Parish, Frederick, and Beauty stared across the table, mouths hanging open as they tried to process what they had just heard.
Octavia, for her part, allowed them whatever time they needed to formulate their responses as she neatly gathered pasta, carrot, mushroom, and garlic cream sauce into an easy bite. It would probably take them a good minute or two to really come to grips with the news.
“You can’t be serious,” Parish said, as always the first one to find his tongue.
“I am entirely serious.” She popped the forkful into her mouth. It was no wonder everypony raved about Marea. They would have to come back one day.
“Seriously?” Beauty asked, her voice far too loud, but that was the curse of a pony with her lung power.
“Most seriously.” Octavia gathered up another bite and considered ordering a second glass of wine. If this is how the conversation was going to go, it would be a long dinner.
“You can’t be serious,” Frederick said, echoing Parish’s sentiment perfectly, all the way down to the incredulous tone.
“Parish already said that. Do you want to try again?”
Not even the slightest hint of a smile played between them. She, at least, had been amused.
“Octavia, darling, you know that our reputation as ponies of class is part of our appeal, yes?” Parish asked, leaning across the table. “It isn’t just that we’re talented, it’s that we are refined. Sophisticated. Part of the Canterlot elite. The sort of ponies that other ponies aspire to emulate. We are the creme of the musical crop.”
“We are,” Octavia agreed, savoring another bite.
The other three exchanged glances. Glances that said many things. Most notably that Beauty and Frederick were not willing to be the ones to say what was apparently on all three of their minds. Not that she blamed them. Had she been in there horseshoes, she would not want to be the one making an ass out of herself either.
Parish drained his wine glass, probably banking on the idea that a little liquid courage might give him the strength to say what was on his mind.
Honestly, she wished he’d just hurry it up.
“It’s one thing for you to have a little... tête-à-tête while vacationing out in the country. That is practically Canterlot tradition. But marriage?”
Octavia set her fork on her plate. The little clink of metal on porcelain seemed painfully loud at the silent table. “That is generally how things progress when you decide that you love somepony, yes.”
The ice in her voice caused Parish to blanch, but, to his – or the wine’s – credit, he persevered. “You must understand, Octavia. You being so closely associated with a… with the… you getting married to a pony so... far outside our social standing would lower the stock of the quartet in Canterlot’s eyes.”
“Yes,” Frederick agreed, nodding along.
“And, right now, we really can’t afford to deal anything that might damage our reputation. We’ve only just recovered from that catastrophe at the Gala. Something else so soon and it might really be the end for us.”
Beauty said nothing, instead choosing to express her agreement with the others by very pointedly not looking at Octavia.
“Perhaps if you just waited a while longer?” Parish asked without hope. “After all, what is marriage besides putting a name on something you already have? What’s that thing that ponies say? Love need not stand on ceremony? Why make any more of it than you already have?”
Frederick continued to nod, while Beauty finally added her own hesitant noise of agreement.
Octavia savored the last bite of her pasta, the subtle bite of the garlic lingering on her tongue. “So, I take it I shouldn’t be expecting any sort of congratulations? ‘We’re happy for you’? ‘When’s the wedding’?”
The three of them endeavored to look at least a little bit ashamed.
“Octavia, you know we’re happy for you,” Parish protested. “It’s just… well… this isn’t about you. It’s about the quartet. You might only concern yourself with the music, but I’m the one getting us work. This sort of scandal will make a difference.”
“This isn’t a scandal. This is me marrying somepony I love.” She couldn’t really muster much enthusiasm in her defense, though. The end of the conversation was already in sight.
Parish, on the other hoof, seemed to be gaining momentum. “It is a scandal, whether or not you think it is, and it’s one we can’t afford right now. I’m sorry.”
All three of them flinched as Octavia set her hooves on the table. “So, I suppose I should say it has been a pleasure playing with you all?”
Swan Song laughed, the normally pleasant sound grating in Octavia’s ears. “That mare you met when we took that trip to Ponyville last year? Really? I had heard rumors that you might still be seeing her, but I never would have expected this.”
Octavia sipped at her cup of tea, enjoying the relaxing hint of jasmine. “Well, it’s true.”
She laughed again. “Oh, my poor, dear Octavia. I understand that feeling. I really do. Why, that farmhand I introduced you to? He was was quite the stallion, and I certainly would not have minded spending more time with him, but the time comes when we must be serious.”
“I am being serious, Swan,” Octavia said. That particular word was starting to irritate her.
