//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1 
// Story: Fluttering High 
// by Glaive 
//------------------------------//

“Everybody else went out drinking,” she says. “It was Pinkie’s idea. I don’t really like that kind of stuff… So I stay at home.” She sighs as she takes a swig of water from the glass on the coffee table. 

You raise your eyebrow.  “…Really? Not even with all of your friends?” Her not liking to go out and do raucous party stuff doesn’t surprise you, but not when it’s with her friends. She’s always willing to open up and go out more as long as she’s with her friends. 

She hangs her head a bit in embarrassment, making herself seem small, as she usually does. “I got drunk once, and I, um, didn’t like it…” She glances at you for a moment before continuing, “I don’t remember it very well, but apparently I was kind of loud. Rarity said I was really intimidating, and I ended up tripping over a lot on the way home and waking up the next morning with a big headache.” She shakes her head decisively. “I don’t like being drunk.”

You chuckle a bit at that story, but deep down you swell with relief, you don’t really like going out binging either. “I know what you mean, hangovers are never fun. And, you know, everyone’s different right? Some just don’t have a good time when they drink too much.” She nods in agreement wordlessly, and an awkward silence begins to creep in as you both hit a conversational dead-end. “So, um, what do you usually do here while the others are out doing that then? It must be pretty boring here by yourself.” You glance over at the sleeping rabbit in the corner of the room, “…with just Angel.” 

“Well, I like to read sometimes, take walks outside and watch the sunsets and the stars with Angel and the other animals…” She tenses up again before looking at you. You’ve been together for a little while now, taking your friendship to a new level, but you’ve both been hesitant to get truly close to one another.  Being alone together like this, sharing awkward feelings, makes you feel closer, but it also makes you feel like you’re on another first date, where you do little more than make awkward silence and fidget. Also, you can’t help but feel there’s more to it than that with how she’s acting, like she’s hiding something, something that she’s excited and nervous to tell you about but still searching for the courage to do so. “And, um, there is something else I like to do…” 

Visibly shaking with anxiousness, she gets up from the couch and moves toward the nearby window. A large, seemingly empty vase sits on the adjacent shelf. She goes to the shelf and peers inside the vase, but quickly snaps out and looks at you again. “Uhm, will you promise not to tell anyone? Please don’t tell anyone…” You smile as you assure her with three words, “not a soul.” She dips her hand into the vase and pulls up a… something that looks like a little tree, with a fat branch jutting out near the bottom of the trunk. As you look closer, you notice that there’s a fairly large hole at the top of the tree-thing. No way… it couldn’t be, could it? The branch at the bottom also seems to have a hole or indention in it right at the end, which seems a little blackened from char. It is! Breaking the silence of your stare, she begins to murmur quietly, “It’s a, um, uh, a-“ 

“A bong!” You exclaim, finishing her sentence. She jumps a bit at your reaction, while Angel wakes up and bounds out of the room in fright. “Oh, sorry,” you chuckle as you get up and go over to her. “I was just… surprised.” Still reeling from the little shock and unsure how to react, she’s frozen still, trembling with the tree-bong in her hands. You try to comfort her by putting your warm hands on hers, which eases her shaking a bit. “You… you smoke too.” Her eyes suddenly light up, “you mean, you… do it too?” A massive smile starts to appear on her face, a sweet smile of relief, like a large weight has been taken off her back, telling her that you do understand her. She suddenly moves her hands away from yours and wraps them around you in a big hug. You return the hug enthusiastically.  “It’s alright, it’s alright,” you assure her, “you can tell me anything. Anything at all, I won’t be mad.” 

Breaking the hug, still smiling brightly, she holds the tree-bong up to you and asks, “shall we then?” You grin widely, “yes!” I’m getting stoned with my girlfriend!

