyan disks looking at me, pleading to make things perfect. I can feel the warmth of flames caressing me, pulling me down, touching my wetness, filling me…


…and that’s when the screaming and laughter begins. It hurts, God it hurts! I look for those beautiful eyes and I see Flash Sentry expending himself on me, caring not what I feel. I feel pain from behind me and I turn to see Turtleshell, a guy I know who couldn’t get a date if his life depended on it, slipping within, making me scream.

I want to run, to shriek away, but I can’t. I feel a myriad of boys who want to be men but can never be, all of them tearing out pieces of me and stomping on my soul. I feel something settle within me, clamping down on my womb, but I don’t know where it comes from. And all I can do is scream.

I feel rough hands on me, pulling me, bruising me. I see the face of the boy I once loved, laughing at me as he spills his seed on me, cheering as Flash starts again from behind me. And all I can do is scream until finally, I feel my hair pulled up to stare into cold spring-green eyes glaring at me with a cruel smile, telling me that all I have to do to redeem myself – to make myself close to human again – is to be her slave.

To be their slave.

Royal Atlas. The boy I fell in love with. The boy who I thought would be my all, and instead took everything from me.

Sweet Cicely. The girl who I thought was my best friend. The girl I began to fall in love with. And she took whatever her brother couldn’t.

I look at them both and surrender as they claim what’s left of my soul.

And I have no mouth, and I must scream.

I jolt up in the bed, the terror thankfully retreating from my mind, even as the nausea remains. The bedsheets are soaked, both with my sweat and my wetness. I blanche at that and run to the bathroom as quick as I can, where I shut the door and void dinner’s contents from my stomach. And lunch. And probably both breakfast and last night’s dinner, too.

I want to cry. I want to go melt into my aunt’s arms and then curl up with some milk and cookies. And I know I should be ashamed of that. I’m in my parents’ home, and the only familial relationship I can feel right now is for those of my aunt and uncle. And I wonder if my mother hates me for that. I know Dad doesn’t, but Mom is a different story, an unknown quantity.

I wish Maud were here. She would be someone to talk to. My big sis understands me, maybe in ways I don’t even understand myself. Probably because she’s older, wiser and has been through it all – sowed her wild oats and can speak from the perspective of an older sibling. Something that I should do for Inkie and Blinkie, and I don’t think I ever can, because their lives are too different.

I wipe my mouth off, flush the toilet, then rinse out my mouth once more and brush my teeth, hoping that the overpowering taste of toothpaste will override the aftertaste of bile. My clothes are so soaked they cling to me like a second skin, leaving almost nothing to the imagination, and it makes me almost wretch again. I know I’m considered beautiful – I figure Atlas chose me for that reason, and being a cheerleader keeps me in tip-top condition – but right now I feel ugly and hideous and like a monstrosity. All scar tissue and bleeding wounds, a scab on the skin of life.

I look in the mirror and see my hair as straight as Twily’s. It’s funny, I don’t know how my hair is one giant mood ring as far as I’m concerned, but it’s a part of me and something I’ve come to rely upon just as much as my intuition (or as AJ’s called it, “Pinkie Sense”). My blue eyes are rimmed red from a girl who’s been crying in her sleep, and all this just reinforces my ugliness.

I know I didn’t deserve what happened to me – no person does, ever – but it’s moments like this that make me feel otherwise.

I make my way back to the bedroom, smelling the sour smell of both my sweat and the light musk of my womanhood. And I want to scream at Atlas and Cicely, I loved you both – why did you do this to me? Why did you make me so shattered and destroyed? Why did I have to fall in love with monsters? Why couldn’t I be a normal girl, instead of this thing that’s a wreck to both men and women?

I want to hate myself for being straight. I want to hate myself for being gay. I want to hate myself for both and neither and all of it at once.

Daddy, Mommy, Uncle Carrot and Auntie Cup – your little Pinkie is just one fucked up individual, probably beyond all repair.


I walk into the room, tear off the clothing and slip on some new sleepwear, pausing only to throw my old clothing into the small hamper. I then grab my phone and my headphones, because I want to call Sunny and ask for advice. Maybe because I know she’s been through the self-hate too; or maybe because I just want to hear her voice. I don’t really know.

My fingers glide along the screen and I hesitate calling her. It’s 1:30 in the morning here; it’s only 11:30 in LA, so she’s got to be up, right? Maybe I could talk to her and Tavi and see how they’re doing. Truthfully more Sunny than Tavi, and that’s not fair to her, because she’s my friend as well.

Why am I doing this to myself?

What am I doing to myself?

I need a walk to clear my head. My mother will probably give me shit about walking out at Satan’s Hour or some bullshit but I need to get out of here. I just…need to get away.