“Oh, I’m sure you think you are.” Swan smiled and pushed a plate of orange pastries at her. “Teacake? I got them from the new shop down the way. Rave reviews.”
“Thank you.” The little pastry proved to be sickeningly sweet, just the way Swan liked.
“Like I was saying, though: a marriage like that has no chance of succeeding. Even if we ignore the very real possibility that she’s just some sort of gem digger—”
Octavia chose not to dignify that with a response.
“—how would it work? Will you be teaching her how to blend into high society? Proper etiquette at dinner parties? How to dress?”
“She’s not a yak, Swan. I imagine she could handle Canterlot.”
“I think you’ve been spending too much time away from home, Octavia. Even if you trained her to behave—”
“She is not a dog either!” Octavia snapped, her teacup spilling as her hoof hit the table with far more force than intended.
Swan levitated a napkin over to dab up the mess. “You’re right. A dog wouldn’t get invited to dinner parties just so ponies could gawk at her.”
Octavia opened her mouth to protest, but stopped herself. No matter how much she wanted to pretend that the ponies of Canterlot were the better breed they claimed to be, Swan was right. They could play their parts perfectly, and they still might end up as nothing more than a sideshow, the eternal targets of endless idle gossip. “Sorry.”
“It is no trouble at all dear,” she said, refilling Octavia’s teacup. “I have gotten quite used to your recent eccentricities. But you see what I mean? Your manners have already started to slip. Could you imagine if that little outburst had happened at one of Silver Frame’s parties? You would never hear the end of it. It is better that… well, as they say, what happens in Las Pegasus stays Las Pegasus.”
Was it possible that Octavia had ever ever been this shallow and vapid? “What if I don’t care what the rest of Canterlot thinks?”
Swan laughed again. “Oh, don’t pretend you’re above all of this, Octavia. Of course you care. You’re one of us. One of Equestria’s movers and shakers. The ponies with a direct line to the princesses. Your family owns… what, eight percent of northern Equestria?”
“Ten,” she corrected, entirely on reflex.
“See?” Swan said, giving her a knowing look that caused Octavia’s cheeks to heat. She then offered her another teacake. “I am sure she is a wonderful pony and you had a lot of fun with her, but Canterlot is full of wonderful ponies – ponies who would not leave you a social pariah.”
Octavia shook her head. “Fine. Then we’ll stay in Ponyville. Nopony there would care.”
“Oh, I can just see it now! Octavia in rustic-chic. Or would you go with street-chic?” Swan tittered inanely and clapped her hooves. “Either would look positively wonderful on you. Oh, why not both? You could wear overalls and dye your mane to match hers? Wouldn’t that be something?”
This time Octavia managed to only jostle the teacups as she placed her hooves on the table and pushed her chair back. “Thank you for the lovely teatime, Swan.”
“Don’t be like that, Octavia. It was a joke.”
“Oh, well that’s all right then,” Octavia said, her voice laced with enough sing-song sarcasm to kill an ursa major. “After all, why wouldn’t it bother me that my friend considers my happiness a joke?”
Swan rolled her eyes. “Really? Your happiness? I would give it a year, tops, before you got bored with her and started to regret it.”
The table rocked as Octavia almost threw her chair back into place. “Then I won’t waste your time by sending you an invitation.”
Octavia’s mother sat on the couch opposite her, sipping from her favorite silver-rimmed porcelain espresso cup. She had hardly said anything since Octavia had been shown in, no doubt waiting for the delivery of whatever news it was that would bring her not-so-prodigal daughter home unannounced.
For her part, Octavia continued to stall. “This tea is delightful, Mother. Rize?”
“Nilgiri,” she said. “You’ve lost your sense of taste.”
“Ah. Yes, you’re right. That it’s Nilgiri.” Octavia’s eyes fell to the floor. It was probably not too late to just lie and claim that she had wanted to check on her mother’s health before she left for another extended vacation. Another conversation like the last couple might be too much.
“I suppose that is inevitable when you spend all your time slumming it, though.”
Octavia started. “What?”
Her mother snorted. “Do you really think that I don’t know what you’ve been up to, Melody? It is bad enough to have my only daughter wasting her time fooling around with a mare, but some ex-Manehattan club tramp at that? Your father must be rolling over in his grave.”
“She is not a tramp,” Octavia managed in what was, against all odds, a level tone.
“How many other ponies has she told you she’s slept with?”
“Mother!” Octavia protested, her face starting to burn.
“That is not a number, Melody.”
“And I will not be giving you one!”
