A gloomy landscape emerged before Stead’s eyes the moment he fell asleep. Slowly, stars of white and purple began to appear in the otherwise pitch black sky. As the dull landscape formed and reformed itself in front of him, a small island, full of bright pink flowers arose from the middle of a blue lake, then, a huge flower appeared on top as fast as the land was formed. Its pink petals slowly bloomed as the stars slowly became brighter the two growing in tandem. When the gigantic flower ceased its blossom, hundreds of golden sparkles began to fall from the very center of it. The gold dust quickly revealed a bed with lavender colored linen and a light purple pillow. The bed was made, all neat and tidy, but seemed as if no one had slept in it in a long time.
“W-Where am I?” asked Stead to no one in particular as the whole scene slowly halted changing.
Stead, unsure of what to do, decided to walk to the center of the pink colored island where the lavender bed was. He walked over the flowers to the top of the small hill. What he saw at the top was something that he couldn’t see from the small trail he had been standing on. He gasped and stood, mouth agape, at the sight in front of him, there, over the top of that colorful hill.
The world seemed to be constructing itself around him as different landscapes were materialized on the horizon. On the north, pure white mountains towered over smaller dark purple ones. The south was full of golden sand as it was dancing across the land, moved by a phantom wind that touched nothing but the golden dust. On his right, a tremendous forest with trees that looked like if they could reach and stroke the stars saluted him, the forest had nothing but trees and vines all over. Like pillars holding up the starry sky. And, on the left, an unending ocean with nothing more in it than pure and pristine water.
Stead looked behind him, to the path where he came from, and saw nothing. No trail, nor the patch of dirt he was standing before. The world seemed to be changing and reconstructing itself as fast as Stead moved. Every time he focused on something, another place in the world rearranged, as if alive.
“This,” he started “This must be a dream…” Stead said with a nervous laugh as he sat on the lavender bed at the center of the island.
The moment he touched the bed, the flower above the bed reacted. It moved over his head, casting a shadow large enough to cover the stars right above him. Stead walked around watching the flower as it followed him around, always right above him, until he moved off the bed. When he did that it went back to its place above the head of the pillow.
“I have had weirder dreams than this… This is, in fact, a nice one. The skies, the mountains… Even the bed seems so real…” Stead used his hooves to feel all over the lavender blankets on the bed, “maybe I should sleep here, could I sleep in a dream? And if I did could I dream in a dream? That would be interesting.”
As fast as he put his head on the bed, dozens of small and bright bubbles began to float in front of him. The flower’s shadow made it possible for Stead to clearly see the bubbles.
In one of them, he saw a black coated stallion unicorn with a gray and white mane, sitting alone on a hill. Stead slowly tried to get a better look at the familiar pony when he accidentally touched the bubble with his muzzle, causing it to explode in his eyes.
He blinked expecting the soap of the bubble to splash his face and make his eyes burn… It didn’t. He slowly opened his eyes. When his vision refocused on his surroundings he noticed the whole landscape around him had transformed in seconds and became what was inside of that bubble, a green hill over one side of Canterlot on a cold night.
The city shone like a dream. All the houses and buildings were completely decorated with a myriad of colors all over them. The stars and the lights of Canterlot performed an impressive show of lights that Stead thought only Luna could do.
Stead has been in Canterlot a couple of times before. Since it was a three days travel, he only went when the supplies were extremely low and when the harvest had only been just enough. But this city… This city was nothing he has seen before. This didn’t look like the Canterlot he had seen.
The lights shone with an almost magical aura that brightened up the night, the streets were full of life as ponies came and went to the different stores carrying dozens of bags filled with gifts to the brim wherever they went. It didn’t take too much to Stead to realize it was Hearth’s Warming Eve.
He was so absorbed by the beautiful scene. His mind cycled through memories of past celebrations with Daisy, opening gifts, the lights across the farm and the road, Stead was captive in his melancholy. Until a female voice spoke from behind him, bringing him to the present.
