“I’m sorry, Bon-bon isn’t with us anymore.”
Lyra frowned. She could only just about see over the desk and at the receptionist, who was giving her a patient smile. “What do you mean. Did she get adopted?”
The receptionist put on a pair of red glasses that were hanging around her neck, and turned to the computer. “Afraid not. She moved to a private boarding school for the gifted and talented.” She typed something in before shaking her head. “Unfortunately we weren’t told where or what it is exactly.”
“...Oh.” Lyra desperately tried to hide the panic and confusion erupting in her stomach. “Do you know when she’ll come back.”
The receptionist gave her a weak smile before taking off her glasses again and leaning over towards her. “Well, that’s the thing. We’ve been told she won’t be coming back.”
“Honey, it’ll be okay. Everything's going to be okay.”
Lyra hugged her mum tightly as she continued to cry into her chest. She kept on being passed tissues every few seconds to blow her nose into. “I-I just don’t understand why she didn't tell me,” she whimpered.
Lyra’s mum began to stroke Lyra’s hair softly. “I’m sure she didn’t mean to. It could have happened on very short notice. Maybe she just didn’t have the time.”
Lyra blew her nose again and continued to cry. She wasn’t satisfied with the answer. “It’s not fair.”
“I know it’s not fair, honey, but sometimes life isn’t.” She gave Lyra a reassuring smile. “But you have other friends, and you’ll make more.”
Lyra groaned. “I don’t want them. I want Bon-bon.”
Her mum nodded understandingly. “I know. She was your best friend for so long, but you’ll soon find yourself a new one.”
“Bon-bon wasn’t just my best friend.” Lyra managed to stop sobbing for a moment to look at her mum. “I think I liked her. Like, liked her liked her.”
There was a moment of surprise, but her mum gave her a warm smile before bringing her in for an even tighter hug. “Oh, honey, it’s okay,” she said softly. “I know heartbreak can hurt, but you’ll get through it.”
Lyra sat alone in the canteen. She never used to come here to eat, as she’d normally take her pack-lunch to see Bon-bon, who also had her lunch break from her private school at that time.
But, seeing how that was no longer an option, she ate her lunch by herself and continued to stare out of the canteen window.
“Hey, you’re Lyra, right?”
She turned to see three girls standing next to her and couldn't help but give them an inquisitive smile. They were a colourful group. The one in the middle was standing confidently with a large purple afro. The one to her left was oddly colourful with her scruffy clothes in colours that clashed, standing shyly and with an innocent smile. And to her right was a smallish girl with short red hair and a bright green jacket.
“Yeah, that’s me,” Lyra replied
“Great, I’m Blueberry,” the one in the middle said. “This is Derpy and Raspberry.” She motioned to her left and right respectively. “We saw you sitting by yourself and decided to come over and introduce ourselves.”
Lyra smiled at the odd display. “It’s nice to meet you,” she said cheerfully.
“We were wondering if you wanted to come sit with us and the gang. I think you know Octavia already.” She motioned behind her towards a group of people including Octavia, who gave her an awkward wave.
“Yeah, we have music class together.”
“So what do ya say?” Raspberry said.
“Sure, sounds good.”
There was a cheesy celebration from all three girls before they led the way to their table. She decided to sit next to Derpy and on the opposite side to Octavia who gave her an apologetic look.
“I’m really sorry about them,” Octavia said with a little disapproving look in their direction. “They don’t mean to be intrusive but they left before I could stop them.”
“It’s fine,” Lyra said nonchalantly. “I actually thought it was pretty sweet.”
“Hah, told you so.” Blueberry smirked. “I’m going to turn this place into a safe haven for the socially inept and you’re not going to stop me,” she said, as if quoting the words from somewhere.
“Oh please, Lyra is hardly socially inept,” Octavia countered. “She could have sat down with anyone if she’d wanted too.”
“Come on, just admit you're mad because I was right again.”
“Nah, me and Micro Chips have been friends since forever. It would just be weird.”