She snorted again as she finished her espresso and returned it to the silver tray on the coffee table that separated them. “Well, let us hope you haven’t caught anything.” Before Octavia could think of how to respond with anything more coherent than screaming, her mother continued, “So, what is this nonsense that I hear about marriage? Has the gossip mill been running wild, or have you completely lost your mind?”
Octavia’s hooves shook as she held the teacup in front of her, trying to decide whether she should put it down to avoid breaking it or continue trying to drink in the hopes that it would give her enough time to gather her thoughts and answer in a civil manner.
Lacking an answer, Octavia’s mother provided her own, “Completely lost your mind, then.”
“I plan to propose to her the next time I am in Ponyville, yes.”
“That is unacceptable,” her mother said with all the assurance in the world that just saying it made it true. “We possess one of the grandest lineages in Equestria. If you think I will welcome that tramp into our family, then you are sorely mistaken.”
The teacup fell to the floor and shattered, forgotten as Octavia brought both hooves down on the coffee table hard enough to crack the surface. “Stop calling her that!”
“Shall I not call a spade a spade?”
“You don’t know anything about who she is, what kind of pony she is, what she’s done, what she’s like…” Octavia’s forelegs shook as she leaned against the table, unwilling to let the tears building behind her eyes free. “Why can’t any of you just be happy for me? I have found somepony who loves me as much as I love them, somepony that I want to spend the rest of my life with, but the only thing that matters to any of you is the propriety of it!”
Her mother stared at the table for a long moment before she met Octavia’s eyes again. “That is because we are trying to look out for you, Melody. Do you really think this little fling of yours will have some storybook ending?”
Taking a deep breath, Octavia squeezed her eyes shut. She wouldn’t cry.
“No. She’ll leave you once she has what she wants, and by then you’ll have burned every bridge you have here in Canterlot.”
“She. Is. Not. Like. That.” The tick-tock of the ancient grandfather clock pounded in Octavia’s ears, thunderous in the silence that followed her statement.
Her mother eventually sighed. “Melody, let me make this easy for you: it is either her or me. If you insist on continuing this insanity, then I will not have anything to do with it. It is as simple as that.”
No matter how hard Octavia tried, she couldn’t stop the tears any longer. Her voice hitched. “Fine.”
Vinyl blinked as she stood in the doorway, cerise eyes gleaming like gems in the moonlight, her mane even more of an unruly mess than usual. Her magic gripped the headphones she was wearing and pushed them down to her neck. Despite the surprise, it only took a second for her face to break into a manic grin. “Yo! Tavi! I thought you weren’t coming ‘till next week.”
“I had a sudden change of plans,” Octavia said, fidgeting as the overstuffed saddlebags and cello case pressed awkwardly against her spine and ribs. “I’m sorry I couldn’t call ahead. If you’d rather I find somewhere else to stay tonight—”
“Tavi, love, it's fine. What kind of marefriend would I be if I didn’t welcome you into my bed whenever you wanted?” She winked at her as she levitated the cello case off Octavia’s back and deposited it inside. “Sweet Celestia you brought a lot of stuff. You planning on staying forever this time?”
Octavia laughed, despite feeling the faintest hints of tears threatening the corners of her eyes. “Maybe.”
“Well, no better time to start then the present! Don’t just stand there, come on, come in! Oh. And, um. And pretend the mess isn’t here.” Vinyl’s grin went sheepish, even as she chuckled to herself. “I’ve been super busy the last couple weeks, so I’ve sorta let things get out of control. I was totally gonna clean before you showed up. And shop.” She made a noise in the back of her throat. “Right. You eat already? Because I really don’t have anything besides the mac and cheese I was gonna make. It should be enough for both of us, but it’s the instant—”
Dumping her saddlebags on the floor, Octavia didn’t let her finish. She didn’t care. Wrapping her forelegs around Vinyl’s neck, she pulled the unicorn close and kissed her. There was only the briefest moment of resistance as Vinyl tried to figure out what was happening, but once she did, she returned the gesture with equal enthusiasm.
Octavia eventually broke the kiss, but only because was she was sure that one of them was going to suffocate if she didn’t.
The unicorn panted, beaming that way only Vinyl knew how to beam. “So... that’s a big yes on mac and cheese?”
Octavia gave her another, much more restrained, kiss on the muzzle even as her heart pounded with wild abandon in her chest. “Vinyl, will you marry me?”
She blinked, then stared at Octavia, her mouth hanging open for just a moment as the words no doubt worked their way through her brain. “Uh... yes? I mean, yeah. Yes!”