“I’m so sorry Midnight. They told us not to fly today because the weather team was working extra hard on those blizzards and they didn’t want any pegasi flying I mean, I’m part of the weather team why can’t I go across? I know the protocol but come on! Anyway so I had to take the train but the train to Canterlot was delayed so I had to speak with a friend of mine and luckily he was on his way here so we got to the station to pick up our bags when–” Midnight put his hoof gently on the mare lips with a warm and genuine smile.
“It’s okay, sweetie–” said Midnight while giving her a nuzzle. “Besides, I just love the view of the city over this hill…” he put his hoof over the mare’s mane. “Remember? The time we met?”
“Midnight? Like Midnight Star?” In that moment Stead’s memory kicked in. That black stallion was no doubt the old pony who lived on the other side of the road. He always did the same thing, he sat in his chair and watched as the days went by. Day after day, he just watched the flowers in his garden. It was a beautiful garden indeed, covered in flowers of all kind, red, blue, purple, almost all of the rainbow was there, and there in the center drawing focus was a pool of white roses. Day after day, he only watched those flowers… Day after day...
Stead then took a glance at the pegasi mare in front of Midnight. She had a pure white coat that seemed to shine under the star’s light. Her mane curled on the tips, blending the bright lilac stripes with her light green mane. Even her feathers were white as the falling snow and seemed carefully preened.
“How can I forget it… You almost killed me!” said the mare to Midnight while taking her hooves over her head. “Why were you flying that thing over here?! Don’t you need permission or something to do that?”
“Well… Yeah, you could say it, but if no one sees it, then isn’t illegal,” Midnight’s hoof was doing small circles on the dirt as he spoke and his eyes were darting side to side in case somepony appeared.
“I saw it, closely, very, very closely,” said the mare with her eyebrow raised.
“Is not my fault! You shouldn’t have been flying here that day! It wasn’t on the schedule!”
“Well, I decided to take a little detour from my regular route. And why did you know my schedule!?” asked the mare with an accusative look.
“I-tha-uh-that’s not the question here! You came to Canterlot for shopping during working hours, I saw the bags!” Midnight stammered as he pointed his hoof to the mare in an attempt to counter her attack .
“No you didn’t.” said the Mare with a stoic face.
“Yes, I did.”
“Then I could say, I don’t know, that you were using prototypes in a populated area, to your boss.” With a smirk, she began to draw circles in the air with her hoof, as if challenging Midnight to continue.
“Then I could say to Rainbow Dash that one of her trainees was shopping instead of doing her duties,” replied Midnight.
“Then we both will lose our jobs.”
“Then we would have to go and live in my mother’s house.”
“What!? No! Your mother hates me!” the pegasi mare yelled while her wings spread.
“Tell me somepony who doesn’t?” said Midnight with an eyebrow raised and a smug face.
“You love me.” She poked Midnight in his chest with her hoof.
“Nah-ah”
“Yes, you do.”
“Hehe… Of course, I do…” Midnight rapidly dropped the act as his face and ears dropped. “I don’t know what would I do if I lose you, Aurora…”
“Neither do I, Midnight…”
Both ponies shared a hug, so strong and full of love that caused a tear to drop from Stead’s face.
He has been fighting with the landlord for the farm, the sales dropped each passing year, he had been working so much that he was unable to recall the last time he hugged his beloved wife in such manner. They had shared many lovely moments, but he never was really present for them. His mind was always trying to solve the next problem, always in the future, and never in the present, never with her. I should have been there… I should been with her...
The moment they released from each other hooves, they both kissed. A slow and warm kiss that ended with them touching the other’s forehead with their own.
Then, with his hooves on her shoulder, he said, “Soon enough, this machine will be complete, and then, we both will buy a farm. Faraway from the city, and will live together with a bunch of foals.”
“That… That will be wonderful… But, a bunch? I’m ok with one or two maybe, but no more!” they released their embrace laughing, while Aurora spoke with a slow and weak voice, “you know? I always wanted to be a gardener. I saw it in my dreams, a garden full of colors, red, blue, purple… And in the center, an array of white roses… All of them in perfect order… In perfect symmetry...”
“I understand your obsession with symmetry, but white roses? Why?” asked Midnight.
“You seriously don’t remember?” replied Aurora dumbfounded.
“Remember what?”
