You know how when a person wakes up with a pounding headache in a movie, they say something witty? Yeah, not happening. I could barely string two thoughts together for a few minutes when I first woke up.
Man, the last time I felt like this was… wait, when was the last time? What happened? I remember buying a scooter at the con and then… riding down the school hall. Why was I riding it down the school hall? Last time I did that they took it away for a week!
And anyways I’m twenty four. A little old to be in school.
But I was just in school yesterday… convention day? Holy heck, what happened?
As my brain kickstarted and the memories flooded in, I began to get more and more confused. I remembered waking up the previous morning and getting ready for school, excited for the new routine we were learning in dance class, and walking out of the bathroom into my friend… Nicki? Sweetie Belle? I groaned in annoyance as the answers evaded my mind.
“Oh! Your awake!” A voice at the foot of the bed I was on spoke up, startling me into opening my eyes. Immediately the glare forced me to shut them again and I dropped back down on my back, having propped myself up to see who was there. I groaned again, covering my eyes with my hands.
“Wha… what happened?” It took me a second fo find my voice, and the pitch startled me. Since when did it scratch like that?
Uh, since forever, my brain replied. Puberty’s kicking you hard, kid.
“Well, we found you in front of the statue, right around where Applebloom was earlier.” I could hear her smile at me, and for a second I relaxed, before I realized a few things. The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.
“Right where Applebloom was?” Dang it! I waited for the doctor to catch on, but was left hanging, in a sense, when she completely missed the emphasis on Applebloom’s name.
“Yes, sweetie, right where Applebloom was last fall. Now that I think about it, she had a bump to the head as well, though it wasn’t a concussion.” She must’ve noticed my flinch at the word ‘concussion,’ because she jumped at reassuring me. “A mild one, sweetie, don’t worry.”
Well, that explains it. I don’t remember the last concussion I had causing as bad of a headache before. I think. Another spike of pain shot through my head as I massaged my temples, trying to ease the headache a little bit. I decided to hazard attempting another question to the doctor. “Is it supposed to hurt so much?”
“Well,” she started, “how badly does it hurt, from a scale of one to ten?”
I snorted at the question, which caused another spike of pain. “Ah, definitely like a good six, doc.”
She responded with a light giggle. “Well, the best this nurse can do for you now is give you some Tylenol, but if it gets worse or isn’t gone by tomorrow, come back.” I cracked my eyes open slightly, peering out at the room. It was familiar, in the sense that I remember being there before, but don’t remember the room.
The doctor-nurse came back with some pain killer, and I stole it from her hand and gulped it down with the glass of water she offered. I handed the glass back to her sheepishly as she grinned at me.
“Looks like someone’s a little thirsty! I’ll get you some more, okay?” I nodded, hesitant about taking up more of her time, but decided that I might as well.
I took another look around at the room, noticing it held a few other beds, but didn’t quite look like a hospital. A glance out the window showed me a hallway full of lockers, so I figured I’d ended up in the school nurse's office. Although why the nurse had so many beds baffled me. I mention as much to the nurse, identified as Redheart by her name tag, and she waved it off.
“Well, Principal Celestia decided to stock the office with better supplies after that whole demon Sunset fiasco.” Another spike shoved its way into my head, causing a wince, and I suddenly remembered the Fall Formal.
The school bully, Sunset, had basically gone mad and caused a princess from another world to be forced to vanquish her. Now, I admit that the lightshow was pretty cool, and the giant crater in from of the school and the collapsed front office managed to net us a full week off of school, but Sunset’s reform still didn’t sit right with me.
Seeing my look, Redheart tisked, and walked over to put the cup down. “I know Sunset was a bully in the past, but I think her work with the Sirens more than made up for it.” Another spike joined the party, just as the last got bored, and my hand went for my head. The Battle of the Bands.
I colored a little at the memory. Sweetie, Bloom and I had been brainwashed along with the rest of the school into getting into an intense competition over who would be the best band. In the end, the Sirens, the culprits who caused the whole mess, were defeated by our resident alien horse princess, this time aided by Sunset herself. I still regret putting on that spandex.
“I suppose,” I mumbled, earning a smile from Redheart as she messed with things over on her desk. I wasn’t quite sure what she was doing, but it seemed mildly important. I decided I had bugged her enough, and got up to leave. I noticed a rickety old- my scooter leaning against the bed and grabbed it, carefully lifting the wheels off the ground so as to cause less noise.
“Not so fast, young lady.” I had made it to the door and had reached out to grab the handle when Redheart’s voice smacked into the back of my head, and I slowly turned around to face her, sheepishly smiling. “Where do you think you’re going with your scooter?”