“Hmm.” Cloudkicker leant back slightly, resting herself against her room's wall. She was facing Raspberry, who was sitting on the floor with her. “What about that boy you have your dance classes with, Silver?”
“No no no no, definitely not,” Rasberry said with a serious look on her face. “That is one ship that will never sail.”
“Alright, you don’t have to get defensive.” She turned her head left to face her bed. “What about you Lyra?”
“Huh.” Lyra had spent the last ten minutes laying on Cloudkicker’s bed while reading one of the comics from her shelf, not really paying any attention to the conversation going on next to her.
“Is there any boy you’re interested in?” Cloudkicker repeated.
“I’m not interested in boys,” She said nonchalantly before returning to her book.
“Come on Lyra,” Raspberry said with a little laugh. “You’re thirteen now. You’ve gotta start thinking about this kind of thing.”
“I do think about that kind of thing,” Lyra corrected, “just not with boys.”
They both gave Lyra a confused look that she rolled her eyes at.
“I’m into girls,” she said, flipping to the next page.
There was a moment of pause with both of Lyra’s friends giving her a surprised look. To her quiet relief there was no negative gut reaction from her friends, they just hadn’t expected it.
“Wait,” Cloudkicker said, frowning as she suddenly found herself drifting into a deep thought. “That’s a thing?”
Raspberry ignored her and focused on Lyra. “How come you never told us?” she asked.
“It’s no secret. I just tend not to talk about it.” She then gave Raspberry a serious look. “Just don’t go around telling people.”
“Yeah, of course,” Rasberry said with a nod. “You seem very confident about it though.”
Lyra shrugged. “Both my parents know and they’re super supportive. Sometimes a tad too supportive. My dad told me he’d still beat up anyone that broke my heart even though they were a girl. I can’t tell if that’s sexist or progressive.”
“Wow, I had no idea.” Raspberry thought for a second. “How did you find out that you were, you know?”
Lyra hesitated. “I have—” She stopped again. “I had a crush on this girl a few years ago. Once I accepted that, the rest kind of fell into place.”
“Oh, what happened to her?”
“Erm, it’s not the most fun of stories, but she—”
“Oh no.” Cloudkicker suddenly interrupted. “I think I like girls too.”
“Derpy, are you alright?” Lyra asked softly.
Derpy, who was putting her coat into her locker, turned to face Lyra. Her eyes were red and her body shaking. She gave her best attempt at a nod before returning to her locker.
Lyra sighed, but then moved in closer. “Listen, if you need anything, anything at all, just give me a text. I’ll come running.”
Derpy turned to face her again, giving her a weak little smile which Lyra was only too happy to return.
This lasted a few more moments before Derpy glanced behind Lyra and her face flashed with fear. She quickly turned around and started walking down the hall.
“You know you’re far too nice to her.”
Lyra stiffened as the familiar sly voice echoed through her body. She turned slowly to see the smirking face and familiar leather jacket of Sunset Shimmer.
Sunset moved closer, causing Lyra to press up against the lockers. “I mean, what would everyone say if they thought you were friends with someone like her?”
Lyra put her hands behind her back as she felt her fists begin to clench, but stayed silent.
“Not only that but what would people say if they heard about your little secret.”
Lyra’s eye twitched.
Sunset continued to smirk at her for a couple more moments, before turning away and carrying on down the hall. Lyra glared at her as she went.
Once she had turned the corner, Lyra let out a long sigh and began to lean on the locker. She stayed like that for a while.
Lyra closed her locker and turned around to see Curly Winds by the lockers opposite, talking and laughing with the boy he sits next to in his English class. Lyra wasn’t sure of his real name, as everyone just called him Wiz Kid.
Lyra could hear them perfectly from where she was standing, and she smiled at their cute small talk. Wiz would every so often let slip a compliment which would cause Curly to blush and brush it off before complimenting Wiz on something he said was more important.