A few minutes later, I’m walking down towards the quarry, wearing jeans, a black t-shirt and my favorite black-and-red flannel shirt. It used to be Uncle Carrot’s, until he thought I looked better in it than he did, so I kept it. I’m using my cellphone as a flashlight – really don’t want to fall in the quarry to my death, k thx – and the grounds are foggy. I guess that’s just the thing about farm country: since everything around is agriculture, there’s extra moisture in the air and that means fog a lot of times. Same thing happens now and then in the Everfree, too.

I get as far as where we were having the picnic grounds when I smell an all-too-familiar smell, on the other side of the barn. Shaped like a barn, if I recall correctly, it’s where they keep both the lawnmower and the skates when people go skating on the farm pond. Dad said that the neighbors around here have kids my age, and if I know anything it’s that kids my age do stupid things. It’s like we’re born for stupidity.

Sure enough, I round the corner to the far side of the barn, and somehow, I’m not surprised by what I see: sitting there, smoking a fairly large one and drinking from a can of some cheap generic beer, is Hope. From the looks of it, she got copies of Playboy from somewhere, and given her state of half-dress, I’m glad I didn’t come earlier – from the smell, however, she certainly did.

She looks up at me, bleary-and-redeyed, with a lazy grin on my face. “Hey, y’ hungry? ‘Cause when you feast on my taco, you won’t want any other.”

Seriously, what is with this girl? I’m bi, not stupid. I cross my arms and glare at her. “What are you doing here?”

“Gettin’ lit and fucked up!” she tells me in a boisterous tone. “And if you get undressed and comfy, maybe I can get all three!”

“Not on your life,” I tell her. “Look, you’re lucky my family’s asleep. My mom’s the type of person who would call the cops on you.” Probably not my dad, but my mom, sure. “And it goes without saying, why aren’t you doing this at your place?”

“Are you fucking kidding? My mom knows where all the stash spots are. So I stashed them over here, where your folks don’t know shit about where the hidey holes are.” She grinned. “Actually, speaking of hidey holes, that sister of yours – Marble? Maybe she’d want to play—”

Triggered. And that’s a word I don’t usually use.

I bend down. “You even think that one more time and you’ll find out why older sisters tend to be protective.” I’m probably making a big mistake by threatening her; I don’t know if she can fight, and I certainly don’t know if I can. I mean, I’m a cheerleader and I take dance classes, and though I’m not proud of it, I’ve been taking those free freestyle karate courses at the community center. I tell them it’s to help with my dance exercises, and they believe it, but I haven’t told Uncle Carrot or Auntie Cup about it, because I know they’ll ask.

Fortunately for me, I guess I sounded convincing enough or Hope is so high it doesn’t matter. “Fine, fine – grass probably hasn’t grown in the field yet anyway, so I can’t use her playground anyway,” she says, waving it off. “But I bet you’re all kinds of fun in your amusement park.”

“Classy,” I droll. “Now, I’m going back to the house. I can see this spot from here, so you have until then to pack up and get off my family’s property, got it?”

She looks at me with a distinct lack of comprehension before looking down at the ground. “Fine. And here I’d hoped I could actually make a friend around this shithole.” She gets up and stretches. “You know, I thought you were being real about being a friend. And yeah, you’re hot, but I said I wouldn’t, and I meant it. I just…nevermind. You don’t give a shit, anyway.” She turns to leave and mutters, “Can’t get a fucking break in life at all.”

Something about this feels very wrong. Not sure why, but it does. And then I remember something I’d said a while back to Twi – Princess Twilight, the alien from another world that looks like Sunny’s sister. I remember those words all too well – I wish I could forget them or at least take them away.

“No! I’m never going to forgive her, no matter what you ask! I want that bitch to burn, I want her to smoke like a Goddamn cigar in the deepest, blackest pits of hell, do you hear me? She ruined my life! She’ll ruin everyone’s again! Right now, if you gave me a gun, I’d point it at her head, pull the trigger and laugh without a care!”

That day, I wanted two people to die: both Sunny and I. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I think I scared Twi a little. I’d say I didn’t mean to, but looking back on it, I meant every word of it back then. And now?

Now I look at the girl standing across from me and wonder if I’m making another mistake by pushing away. Thank God Sunny reached out to me instead or I wouldn’t have the precious friend that I do. That should’ve been a grade A lesson for me that day – maybe it was the one that Twi was trying to impart to me.

I look at Hope and say, “Look, if you need to get away for a while, I get it. It’s just…put the shit away, please? I don’t play those games.”

Hope gives me a look that makes me wonder if I’m going to regret this. “Yes, mom,” she snarks.

“Look, what you do is your life, but with all my extracurricular activities I can’t afford to screw things up for myself. So if you want to be my friend, ditch the stuff, at least for now, okay?”