“They said that the smartest ones are the dumbest, I guess they are right,” said the mare with a giggle.
“Who is the dumb one? The dumb stallion or the mare that marries that dumb stallion?”
“Touché…”
They both kissed.
As if it was their first time, but also, their last.
Midnight began to cry as the world slowly lost its color and transformed into a black and white landscape until it faded away into the dark void, carrying Midnight with him.
Stead’s eye began to shed tears as a feeling of emptiness and sadness suddenly overwhelmed him.
His heart pounded loudly in his chest.
He desperately gasped for air, but his lungs rejected all breaths he took.
As the hill became an oppressive endless darkness.
And so...
The landscape of Canterlot was no more.
He was again in the lavender bed on that hill. The bubble containing that vision of Midnight still there, but empty.
“What… What was that? It was like…” Stead’s breath was accelerated as he tried to understand that hurtful feeling that assaulted him seconds ago, “like if my heart was suddenly ripped from my body…”
His eyes focused on the lavender bed as he was trying to recover himself from what had happened. His tears poured down his face dampening his fur, falling downward onto the blanket. Catching his tears and absorbed them leaving damp patches he could feel with his hooves. The sound of tears hitting the blanket echoed in his ears, his sight was clouded by the mist in his eyes as the only thing he could see was the echo of Midnight and Aurora.
“Was that… The same stallion that lives across the road? Was that his memory? I… I had never seen that mare with him… Not in all those years since we moved in…” Stead was trying to remember one time he saw Midnight with somepony else, but no moment came to his mind. Not even on Hearth's Warming Eve. He was always alone ever since he had known him… Yet, he never looked angry or sad… He was just waiting… for something…
Or somepony...
Suddenly, a bubble appeared in front of him. One containing a very recognizable place and a very well-known mare. It was his house and his wife.
Daisy.
Stead didn’t hesitate, and after he dried his tears with his foreleg, he touched the bubble where his wife was.
The landscape quickly transformed into his house at the farm. It was like if that last few days never happened, the door was again in its place, and the room was tidy like his wife always left it. It had only been a couple of days, yet, it felt like he was in the distant future.
Stead was watching his room carefully; it was exactly as he remembered it. The magic books he left to the dust on the shelf, the perfume he hadn’t used since the last time he and Daisy went out to dinner months ago. Even the tool harness he always carried was where he left it the last time: On the floor. Like if all of the incidents with the princesses were just a dream.
Then, a soft and beautiful voice caused his ears to perk up. The unmistakable sound of his wife’s call, but something was different, his wife didn’t call him, but somepony else…
“Orchid, breakfast is ready!”
Stead trotted like lightning down the stairs to see who was she calling.
“Should I wake up daddy?”
“Sure, he must be starving.”
He froze.
There at the end of the stairs, he saw her.
A brown filly unicorn with a green and peach mane quickly ran literally through him as she went up the stairs yelling “Daddy!” again and again filled with excitement.
Stead’s heart sunk into the deepest hole it could be. That little filly has the name of Daisy’s mother, something they both had agreed to use if they had a filly, something that never happened.
“Or-chid Petal…” whispered Stead, with his shaking voice.
The filly quickly came down the stairs, and behind him, Stead Hoof.
“Is… is that… me?” He didn’t see himself as he is now, but what he was a long time ago. A stallion full of life, with a certain light in his eyes, something that he knew he had lost.
“Good morning honey,” said Daisy, “want some breakfast?”
“Hi, sweetie. I’d love to, you know how much I love your food,” he planted a sweet kiss on Daisy’s cheek.
“And you know how much I love you when you take care of Orchid for me when I need to go to the store,” answered Daisy with a smile that could melt anypony heart.
“Well… I guess that is my turn,” Stead move aside to give a warm nuzzle to his wife, and then he turned toward his daughter, “Orchid, do you want daddy to teach you some magic tricks?”
The little filly began to jump from side to side, squealing in a pitch that could easily break all the glass in the house.
“Wow, wow, easy there, young lady. First off, we need to eat our breakfast or your mom will get mad at us.”