From that same vase, she dips her hand in again and pulls out a tiny cloth bag and a lighter decorated with butterflies. Beckoning you back to the couch, she sits down and lays the bong and the little bag of buds on the coffee table. You sit beside her and watch as she gingerly pulls a bud of cannabis out of the pouch, breaks it apart, discards the stem and packs it into the “branch” of the “tree”.  Her movements are a lot more confident now, bereft of the nervous shaking that plagued her before. Something begins to niggle at your mind as you watch her, though. “Wait, do you only smoke by yourself then?” Self-consciousness starts to make its way into her voice again, “well, um… Angel watches.”  She giggles nervously, “this will be the first time I’ve done it with someone.” Almost done, she picks up her half-finished glass of water from the table and pours some of the liquid into the bong. “You can go first if you want,” she says as she offers you the bong and the lighter. 

“Sure,” you accept, light the branch, and start inhaling. A rush of burning taste enters your mouth, which is something similar to apple. You lay back, remove the tree from your mouth, hand it to her and savor the taste of the apple-flavored weed. As you let the substance elevate you, you close your eyes. That was some powerful bud. Beyond your closed eyelids you hear the bubbling sound of your girlfriend’s inhaling, followed by a short bout of coughing. Virgin lungs. “The one that makes you cough gets you off,” you mutter to her. “Mmm,” she murmurs in reply. Her voice is so sweet. You could listen to her read from a phonebook for hours on end. With your mind still floating on cloud nine, you’re surprised when you feel a pair of arms lock on to yours, and a head rest on your shoulder. 

You open your eyes, and turn your head to see her gazing right at you. So close, her dazzling seafoam green eyes (bloodshot as they may be), soft pink hair and gentle smile have you spellbound. All you can do is stare at her, as your throat still burns from the bong hit. Kiss her. Your mind nudges you. “Fluttershy… You’re so beautiful…” You manage to speak, “You’re… The most beautiful girl in the world… You’re more beautiful than the princess…” She can’t respond with words, her eyes fill with longing and love as she moves her arm to cup her hand on your cheek. Kiss her. Swimming in a weed-induced plane of contentment separate from reality, you both unconsciously move closer to each other, lost in each other’s eyes. She brings her other arm away from your side, and cradles your face in both of her hands, her nose an ant’s-length away from yours. Kiss her. 

The moment between that thought and what follows is a blur, but she makes a tiny squeak as your mouths meet, waking you to what is happening. You feel as if you’re sitting under a gentle waterfall of joy that’s pouring over every fiber of your being as you taste her, as you feel her warm palms on your cheeks, and hear the rhythm of her breath. You wrap your arms around her, holding her, clinging to her as much as you can possibly cling. Her trembling body tells you everything that words don’t need to: I want you, I need you. The kiss quenches the heat of smoke in your throat and the dryness in your mouth, while filling you with an immutable sweetness. 

Finally, after what seems like forever, your lips separate. You open your eyes, and gaze once again into those seafoam pools only to notice that her cheeks are glistening with tears, and her mouth forming another lovely smile that could melt the blackest heart. But you move into each other again, except this time she gently pulls your face onto hers, telling you that she wants more. Your tongues dance again, and that waterfall continues to flow down your back. When you separate again, she finally speaks: “You’re- You’re my everything… I love you, I love you, I love you…” Now you feel your own eyes begin to well up as you respond as best you can, “I, I want to be with you forever… I can’t imagine a day where I don’t hear your voice or see your soft smile… I want to be with you forever, I want to be with you… I love you too…” Your attempt to make a comprehensible sentence fails spectacularly, but she doesn’t care, every word meant the world to her. 

Your faces finally apart, she moves her hands away from your cheek, brings her arms around your neck, and snuggles into your chest, her hair brushing your chin. With your arms still around her, you’re as comfy as comfy can be. And as you rest against one another, happily entwined, she pulls a blanket from under the couch and spreads it over the both of you. She turns off the only illumination in the room, a lamp on the coffee table, leaving only the two of you, bundled together, with the glint of the night sky in the windows.