She looks at me and wonders. “Fine, fine, but you owe me for this shit, okay?” she finally says. “You know how hard it is to get decent weed in this place?”

“No, and I particularly don’t care. What’s your problem, anyway?”

“As if you fucking care.”

“Try me,” I tell her.

“I would, but you won’t take off your panties.” I give her a glare that Fluttershy would be proud of (sorta), and she shakes her head. “Fine, I got what you meant.” She sat back down, popped open another beer, and then drank it, not caring about my opinion. “I want out of this wasteland of a fuck town, you know? Just can’t wait to get back home with my old man – running away first chance I get.”

“Running away? Why?”

“Because I fuck girls, okay? Because my best friend Tiramisu turned out to be a little more than besties, okay? Because Mom walked into my bedroom with my fingers in the pie – and I’m not talking mine, got it?” I look at her and to my surprise, I see a little emotion on her face – something I wasn’t expecting.

I sit down next to her and urge her to continue.

“Tira? God, she’s great, one of a kind. We were just friends, and we just seemed to match, you know? It’s just like one moment, we were just hanging out like friends, and the next, we were liplocking, and it was…well, pure.” Listening to her, I know that tone in her voice: the sound of someone in love. “And then that bigoted bitch had to break us up.”

“Your mom?”

“Yeah,” she spat, the anger clear on her face for me to see. “You know, Princess Amore may be one of the top romance writers in the country, but for being a mom? Failure, plus. Probably why my old man left her – ‘cause she only knows love just from being bullshit on paper.” The look in her eyes was bleak, another thing I’ve known in my life. “Dad probably would’ve let me stay with Tira, but not meant to be. Mom pulled me here to this fucking wasteland because she could avoid a scandal that way.” Her laughter was bitter as she added, “Yeah, as if your daughter being in love is a scandal just ‘cause she kissed a girl and she liked it.”

I don’t know what to say other than I feel her pain in so many ways it’s not funny. I know my dad would accept what I am, but my mom? There aren’t enough ways in the world to say “oh fuck no” to that. And then there’s my aunt and uncle. I really don’t know how they would react. Sure, they treat everyone with respect and dignity regardless of the usual creed, color, et cetera, but there’s them and then there’s me. The abstracts in all the world mean nothing if the stark reality is much different.

I look at her and I see myself in her shoes. If I were separated from my friends, from those I care about and…. I feel myself shudder and I wrap my arms around myself for warmth, even though I’m not really cold. After all, it’s not the air that’s pouring ice water through my veins right now.

“And your mom really hates you for that?” I ask.

Hope nodded sadly. “All I want is to be back with Tira! That’s all I want! Is it so wrong to want to be with my girlfriend?” I could see the tears in her eyes, and they were real – they had to be. I’ve seen crocodile tears before, and while I don’t exactly consider myself an expert at those kinds of things, this just seems too real. I mean, I’ve met some master manipulators in my time.

It’s scary that I know that at my age.

We spend the entire time talking right up until the sun starts to creep over the horizon. At this point she pulls out her phone and looks at it. “Well, looks like I gotta go pretend to get some sleep, so that my mom doesn’t suspect anything,” she tells me.

“Yeah, same. My dad would be okay with it, and my aunt and uncle are used to it, but something tells me my mom still thinks it’s the 1950s,” I admit. Which probably isn’t all that far from the truth – I suspect my mother, if she had a chance, would insist I wear nothing but baby-blue and pink clothing, probably festooned with balloons or something. And while I like balloons…seriously? Baby-blue and pink? What am I, some dress-me-up toy doll?

As we both stand up, she looks at me with appreciation. “You know, you’re not all bad, you know that?”

“Yeah, people kinda tell me that,” I joke.

To my surprise, she bends over and kisses me on the cheek. “It’s nice to have someone to talk to who isn’t a total retard. Thanks for listening.”

I try not to react. That was the exact same thing that Cicely had said and done to me when she was flirting with me. And like a stupid, naïve child, I didn’t get it. I don’t think Hope means anything by it, but just the flash to the past is making my skin crawl. I hope I didn’t react and I hope I didn’t give off any bad signals. That would be the worst thing right now.

Waving goodbye, I head back towards the house, and as I walk in, of all the luck, I come across my mother as she’s coming down the stairs. “What were you doing outside, Pinkamena?” she asks me.

“I’m used to going jogging in the morning,” I reply reflexively, though it is the truth. I’ve always gone jogging in the morning. For one, I like the sunrises as they welcome the new day. Plus, then I get to go home and smell the first batches baking in the ovens.

“You don’t look like you’re dressed for that,” she insists, then sniffs the air. For a minute, I pause and wonder if enough of Hope’s marijuana smoke got on my clothing and that’s what my mom’s smelling – and oh boy would I be in trouble then; even my aunt and uncle wouldn’t let me get away with anything like that. Then I remember, this is my mom, who thinks that marijuana is some sort of Spanish name, go figure.