“But-” I started to protest. She grabbed the scooter out of my hands.
“I’m afraid I’m going to have to confiscate this, and I’ve already contacted your aunts.” I wanted to run, but I knew it was futile. The scooter was already lost, and I was going to be roasting over a fire tonight at the house tonight. That’s when my old friend pain decided I needed a good bashing over the head with a stick.
I pressed both hands to my temples and sank slowly to the ground, heedless of my surroundings as the memories revealed themselves to me. My first birthday at my aunt's house, having Sweetie and Bloom meet them after a long intervention about how I was embarrassed by my family. Begging Aunty Lofty to stay in the car if she insisted to be at the Fall Formal all night.
I barely heard nurse Redheart’s voice as she called to me, and I waved her off, mumbling something about how I was fine through gritted teeth. After what felt like hours, the memory influx ceased, and the pain receded with it.
I grabbed the door handle and pulled myself up, wincing as my head pounded. I focused my slightly blurred vision on the clock on the wall and realized it was half a period before lunch. I shakily walked over to the bed I’d woken up on, sitting down so I could focus on my words.
“Is today a school day?” Nurse Redheart looked me curiously before responding.
“Yes, today is a school day. You were found passed out during second period. Rumble came in all flustered and said he’d found you collapsed by the statue.” This time, the pain came with a different sort of feeling.
My chest grew warm, as did my face, and I felt my lips stretch upwards into a smile. “He did?” I looked up and saw an amused look on Redheart’s face, and I quickly looked away, my face growing warmer. “I mean, of course he did. Anyone would do that if they saw someone on the ground.”
I tried to save face, but I could see it failing to do much of anything to Redheart. “What? What do you want me to say? That I like him? That he’s sweet and cool and…” I realized my mouth had run off without me and I quickly shut my mouth, my face turning into a furnace.
“Please don’t tell anyone I said that.” I mumbled, trying to get some semblance of anything from this encounter.
“I haven’t said anything dear, and I won’t say anything either.” Nurse Redheart’s amused smile turned into a friendly one and I sighed, glad my slip up wouldn’t get out anywhere. “Why don’t you rest here, and we’ll see how you feel in half an hour.”
Frankly, that sounded amazing, and by the smile I think my quick agreement got that idea across. I lay back down, closed my eyes, and woke up to Nurse Redheart shaking me an hour later. “Scootaloo, wake up! It’s almost time for fifth period!”
“I’m up, I’m up!” I yawned and sat up, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes and ruffling my hair a bit.
The pain had decided to tone down now, thankfully, and I was left with a not so pleasant pulsing feeling in the back of my head. I tossed my feet over the side of the bed and stood up, fixing my balance before realizing I had been in bed with my shoes on. In fact, I had woken up earlier with them on as well. Shaking it off as the bell rang, I bolted for the door, tossing a “thank you!” over my shoulder at Redheart as I left.
I racked my brain for the directions to my fifth period, or even what it was, and was only met with pain. I skidded around a corner, barely missing a kid, and ended up running into another. They caught me in their arms, and I had to shake off a sudden sense of peace.
“Sorry, I…” I peeled my face off their chest and looked up, straight into the most gorgeous lavender eyes I had ever seen. I lost myself in their depths, the eyes filled with such tender care, up until the point of someone nearby coughing.
Quickly, I scrambled away, my face heating up as I turned my gaze to the side, wishing I had fluttershy’s hair for just a little bit. I risked a glance back at Rumble to see him doing the same thing, and I laughed nervously. “Hey Rumble.”
“Hey Scootaloo,” he smiled at me, and the heat pulled away as we got a little more comfortable. His look changed to concern after a second though. “You’re not hurt, right? You’re okay from earlier this morning?”
My thoughts spun about in a whirlwind until I remembered Nurse Redheart saying Rumble was the one who had found me. I looked at him shyly, “No, I’m fine Rumble, it’s just a small headache. Thank you for wondering.”
He rubbed the back of his head, his face flushing a little bit. “It’s nothing Scoots, I was just wondering if you were going to be okay for our… outing tonight?” He danced around the subject, and It took a second for me to remember that we had planned to go on a date tonight.
I flushed and quickly spoke up. “Oh! Don’t worry about it! I’m totally gonna be there!” He smiled at me, making my heart do little flips. And then the tardy bell rang, cutting our little reunion short. I called out a rushed bye as I headed for my locker, not even bothering to think about the fact that I had no idea where it was just a few minutes ago.
“Let’s see, fifth period, fifth period… Dance?” I stared at the paper as a smile came over my face and I tossed the paper back into my locker, slamming the locker door as I sprinted towards the gym.