Curly was definitely more adorable than flirtatious. Unfortunately, due to the fact both of them were incredibly shy when it came to this kind of thing, the conversation would most likely go nowhere.
Wiz Kid eventually did leave, as he needed to go to some after-school activity, leaving Curly to give him a little wave off, before coming over to join Lyra once he saw her.
“It looks like someone's got a secret admirer,” Lyra teased as he joined her.
“What?” he said with a blush. “He’s just being friendly to me. He doesn’t actually have a thing for me.”
Lyra raised an eyebrow. “I was talking about Wiz Kid’s secret admirer.”
“Oh.” He started scratching the back of his head. “How did you know?”
Lyra giggled. “I have these great things called eyes and they have this amazing ability to spot things that are painfully obvious.”
“Ah, yeah, that’ll do it.” He let out an awkward chuckle.
“I wouldn’t worry though. Another thing that’s pretty obvious is his thing for you.”
Curly Winds seemed surprised at the comment. “I don’t think so,” he said with a sigh. “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t even swing that way.”
Lyra shrugged. “Yeah, I mean what do I know. It’s not like I know anyone who I could talk to confirm this theory of mine. No one like his sister who I sit next to in science for example.”
Curly winds paused for a moment, giving Lyra a sceptical look. “Are you messing with me right now.”
Lyra kept up her confident smile and a blush slowly began to appear on Curly’s face.
“Go get ‘em tiger,” she said.
Curly hesitated for a moment, but then gave her a confident nod and began jogging down the hall.
Lyra smiled as he left. She had hoped he would be able to figure that one out himself, but she had gotten bored of waiting. She hated seeing opportunities like that slip through people's fingers anyway.
With a satisfied smile, she turned around to make her way home but was immediately stopped by the presence of someone behind her.
Sunset Shimmer was standing a few meters away from her. It looked like she was smiling at her but then she panicked once Lyra turned to face her.
There was a moment of stillness as neither of them knew what to do. Eventually, Lyra decided on just turning around and heading out the longer route.
“Lyra, wait,” she heard Sunset call after her.
“I really don’t want to hear it,” Lyra snapped, continuing forward.
“Lyra please.”
She was stopped by a yank of her arm and turned to see Sunset holding on to it. She glared at it and then moved the glare to Sunset who promptly let go with an apologetic look. She kept her glare but did not start moving again.
Sunset took a breath and forced on a confident look. “I needed to say I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything that I did these last few years.”
Lyra gave her a look of disbelief. “Is that it? You’re sorry? Great, it’s good to know you feel bad for being a crappy person.” Lyra turned once more to keep walking.
“And thank you,” Sunset blurted out.
Lyra turned back towards Sunset with an inquisitive look. “Thanks for what?” she asked.
Sunset hesitated. “Listen, I know I’ve done terrible things and using your sexuality against you is one of the worst, but since the Form Formal, seeing you be so open and confident about it again gave me the courage to do the same for the first time. Towards my friends that is.”
The feeling of anger focused towards Sunset dulled and she relaxed her body. “So you’re also like that?”
“Yep,” Sunset said awkwardly. “Kinda knew the whole time as well.”
Lyra sighed. “Sunset, I know you’re really serious about making amends, but right now, everything you’ve done, it still hurts. I think you’re just gonna have to wait till it stops.”
Sunset nodded. “That’s fair.”
Lyra gave her a weak smile. A few more moments passed in silence before Lyra began to walk home once more, leaving Sunset to stand there for a bit longer.
“What’s wrong with Lyra?” Cloudkicker asked.
Lyra was slouched over in her chair, staring at her phone that was placed on the canteen table. Her eyes were wide and she remained perfectly still as everything continued around her.
“She’s been like this for ten minutes already.” Octavia, who was sitting opposite Lyra, looked up from her food to check on her. “Apparently some ghost from her past has jumped back into her life.”
“What am I meant to do,” Lyra suddenly said. “I said I would text her. I can’t text her. I haven’t seen her in years.”