“I went out for a walk. Didn’t bring my workout gear, and I didn’t think you wanted me to run outside naked.” Instantly I realize that is probably the worst possible thing to say.

I see Mom’s eyes narrow. “Don’t give me sass, child.” I opt to say nothing. My big mouth’s already caused me enough issues as is. “Again, what were you doing out there?”

“What, can’t I take a walk?” I’m not happy, and why should I be? My mother doesn’t trust me to even go outside! Yeah, sure, I was out all night, but it’s not like I was doing what Hope was doing! And while I don’t have any real reason to protect Hope, the fact that it would probably only make my mom even more pissed is more than enough reason for me not to say a single thing.

To my surprise, she softens and admits, “Pinkamena, I’m not so much worried about you as I am about that other girl – what was her name? Radiant Dawn?”

Hope. Radiant Hope. Why is it I know your neighbors better than you do?”

“Don’t get me wrong; Mrs. Amore is a decent enough soul, even if she does something…distasteful…for a living.” And somehow, as if that were enough to say about that, that was that. “I’m going to make breakfast. You should go wash up.”

I don’t say anything and just turn away, heading back up toward the stairs. Sleep is shot and I need to take my daily pill regimen before I....

No. Never again.

I hear a familiar, comforting chuckle and a voice say, “I see I’m not the only one who’s a creature of habit.”

I smile, reach over and hug my aunt, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “Hi, Auntie,” I tell her with all the love in the world. Maybe I should feel guilty about that. Naaaaaah.

“So what’re you doing up so early?”

“Got up to go running, realized I forgot my clothing and decided to take a walk.” I feel bad about lying to my aunt, but I need to keep my story straight. Granted, if push came to shove, Auntie Cup would believe me before she would believe Mom, but why compound bad with worse? I’m already screwing up as is.

“Well, this is a week to relax – and I should tell myself that,” she says. “Your uncle already decided to sleep in, the lazy bum.”

“Uncle Carrot deserves it. Plus, I’m sure the twins kept you two up all night,” I yawn. I really need some sleep.

“Actually, they were quiet last night, thankfully.” She yawned again, and added, “I guess I should freshen up and see if my sister needs any help in the kitchen. If I’m lucky, we can have a conversation without one of us wanting to bite the other’s head off, for a change.”

I nod at that, give her a smile once more and then head back into the room I’m using. I strip off my dew-soaked clothing – funny that I didn’t notice that earlier, go fig – and then climb back into bed. My mother would be completely scandalized to find me sleeping in my panties and bra, but that wouldn’t surprise me.

But I have to wonder, am I not giving her enough credit? Good or bad, she is my mom. And as strained as it can be at times, it is better than the relationship that some of my friends have with their parents. Lyra, for example, has parents who would get along swimmingly with my mom; at least I can take solace in the fact that my dad would stick up for me if he ever found out my sexual orientation. Then there’s Derpy, who doesn’t speak to her mother unless it’s legally required – and vice versa. If I remember correctly, her aunt (wow, a familiar pattern!) acts as her mother figure to the point that I think she mentioned that she thinks her father and her aunt are dating. But again, she hates admitting that her mother is world-famous fashion photographer Artiste Boheme.

Hrm…think I noticed a pattern here. Any of my friends who have well-known parents don’t have too good of a relationship with them. I wonder what that’s like. Makes me wonder if Flutters’ father is the same way; she doesn’t talk about him much, though she said he’s still alive.

Probably shouldn’t dwell on it, anyway.

I’m starting to drift off to sleep when I hear a chirp. I reach over to my phone and look at it and give it a lazy smile. Tavi posted a picture of her and Sunny at that swanky event that they’re attending in LA. Tavi looks absolutely gorgeous, but then I look at Sunny….

My heart stops in my chest, and I feel warm all over. I want to reach out into the picture and hold her, look into those eyes forever and…

No. I can’t. I know what this is, but I can’t! That’s the kind of thing that destroys friendships and besides, Sunny’s straight as far as I know. Besides, maybe it’s just a brief infatuation. I know Rarity thinks that I’m mistaking it for admiration of the way Sunny’s changed her stripes. Maybe she’s right and I’m letting what happened to me in the past color my actions and my opinions. Causation causes results, I think Twily would say.

And yet when I look into those beautiful aqua eyes, I just want to get lost in them forever, like a Caribbean sea I could swim in fendlessly….

I….

I….

I set the phone down, biting my lip in frustration. I know what this is, I think, and if I let it, then I could ruin us all. And I love my friends too much to let that happen.

The irony is so thick I could cut a knife with it.