And so, the three of them sat at the table to eat their breakfast. Stead stood on the stairs through the whole scene, watching, with his eyes bloodshot, tears freely falling. He noticed how the house was exactly the same, the figurines she collected, all his tools scattered through the floor, even the malfunctioning tractor was the same. Only one thing was different, the only thing she always dreamed of.
Their daughter.
His breath became faster and could feel how his chest tightened, it was not like the last time. His vision was dull and misty. The world seemed to slow its pace as his heart beat louder and louder in his chest. This was nothing like the last time. Now he could feel something breaking inside himself.
The scene continued for many minutes, the three were just smiling and talking about their everyday, they kept smiling and having fun, talking of how Stead almost broke Orchid’s birthday gift months ago, or the time that one of Orchid’s friends crashed against the family tractor and left a dent in it.
Stead's heart was destroyed already, he knew Daisy wanted a child, but never imagined how much, yet, she always had that smile…
That smile was what made his world go around. The only thing that could turn his day into something else, something beautiful, something magical.
She was his reason to work, to wake up… to live… He would give everything he had, everything he is, everything he could be.
Only to protect that smile.
To never watch her cry.
To never watch her suffer.
To see that smile every day, until they both died.
Yet, he felt like he failed.
He cried. His heart had been removed. Also his words. For moments, the only thing he could do was cry.
Time passed like hours as he was telling himself that it was all his fault, that he would never be able to make her dream come true. The reason why she would never be happy.
A spiral of dread began to suck him in until a voice called him.
That voice. That unmistakable voice. Daisy’s voice.
“Wake up,” said that sweet, sweet voice.
It was like if she had come to save him, to be his angel. He extended his hoof, trying to reach that voice as it became louder and louder.
“Come on sleepy head, wake up.”
And so, with his eyes full of tears, Stead woke up.
The moment he opened up his eyes, he saw Daisy’s face. Her mane was messy and all over her tired face. He leapt up into her hooves. The suddenness of the action leaving surprise written on her face..
He hugged her like he hadn’t in a long time. A warm and strong embrace, that had something else, something that was missing. It was him.
For the first time in years. Stead really could feel Daisy’s heart, pounding in chest, he notice her sweet essence once again, the same as the orchids in the garden, a smell he had forgotten, and now was taking him to his sweetest memories. He saw the beautiful colors that her mane had and how her tail had small motes of dust over it and curled perfectly at the end.
With his face planted on the soft green colored fur in her neck, he muttered:
“I don’t deserve you…”
To Daisy it was only a whisper, a sound in the wind, the futile attempt of her husband to speak was heavily clouded by his audible sobbing as he stuttered.
Daisy's chest hurt from to the strong affection her husband was showing, she was about to tell him to stop until she felt the tears dampening her fur and shoulders.
“Stead… What happened? Are you okay?” Daisy was scared that something like yesterday could be happening again.
But Stead remained silent, as he tried to regain his voice and forced himself to swallow the knot on his throat.
Several minutes passed, until he could say just one thing:
“I’m sorry…” His tears fell down his face, and all over Daisy.
“I-I’m sor-ry…” His voice was shaking, almost at the point that his words were no longer understandable.
“Please… Please forgive me…” He could only tighten his grasp on Daisy as he spoke.
“Forgive me…” Stead mustered all the strength he could to produce his next words.
“Forgive me... I can’t give you a daughter, I know you dream of having foals…I… I will never deserve you.”
The room felt in silence. Only the ceaseless sobs of Stead were audible. Daisy was in shock at what he had said. She fought to stay on hoof and not to cry, not for her, but for him. As her eyes got misty, her lips trembled, and she said in a warm and lovely voice:
“I love you, Stead… I have loved you since we first met and I love you now, more than ever… There’s nothing to forgive.”
She wrapped her hooves around him, and for a moment, they both just stood there, crying for a pain they thought had disappeared years ago. That wound, that cursed injury that marked their hearts so profoundly was, in the end, being healing. Fueled by each other’s love, just like the warm and powerful hug they were sharing.
They both released each other.
And with that smile of hers she said, “Do… do you want some breakfast?”
And so, they both crossed the broken door, and took a seat at the table. They chatted, they laughed, and they talked.
About their hopes and dreams.