“Steady on there Lyra,” Cloudkicker said, sitting down next to her and putting her arm around her. “Who is this person exactly?”
Lyra gave her a worried look. “You remember I told you about that girl I knew when I was little?”
“Erm, oh, you mean your first crush?”
Octavia looked up from her food, suddenly interested. “You mean the one who made you realise you were gay? She’s back?”
“Yes, her.” Lyra pushed her head into her hands. “I thought I’d never see her again. How am I meant to deal with that?”
“I wouldn’t worry about it. It’s been like seven years or something. You don’t have a crush on her anymore, right?”
Lyra brushed off the idea. “Yeah, I’m being silly. It’s been years since I’ve even thought about her properly. I’ve been over her since I was twelve.” A flash of horror spread across her face. “Oh no, I still have a thing for her!”
Cloudkicker laughed. “Oh come on. You can’t be serious.”
“Don’t make fun of her,” Octavia interjected. “Often seeing someone after a long time can bring back the feeling you had for them. I can only imagine it’s worse for first crushes.”
“I don’t need you to analyse me, Octavia. I need you to help me.”
“Relax,” Cloudkicker said, standing up once more, “you don’t need the help of Miss Single over there when you have the relationship expert ready and at your service.”
Octavia frowned. “Cloudkicker, you’re single too.”
Cloudkicker picked up an orange from her food tray and smirked. “I wasn’t talking about me.”
Without warning, she threw the orange across the canteen. It hit Curly Winds, who was sitting two tables down with his friends, on the back of his head. He turned around to see Cloudkicker motioning him over to her.
He rolled his eyes with a sigh before saying goodbye to his friends and moving over to them.
“You have really got to stop getting his attention like that,” Octavia said bluntly. “He’s only a few seconds away.”
“What do you want Cloudkicker?” Curly asked once he arrived.
Cloudkicker frowned. “Is that how you say hello to your favourite friend.”
Curly smirked. “But I haven’t said hello to Lyra yet.”
“That’s a bit harsh, but seeing how you’re so fond of her, I guess you can’t really refuse helping Lyra in her moment of need.”
“How so?” Curly asked, glancing over at the awkward looking Lyra.
“Lyra’s in need of some serious romance help and we are all going to spend all of lunch figuring out the perfect text for her.”
Octavia frowned. “I need to go practice.”
“You can have one day off dammit.”
“Okay… are you guys sure it doesn’t sound too weird?”
“Please, just send it,” Raspberry practically begged. She had been lying face down on Curly’s bed for the last ten minutes.
“Come on now. Don’t act so negative,” Curly said, entering his room with a plate of teas he had brewed for everyone. “We all said we’d help Lyra make the perfect text.”
Lyra didn’t pay much attention to Raspberry’s moaning; she was far too stressed. When the lunchtime brainstorming failed to produce any results, everyone who was free agreed to meet up after school to help finish the job. They had decided on Curly’s house simply because it was the closest to the school.
“While I agree that was the promise we made, I didn’t quite imagine such a commitment,” Octavia said. She looked very deflated in Curly’s desk chair. “I’d also like to add we’ve had many satisfactory versions of this message, including this one.”
“Rubbish,” Cloudkicker exclaimed. She still had more energy than everyone else combined. “Yes, we’ve had to redo it a few times.” She put the latest paper with rough text idea’s into the bin which was already full of them. “But we can’t rush this kind of thing.”
Cloud moved over to the still panicky Lyra and rapped her arm around her shoulder. She gave the text a little read over before giving Lyra a confident nod. “It’s great. Very you. That’s the most important part.”
Lyra gave Cloudkicker a little smile. Cloud had told her she was free to do this, but she knew she had skipped football practice. This last little bit of encouragement gave her the confidence to make up her mind.
She took a long breath and then hit send.
“I did it,” she said with a long sigh of relief.
Everyone gave a little cheer, with Cloudkicker bringing her into a hug. Octavia, despite having seemed quite deflated, looked quite pleased with the outcome. Raspberry just cheered “I’m free,” with a weak little fistbump.
Curly moved over with two teas in his hands, handing one over to Lyra. “You did great,” he said with a smile.
“Yeah,” Cloud agreed, releasing her friend from the hug and taking her tea from Curly. “We’ll soon have you with this mystery girl, even if it’s the last thing we do.”
“It may just be,” Raspberry joked. “And I thought Curly was slow with this kind of thing.”
Curly chuckled. “Got there in the end though.” He took a sip of his tea and thought for a second. “But speaking of mystery girls, have you heard about the new girl who everybody’s talking about.”
“Oh have I,” Cloudkicker moaned. “I’m in her P.E. class. Saw her now famous pull-up endurance test first hand. I’ve been trying to get her to join the football team ever since.”
“I’ve only heard of her from Wiz. He’s in her maths class. Apparently, they’re trying to get her on some gifted and talented list but she keeps turning them down.”
Lyra had indeed heard many of these rumours about said mystery girl but had never seen her personally. It was then a thought hit her. “Wait... this mystery girl, is she the same girl that saved Derpy from those bullies?”
A wave of harsh silence washed over the room, with everyone suddenly avoiding Lyra’s eyes. She almost regretted bringing her up.
“Yes,” Raspberry finally said. “When I heard about it I went around looking for her. Apparently, Micro Chips had seen it happen and he pointed her out for me in the canteen. She was sitting next to Derpy. She always is. They’ve become good friends.”
Next to each other. Lyra hadn’t really paid much notice to it before, as seeing Bon-bon had been all that could occupy her mind at the time, but now that she thought about it, wasn’t Derpy with her?
“This mystery girl, what’s her name,” Lyra asked.
“Bon-bon,” Raspberry confirmed. “Have you met her?”
Lyra stayed quiet for a moment. “No. No, I haven't.”
The phone showed that there were still no new messages.
Lyra had been checking her phone so often the past week it had almost become a nervous tick. Every little buzz gave her a sudden rush of excitement, only for it to disperse once she saw it was spam or some other notification.
She looked up from her phone at her friends around the table. The whole gang was here with the exception of the berries (Raspberry and Blueberry still got annoyed at Lyra’s nickname for them). They were discussing, as they had been for a few days now, their present for Derpy.
Lyra had watched the whole Derpy’s surprise party business carefully, seeing it all unfold in detail. Conversations between each of her friends and Bon-bon had ended in each of them agreeing to help out in the secret party, and once they found out they were all in on it, Pinkie pie had suggested they all work together to think of a gift for Derpy.
Of course, it was pretty easy for Lyra to see that the strange coincidences of it all didn’t add up, even if her friends were too focused on the job at hand to stop and think about it. She imagined the berries would get there invites to the secret circle soon enough.
There wasn’t any need for Lyra to add anything to the discussion. She wasn’t part of the plan and, in reality, shouldn’t even know about it as Bon-Bon had sworn them to a strict secrecy. Unfortunately for that part of the plan, Cloudkicker always told Lyra everything.
Lyra reached into her bag and picked out a letter. Looking through it, she couldn’t help but smile. Pinkie pie had been secretly delivering party invitations to everyone in the school all day, and hers had just been the same as others.
Before Bon-Bon, Lyra had been the person Derpy was on best terms with. They had texted a fair bit and been friendly whenever they saw each other. Unfortunately, with Lyra’s best friends being Derpy’s old group, it greatly limited just how much time they could spend together.
This surprise party, while she was more than willing to admit that she was still quite nervous about it, could end in Derpy once again moving into her old gang like the old days. Even the idea of that brought a gleeful grin to Lyra’s face.
Though, this idea also made her extremely worried. If Derpy was hanging around with her and everyone, then would Bon-Bon come with? The thought seemed unlikely; she had never been the most sociable person. In their childhood, she never knew of her having any other friends, and now she hadn’t seemed to have made bridges with anyone other than Derpy.
But her main source of worry was whether Bon-bon would even want to hang around with her specifically. It had been five days and she still hadn't replied. What if she didn’t want to be friends again? What if she didn’t want to see her? What if she had found out about her feelings and it freaked her out?
Any one of those ideas made Lyra feel a bit sick.
The music changed. The fast-paced beats of some random pop-song faded out to be replaced with a slower, more familiar love song.
“This is an interesting playlist,” Lyra said slyly, stepping forward as she did so.
Bon-Bon shot an annoyed look behind Lyra before trying to cover it up with a weak smile. Her blush was definitely noticeable even with the dimmed lights, and as Lyra moved closer, she could almost see her flinch back slightly.
Lyra delicately held Bon-bon’s hands. She could feel them shaking as she pulled her closer and placed them on her hips. Lyra couldn’t help but giggle and blush at the situation she found herself in. Finally letting go of Bon-Bon’s hands, she then moved her own up and rested them on Bon-Bon’s shoulders.
“You ever slow danced before?” Lyra asked as they started swaying from side to side with the music.
Bon-Bon didn’t reply, she barely even looked back at Lyra. She did her best to sway with Lyra, but her movements were visibly stiff. The scene must have looked quite odd to the people watching.
A small, content smile appeared on Lyra’s lips. Despite Bon-Bon’s adorably flustered state, she felt quite nervous herself. It had been so long since she last knew Bon-bon, so this was the first time she’d seen Bon-Bon this close up.
She had changed so much. She’d grown out her short frizzy hair and managed to tame it, yet it still had those some signature curls. Her arms were no longer the thin ones of a child, they had bulked up to the point they made Lyra blush, but she could still tell it was Bon-Bon’s soft touch holding her. There was now such a height and presence in the way she held herself, but now they found themselves in each other's arms, Lyra could tell she was an inch, maybe two inches, taller than her—something that made her giggle just a little bit.
Lyra wrapped her arms around Bon-Bon, moving closer so she was only a few inches away from her.
They suddenly found themselves both blushing profusely, with Bon-Bon finally mustered enough courage to look at her directly.
In that moment, Lyra looking into Bon-Bon’s eyes, she could see that even though she no longer wore glasses, she still had the same deep blue eyes.
“I don’t know what's more beautiful,” Lyra said with a cheesy smile, “this music or you.”
Bon-Bon’s eyes widened, almost looking shocked at the statement. “Lyra… Lyra I—”
That was when Bon-Bon tripped over and onto the buffet.
“Wha… ow… damn it…”
Lyra slowly began to pick herself up as her bearings returned to her. She felt very confused as she regained consciousness on a surface she didn’t tend to wake up on.
“Where am I,” she muttered.
Her vision was a tad blurry, but it quickly focused, revealing she was laying down in the middle of the school halls. She forced herself up and began to look around.
“What happened?” she asked out loud.
Her memories were fine until a certain point, but then things got fuzzy. She remembered three girls singing. Then the music competition must have happened, yeah, she remembered that. Why was she angry the whole time though? She’s never normally been so competitive.
‘Mind is being controlled.’
She suddenly remembered Bon-Bon. The hidden suit, the gun that fired pellets. She stopped for a moment. That couldn’t have all happened. Could it?
She turned to see the back panel of the locker laying on the floor where Bon-Bon had thrown it.
She put her hand to her head but was shocked by a sudden pain. Taking out her phone to use the camera, she found a small bruise on her forehead.
“What on earth is going on?” she muttered.
She continued to make her way to the exit when she saw something in the corner of her eye through the window.
“Bon-Bon?”
Outside she saw her friend running down the street outside the school, wearing a familiar looking waistcoat. She quickly realised that Bon-bon was running in the exact opposite direction to her house, leaving her very confused for a few more moments before it hit her. The music final.
Bon-Bon by then had ran past where she could see, but Lyra found herself running after her anyway. She had no idea what was going on, and she wanted answers.